Isabela Merced is ready to go

The star of Alien: Romulus conquers the world and beyond.

It’s a question many of us have pondered in the middle of the night, but Isabela Merced has lived it herself: if you had to face a Xenomorph or one of the infected, The last of uswhat would be worse? For Merced, who plays Dina in the show’s second season and stars in Alien: Romulusare infected. “(But) it depends on the condition, right?” he says Empireafter thinking about it thoroughly – Merced is a thorough researcher of all the projects she works on and has played the entire game. “There are the dumbers, then there are the Clickers, and then there are the Stalkers in the game… But the Bloaters are frightening!
Oh my God. My heart is pounding right now just thinking about it!”

IN Alien: RomulusMerced plays Kay, one of a group of space colonists who run into aliens on an abandoned space station. She’s the youngest of the group, and Merced says she was inspired by Sigourney Weaver’s iconic performance — think “Ripley’s daughter,” she says; “I definitely drew inspiration from her spirit.” As a huge fan of the original films, she appreciates how loyal the new one is — especially when it comes to special effects. The team used old-school animatronics and costumes, meaning that when Merced’s character encounters an alien, the alien is in the room. Sometimes it was controlled remotely; sometimes it was a very tall person in an alien suit towering over the petite 5-foot-1 Merced. “There was no point where I got used to it!” she says with a laugh. “It’s just terrifying.”

“Every time I try on a supersuit, I get high! It’s the coolest thing in the world for me.”

Right now Merced is shooting a movie Supermanplaying Hawkgirl, the classic DC superheroine with wings who fights hand-to-hand, but in this reality, Merced flies through the air on a harness, trying not to panic. As for whether she can tell us anything about Supermanshe says, “I can feel James Gunn’s eyes boring into the back of my head,” so we’ll take that as a no, but she does say she’s figured out how to wear a flying harness and still breathe. She also loves the experience. “Honestly, deep down, I’m just a nerd. I feel like that’s who I am. Every time I try on a supersuit, I get high! It’s the coolest thing in the world to me.”

She has quickly risen to the point where she seems to be the go-to person for big-budget blockbusters, including Mrs. Web AND Transformers: The Last Knight in 2017, which she considers her big break, even though she starred in the Nickelodeon series 100 Things to Do Before High School at the age of 13.Transformers was a smooth transition into my adult career,” she says. Why are she so drawn to these massive projects? “I don’t know,” she says, “(But) every time I do one, I feel more comfortable being myself in these intimidating spaces. It allows me to see myself as someone in the future who is more than just an actor.”

Merced in Alien: Romulus

Her interest in acting developed when she was six and discovered the films of Shirley Temple and Judy Garland — she loved how close to theatrical the older films were, and she grew up as a musical theater child, making her Broadway debut at age ten. Evita — but she’d like to produce one day. “I really like control,” she laughs. “It’s a gift and a curse!” Apparently, in the scheme of what’s scarier, directing an entire movie is much lower on the list than a xenomorph or a bloater.

TV program: Office (USA)

“It’s my comfort program. You notice a new joke every time because it’s so clever. My entire “featured” page on YouTube is Office.”

Album_: Here In The Pitch_ – Jessica Pratt

“I have tickets to her concert in June, so I’m trying to know all the lyrics before I go!”

Book: Torera! Memories of a Bullfighter -Conchita Cintron

“She’s Peruvian, and Orson Welles wrote the introduction because he was friends with her. I have my version of Peru that I’ve always known, (but) I’d like to see the Lima that they talked about in the book.”