David Weil, the co-creator of new Apple sci-fi epic “Invasion,” said that he wanted to showcase an alien story that doesn’t center around an action star like Tom Cruise or Will Smith.
“We’ve seen so many great alien invasion stories, but they’re often led by these movie stars and action heroes. We wanted to turn that on its head and focus on real people,” Weil, 32, told The Post.
Co-created by Weil (“Hunters”) and Simon Kinberg (“Mr. & Mrs. Smith,”) “Invasion” follows various characters around the world as they experience and react to inexplicable events that eventually relate to the titular alien invasion.
There’s Oklahoma sheriff John (Sam Neill, “Jurassic Park”), who’s near retirement and is investigating bizarre crop formations; Japanese aerospace engineer Mitsuki (Shioli Kutsuna), who is sending her astronaut girlfriend (Rinko Kikuchi) to space; Long Island mom and Syrian immigrant Aneesha Malik (Golshifteh Farahani), who discovers that her husband is having an affair and finds that her home is the only one left standing after her neighborhood is destroyed by something mysterious and unseen; London teen Casper (Billy Barratt), who’s struggling with bullying and epilepsy, and Trevante (Shamier Anderson) an American soldier in Afghanistan who is isolated from his unit.
“We wanted to do something that was different in this genre,” said Weil, who grew up in Long Island with an astronomy buff father. “Oftentimes, in an alien invasion story, they center on a white Western often male hero. We wanted to turn that convention on its head and explore a global set of characters. What excited us most, though, was each of these characters — whether culturally or in their families — felt like aliens in their own world. Each of our characters are in some kind of crisis.
“So, we wanted to foreground our character story, and background alien invasion itself. We really try to live in those characters’ stories before we get to the big alien set pieces. Many alien invasion stories are about the aliens, but ours is really about the humans.”
Weil said they had a consultant on set from The Search for Extraterrestrial Life Institute.
“I asked him, ‘If and when you find aliens, what is the question that you would want most to ask them?’ And he said, ‘Do you have music in your culture, and do you have religion?’ There’s something so interesting about that. Without a doubt, I do believe aliens are out there.”
Weil is also working on Season 2 of his Amazon show “Hunters,” which stars Al Pacino and Logan Lerman as Nazi hunters in 1970s New York.
“We’re almost done filming Season 2, so that’s exciting. Honestly, I would just expect the unexpected. It’s a really bold and imaginative show, so Season 2 is bigger and better. I’m excited for an audience to see this next chapter of the story.
“I think that while ‘Hunters’ and ‘Invasion’ are big in scope, the next thing I’d like to do is something a bit more intimate. I always like to do something different and something new, to play in a different genre sandbox and flex different muscles.”