Ridley Scott’s “return to the Alien universe” in Prometheus has been the subject of unimaginable speculation ever since the film was revealed to tell a related story – as opposed to serving as an outright prequel. For months cinephiles have poured over Prometheus trailers and set images hoping for a clear picture of where, exactly, the highly-anticipated film would fit into the iconic story of the xenomorphs. Fortunately, the Prometheus marketing has been (for the most part) pretty subtle – flashing a variety of mysterious and tense shots entirely out of context – leaving speculators with little information to analyze.
Now that Prometheus (read our review) has officially been released, information about the secretive production has come flooding in – and we have a much clearer picture of how Prometheus is connected to Alien (and the larger Alien universe). To help steer discussion we’ve put together a lengthy analysis of Prometheus and explained a few of the plot points that might have been confusing to some moviegoers. Does our Prometheus explanation match your theory? Find out!
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I think that, since the xenomorphs were in their proper form on earth ages before the time period of any other alien movies (as shown in AvP) i would say either engineers tried to destroy humanity once before which caused aliens’ appearance on earth, or they were brought by predators to earth and their true origins still remains to be seen, or the engineers wanted to destroy humanity preciselly because we had aliens there. Who knows, personally i think that they made loads of storyline mistakes which may take at least 2 more movies to explain wtf is goin on (which could have also been part of the plan knowing the todays tendency of neverending movies)in any case like it or not aliens existed the events in Prometheus, which may explain only their existance by the appearance of the biological weapon which was used in some distant past and may have led to the birth of aliens. One more confusing part of the movie was the beggining where the engineer looks at the ship flying away and drinks the blask liquid, my question is why? where was he at that time? was it earth? why was this shown anyway. This movie made more questions than it answered.
AVP has absolutely zilch to do with Prometheus. As far as the writer, Damon Lindelof, and the director Ridley Scott are concerned the events of AVP exist in a totally different universe. They’ve been quoted as saying this before. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5TQLRMIGA2I
Exactly. I don’t know why so many people haven’t figured this out on their own yet.
In predator 2 though, when he explores the predator ship, there is an alien skull in his trophy case and that was based in the 70′s 80′s.
Why hasn’t anyone brought up that the Engineer “petted” David and looked at him lovingly before tearing his head off? That’s the very heart of this entire movie.
The Engineers created the xenos and they were the Engineers destruction.
Humans created David, who “wanted his parents to die.”
The Engineer saw David as both his greatest accomplishment and greatest fear realized. They knew eventually that their creation, HUMANS, would turn against them; and Weyland wanting to to use them for his own benefit was a sign that it’ll soon happen.
David desired to be free from his own programming and we saw with his choosing of Halloway (the man that bullied him) to be the test subject, that he was capable of eventually turning against man.
The Engineers had a carving of a xeno, worshipping their great creation.
Weyland call David his “son,” another form of worship.
The Engineers knew that we had to be “put down”
Also
Don’t have the audacity to claim this movie has plotholes while bringing up AVP or PREDATOR; that’s utter ignorance.
AVP is nothing more than fan fiction, get over it!
PREDATOR has NOTHING to do with the Alien franchise!!! I’ll never forgive myself for thinking it was cool to see the alien skull in Predator 2 and I was 11 at the time.
If you truly believe that AVP was canon, I’m pretty sure there’s a TWILIGHT thread somewhere that you would better suited for.
I like all the analysis from the folks at this site. One thing that occurred to me on the way home from the movie is an intriguing (albeit convoluted) web of sensitive compatibility–or “recipe”–for alien creation:
DARK LIQUID
a) The Engineers are not suitable hosts for the dark liquid; they disintegrate.
b) We ARE suitable hosts for the dark liquid; Charlie gets it in his system and impregnates Elizabeth, spawning a “maggot-like worm.”
MAGGOT-LIKE WORM:
a) The Engineers ARE suitable hosts for the worms; a queen-like xenomorph bursts from the chest of one at the end of the film.
b) We are not suitable hosts for the worms (at least not at the stage of evolution we find them in during Prometheus); we become zombies (e.g., Fifield).
Now that the queen ancestor is launched, things can evolve en route to Alien. But perhaps the dark liquid was just an ingredient of the Engineer’s intended weapon–which was in fact the alien, proper. In which case, they wouldn’t be able to breed using their own kin, but would instead have to “engineer” a middle-man to host the intermediate stage of procreative evolution. Which would explain the impetus for creation and annihilation as one and the same: the pursuit of weaponry.
So, I think that’s all I’ve got on this theory. Any and all flaming is 100% justifiable, as I’m not at all convinced I buy into this myself. It’s weak in all kinds of ways, including the idea that the worms go from human-incompatible (zombification) to compatible (chestburster) in just a few decades…provided we assume the worm is ancestor to the bodyburster (as opposed to chestburster, which becomes a xenomorph). But in any case, I found it interesting to mull over, thanks to the wonderful constellation of uncertainties left by the movie. Would be interested to read any comments. And apologies to any/all this may annoy.
Dude…(facepalm, sigh)…really!?!
C’mon!
The maggot worm that killed the biologist: an earthworm mutated by the black goo
The “worm” that impregnated the engineer: a TONGUE from a giant facehugger!!!
Know what? I’m not going to bother to continue correcting you…
…pay attention to the movie next time!!!
That wasn’t even black goo the Engineer drank…dude
What was the black goo the humanoid alien drank at the beginning of the movie? And was that Earth at the beginning of the movie? I don’t understand how that scene plays into the plot.
I took that first scene as the entire point of the movie’s name – Prometheus. That was “prometheus” giving us the gift of “fire” – using his own DNA and, perhaps a different version of, the ‘black goo’ to spread their DNA amongst the ancient humanoid species of earth or making us in the first place (I can’t remember, was there a “Earth – date” for that scene?)
That’s how I saw it at least. Or it could be an Engineer on the planet the movie takes place on sacrificing himself to stop the others?
Very well said.
Adding to my thoughts above I have a different idea about the goo in addition to what I just wrote.
This is merely a chicken vs. egg scenario. As I said before the goo was different in its infancy but the goo itself was a byproduct of the research that was done on the Xenomorphs. Perhaps the Xenomorph study happened hundreds or even thousands of years before the initial event in the Prometheus film. Over the years the engineers figured out that the goo was useful in many ways and this caused different divisions within the culture of the engineers (mad scientists [LV-226] and religious fundamentalists [Earth] and maybe a large culture on some other planet) which we will see more in future films…perhaps even a prequel to Prometheus itself. It could happen!
You really need to brush up on the Alien universe timeline and concentrate on watching movies better. Good luck and Godspeed man…
Some new thoughts-
The guy in the beginning was not who we think he was. The ship was obviously a different model and size than those that were found on the planet Prometheus went to. No, these guys that came to Earth were infants compared to the guys they encounter on that fateful trip. Just imagine how much our civilization has changed in 100 years. Now take that guy who ceremoniously killed himself…depending on the time-line- (which I theorize to be about 50,000 years before the events of the bible) his civilization also changed during those years. The tech for the stuff in that cup matured and changed as the creators of it also changed, perhaps they changed mentally, physically (got smaller), and their ideals changed. They were no longer interested in colonizing the universe through genetic improvements to DNA strands with cups of goo. They may have endured civil war, rare and incurable strains of virus encountered during their genetic philanthropy throughout the galaxy, or just a general lack of interest in what their race was doing 40-50 thousand years ago. Can you imagine keeping the same mission in life for your race or organization for that length of time? I think it would be impossible, for humans at least. These guys are self actualized beings that have transcended their own greatness, perhaps hundreds or thousands of times in the scope of their existence which we cannot even correlate by the small amount information that is available from the movie. [Let me make a new paragraph LOL]
The being on the planet that the cast of Alien encounter would be an earlier space jockey that was part of the initial phase of the galaxy-wide quest for life and exploration; except this guy encountered something terrible that he could not control. He crashed and that was his story. The aliens were very adept at preserving themselves for thousands of years (their very own organic chamber not unlike the chambers the humans and engineers made from technology to preserve themselves during space travel and hibernation) and were able to continue their existence once encountered by the humans who ventured aboard the spacecraft.
I actually think that the spacecraft that left at the end of the movie had the Doctor and David aboard and that was it. David was now maimed to the point where he was unable to plot against the Doctor. I feel he was probably intrigued by her insistence to go boldly where no man has gone before and to seek out these engineers on their own turf. This will be a good story arc that Ridley Scott will have a great deal of fun fleshing out for all of us adoring fans.
What a great movie to inspire so much interpretation and theorizing. These types of movies that make us use our imaginations are so rare and when they come along are such a treat for the senses. All of us being critics in our own minds will do our best to find faults with the timeline in relation to the other films but I truly believe that this movie has made the intended impact. We will all be there years from now when the sequel roles into theaters; at least I know that I will be there! For all you trolls out there…shame on you! LOL!!!
“The guy in the beginning was not who we think he was. The ship was obviously a different model and size than those that were found on the planet Prometheus went to. No, these guys that came to Earth were infants compared to the guys they encounter on that fateful trip. Just imagine how much our civilization has changed in 100 years. Now take that guy who ceremoniously killed himself…depending on the time-line- (which I theorize to be about 50,000 years before the events of the bible) his civilization also changed during those years.”
While I don’t necessarily disagree with you I also think it’s possible that the different ship could represent a different faction of Engineers from the ones we see on LV-226. If I’m not mistaken, Ridley Scott suggested that the opening scene of Prometheus doesn’t necessarily take place on Earth and we could further assume that it doesn’t necessarily take place in the distant past. It merely introduces us perhaps to the purest ideals of the Engineers. And then at the conclusion of the movie we see those same ideals corrupted by their own creations and the creations of their creations… :S
Sorry if that sounds pretty convoluted. It probably is.
I believe that the first Engineer was on Earth. And when he drank the liquid and fell into the falls his DNA recombined and created us.
I believe that the first Engineer was on Earth. And when he drank the liquid and fell into the falls his DNA recombined and created us.
So he was maybe a test subject, and it was successful because they created us as hosts for the Xenomorphs.
Anyone else think its possible that, that particular space jockey and all the others were some kind of terrorist cell? And that they stole that bio weapon from the good jockeys?
Anyone else think its possible that, that particular space jockey and all the others were some kind of terrorist cell? And that they stole that bio weapon from the good jockeys? I mean, it seems like a possibility.
Anyone else think its possible that, that particular space jockey and all the others were some kind of terrorist cell? And that they stole that bio weapon from the good jockeys? I mean, it seems like a possibility, considering we war amongst ourselves, why wouldn’t the Jockeys? They’re not perfect.
Anyone else think its possible that, that particular space jockey and all the others were some kind of terrorist cell? And that they stole that bio weapon from the good jockeys? I mean, it seems like a possibility, considering we war amongst ourselves. why wouldn’t the Jockeys? They’re not perfect.
Anyone else think its possible that, that particular space jockey and all the others were some kind of terrorist cell? And that they stole that bio weapon from the good jockeys to wage war against them? And we just got in the way? I mean, it seems like a possibility, considering we war amongst ourselves. why wouldn’t the Jockeys? They’re not perfect.
Is it possible that the original Space Jokey was Shaw? Ripley produced a queen, so its very possible Shaw could as well. That seat/suit/thing would still be giant, even with her inside, piloting it. Queen pops out, finds that cool cavern to lay a bunch of eggs in, bada Bing, bada boom!
The crew in the original ALIEN never studied the Jockey or explored the ship. They found that cavern…and we know what happens next.
David could’ve sent the coordinates and details; knowing humans curiosity and greed over the ultimate weapon would surely bring them there and they would cause their demise.
I say no, only because there would be no sequel to be made to this film and Ridley Scott already said this is not a prequel to Alien. I still support my view above. The ship discovered in Alien was something that has been there a long time, longer than the arrival of Prometheus in this film.
I do like your idea though, that David sends out a message. It could happen in the next movie(s). I think we are in for another film or perhaps even a trilogy just focusing on the engineer race.
A prequel could be made to Prometheus later down the road once the rights to this film are proliferated to the rejects of filmdom…[sigh] -aka AVP
i agree with crusard…nothing to do with prequel to alien….or any connections with alien story line…but the bottom line is that this movie is a beginning of another movie which will focus on why humans were created and why are they subject to annihilation …the alien that burst out of the engineers body may serve for another purpose …and that’s up to the directors of the film to fill up that part …but I’m sure it’s not a connection to the old alien movies…if this was the plan they would have announced it earlier when they promoted their movie back in London.
I guess, if anyone, Ridley Scott knows what is planned, he could easily have tied everything up to Alien if he wanted to, I suppose this is his ‘episode 1′. Whether he ties the next one up neatly or goes with the Shaw story is anyones guess, maybe he will do both.
Perhaps ..but then again id prefer the shaw storyline….i just hope they will tie it up with that story and not as a prequel to another alien movie..i mean no pun intended to the alien fanatics but if its another alien movie id rather stay home ..i mean comeon same old story..but with the shawstory line..it will appear more excting.
I wondered why they used a heavily aged Guy Pearce for that part? surely it can be only to use him in a future movie as his younger self? or why not just use an older actor ?
btw 2012 and they still cannot get making actors look older right
Because there were scenes in the script with a young Weyland, but the scenes were cut and Guy was already cast.
Have you seen the Weyland viral?
Yes, I did see that, was that taken from the movie then? I just assumed it was another marketing thing…
Ridley Scott himself did say this is a prequel, but a very loose prequel at that.
I mean it has to be linked to the Alien story with the space jockey and the big gun, which is seen in Alien.
But we do know there was more ships out there, probably meaning more engineers too, so one of them could of flew to the planet in Alien, explaining why it was seen there in Alien.
Who knows the next Prometheus might take place where the original Alien occured. And that engineer in the space jocket suit might crash down during the film.
Only Ridley Scott knows…
The original script was a direct Prequel, but they rewrote it to be indirect.
As much as I loved Prometheus, how far can the story go before becoming laughably ridiculous? One or two more films, maybe? That’s why I hope they tie it into the original ALIEN.
Also, is it possible to reboot an Alien sequel? Maybe Joss’s original Resurrection script, sans Ripley…
i get your point, otherwise it will be another anti christ/anti religion thing =) where everything gets too boring..
I really hope Scott stays away from the Space Jesus concept. Frankly speaking, it’s stupid and incorporating it into the Alien Universe would just shatter it. Many rumors are flying concerning the crucifixion of Jesus (a noble Engineer emissary who got killed by the their own creations) and how it was connected to the sudden change in the opinions of the Engineers concerning the entire human race. Therefore the Crucifixion forced the Engineers to take action, build a base on LV-223, fill it with dangerous bio-weapons which later get out of control and turn on them forcing them to go into cryogenic stasis to be woken until the threat has been neutralized and then wake up again to continue the mission? Not only does this idea offend many non-Christian fans out there, it just provides a totally whimsical logic to the actions of our so-called “advanced predecessors”. I can see the theory of the Space Jesus written over mag websites on the Net and personally it makes me want to laugh.
i think your interpretation of the movie is good..actually this movie is somehow similar with the books written by the great author Zecharia Sitchin…it all explains in his volumes of books..where and how humans were engineered..through the intercession of these so called “engineers/astronaut” …there are so many artifacts that evidences worships of beings coming from above with these spacecraft thing shaped like a saucer and stars and sun…moses was taken by these astronauts to see the overview of earth and made him realized that mankind is by its nature evil and thus, he was tasked by these engineers to create rules and laws so as to establish a stable society…the noah’s arc story in the bible was also scientifically proven to be true and that was also in his book…the sodom and gomorah where the characters in the bible turned into stone..actually there was a scientific explanation…it was a nuclear explosion that set forth radiation all over the place..well during that time..that could only be done by these so called engineers …anyway..it’s almost the same as this movie…im not saying that these are true, I myself is not a believer of these astronauts but the thing is I am still a christian by heart and mind…actually i just find it amusing speculating on this darwinian theories on where and how did mankind came into existence..are they a product of evolution or are they part of this genetic engineering from higher intellecutal forms from outerspace who are ahead of us billions and billions of years…its like asking the question “how did the universe came into existence? is it constantly expanding or contracting..?” anyway dealing with this kind of questions will not be healthy for our brain ..unless you are trying to write a book or trying to expermient something that has to do with time dilation or time travel..haha going back to the movie…im really a fan of the storyline because it mixed suspense, action plus these concept on speculations of history of mankind’s existence…that is why im really hoping that ridley scott will be making another sequel which will properly patch the storyline..something that will again capture the imaginations of the moviegoers..unlike other movies who produces and directs films that only depicts violence but no sense at all..
Offend non-Christians you say? How about offending Christians as well? I think (and hope) that the “Space Jesus” thing is nothing more than pure allegory.
I think that’s the problem with this whole “ancient aliens” concept. The religious don’t like its somewhat blasphemous implications about the origins of life or religious belief, and the non-Christians don’t like it because it runs completely contrary to everything science has taught us about the history of Earth. The ancient aliens idea must appeal to someone, though, given the popularity of the pseudo-documentary show “Ancient Aliens”, and the prominence of the concept in pop culture.
If you look back in history, Persian Mythology, the Gods were fighting all the time over us and each others position in the heavens. I believe Mr Scott is telling a Bible story from a very different perspective, and I love it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persian_mythology
I believe Prometheus is part 5 of a six part story like Star wars that includes all previous(official) Alien films. The last film will tie everything together….Amen
Here is a good read about the Gods, the beginning, and possibly what Scott is using as a base for his movies.
http://www.ancient.eu.com/Mesopotamian_Religion/
One more link. Just plug in the Prometheus story so far, and this may be the answer to the story.
http://www.preparingforeternity.com/sr/sr00.htm
It’s religious, and just my thoughts, so please don’t get upset with me. I’m not selling or preaching anything. It’s just an idea were the story might be going, and It makes a lot of sense to me.
Thanks for your opinion.
The black liquid is a substance directly derived from a naturally occurring species of Xenomorphs whose location is known to the Engineers. The liquid is basic genetic stuff or a primordial soup if you will. Supplying DNA to it results in the formation of random, unique and diverse life-forms and sometimes it may even mutate said DNA if programmed to do so. The Engineers can be considered as being the Titans, as per Greek mythology. A separate faction or splinter of this Engineer race can be wholly considered to be the Prometheans, defying the ideologies of the original group of Engineers and desiring to directly seed otherwise lifeless planets in the Universe with life. One of these groups arrived on Earth and programming the black liquid to disintegrate and recalibrate the Engineer’s sacrificed DNA, it seeded and disseminated unique lifeforms throughout the Earth eventually leading to the creation of the human race. Through time the Prometheans maintained contact with their creations and supplied them with knowledge and technology. They even provided star maps pointing to their off-world bases (since they were exiles and not accepted by the main group of Engineers). At a certain point in time, the Prometheans simply retreated due to unknown reasons or were completely exterminated by the larger main Engineer group. They took over their off-world bases and filled them with re-programmed and weaponized versions of the creating black liquid, so that instead of creating it would rather mutate already existing lifeforms. Deciding to snuff out every trace of their splinter group’s existence, they decided to destroy all of their creations, like Hitler preferred burning Jew books, the Main Engineers decided to drop the black liquid on Earth 2000 years ago. Unfortunately the weapon was released and nearly killed all of them. Unable to escape its genetic grasp, Engineers retreated into cryogenic stasis to leap forward a few thousand years until the mutated lifeforms had been naturally exterminated. During said sleep, humans achieved interstellar flight and they came knocking on the doors of the angry and malevolent Engineers. What follows is simply what you see in the movie. All this was simply the Main Engineers being angry at the pesky acts of the Promethean splinter and deciding to blow their beautiful creations to hell. That’s just what I think.
Referencing a story point that places more engineer ships in addition to the one found by the nostronomo doesn’t quite fit right imo unless they’re trying to say that the same thing happened on every planet which is absurd.That and the evolution line which makes no sense at all! The ship found by the nostronomo if we remember was the ship that had been blown up you can see by how half the craft was pointed upward, after it had been countered by Prometheus before crashing and toppling on its side (which is seen in prometheus) and in Aliens we see it several times, in the beginning when newts Family are on approach and again when Ripley & the sulaco crew arrive. For godsake Ripleys been there twice so this film is beyond a shadow of doubt flawed
MrDifficult, you’re absolutely wrong. The planet that we see the crew from Prometheus visiting is not the same as the one visited by the NOSTROMO crew. In Prometheus they visit a planet specifically designated by Weyland Corporation as LV-223. 30 years later, Ellen Ripley stands on another similarly designated planet LV-426, designated by the Weyland-Yutani Corporation. The ship you see there is similar to the one seen at the end of Prometheus. Also, at the end of Prometheus *SPOILERS* the Engineer survives the spacecraft crash and tracks down Elizabeth Shaw for killing. There instead he is ambushed by the Trilobite a huge proto-Facehugger creature that impregnates the Engineer with an early version of a Xenomorph queen known as the Deacon. In Alien, we see the Engineer in his bio-suit still sitting in his pilot jockey with his chest burst open. Obviously both the events are somehow connected to the breakout of the black liquid 2000 years ago on LV-223 but is not in any case the same event at the end of Prometheus.
Maybe the Engineers are at war on their own planet, amongst themselves, or another race, or maybe just developing weapons ‘because they can’. Maybe not a weapon at all, but the means of creating human life throughout the universe.
They set up a weapons research base on a seemingly lifeless planet and come up with the stuff we see David with from within the containers inside the urns.
The opening scene could be them testing it on another planet.It simply disintegrates Engineers/humans on infection.(as intended?) (btw that is not the same type of craft as we see on LV-223 for some reason?)
It could be a side effect that infected humans impregnating non infected females produce the ‘facehugger type’ offspring, which in turn can create xenomorphs by implanting again.
And maybe their ‘weapons research base’ becomes infected accidentally with some life form originally on that planet that they were unaware of, the ‘worms’ or the worms could be later generations of the infection.
Second viewing of Prometheus now it all makes sense to me (in my head anyway)!
Went to see Prometheus for the second time in 3D at the IMAX (wasn’t impressed that much with the 3D mind, but still looked brilliant)
I don’t know if I missed a couple of things first time around, or if because as soon as it finished i went online to check what people thoughts were, and maybe it changed my mind on what had happened. But i was very confused with the black goo, as I read so many different things, people saying its there’s two types, one which was spilling out of the containers, and one that david took.
But i think people are complicating it a little, I beleive theres only one form of black goo, it was oozing out when the atmosphere changed, but David contained that one then took it apart, when he turned it upside down you saw the black goo coming down and he took a drop on his finger. So that is that for me!!
But my understanding of the whole story is this;
Opening scene is showing the engineer sacrificing himself in order to create new life, i think there is only male engineers, and to create new life they need to sacrifice themselves, the Spaceship was watching him to make sure he sacrificed.
When he drank the black goo you saw it destroying his DNA, then when it fell into the water it started to make new life and reproducing.
I beleive this eventually went on to make humans.
The engineers kept watch over us, to see how we progressed etc, i think they will of saw us killing eachother, money obsessed etc and probably saw us a failure.
David said something like ‘end life to create new life’ and that’s exactly what the engineers were doing.
Like the captain said LV-223 wasn’t the engineers home, they didnt want to have nuclears weapons so close to home, so they used LV-223.
I think the plan was to fire the black goo onto earth, it would infect humans, turn them into Aliens, and that would be the new race.
But, like the captain once again said, the engineers created the black goo, and it was used to create new life, but it got out of control and ended up killing the engineers.
The engineers knew that the black goo could create/end life, so their planned to use it on earth to wipeout mankind.
The alien in the final scene obviously wasn’t the first alien ever created, as they was one engraved earlier in the movie, I think the engineers created the alien, probably through sacrifice (as we know they dont mind sacrificing themselves for new life) and they seen the results of a facehugger on an engineer, forming an alien, and probably saw this as their greatest creation (this could of been done on a different planet also, maybe on the planet we see in Alien?).
The black goo basically takes DNA from whatever it comes in contact with and forms a new species, hence the worm then the super worm.
And that’s pretty much that.
They wanted to end our life and create more new life, but they got stopped by their own creation.
Dan, i’m agree about certain things you stated though i have my theory as well: same as you i belive the gray goo is some sort of intelligent substance maybe some sort of DNA enhancer but capable of certain intelligence which the Space jockeys may as well control and manipulate somehow, as you can see in the movie the first “person” who touches the goo (one urn to be exact) was David.
As we can remember in Alien, Ash theorizes about the composition of the face hugger (hence, the alien) and he said something about a non carbon based composition more likely to be a silicon based creature, it is likely to the gray goo to replicate such composition from David and ultimately that causes a creation of a new silicon based species? and maybe that’s why the last space jockey alive first contemplate David in awe before attempting to destroy it?, maybe the space jockey realizes that kind of “life” is a threat for their experimentation or whatever they were doing so this space jockey decided to destroy humans so they are capable to construct this forbidden and insulting kind of life? i don’t know but is an interesting line, what do you think? of course there is so much left since the Alien is represented carved in the cave, also what actually kill them etc. to much to deal with…
I am curious as to why there are carvings in the first place. advanced peoples do not carve, primitive peoples carve… an advanced race would have something like a datapad that has a 50,000 year battery or something more like that. they would not have been secretive about anything. they would have made a personal video and clearly stated, “hey, run away from here!” or “good evening and welcome to our newest theme park designed for the viewing of…” ect ect ect. masters of the universe types try to make sure about everything. not make carvings. I bet WE did the carvings… and any relevant info from the advanced race(s) would be in tech/digital format… like on the ship or something…
i would like to point out a small detail that keeps coming up regarding lv – 223 and lv – 426 these are not “planets” they are actually moons if noted in both prometheus and alien there are many moon around a planet and is is the moons they land on. it seems that many people cant get it into there minds that ridley is a very intelligent man and hails from the era of directors that made mindboggling films, look at 2001 : a space odessey kubrick wanted to make a film that would be considered a epic myth which he achieved, ridley has done the same here! love it or hate it everyone is talking about it and thats what makes an epic film you dont see people annalising other films in such depth(i dont see countless forums talking about adam sandler films lol) . sadly we now live in a time that there has to be a blockbuster sequel to explain things or link up to something else. take it for what it is and when he releases his “directors cut” (with rumoured 20 mins extended) like most if not all his films it will paint a clearer picture. and also to the people who try to decipher the story its not confusing or hard check out some greek mythology epsecially “prometheus”. once you have an idea of that story you will realise that the first 5 mins of the film becomes clearer, shot down i may be for saying this but the engineer at the beginning could very well be “prometheus”…..
I’ve always thought from the beginning that the Engineer at the beginning of the movie is a ‘Prometheus’. Whether he was on Earth is a matter that will hopefully be resolved in later films if not by Ridley himself…
There is interesting stuff when you look about [wikipedia, from which the rest of this info is taken
] , especially the story of Prometheus,as well as credited with creating man, apparently when he stole fire to give to man(which enabled mankind to develop), Zeus hides fire from man but also withholds ‘the means of life’ (btw there were no women) and as a punishment sends Pandora(the first woman) as a gift which Prometheus’ brother Epimetheus accepts, despite Prometheus’ warnings.
Now I’ve heard the story of Pandora’s Box before, however from the Hesiod story it reads..
Pandora carried a jar with her, from which were released “evils, harsh pain and troublesome diseases which give men death”. Pandora shut the lid of the jar too late to contain all the evil plights that escaped, but foresight remained in the jar, giving mankind hope.”
This stuff can go in all sorts of directions and that’s just one bit, where I think the film fails,is most film goers,including me, will be unaware of most of the stuff Scott has put in, or actually does it succeed because we are going out and looking for the answers
Has anyone delved so much into a movies meaning before?
The “engineer” at the beginning and later in the movie were obiously perfect beings. He drank the Jagermeister in order to create mankind. Unfortunately, instead of evolving into a perfect race that mirrors the imaage of the Engineers, – our “creators” -, “our” race had become, over the years, a disgrace, an embarrasment, a failure, which in turn convinced the Engineers to erase life as we know it.
to rob… exactly a point i was trying to make about people talking about movies, when was the last time a film of this kind generate so much interest? one thing i would like to say toward the reviews of the movie is i own a copy of a uk magazine called “starburst” and it contains the very first review from ’79 of “alien”, pretty much “alien” got terrible first reviews saying that there was not charactor plot, the story was full of loopholes etc bit of a coincedence? i think give ridley the credit he deserves least he is not regenerating a certain ’77 film with added cgi and ruining childhood memories (yes you lucas!! lol) another point i would like to make toward your comment on prometheus stealing fire to give to man which is found in many webpages and is part of the myth but he was also intrusted by the gods to mould man out of clay which is where i got the idea that the first engineer we see in the film is “prometheus”.
I just wonder if Ridley is using all these elements but giving his own modern ‘space alien’ take on it, after all I’ve read stuff linking Prometheus (and other Greek stories) as the forerunner to the Christian (and other religious) beliefs, there are huge similarities in the various stories.
Prometheus creates ‘man from clay’ , gives them fire , medicine, and helps and protects them as if his children, and is punished by being bound to a rock.
So, instead of Greek Gods or the modern versions, we have beings from other worlds creating us…
I also read an interesting bit that Zeus decided to wipe out mankind but Prometheus stopped him,in the movie,was that meant to be Zeus trying to take off and head for earth to destroy mankind?
Maybe we have a battle going on between the Titans and the Olympians
Isn’t it really awesome how with an androids’ one tiny curious action, an entire race can be endangered…
If David hadn’t spiked Charlie’s drink (by the way, i’ll explain why he did that here: David doesn’t have emotions, but he’s very curious and is constantly doing research for Weyland. He wanted to see what the black goo would do to Holloway, but still only placed it in his drink after he got Holloway’s permission to do so. For those who don’t remember, David asked him if he would be willing to do anything to get the information he’s after), then Charlie wouldn’t have been able to impregnate Elizabeth (another thing needs to be explained- when charlie was infected, it was with a trilobite’s dna. that is what made him so sick.)with a Trilobite baby. That baby would have never been there to impregnate the last Engineer, and that engineer would have never ended up birthing the first (or so thought at this point) alien, as seen in the aliens franchise. A chain reaction of epic proportions!
MY TAKE OF THE ALIEN/ENGINEER WORLD:
The Aliens pre-dates the Engineers. The Engineers are a bunch of cultists who worship the Aliens (much like how Predators hunts aliens but in opposite form [Engineers worship Aliens]). The Engineers go around a ritual of populating a new world (like Earth) with their own body-parts (they sacrifice themselves and donate their DNA into the new environment [ie, they are so advance, they don't NEED to sacrifice themselves to seed a planet unless they choose to do it as a ritual], and then later, send in their Gods (aliens) to play with the new life-form (us).
Hence the first Engineer who sacrifice himself to seed Earth, and the 2nd Engineer who were in cryo who is supposed to wake up and send the Aliens there. Cultist theory also explain why the Engineer were violent and kill the group of human (the David head scene) without even communicating with us. We’re not their beloved creations. We’re just life-stock they create for the Aliens. Plus there was this big ornate-metal wall with an exalted Alien carving (you don’t carve your weapon or enemy like that, only carve your God in such exalted manner).
The moon they are on is a “station” to do this ritual. From that base-station (the moon), they will seed a planet with life, then send in Aliens to kill them (some kind of ritual).
AvP: After the Engineers seeded earth and waiting for the 2nd Engineer to wake up from cyro, humans developed and unknown to the Engineers (since he was sleeping), the Predators already found Earth (with humans) to be great victim of Aliens (since this is our purpose –to be the perfect victim of Aliens as designed by the Engineers); thus they built that hunting ground in Antartica for their sports. And since it is our built-purpose to be the perfect victim of Aliens, explain why Predator like to use human to breed Aliens and hunt then them.
The Predator and the Engineers are probably enemies.
I believe that the first Engineer was on Earth. And when he drank the liquid and fell into the falls his DNA recombined and created us.
So he was maybe a test subject, and it was successful because they created us as hosts for the Xenomorphs.
Ok, following the patricide theme in the film, if the children wants to kill the parent, and the engineers are trying to wipe out life on earth…then it follows that in that allegory humans are the parents. It also doesn’t follow evolutionarily that our ancestors would be way more advanced and us a bit behind, but vice-versa. haven’t heard anyone else suggest this, but what if we have it all backwards and they are a splinter group of humans who set off into space at some point long ago and we evolved separately…the cave paintings are us pointing to where they went off to…just a thought.
I’m a big fan so my mind struggled to put up this theory hoping to better explain everything better. also to relieve the pressure in my head. here’s my theory-
engineers discovered the black goo, which they found on a desolate planet (where xenomorphs use to live, but because of their destructive nature
they eventually consumed the whole planet and themselves). discovered the xenomorphs and what they are capable off.
engineers came in contact with the predators and a war immediately began (since the predators are war freaks). The engineers
harnessed the black goo and used its mutagenic properties to create bio weapons and in the process resurrected the race of xenomorphs.
project went out of hand and more xenomorphs were born. predators had to deal with these creatures
predators discovered that these xenomorphs are the “worthy” opponents,
or a “good sport” to test their mettle with (we all know that predators are “viking-like”,proves their worth through battle)
predators has “moons” or facilities to produce these creatures like the engineers does.
with the predator’s minds diverted into the xenomorphs, the engineers resumed their work on spreading their dna all over the universe.
because their numbers was dwindling. because of the war and a lot of them got infected with the xenomorphs.
engineers spread their dna on earth using the black goo, made “some” of the species evolve from them including us.
engineers watched over us, observed and guided us through our “religions”, perhaps even incorporating their own religion into ours
by re-en acting them and presenting themselves as Gods. But the decided to stay out of our sight as much as possible,
gave us freedom and independence.
engineers saw our potential for evil, and greed. We repeatedly ignored their warnings,
killed and prosecuted their emissaries so they decided to annihilate us.
we were imperfect creations, yet also has the potential to overthrow the engineers given enough time.
the lv-223 was base for operations on the mission to annihilate humans.
the messages that was mistaken for an invitation was actually a map for engineers traveling
all over the universe, so that they can coordinate with each other if some of them reached earth.
the facility on lv-223 has been compromised, so the plan to destroy humans was delayed or canceled.
engineers-spread their dna and religion throughout the universe.
good-nature, yet highly strict moral values. authoritarian, kind, and just. does not seek war, yet always prepared for one.
predators- proves their worth through fighting, seeking ever stronger opponents to assert their dominance. warriors.
hunted the engineers, followed them to earth. visited the humans and enslaved us.
also used humans to raise xenomorphs for battle. went out of hand, nuked the pyramids they built (AvP)
Weyland Yutani discovered this, saw the potential of the xenomorphs for warfare of whatever it was that they were thinking.
Discovered the species of predators and their high tech weapons (AvP2).
Fueled their plans on exploring the universe and meeting with these creatures.
weyland landed on lv-223 2093. woke up the engineer and the engineer resumed his mission and tried killing everyone.
-”insignificant insects, ruining my sleep and possibly unleashing the xenomorphs i tried to contain.”
engineer decided that the best course of action was to escape because of the danger of getting infected is high, and
might have been thinking that one or more of the humans were infected, hence he might be vastly outnumbered.(Prometheus)
on a separate expedition Ellen Ripley encountered the xenomorphs 31 years after the incident on lv 223. (Alien)
Is there connection between Alien vs Predator and Prometheus ?
Because is supposed that in Prometheus we are witnesses of the origins of the Aliens. So why there are Aliens in the Alien vs Predator movies if they are many years before these events?
My guess is that it’s possible they ignored the AVP films and went on as if they never existed.
But others have postulated that what happened with the Aliens on Earth was covered up, and when Wyland went looking for the “engineers” he knew about the Aliens.
I know Prometheus is copping some frustrated criticisms, but I was totally into it. The cinematography was rich and vivid… some of the plot concepts totally confused yet intrigued me. Thanks ridley scott (and co) for sci-fi that doesn’t involve a “hollywood hero”, or a “tidy plot of predictability and cliches”. Wonderfully visual and puzzling. MORE please
I happen to know that Prometheus and Alien are from the same “universe” in regards to IP. Meaning, just like Spider-Man is Marvel, so is Thor, as well as Iron Man, they are in the same “universe” so far as IP. Having said that… Prometheus and Alien are in the same mix. The key to connecting them is in knowing the respective time lines to each other and if the people/events of Prometheus directly connect/effect Alien… It could be………. different stories of the same thing….. There is a special untapped market out there in regards to film making… Making epic movies and then connecting them to other epic movies in order to re-launch and expand older epic movies. It has been done before, but I’m just saying it is an untapped market full of epic potential and in need of a spotlight especially for fans of stories who want to see those stories on the big screen. It is also a way of fixing past mistakes in movies that would have been to this day the best ever if not for a few TREND mistakes. For example, the firs two batman movies with Keaton… EPIC EPIC EPIC! the fail point of those films was in the demise of the joker, demise of the penguin, demise of cat woman those were the reasons those films are epic fails. then new people playing batman was a mistake, and demise of bad guys who aren’t ever supposed to die inorder to have other stories. how can you make an epic movie about batman and joker if joker dies in the first act? oops. same for spidermans killing of green goblin twice, killing venom is to me a personal vendetta against the idiot responsible. Nolans batman movies brought honor and respect to the franchise. Having said all that, with starcraft 1 having direct audio one liners from Alien franchise and the way the Terran and Zerg look and act and the way the tech looks, and how well starcraft 2 is doing, it is time to use that untapped market and tie things together. if you tie things together and the whole world is thrilled and happy, so far as fans, you can improve the worth of each brand/franchise that gets tied together. Prometheus, Alien, Starcraft, and a few others should all end up tied together somehow and each company should work together to produce these tie-ins instead of bicker or worry about shaking hands with a competitor or such nonsense. If the fans dislike an arrangement, fine, bicker away. But if the fans want something, take advantage. Starcraft could be the future of the aliens franchise timeline wise, and to easily deal with the predators, they are a cuz/brother race to the Protoss. The Zerg being the future version of the “aliens” as well as the original race that the “aliens” came from. That also gives an origin location for the “aliens”, the planet Char in Starcraft. Prometheus could be linked to how the terrans got ahold of “zergs” for experimenting so far as starcraft 1. there are tons of possibilities each a garauntee that the worth of Prometheus, Alien, Starcraft, predator, and other franchises only go up in worth. then we could have the predator race come to Starcraft. then we could have a starcraft movie… ooooooooh yyyyyyyyeah……..