James Cameron wants to redo Aliens as a 3D movie

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Published May 5, 2026, 5:20 PM EDT

I would gladly wear 3D glasses again for an Aliens re-release

An image of the Xenomorph in closeup, all snarly teeth and spiky tail. Who knows which movie this one’s from? Could be any of them.

Some directors just can't stop futzing with their own work. George Lucas may be the most famous tinkerer, thanks to Special Edition re-releases and subtle edits to his Star Wars films over the past 50 years. But James Cameron is also a proud perfectionist; he's delivered multiple director's cuts of films like Terminator 2: Judgment Day and The Abyss, and in 2023 defended the controversial AI-upscaled 4K transfers of True Lies and Titanic.

Now, Cameron may have a new version of 1986's sci-fi horror thriller masterpiece Aliens in the works. This one, at least, sounds promising, because Cameron says he's thinking about — or threatening to, depending on your point of view — convert his action-heavy sequel to Alien into stereoscopic 3D. Cameron is a famous proponent of 3D movie technology; his Avatar franchise helped usher in a new wave of 3D filmmaking, and he's created passion-project documentaries like Ghosts of the Abyss in 3D.

In an interview with Letterboxd for his new 3D concert film Billie Eilish — Hit Me Hard and Soft: The Tour (Live in 3D), Cameron says Aliens in 3D may be next.

"Aliens is a creature of its time," Cameron said. "We are thinking about converting Aliens [to 3D], because I know now that the tools are so much better than they were for creating depth maps. We’re probably going to wind up converting Aliens, which will be a fun experience. That film seems to be evergreen. People still go back to it a lot."

Cameron's done 3D conversions before for films like Titanic and Terminator 2. He also directed a 3D mini-sequel to the latter in the form of T2-3D: Battle Across Time, a discontinued attraction for Universal Studios. So if anyone is in the position to get the most out of a 3D conversion of Aliens, it's Cameron.

When and if Aliens 3D will ultimately happen is up to Cameron's schedule, which is currently occupied with making Avatar 4 and 5, as well as Ghosts of Hiroshima, a movie about the U.S. World War II atomic bombing of Japan.

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