Prometheus (2012) discussion - *SPOILERS!*

[iansales]

It may be that the sequel shows Pearce as Weyland in flashbacks, hence casting him. Also, he was in some of the online advertising as a young Weyland, but that does seem a bit like a daft reason to cast him.

 

[Aun Doorback]

Alchemist - I'm with you on everything you say

 

[alchemist]

It may be that the sequel shows Pearce as Weyland in flashbacks, hence casting him.

That actually sounds quite plausible.

Here's a very detailed review of some of the controversial points raised. It's worth a read.
http://www.hitfix.com/motion-captur...look-digging-deep-into-spoilers-and-questions

 

[TheTomG]

10 things about the making of Prometheus explains the casting of a young person for an old man - there was originally going to be a sequence where he was a young man.

Now if only we can have the other annoyances about this movie patched up! Oh wait, that would require re-filming it - maybe it's in need of a reboot?

http://io9.com/5917639/10-things-you-didnt-know-about-the-design-of-prometheus

 

[PTeppic]

The very beginning of the movie, where we see an Engineer watching the ship leave I believe was on Earth, and was facing some sort of punishment.
Taking the drink was some form of suicide, I think, but when he fell into the water, there was an adverse reaction. He broke down into molecules, which we saw floating in the water. Through evolution, those molecules eventually formed the human race. Hence, the 'we were created by the Engineers' theory.

The Engineers clearly came back and discovered the human race developing on Earth and figured out what happened. They decided to create a bioweapon of mass-destruction to destroy the human race.


What doesn't make sense to me is that the Engineers don't appear to know the location on Earth until David plucks it out of the map, essentially telling the Engineers where to find the human race. If they had already been to Earth several times, then why did they need David to show them? And why leave it until now?

Ah - that actually makes a kind of sense for their behaviour, though how they were able to deduce what had happened in such a short space of time and from David introducing them (we could have evolved naturally, at some point).

As for the question, that world had been dormant for 2000 years, apparently the result of a bio-emergency when their pets got away with them. They've been "accidentally" awoken now. They may have been to thousands of worlds and effectively obeyed the Prime Directive (notwithstanding they didn't forsee a dissolving body accidentally creating evolutionary life). As such, they wouldn't know which world we came from until the remaining Engineer was awoken.

 

[alchemist]

More opinion on the film, this time a summary from an archaelogical standpoint. It's funny, if long.

http://digitaldigging.net/prometheus-an-archaeological-perspective/

It seems that at least one part of the crew selection procedure took the form of a raffle at an a*****le convention.

 

[cesarica]

Nobody really discussed the opening scene?
After giving it some thought, my best shot would be that he actually tried to save humans by infecting himself with the goo (or whatever it was), which is why he went all the way to the top and then after falling down, we clearly see the new DNA forming. So it probably got out and infected the others too...which is why they failed at completing their ultimate kill-all-humans mission ... or not.
I'd like to hear others' opinions on this and your theories because this one's really bothering me.

 

[CyBeR]

My take on what happens in the film, and I may be mistaken.

I think in the past, at the Engineer base, there may have been a biohazard contamination. Most of those there had burst heads if you remember and I imagine that was what was happening to them. Somewhere along the way, their bioweapon had shown mutation characteristics when exposed to certain elements. As it was, it made them decompose rapidly (I don't believe the original scene was set on Earth...nothing said as much, but I may be wrong), mutated it would undergo a few phases in different animals until it reached a xenomorph form.

The xenomorph was not originally the purpose of the poison but more likely something that resulted when the chemicals went to pot. The bit that goes "I think we altered the atmosphere in the room" is what got me thinking of this, especially as that was the moment when the pots started leaking the black goo. Coupled with the fact that the unaltered poison made the doctor sick, but the poison in his body made him impregnate the woman with an ugly alien face hugger (which grew to full size without any nutrients...always something that bothered me with the Hulk in general and here as well), gives me more reason to believe that the main characteristic of that weapon was how unbelievably unstable it was and thus uncontrollable. A killer flu virus if you will.
However, despite the fact that it wasn't the intended purpose, they discovered that it was a possibility to happen, which led to the murals. At the time they saw them running I don't believe there were xenomorphs after them as much as that they had a contamination on their hands, which led to the mass of bodies with exploded heads.
As well, the difference between the doctor and the geologist exposed to the poison are the last pillar on which I hold this idea. The doctor dies horribly from a drop...the geologist is mutated after falling with his face in the black good, zombified if you will.

Going forward, I do see some reason to the theory that the ship in Alien 1 may be one in which the lady had crashed after having something burst out of her...but I doubt it very much, it would resemble the Alien 3 plot too much.
However, I believe that the alien born out of the Engineer was a queen in fact, especially as it resembled a queen more in face rather than a drone, species characteristics and all. As such, it would lay eggs and eventually die off due to starvation...or wander off in search of prey of any kind.

I believe Earth was pretty much a testing ground for the weapon, not something created for any other purpose. Before they would implement it wide scale - other species, maybe? -, they would attempt it on a controlled population in a different system, based on their own genealogy. As such, why they wanted to destroy us and why the Engineer was hostile would make a lot of sense: we are test subjects and should have no more value in their eyes than most test samples have in ours: useful but to be destroyed when it poses a danger.


Sure, there are some things that don't tie up as well as they probably should, but I loved the film nonetheless. Idiots have always been part of the Alien universe, so it's not that far o a stretch to assume that these were from the same genetic pool.
Still, why would you want to touch an alien life form that may spit out god knows what acid venom.

 

[iansales]

No, the opening scene is definitely set on Earth. Ridley Scott has said as much, and besides it would make no sense otherwise given the whole "finding our makers" theme of the film.

Of course, this doesn't explain why the Engineers haven't evolved in the billions of years since life started on Earth, or indeed why adding their DNA to the primordial ooze resulted in everything from humans to caterpillars to mushrooms. And if their DNA only resulted in humans... why do we share 98% of our DNA with a banana?

 

[Moonbat]

And if their DNA only resulted in humans... why do we share 98% of our DNA with a banana?

Yet 100% of our DNA with the Engineers?

Very amusing article linked by Alc, had me laughing a lot

He’s been asleep for two years, and decides to decorate a Christmas tree (while smoking a cigar in a closed environment) before he has breakfast

Why do they make people smoke in these films? I was amazed when I saw it at the start of Planet of the Apes (the original) but forgave them as it was so long ago that they might not have known how bad it was and how much of the limited air cuplpy it pollutes, but now it's just being silly.

He’s evidently a hardcore scientist – He tells us Fassbender is the closest thing he has to a son, that he’s immortal but can never appreciate it because he hasn’t got a soul. Oh, one of those hardcore scientists.

 

[iansales]

Maybe bananas evolved from humans. It would explain a lot...

 

[clovis-man]

Of course, this doesn't explain why the Engineers haven't evolved in the billions of years since life started on Earth...

Probably because they're perfect, or at least think they are. Natural selection only occurs when there is an environmental reason for it. Actually, the fact that they were unchanged (at least from the swan dive on Earth to the time things went wrong for them on LV-223) argues for an attitude that anything inferior, like imperfectly evolved humans, should be sent to the scrap heap. The over-elaborate biological scheme they ginned up to accomplish that was grist for the mill in the story-telling sense.

All of which reinforces my original thought that religion, or what passes for it in Ridley Scott's imagination was a driving force in the events taking place. The engineers were fine with self-sacrifice, but would not tolerate a poor result of that sacrifice. Maybe it's just me, but I thought there were several possible worlds which could have been targets for the engineers' bio crusade. Earth just happened to be readily chosen. So does that mean the engineers had lots of "failed" creation attempts to tidy up?

I won't go into the Christmas bit and Scott's speculation of an engineer Christ.

Lots of great discussion on this and other venues. No matter what you think of this film, it's hard to be complacent about it.

 

[Christopher Lee]

Stuinning visuals, great performances- ruined because they were unwilling to spend a few bucks on hiring a writer who has even a basic degree of scientific literacy.
"we've traveled half a billion miles"!

This was a joke on the character who said it. Don't think he was talking "actual" distance. . . sarcasm is a good word I suppose. He was being sarcastic.

I liked the movie. Still dissecting the opening scene though. I think I'll be going to see it one more time.

 

[Welsh Andy]

I don't get how the "half billion miles" gaffe was sarcasm? And taken in the context of all the other examples of the writers not having even a basic level of literacy with regards what they are writing about, the cod philosophy and science, it just seems like another example of sub-B-Movie writing.

Plus, I'm sure someone else has mentioned this but, 35,000 years ago? 35,000 years? The earliest evidence we have for human activity in Scotland is from around 10,000 years ago on account that before that it was under a kilometre of ice!!!

Also. The cave paintings were supposed to look like the cave art from Lascaux in France. Which dates from around 17,000 years ago. The people then were able to paint these images on account of France not being under A KILOMETRE OF ICE!!!

Do these people not have access to wikipedia? Hell, there are enough people out there with archaeology degrees that are unemployed, of which I am sure to be one in about 12 months, so why not hire one of us to give your script the once over before you spend millions on it? We could then explain to you why NO ARCHAEOLOGIST would behave in the way depicted in the film.
/rant

 

[THX-1138]

I didn't like it. It posed all these great questions, but didn't answer a single one. The only questions it needed to answer were what are space jockeys, why do they have aliens, how did their ship end up on LV-426, who sent the distress signal and why did they send a distress signal. Not one of those was answered, but now we have all of these questions;
Did the space jockeys want to destroy humanity, and if so, why?
What happened to the other space jockeys?
Why did the space jockeys create humanity and life on Earth?
How did David learn the space jockey language?
What did David say to the space jockey?
Why did David infect the scientist guy(this might have a logical answer, I forget)?
Why did the space jockey attack the humans?

Without the answers to at least some of these questions, the movie really doesn't make any sense. I loved the creatures and special effects, the acting was great, but the script is just crap. What was the point of the severed head? That did not progress the plot, it got us nowhere. The creatures were cool, but one thing I liked about the Xenomorphs is their realistic, efficient lifecycle. The lifecycle of the proto-xenomorphs in this movie is redundant and ineffective. If in the space of the few hours between the scientist guy becoming infected and him becoming a zombie, he had not had sex, the next stage in the lifecycle would not have continued. How unlikely was it that he would get laid in those few hours? Without that step there would have been no giant facehugger and thus no xenomorph in the end. And why would you have a facehugger burst from one host just so that it could attach to another host?

 

[iansales]

Some of them were answered. David learnt the Engineer's language by comparing all the ancient languages on Earth to build up a model of an ur-language. I'm assuming the filmmakers thought this language was taught to humans 30,000 years ago during one of the Engineer's many visits. In fact, it's a complete distortion of the idea of proto-indo-european, and ignores the fact that are many different and completely unrelated language groups.

 

[clovis-man]

Plus, I'm sure someone else has mentioned this but, 35,000 years ago? 35,000 years? The earliest evidence we have for human activity in Scotland is from around 10,000 years ago on account that before that it was under a kilometre of ice!!!

Also. The cave paintings were supposed to look like the cave art from Lascaux in France. Which dates from around 17,000 years ago. The people then were able to paint these images on account of France not being under A KILOMETRE OF ICE!!!

It wasn't all that long ago that people were convinced that nobody had been in North America earlier than 10,000 years BP. We have since learned that there had been some southward migration along the far northwestern coast that dates twice that far back. And today's news seems to indicate some 40,000 year old cave painting evidence in Spain. The evidence keeps getting more "evolved".

Do these people not have access to wikipedia? Hell, there are enough people out there with archaeology degrees that are unemployed, of which I am sure to be one in about 12 months, so why not hire one of us to give your script the once over before you spend millions on it? We could then explain to you why NO ARCHAEOLOGIST would behave in the way depicted in the film.
/rant

You have to accept the fact that scholarly accuracy is not the first priority among movie makers. I don't think they worried about it very much. The story is the thing, or if you're Ridley Scott, the potential box office success of this movie AND its sequel.

I sympathize with any incipient unemployment among archaeologists. Even as far back as 40 years (verified by carbon dating) I had to settle for a civil service career instead of one in Anthropology. But no worries. I never had to worry about "publish or perish"; just the occasional pithy memorandum.

 

[PTeppic]

I don't get how the "half billion miles" gaffe was sarcasm?

Is it not rounding/ease-of-speech?
Okay, it's closer to "half a million billion miles" aka "half a quadrillion miles" but they don't exactly slip off the tongue. "Half a billion miles" is a fairly round, generic sort of a distance than implies a really, really long way.

Or, perhaps, they were long scale numeric, and meant "half a billiard miles" which would be roundabout right... I think

 

[Welsh Andy]

@Clovis-man: The difference is that the cave they were 'excavating' was under a kilometre of ice 35,000 years ago. So unless these hypothetical Paleo-Scots were keen ice miners...
I'm not concerned with total scholarly accuracy but when it's the basics like this it really bugs me. Well, it bugs me when it's a multi-billion dollar production. If it was a straight to TV syfy movie then it would be fine.

@PTeppic: But surely the simple way of saying that would be simply 'billions'. Also Theron's character didn't seem like the sort to make a mistake like that. Then there's the fact that David informs them that they have been asleep for 2 years, 4 months, 18 days and 36 hours...
I swear the script must have been proof read by a drunken baboon.

Plus all the cod "oh aren't we so deep" philosophy. You get better philosophical musings on Youtube! I thought that after Inception there was a chance that film makers would stop treating us like bumbling idiots. I must have been wrong.

It was very, very pretty though.

 

[clovis-man]

Maybe bananas evolved from humans. It would explain a lot...

Many years ago, a Zoology professor I knew was heard to say in class: "Man resembles the monkey.....too much!"