Lost’s Josh Holloway Joins Carlton Cuse’s Alien Invasion Drama Colony

By David Wharton | Published

This article is more than 2 years old

HollowayJosh Holloway has already earned his place in the pop culture pantheon thanks to his role as the charming con artist Sawyer on ABC’s mega-hit mystical island drama Lost. No matter what he does in the future, for many of us he will always be Sawyer, and so far Holloway hasn’t found the role that helps move him beyond his automatic association with that role. CBS’ Intelligence certainly didn’t do the trick, largely squandering Holloway’s talents and only surviving for a single season. Now Holloway is at bat once again, and this time he’s teaming with one of his old Lost buddies for a new science fiction series that hopes to colonize your DVR in the not-too-distant future.

Deadline reports that Holloway has signed on to play the lead in USA’s Colony, a new science fiction pilot from Lost executive producer/showrunner Carlton Cuse. Colony is set in 2015 Los Angeles, after the city (and presumably the rest of the world) has been taken over by alien invaders. These aren’t the “kill all humans” breed of extraterrestrials, but life is by no means all rainbows and puppies. Humanity lives under a state of occupation, with their daily lives ruled and regulated by the invaders. Holloway will star as Will Bowman, a former FBI agent now reluctantly collaborating with the alien occupiers in order to protect his family. It’s a tough position to be in, especially since his job pits him against the growing human resistance movement.

We’ve had quite a few “alien invasion/occupation” series over the years, but it’s been a while since we’ve had a really good one. Falling Skies is maddeningly uneven, and it’s been three years since the V remake went off the air. If the show goes to series, I’d say it’s almost a given that Holloway’s Bowman will eventually begin aiding the resistance on the down-low, and I can see the show getting lots of material out of that conflict and Bowman’s having to keep his divided loyalties secret.

As for Carlton Cuse, he’s got more irons than he’s got fire these days. In addition to developing Colony for USA, he’s executive producing A&E’s Bates Motel and FX’s The Strain, as well as a remake of the French supernatural drama The Returned, also for A&E. He also co-created/co-wrote the Colony pilot script with writer Ryan Condol. He’s a relative newcomer to Tinseltown, with Brett Ratner and Dwayne Johnson’s Hercules as his sole produced screen credit so far. Condol also worked with Cuse on the The Sixth Gun, a supernatural Western pilot that NBC wound up passing on last year. Fingers crossed that Colony will fare better on USA.

You can watch Condol’s sci-fi short film Plurality below.