With "The Predator," Shane Black hopes to reintroduce "a sense of mystery" to the nearly 30-year-old sci-fi franchise.

"We're going to get a great cast and we really just write it and write and and write it," the filmmaker told IGN, "just keep writing it to make it as interesting and stuffed with ideas as we can and hopefully to re-infuse it with a sense of mystery. The worst thing you could hope for in one of these is a shot in bright sunlight of a field and the Predator just kind of walks on and 'hello' - you want to do ... I keep going back to Ridley Scott, the way he captured the alien in that first movie. The sense of mystery and portent. If we could just cut into a little piece of that - that sort of vibe - and then I think there's humor to be had too. And tonal shifting."

That's not the first time the director and his co-writer Fred Dekker have referenced the "Alien" franchise in discussing their "Predator" plans. “If you think of the first ‘Predator’ as ‘Alien,’" Dekker recently said, "ours is much more ‘Aliens.'"

Although no casting has been announced, filming is targeted to begin this fall on "The Predator," which will arrive in theaters in March 2018.

"I'm just having a ball," said Black, who of course co-starred in the 1987 original. "I'm getting more excited by the day, 30 years later working on this damn thing."