Alien: Earth Prequel to Premiere at San Diego Comic-Con

Comic-Con has officially opened in San Diego with tens of thousands of pop culture fans expected to descend on the city over the coming days, and with a few historic names on the guest list, old-school fans are in for a real treat this year.

Legendary filmmaker George Lucas will be attending Comic-Con for the first time in the festival’s history. Despite Comic-Con’s roots being firmly in his famed universes of “Star Wars” and “Indiana Jones”, the director has never before made an appearance at the convention that has become a mecca for pop culture storytelling, film, and fandom.

This year’s event has been billed as a true full-circle moment in that sense. “Nearly 50 years ago, Star Wars made one of its very first public appearances at our convention and a booth that featured [comic book artist] Howard Chaykin’s now legendary Star Wars poster as a giveaway item,” Comic-Con’s Chief Communications and Strategy Officer David Glanzer said in a statement. “To have George Lucas join us at Comic-Con is a true full-circle moment, and a testament to his influence on world-building, narrative, and visual storytelling.”

Lucas will join a Sunday panel moderated by Queen Latifah about the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art, which is due to open next year in Los Angeles. Oscar-winning artist Doug Chiang will also attend, whose concept designs for the Star Wars franchise span 30 years. The panel will discuss the opening of the new art museum, which is set to house the expansive Lucas collection. It will celebrate illustrated stories and storytelling across film, comics, and concept art.

Comic-Con Through the Years

Comic-Con began in 1970 as a small comics convention. Since then, the annual pop culture extravaganza has grown into a major festival with some 130,000 attendees each year who come to San Diego to celebrate the various facets of storytelling, cosplay, and fandom. Visitors can buy collectibles, show off costumes, meet celebrities, and get first looks at sneak previews and panels for the latest and most anticipated Hollywood blockbusters.

Alien and Predator Grab the Spotlight

Alien: Earth, a prequel to the 1979 Ridley Scott-directed sci-fi film Alien, will make its world premiere on Saturday, and it’s one of this year’s most anticipated announcements. The new series from director Noah Hawley will explore the franchise’s mythology and is set a few years before Scott’s original movie. It will premiere tomorrow in Hall H, the convention’s starriest venue, and is set to debut on streaming services in August.

Equally grabbing attention is Predator: Badlands, a new take on the iconic sci-fi franchise. In the upcoming feature, the title creature is a hunter who, for the first time, becomes the hunted. The event will see director Dan Trachtenberg, who revitalized the franchise with 2022’s Prey, on the panel, along with actors Elle Fanning and Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi, who plays the alien Dek. Fans will be eager to hear what Trachtenberg has in store for the reimagined sci-fi property.

Marvel Takes a Back Seat This Year

Marvel Studios will be notably absent from this year’s festivities, forgoing its usual Hall H stage showcase due to recent developments with the upcoming Avengers movie. The news that the next Avengers installment would not debut at the convention had been confirmed earlier this year, with Variety reporting that Marvel Studios chose not to hold the event due to production still ongoing in the UK.

But Marvel’s absence has left the door open for plenty of sci-fi mainstays to step in and fill the gaps, with a jam-packed Hall H program this year that promises to keep Comic-Con attendees hyped over the weekend.

Ryan Gosling, Peacemaker, and Other Headliners

Look for the Project Hail Mary presentation, an adaptation of the book of the same name by The Martian author Andy Weir, to be another big Comic-Con 2022 event. The film will hit theaters next year and stars Ryan Gosling as Ryland Grace, a former high school science teacher who finds himself mysteriously alone on a spaceship after waking up from cryogenic sleep. He eventually realizes he may be the planet’s last hope for survival. Gosling will attend Saturday’s panel along with directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, the creative duo behind the Spider-Verse trilogy.

DC Comics fans will be treated to an update on the second season of Peacemaker. James Gunn, who, after a successful reboot, is now in charge of DC’s wider cinematic universe reboot with Superman, will be on the panel with the show’s cast to share footage from behind the scenes and previews of the season.

Costumes and Fans Take the Center Stage

Comic-Con’s big stars may be the splashy announcements, celebrity panels, and shiny previews for blockbusters, but at its heart, Comic-Con is still about fandom and community. Thousands of attendees will swarm the San Diego Convention Center this weekend, decked out as their favorite princesses, warriors, monsters, and superheroes. The event runs through Sunday, July 27.

Fans may come for George Lucas’s Comic-Con debut or the first glimpses of an alien-inhabited planet, but they’ll stick around for the comic book lore, cosplay, nd sci-fi fun.