Has James Franco infiltrated Alien: Covenant?

Last Updated on July 31, 2021

The ubiquitous James Franco may have just made another giant leap in his quest to dominate pop culture. While the star of stage, film, web series, soap operas, and Lifetime TV movies had been rumored to be gunning for a role in the upcoming PREDATOR sequel THE PREDATOR, maybe we should have been monitoring his intentions toward a different 20th Century Fox franchise about murderous aliens.

AvPGalaxy has reported that Franco is in Ridley Scott's ALIEN prequel / PROMETHEUS sequel ALIEN: COVENANT. According to the site, Franco plays a character named Branson in the film, the captain of the Covenant ship and the husband of Daniels, the heroine character played by Katherine Waterson. Apparently, Branson "appears in the first ten minutes or so of the film with later small appearances" and will also be featured in the ALIEN: COVENANT viral marketing campaign.

It's not known whether or not Branson will come face-to-face with a Xenomorph, but passing up on the chance to have Franco and the iconic monster on the screen at the same time would seem like a missed opportunity.

Written by Michael Green, Jack Paglen, and John Logan, ALIEN: COVENANT is said to be set ten years after the events of PROMETHEUS and tells the following story:

Bound for a remote planet on the far side of the galaxy, the crew of the colony ship Covenant discovers what they think is an uncharted paradise, but is actually a dark, dangerous world — whose sole inhabitant is the "synthetic" David, survivor of the doomed Prometheus expedition.

In addition to Waterston, the confirmed cast members are Danny McBride, Benjamin Rigby, Demian Bichir, Jussie Smollett, Carmen Ejogo, Amy Seimetz, Callie Hernandez, Billy Crudup, Noomi Rapace, and Michael Fassbender. Fassbender will not only be reprising the role of David, he is also playing another android character named Walter.

Guy Pearce may be in the film as well.

ALIEN: COVENANT will be released into theatres on May 19, 2017.

Katherine Waterston