They did the same thing with Fred Dryer, or even with Thomas Kretschmann with Ultron. Saw 1955's Kiss Me Deadly the other day and the main bad guy, top billed, is quickly killed at the end of his monologue. I Guess that's an old trick :-)

Joss Whedon told a magazine his idea of "casting is storytelling", arguing that put Dourif as the scientist (He wrote a draft of Alien 4) spilled the beans immediately as the vile nature of Gediman and was an awful choice from the producers.

SO Glad there's going to be Michael Bowen's Uncle Jack in the mix .