Alien: Romulus is landing very soon folks! On August 16, the latest installment in the legendary Alien Anthology will be scaring up audiences. And this week, at San Diego Comic-Con, filmmaker Fede Alvarez and his cast took to the stage to terrify over 6000 attendees with some amazing footage and a few surprises.

I must say, being in Hall H is a terrific experience, because you never know what surprises a panel may hold. The panel for Alien: Romulus not only brought an inciteful Q&A session with Alvarez and cast members Cailee Spaeny, David Jonsson, Isabela Merced, Archie Renaux, and Spike Fearn but also some terrifying footage and a terrific display of immersive horror showmanship!

The premise of this installment is that it’s a stand alone movie about a group of young space colonizers who go scavenging, only to find death and terror waiting for them in the depths of space. And if what happened in the panel is any indication, this is a genuine return to form to the strict sci-fi horror roots of the Alien franchise.

The panel kicked off with a never before scene clip. The crew is looking to reboot their synthetic, artificial being Andy, when they encounter a shelves full of dormant face-hugger fetuses. After one of the members pulls out some sort of tank, the face-huggers begin awakening and breaking out of their pods, leading to a suspenseful chase all over the ship, with the creatures trying to attach themselves to the crew’s faces, and the crew desperately trying to battle them off before things get worse!

Alvarez and the cast then took to the stage to discuss the project in more detail.

On Alvarez as a director, Alien: Romulus star Cailee Spaeny, “When I saw it was Fede, I saw he had such a grasp on the language of horror. And when I met with him, it was so clear immediately that he knows this franchise like the back of his hand. And there was so much care. And he talked about his priorities and goals for this film. One of them being as much practical effects as possible!”

Merced was asked about what it was like to see footage of the movie on the biggest screen possible at Hall H. “I was enjoying that thoroughly but I had a hard time focusing because I kept looking at you guys [the audience] all crowded together. And your faces – just jaws dropped. And it’s an experience that only we [previously] shared with each other in Budapest, Hungary [where the film was shot], and I couldn’t have asked for better people to be here with. Especially for this panel as well.”

When asked about joining the Alien franchise, Jonsson had this to say: “It’s an honor. Not only is the franchise something really special, especially since I love film and cinema. Watching these kinds of movies, they’re the movies that shape your taste and habits. This is one of them…What’s amazing is having a team like everyone on stage…we just embraced it. It’s a challenge taking on the shoes of a synthetic.”

Adding on to what it was like to be on seeing the xenomorph, Renaux stated, “To be on set with, not only you guys [the cast], but also the xenomorph who has a starring role in this film; it’s so surreal. I can’t really put it into words. And that’s why I think this film, and this experience – no matter what I go on to do in my career – I will always have this. And this film being part of the Alien legacy, I’m very, very proud of it. And I love everyone here.”

Fern was asked about the practical effects in the film. “Pretty much everything was pretty practical, which was nice… When I first spoke to Fede about this project, everything was going to be built and very, very real. And that’s what you want as an actor. I’ve never done a tennis ball thing, but if anyone wants to give me a job with a tennis ball, I’d do it… but I was ready to get to work really…The world was captured very, very well.”

Alvarez was asked about adding his stamp on the franchise alongside directors like Ridley Scott, James Cameron, and David Fincher. He said, “I stood on the shoulders of giants. The directors that made the original films are my favorite directors… those guys are masters of their craft. So it’s quite a challenge to come in and make another movie in that world. But usually the pressure goes away when you subtly realize… that I’m on a Weyland-Yutani shake-and-bake colony, and every vehicle that goes around is real. And there’s a neon sign, a bar sign from Aliens. And a whole bunch of stuff… to be on a real space ship where we shot the movie chronologically. The first day was the first part of the story. So we could all together go through that story.”

Alvarez also took taped questions from film masters Sir Ridley Scott, Guillermo Del Toro, and Dan Trachenberg.

When Trachenberg asked who’d win in a fight, the xenomorph or the Predator, the cast unanimously answered the xenomorph (of course). “There are movies about this!” quipped Alvarez!

When asked by Del Toro what it was like to take the iconic design of the xenomorph and bring it to life, Alvarez said, “It felt f**king amazing! A massive responsibility, but such a fascinating challenge. You really had to go through books and honor that legacy design. But also the main thing was to make sure we hired the guys that were there at the beginning. So we went to…the guys from Legacy that worked on Aliens… so [they] built the xenomorph on this one.”

When asked to rank the Alien films by Scott, Alvarez laughed at the trick question, and cited that, from “best” to “not as good” he said, “The best one is the first one. The not as good one is AVP: Requiem. There’s some really good kills in that movie. But let’s say that. Then everything in the middle is everything you want it to be… That’s the best thing about this franchise. There’s not an obvious top to bottom about it.”

In a showstopping way, the panel was then interrupted by an invasion of face-huggers, “claiming” one “attendee” and then following us all home!

All in all, one of the best Hall H experiences I’ve had in years! I cannot wait to see this movie!

Alien: Romulus hits theaters August 16!