Zendaya is set to work with writer-director Alex Garland on an untitled science-fiction film for A24. That is the entire official-shaped payload for now: no plot, no character names, no release date, and no indication of when production might begin. In an era when a single casting report can arrive accompanied by a lore bible, three teaser posters and a limited-edition tumbler, this one is admirably committed to keeping the airlock sealed.
The combination is still easy to read as a notable one. Zendaya has led major franchise work through Dune and Spider-Man, while Garland’s science-fiction films have repeatedly used speculative concepts to inspect people: their behavior, their fears, their ability to rationalize power, and their capacity to mistake an answer for the answer. A24’s involvement places the project with a company associated with unusual, creator-driven movies, but it does not tell us what kind of science fiction this particular film will be.
That distinction matters. An untitled project is not a premise. It is not evidence of aliens, time loops, dystopian governments, robots, spaceships, virtual reality, or any other item on the genre’s extremely tempting menu. For the moment, the responsible description is also the briefest: Zendaya and Garland are developing a secretive sci-fi film for A24.
What has been confirmed
- Zendaya is attached to an unnamed science-fiction movie.
- Alex Garland is involved as writer and director.
- A24 will release the film.
- The story is being kept under wraps.
Everything beyond those points is currently inference, wishful thinking, or an internet detective pinning red string to a corkboard that has not been issued yet. There is no announced cast beyond Zendaya, no stated adaptation source, and no confirmed connection to Garland’s other work.
That last point is worth underlining because Garland is also attached to write and direct an Elden Ring adaptation with A24. The two projects share key names, but there is no factual basis to treat the new Zendaya film as an extension of the game adaptation or to assume it borrows anything from FromSoftware’s world. One is an announced adaptation; the other is an original project whose story has not been revealed.
Why Garland’s sci-fi track record invites attention
Garland’s earlier science-fiction work provides context, not a spoiler sheet. His genre films have dealt with ideas including clones, androids and quantum computing, framing futuristic devices and concepts as ways to probe human choices. The technology is not merely decoration around the edges of a drama; it can alter who holds power, who gets treated as a person, and what characters think they are entitled to do.
That approach is often called speculative fiction. The term broadly refers to stories that alter an element of reality—through advanced technology, an imagined future, a scientific premise or another “what if”—to test how people and societies might respond. The critical point is not whether every scientific detail can be built in a lab. It is whether the altered premise makes real questions clearer.
Garland has articulated a preference for the scale that science fiction permits. In a previous interview, he said:
“Sci-fi allows really, really big subject matter without having to feel embarrassed about it, and a lot of other genres, including, by the way, straight adult drama, is sometimes really embarrassed of big ideas.”
He continued:
“Sci-fi just says, ‘Do whatever you want. The bigger the idea, the better. Bring it on.’”
Those comments explain why the Garland-Zendaya pairing has immediate appeal without giving away a thing about the film itself. They indicate an interest in using genre as a permission slip for big questions, rather than treating it solely as a delivery system for visual spectacle. Whether this movie will follow that pattern remains unknown, but the creative history makes that a reasonable area to watch rather than a conclusion to declare.
Zendaya’s role remains the largest unknown
Zendaya’s character has not been announced. There is no description of her role, no indication of whether this is a solo-led story or an ensemble piece, and no information about the film’s setting or tone. That leaves audiences with the productive kind of uncertainty: not a riddle that needs to be “solved” prematurely, but a project that has not yet decided to show its hand.
Her upcoming slate illustrates the range around this new collaboration. She is due to appear in Dune: Part Three, which is set for release on December 18. She also has the Ronnie Spector biopic Be My Baby ahead, and has provided voice work for the new Shrek movie. None of those projects answers what Garland’s film will be, but together they make clear that this sci-fi role joins a varied group of forthcoming performances rather than signaling a retreat into one lane.
There is also a useful difference between science-fiction casting in general and this particular announcement. A recognizable performer does not automatically mean a movie is aiming for the broadest possible version of its genre. Likewise, an A24 release does not automatically make a production small, surreal or austere. Those assumptions flatten the creative choices involved. The more specific fact is that an actor with major franchise experience is joining a filmmaker whose sci-fi work has centered ambitious ideas, under a distributor known for distinctive projects. That is a compelling foundation. It is still only a foundation.
The A24 and Elden Ring overlap, explained
A24’s participation is the clearest production-side detail currently available. It also creates a notable overlap with the planned Elden Ring adaptation, another A24 project Garland is set to write and direct. For game audiences, that makes Garland’s immediate film work especially interesting: he is moving between a game-world adaptation with a massive existing mythology and a new science-fiction project whose premise has not been publicly named.
Those are fundamentally different creative assignments. An adaptation begins with established material, established expectations and an existing audience that knows the world’s landmarks. A secret original science-fiction project can choose its rules, terminology and mysteries without having to translate a known interactive experience to film. There is no announced timetable explaining how the two productions relate or which arrives first, so any attempt to map out Garland’s schedule would be speculation.
Still, the shared A24 connection makes the pairing relevant for readers following game adaptations. It is another sign that the filmmaker behind the forthcoming Elden Ring movie is continuing to work in speculative storytelling, even if the Zendaya collaboration should be treated as its own separate project. For more on the broader question of how filmmakers approach ambitious screen worlds, see how large-scale practical production choices can shape an epic film world.
What not to read into the silence
Secrecy can be a sensible early-stage strategy. It prevents a movie from being reduced to a one-line elevator pitch before the creative team is ready to define it, and it gives audiences fewer half-formed details to treat as permanent canon. It can also invite overinterpretation, especially when the filmmaker has a recognizable body of work and the lead actor is already connected to science-fiction franchises.
For now, several questions simply have no public answer:
- What the movie is called.
- What Garland’s central science-fiction idea will be.
- Who Zendaya plays.
- Whether other performers have joined the cast.
- When it will shoot or be released.
- Whether it is based on existing material or is wholly original.
That uncertainty is not a shortcoming in the announcement; it is the announcement’s defining feature. The confirmed collaboration promises a meeting of a performer with considerable experience across genre and character-focused projects, and a filmmaker openly drawn to science fiction’s freedom to tackle enormous themes. But promise is not plot. Until more details emerge, the best expectation is not a specific story but an opportunity: a new sci-fi film built by artists whose prior work suggests they are unlikely to be embarrassed by a big idea.
