@Birdie, that's a good explanation in regards to the content of the other films but I wonder if that was the intent here. In universe it would seem to make sense assuming they didn't have a first contact in the intervening 30 years...or this was first contact and Ash's response and those of Hudson are because of the events in Prometheus! It's like a STAR TREK episode! :lol
Prometheus (Post-release)
- Thread starter Vivek
- Start date
Getoninja
Sr Member
Kit Rae
Sr Member
It's in there, and he says "it's in my suit".
I guess when a few of us were debating that section of audio from the viral audio puzzle a while back, we were all sort of right. He said "in my suit", and 10 seconds later it did go down his throat! I thought Milburn claiming the snake it was a female, when it clearly looked penis-like, was hilarious. Then Ridley rams it into his mouth! I bet they were laughing their arses off editing that scene.
And I say again, comparing Alien to Prometheus in the way you guys have been, makes about as much sense as comparing 2001 to Blade Runner
But that's just me.Enthusiasm for self preservation from Milburn? Are you confusing his lines for Fifield? Or do you mean the fact that he decided to leave with Fifield? I assumed he left because #1 he was following Fifiled's lead as the tough guy who did not need to be there, and #2, he was a moron. As far as the snake scene, as I said, I got that he was just trying to show-up Fifield this time around (and he was a moron), now that he had finally found something more into his field. It's all in his dialogue.
Let's just pull up the script :cool
FIFIIELD
Do you think this thing was some kind of god that they worshipped?
MILBURN
I don't know.
Fifield jumps, startled at something he spots out of the corner of his eye. We briefly see a snake like shape wriggling through the black slime puddle around the nearby ampules.
FIFIIELD
What is that?
Milburn jumps up, taking charge of the situation.
MILBURN
Oh, hang on, Ok. Ok, Ok. Just stay calm. Stay calm.
FIFIIELD - hysterical.
What is it!
MILBURN
I can handle this.
A large, pale, snake-like creature rises up out of the slime, with a featureless, bulbous head, vaguely phallic shaped.
FIFIIELD
Look at the size of that, what is it?
MILBURN
You need to stay calm.
FIFIIELD
What's there to be calm about?
MILBURN
You need to stay calm, because she is beautiful!
Now, I wouldn't go THAT far. I don't think they were trying to be that smart here with biblical symbolism. I think this was more Ridley liking the idea or a horrific death that was uncomfortably sexual in nature. Could be wrong.
I'm pretty sure that's from right after mutant Fifield attacks and they are torching the garage. Not necessary dialogue, but it fits, and he is wearing the same clothes.
I started to wonder that about 20 pages ago, but it is kind of obvious now.
My last words on Prometheus. Let me start by saying I didn’t “hate it“ ,but I remain very disappointed that it failed to deliver, as a film ,the experience I was expecting.
When this was first announced back in 2010 it was absolutely quoted as a DIRECT prequel to that film. That was the script John Spaihts had delivered and by all accounts that is what it was, face huggers and all. If it was going to go in such a different direction why would Ridley include the original Alien soundtrack ,mixed in with a thumping new score (that also ,I’m sad to say ,never featured in the actual film) together with so much design referencing to the old film in the trailer if it was going to be so “unlike it“. The truth is a lot of us were led directly up the garden path quite intentionally by Ridley and FOX marketing playing with that expectation to get us into see it.
I did not WANT the film to be Alien again. I wanted something stronger and less predictable. Why? Because the reason the original succeeded so well for me remained in the “unseen” back story of the origin. It has managed to haunt both my imagination and the many others who saw the first film years ago. There was this terribly dark promise held by it , one of a brilliantly horrifyingly alternate and malevolently civilisation that just briefly brushed up against ours in the form of a bizarre space wreak, a strange semi fossilized skeleton and a radically monstrous and deadly creature which destroyed people in the most terrifying ways as it rapidly evolved. Stay away from me it said. Yet we obviously cannot not.
All this was so marvellously evoked by the superb contrasts in art direction chosen by Scott between the familiar human world and Giger strangeness . I had never come across his work before I saw it in the film and it utterly fascinated me as a nightmarish depiction of an advanced civilisation whose biotechnological rules were so entirely different to ours that they would complete corrupt it on contact. And for three decades I’ve been waiting to see much more of it revealed.
And this is where Prometheus so desperately missed the mark for me. That unique contrast was immediately lost once the Engineer/Earth ancestry link was made. It made the back story so just like so much other average science fiction I’ve seen and read in the media over the years. It was such a well worn path. Been here before ,seen that. For a supposedly fresh take on the story ,this was all very old sci fi mythology.
The Engineers became simply big ,albino, steroid enhanced, marble sculptured humanoids in sub Borg Star Trek body armour whose collective behaviour and “civilisation” were eventually so predictably like humanities ( because they were in effect “humanity”) that all the mystery evaporated in an instant. Making them “human” made them predictable. Gone was the huge potential in that strange elephantine colossus welded into that strange device with his chest burst open. Their “history “under whelmed me with its lack of vision and imagination. When an awoken Engineer becomes nothing more than your bad tempered great, great, great etc grandfather giving humanity a slap for daring to wake him up. Did he pause to question these creations of his that were so obviously in awe of him, begging for further life? No. he doesn’t. Despite two thousand years asleep he immediately springs into homicidal rage and panic, despite his “obvious superiority” . I saw nothing godlike in his behaviour, only the same continued idiotic character reaction that seemed to dog most of the films storyline. Juvenile is the word I’d most use to describe almost every response written into the script.
The black goo which ,as a key plot device, I’d already seen used constantly in the X files and more recently in District 9 ,where it arguably played a more poignant part in biologically changing a person completely WITHOUT destroying his humanity, was unoriginal and an uninspiring choice of inconsistent mechanism of change. Is something that looks like crude oil terrifying? Only if you have to clean up the mess it leaves when you’ve spilled it on everything. Even the creatures it eventually “designs” were less interesting than you’ll find on a terrestrial deep sea dive ,and considerably less frightening and alien. And the eventual nod to the parentage of the original monster was so totally bereft of the other world menace and eerie elegant beauty of the original I felt sick with disappointment from the moment I saw it. That gigerish biohorror was not there at all. They simply drew it in crayon and gave it a pointy hat .
Leaving aside all the other obvious arguments that make this thread such an interesting illustration on just how differently people perceive and think about a film and the messages it conveys to them, those are the two main rationales that made Prometheus such a moderately average film for me. There was nothing in it that made it remarkable or different than anything I’ve already seen before. It failed to break any new ground thematically or entertainingly. There were some potentially great scenes in it but they were undermined by the inexplicable poor plotting decisions leading up to them. The sets were beautifully designed (and referenced to the original film) but the character reactions to them were almost as if they weren’t performing on the same stage. There was this general “clueless ness” to every character motivation here that you would not expect. The lack of preparation evidenced here to potentiallly "meet your Makers" begat belief. It under mined the whole credibility of the story. And that’s becoming more evident in the waffling explanations now being given by both the Director and the writer in interview ,where neither can seem to agree about where it was actually going and clearly disagreeing with previous statements they’ve given before on it.
The only thing they are agreeing on is that maybe it will lead “somewhere, eventually” . I hope it does . I’m glad others enjoyed the film and the areas of debate it opens up to them because it may encourage FOX to fund for a sequel to be made because beyond ANY DOUBT at all that’s what will be needed to satisfy everyone whose seen the film. Do I want Lindelof to be involved in it ? I’d rather he go kiss a face hugger.
At the moment it looks like it will gross less than John Carter (which I enjoyed!!) but will make more of a profit. So maybe we will get a sequel. Maybe not. It is hugely difficult to get any film made so the failure of any science fiction story makes the others waiting in gestation to burst freshly onto the screen less likely and that’s to the detriment of everyone.
Prometheus simply missed the mark for me. The strong indications that existed that it would not was an unpleasant surprise. The evidence that it could have been a much better film for many people is evidenced by all the arguments its generated and I hope they last long enough for the studio execs to take notice of the balance sheet at the end of the year and possibly finance the development of a sequel.
Until then thats the end of it for me.
When this was first announced back in 2010 it was absolutely quoted as a DIRECT prequel to that film. That was the script John Spaihts had delivered and by all accounts that is what it was, face huggers and all. If it was going to go in such a different direction why would Ridley include the original Alien soundtrack ,mixed in with a thumping new score (that also ,I’m sad to say ,never featured in the actual film) together with so much design referencing to the old film in the trailer if it was going to be so “unlike it“. The truth is a lot of us were led directly up the garden path quite intentionally by Ridley and FOX marketing playing with that expectation to get us into see it.
I did not WANT the film to be Alien again. I wanted something stronger and less predictable. Why? Because the reason the original succeeded so well for me remained in the “unseen” back story of the origin. It has managed to haunt both my imagination and the many others who saw the first film years ago. There was this terribly dark promise held by it , one of a brilliantly horrifyingly alternate and malevolently civilisation that just briefly brushed up against ours in the form of a bizarre space wreak, a strange semi fossilized skeleton and a radically monstrous and deadly creature which destroyed people in the most terrifying ways as it rapidly evolved. Stay away from me it said. Yet we obviously cannot not.
All this was so marvellously evoked by the superb contrasts in art direction chosen by Scott between the familiar human world and Giger strangeness . I had never come across his work before I saw it in the film and it utterly fascinated me as a nightmarish depiction of an advanced civilisation whose biotechnological rules were so entirely different to ours that they would complete corrupt it on contact. And for three decades I’ve been waiting to see much more of it revealed.
And this is where Prometheus so desperately missed the mark for me. That unique contrast was immediately lost once the Engineer/Earth ancestry link was made. It made the back story so just like so much other average science fiction I’ve seen and read in the media over the years. It was such a well worn path. Been here before ,seen that. For a supposedly fresh take on the story ,this was all very old sci fi mythology.
The Engineers became simply big ,albino, steroid enhanced, marble sculptured humanoids in sub Borg Star Trek body armour whose collective behaviour and “civilisation” were eventually so predictably like humanities ( because they were in effect “humanity”) that all the mystery evaporated in an instant. Making them “human” made them predictable. Gone was the huge potential in that strange elephantine colossus welded into that strange device with his chest burst open. Their “history “under whelmed me with its lack of vision and imagination. When an awoken Engineer becomes nothing more than your bad tempered great, great, great etc grandfather giving humanity a slap for daring to wake him up. Did he pause to question these creations of his that were so obviously in awe of him, begging for further life? No. he doesn’t. Despite two thousand years asleep he immediately springs into homicidal rage and panic, despite his “obvious superiority” . I saw nothing godlike in his behaviour, only the same continued idiotic character reaction that seemed to dog most of the films storyline. Juvenile is the word I’d most use to describe almost every response written into the script.
The black goo which ,as a key plot device, I’d already seen used constantly in the X files and more recently in District 9 ,where it arguably played a more poignant part in biologically changing a person completely WITHOUT destroying his humanity, was unoriginal and an uninspiring choice of inconsistent mechanism of change. Is something that looks like crude oil terrifying? Only if you have to clean up the mess it leaves when you’ve spilled it on everything. Even the creatures it eventually “designs” were less interesting than you’ll find on a terrestrial deep sea dive ,and considerably less frightening and alien. And the eventual nod to the parentage of the original monster was so totally bereft of the other world menace and eerie elegant beauty of the original I felt sick with disappointment from the moment I saw it. That gigerish biohorror was not there at all. They simply drew it in crayon and gave it a pointy hat .
Leaving aside all the other obvious arguments that make this thread such an interesting illustration on just how differently people perceive and think about a film and the messages it conveys to them, those are the two main rationales that made Prometheus such a moderately average film for me. There was nothing in it that made it remarkable or different than anything I’ve already seen before. It failed to break any new ground thematically or entertainingly. There were some potentially great scenes in it but they were undermined by the inexplicable poor plotting decisions leading up to them. The sets were beautifully designed (and referenced to the original film) but the character reactions to them were almost as if they weren’t performing on the same stage. There was this general “clueless ness” to every character motivation here that you would not expect. The lack of preparation evidenced here to potentiallly "meet your Makers" begat belief. It under mined the whole credibility of the story. And that’s becoming more evident in the waffling explanations now being given by both the Director and the writer in interview ,where neither can seem to agree about where it was actually going and clearly disagreeing with previous statements they’ve given before on it.
The only thing they are agreeing on is that maybe it will lead “somewhere, eventually” . I hope it does . I’m glad others enjoyed the film and the areas of debate it opens up to them because it may encourage FOX to fund for a sequel to be made because beyond ANY DOUBT at all that’s what will be needed to satisfy everyone whose seen the film. Do I want Lindelof to be involved in it ? I’d rather he go kiss a face hugger.
At the moment it looks like it will gross less than John Carter (which I enjoyed!!) but will make more of a profit. So maybe we will get a sequel. Maybe not. It is hugely difficult to get any film made so the failure of any science fiction story makes the others waiting in gestation to burst freshly onto the screen less likely and that’s to the detriment of everyone.
Prometheus simply missed the mark for me. The strong indications that existed that it would not was an unpleasant surprise. The evidence that it could have been a much better film for many people is evidenced by all the arguments its generated and I hope they last long enough for the studio execs to take notice of the balance sheet at the end of the year and possibly finance the development of a sequel.
Until then thats the end of it for me.
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NAZGÛL
Sr Member
Id say its no doubt an allegory of how Adam and Eve gets tempted by the serpent of Eden. Id be very surprised if it wasnt done on purpose.
The biblical serpent is tricking man to learn knowledge, something God had forbidded and also warned them that they will die if eating it. The serpent tells Eve that if she eat the fruit she and Adam will gain knowledge and will not die. When Adam and Eve eat the fruit they gain knowledge but at the same time they lose their child-like innocence. Their purity. They are then driven from Eden so they shall not eat the fruit of eternal life.
In the Prometheus snake scene there are two persons acting quite childlike. One wants to "talk" to the creature, he does, they get to "eat" the black goo and becomes soulless.
The same theme can be seen when David infects Charlie, and when Charlie (or actually David) infects Elizabeth.
The Adam and Eve story goes hand in hand with the one of the titan Prometheus stealing fire, as both is about stealing knowledge from gods.
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GiovanniDekkers
Active Member
My main question about all the Alien movies (even the first AvP movie) and Prometheus, is still "What does Weyland know that we don't"?
I had this same question for years between "Alien" and "Aliens", Weyland knows more than it leads to believe in Prometheus, just like in "Alien" with Bishop.It seems/feels like there is a whole single story behind Weyland's intentions.
Aren't the Alien movies mainly about "The Xenomorphs and Weyland", and Prometheus mainly about "The Origin of the Evil creature".
I love this movie because it raises the questions about Weyland again like it's some Diabolical Company which has much more to hide than it really shows.....
I had this same question for years between "Alien" and "Aliens", Weyland knows more than it leads to believe in Prometheus, just like in "Alien" with Bishop.It seems/feels like there is a whole single story behind Weyland's intentions.
Aren't the Alien movies mainly about "The Xenomorphs and Weyland", and Prometheus mainly about "The Origin of the Evil creature".
I love this movie because it raises the questions about Weyland again like it's some Diabolical Company which has much more to hide than it really shows.....
:lol I love it.
Ah. Thanks!
Ha. I can totally picture that.
Oh, I think Nazgul nailed it completely there. His comment had me slap my forehead. Gawd, I feel so obtuse some days! What with Sir Rid's interview comments I think this is a very strong hypothesis. And if it is unsubtle, crude symbolism, well, that fits too. SRS is a famously blunt kind of guy, right?
It *could* be accidental but I do think you're likely dead right. Hats off, sir.
I think I understand now. You don't like Ripley because you think she was written to as a man, you don't like Ripley because she doesn't have a 'faith'.
And even with that, you still get the faith bit wrong. There is a difference between believing in something, and having faith in something.
rodneyfaile
Sr Member
After Shaw and Holloway made their discoveries, (expeditions likely financed by Weyland) and as the trip to LV-224 was being planned, Weyland and David probably analyzed every scrap of information (much like we are doing with this movie) and formed a hypothesis. But just as we have little to go on, and our thoughts on the movie are probably wrong, so are David and Weyland, because David gets his head taken off. That part wasn't in the cave drawing.
If Weyland does have secret information, where would he have gotten it? Another expedition separate from Shaw and Holloway? Maybe.
GiovanniDekkers
Active Member
Let's suppose Weyland financed the whole thing and knows more, this could mean that he could have more information about the Engineers, like some archeological found artifact, years before as he is an old man here, maybe this artifact has the whole story about the Engineers and why they came to earth.What I like to see in the next movie is at least somekind of flashback where we get to see the younger Weyland (Guy Pierce's character) finding the artifact as an Archeologist uncovering the mistery, that would at least make some sense and create somekind of starting point for Weyland's intentions with the information given to him, at some point could have made/have contact with the Engineers earlier than Prometheus encounter with the fenomena.
Kit Rae
Sr Member
January 1, 2073 - Date LV-223 is discovered.
June 22, 2091 - Date Peter Weyland records his message to the Prometheus crew, 18 years later.
December 23, 2093. Date the Prometheus arrives on LV-223, 2 years later.
VICKERS
My company paid a trillion dollars to find this place and to bring you here.
Nothing I see in the film indicates that Weyland had specifically sent explorers to LV-233 before, and everything in the film points to the fact they they knew absolutely nothing about this specific place, but I got the vague impression that Weyland and David had prior knowledge of SOMETHING.
They may have sent probes to map the systems. They had 18 years to do it, and that group of stars was apparently only 2 years away using their top of the line FTL drive. Or they may have sent a previous mission that found SOMETHING in one of the other locations.
Mr Webber
Master Member
Have said from the start Weyland is the master key, just havnt seen all the locks yet. The company was actually started by Peter Weylands father so there is another back history SRS can play with if he chooses. In his TED speech, young Weylands technology timeline jumps dramaticaly around the time the company is formed, did daddy have some "advantage"? First contact theories might be better starting with this.
Kit Rae
Sr Member
I'm sure Ridley or Damon would have been aware of the implied symbolism, after all, they had Christian allegory scattered all throughout the film. But if they were going to specifically tie that scene to Adam and Eve symbolically, I think they would have done it with Shaw and Holloway. Fifiled and Milburn were just two expendable morons, and they were not really even the ones seeking knowledge in this case. Shaw and Holloway were. The morons just bungled into it. They were trying to leave and did NOT want this knowledge.
Kit Rae
Sr Member
Have they disagreed with previous statements? I have seen where Ridley and Damon have each stated a few different contradictory reasons for some of the subtext points. Damon seems more bent on giving a few clues here to some of the open questions, but letting the viewer decide the answer, whereas Ridley has actually been a bit more direct and explained a few points. I took that as each simply having their own interpretation, but what have they said that contradicts a previous statement? Just curious, as I don't remember anything, other than something like Ridley saying there would be no xenos in 2011, then we get one at the end of the film anyway.
Kit Rae
Sr Member
I wondered that too, but I'm not taking too much stock in the viral website timeline being canonical to the actual film as it was written long after the film script.
Why were the engines on the Prometheus always on when it was depicted as traveling only in a straight line? Shouldn't it just accelerate at a desired velocity, stabilize the path and than cut off engines and let inertia take over?
Remember how in ALIEN we only saw the Nostromo's main engines fire up once before it was going to land on LV-426? Remember how the Refinery had three big engines but were never seen being used?
Remember how in ALIEN we only saw the Nostromo's main engines fire up once before it was going to land on LV-426? Remember how the Refinery had three big engines but were never seen being used?
Because it is a science-fiction spaceship, not a real one.
The Nostromo is a ludicrous design, love it though I do. Why (and how) does it have to suffer such huge thrust and structural penalties from those absurd angled landing thrusters? When it burns to land on LV 426 why does it apparently accelerate? If it has just parked the refinery in orbit then it should *decelerate* in order to drop out of orbit.
Incidentally, the Refinery has no engines of its own. The three biggest ones on Nostromo socket into it and burn through thrust tunnels that run through the core of the platform.
The Nostromo is a ludicrous design, love it though I do. Why (and how) does it have to suffer such huge thrust and structural penalties from those absurd angled landing thrusters? When it burns to land on LV 426 why does it apparently accelerate? If it has just parked the refinery in orbit then it should *decelerate* in order to drop out of orbit.
Incidentally, the Refinery has no engines of its own. The three biggest ones on Nostromo socket into it and burn through thrust tunnels that run through the core of the platform.
Oh. I was more interested in consistency than actual reality.
