Prometheus Secrets Revealed: What Did David Say to the Engineer?
Of the many, many unexplained puzzles left untangled in Ridley Scott's Prometheus, one deliberately vague scene has had Prometheus-watchers scratching their heads and speculating for weeks — let's call it the "Lost in Translation" question. So what did Michael Fassbender's David say, in non-translated ancient alien-speak, to a certain you-know-who in Prometheus? Actual answers within!
Spoilers follow.
Over at The Bioscopist blog, Stu Holmes was wondering the same question when he managed to track down the real-life linguistics expert who served as consultant on the film, Dr. Anil Biltoo of London's SOAS Language Centre. Biltoo not only taught Fassbender how to speak in Proto-Indo-European (PIE) language as the android David — seen studying ancient communication as the crew sleeps in the film's opening measures — he also appeared onscreen as the holographic linguistics teacher David learns from as he recites the real-life text Schleicher's Fable, a story created in 1868 in the reconstructed PIE language.
While Scott, Damon Lindelof, and Co. remain mum about Prometheus's many open-ended provocations, Biltoo revealed what it is that David whispers to the Engineer at the end of the film, setting off the being's violent rampage:
The line that David speaks to the Engineer (which is from a longer sequence that didn’t make the final edit) is as follows:
/ida hmanəm aɪ kja namṛtuh zdɛ:taha/…/ghʷɪvah-pjorn-ɪttham sas da:tṛ kredah/
A serviceable translation into English is:
‘This man is here because he does not want to die. He believes you can give him more life’.
Aha! So... according to Dr. Biltoo, David did as directed by Weyland, with no funny business involved. I'd entertained the thought that David had deliberately provoked the Engineer into attacking Weyland, but Biltoo sets the record, and David, straight: A loyal robot to the end. Kinda. The revelation also supports the idea that the Engineers were set on punishing humanity for their flaws and hubris, though why the Engineer then tore off David's head is still a mystery.
More intriguing is what Dr. Biltoo shares about that scene: There was a full conversation in the PIE language between David and the Engineer. "We’re all going to have to wait for the director’s cut to see if the conversation between the Engineer and David — and there was indeed originally a conversation, not merely an utterance from David — yields any fruit," he said.
How does the David revelation affect your thoughts on Prometheus? Sound off below.
[The Bioscopist via Rope of Silicon]
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Comments
Well, that certainly adds to all the Blade Runner comparisons I've been reading. Interesting....
I always just assumed Scott was referencing the same scene in Blade Runner, though with the tables turned in the outcome :
Essentially David delivers Weyland's message "I wan't more life, Fucker!"
That's the other great thing about David : he's designed to look like us, so that we feel more comfortable around him - but what that actually leads to, is that we project our misunderstandings of his actions as a growing sense of malevolence on his part.
There are a number of times that he misinterprets human (and alien behaviour) and in the process of trying to fit in, comes across as sinister, rather than just socially awkward.
He's always actually playing by the rules of robotics - though sometimes arguably in the grandest sense, the needs of the many outweighing the needs of the few.
"The trick is, not minding that it hurts."
I always thought the reason why the Engineer tore off David's head was because he's disgusted and angered by the fact that David was a robot. After David spoke to the Engineer, the alien looked at David with some kind of admiration in his eyes. Then, he touched the robot's hair...as if a proud parent touching his new born baby. Then, he realized what he's touching was robotic! Humanity....creation of the Engineer...also was about to be wipped out completely 2000 years ago was capable of creating their own "products"...and without the needs to scarface themselves! That just pissed off the Engineer....so he torn off David's head.
Whatever. With or without this knowledge, the movie still sucked.
Exactly... poor characters and a sloppy script. What a waste.
I loved the movie and have gone back five times, but I suck to. Especially anything over six inches. But my serious comment is that I thought he was just trying to lift/strangle him and becuase of the engineers strength, David's head popped off. It usred to happen to me with my sister' Barbies.
I love this comment.
saw it 3 times loved it can't wait for the bluray
Why do engineers need helmets where humans don't? If the DNAis a match, why do we look so different? Why did he come back for Noomi after the crash, but not before? And what about the guy who says you're throwing away 300 years of science, or something like that? Doesn't anyone want to explain how it turned out that everything we know about human evolution is wrong and Zechariah Sitchin was not really just a crckpot charlatan.
The whole point of the opening sequence was that the engineers-as-creators idea doesn't clash with the theory of evolution. Evolution doesn't prescribe how the DNA got started, just that it evolved once it was up and running. Folks are so sensitive about their precious theory these days...
Yeah, I never found it to conflict with evolution either. The opening scene is of an engineer sacrificing himself, and his dna breaks up, then reassembles in the water in a different configuration.
As far as the engineers needing helmets, you have to remember that there was an outbreak. Perhaps they momentarily shut down their terraform systems to see if they might help stop the spread of the infection as well as potentially kill the monsters as well.
What I like about this film is that, unlike a lot of other science fiction films, it doesn't play into what it's genre normally does, which is that it doesn't spell out the explanations for why certain things can work or why. It leaves a great amount of speculation up to the viewer instead of delivering an explanation artificially.
No one ever bitched this much about the very first Alien movie. They accepted it and ALL its flaws and plots holes and poor character niches. I love the Alien franchise. I do my homework on shit before opening my mouth, unlike every other asshole who finds a conflict with something they can't comprehend.
actually, when Alien first came out, it was met with the same kind of attitude that this film is getting now, it didn't become a cult hit until later...I just watched all the Alien movies from 1 and then Prometheus, I think Scott did a good job tying it all together despite the fact that he didn't have the reins of the franchise the entire time.
Truth is; a LOT of people bitched about the original movie... Many people had questions and (remember) the original film stood alone. l don't think that Scott worries about fans having questions. He wanted to provoke debate and he needs interest in order to write & film the sequel. I believe this is a 3 movie deal. I was unhappy about the most obvious stuff; no translation of the alien speak, the dumb biologist touching the space cobra, the unexplained drink spiking and the Captain coming up with his theory without ever having seen the inside of the alien ship. I hate crappy writing and there was plenty of it. I'm going to write to Ridley asking him to write his OWN sequel and leave idiots out of the process. Art cannot be put together by committee and I think that's what happened to this movie.
Stand alone or not, this is a great movie that makes you have to think like a detective in order to get what is going on or has gone one. Very intelligent script that is not normal in today's crappy movie making for moron's. Every single thing in this movie has an explanation (much better than the original Alien).
Someone asked why David spiked the guys drink (after asking him how far he would go). See for me that explains it. How far wiil you go to get the answers... here drink this, it's what it was meant for, lets see what happens. Remember that these android's always have a mandate with no real protocal to get that mandate done. There are really no questions here for me as they were all answered if you just use common sense.
PLeople are thinking because of these movies, that means they are growing. How many movies can actually do that, make people move intellectually, become smarter from a two hour movie.
He has the same message that Q had for Captain Picard in the last episode "All good things".
Q: Exactly. For that one fraction of a second, you were open to options you had never considered. *That* is the exploration that awaits you. Not mapping stars and studying nebulae, but charting the unknown possibilities of existence.
Good job and kudos to Ridley Scott.
Whatever. The 1st movie had nothing to be compared to as apart of a franchise. It set the precedence. The whole alternate universe talk is a cop out. There was no reason for it to be this ridiculous. The racism folded in was unnecessary as well. With all the scientific and archeological data we know pointing that all life sprung from melanated people in Africa proper to be chucked away for an ancient alien theory of nonmeanated steroidal aliens who now want to decimate life on earth starting with the sprung (as David amply showed) was enough for me. But hey we had a black ships captain that made it all good.
Here, let's all do something since we either can't look past the obvious fuck ups and lack of important detail and instead of continually whine about what should've been to what never was and write, produce and fund our own fan film for a "what could've/should've been" a better introduction for the Alien/Predator franchise and lore. What do you guys say?
He also appeared onscreen as the holographic linguistics teacher David learns from as he recites the real-life text Schleicher's Fable, a story created in 1868 in the reconstructed PIE language.
Well Weyland did just direct David to "tell him why we're here" so I thought the untranslated dialogue was obvious.
Same here. Just saw the movie and it was pretty easy to understand. Movie audiences are getting dumber and dumber if people are confused about this movie. The reason the Engineer got pissed off and went to destroy humanity is when he found out humanity had the power to travel to other worlds but were only interested in selfish goals.
That is basically my interpretation, too. Engineers created or planted humans on earth (and probably other lifeforms on Earth), not out of "love" or "cause they could" but to do experiments on. But look, they were doing an experiment with Earth it seems, not just using individual humans as slaves or guinea pigs. And it seems that as they were constructing their next phase, things went wrong for them. When Big Dude woke up and saw the humans standing there - he realizes how long he's been asleep, and that their destruction of Earth never took place, that the humans were able to "evolve" into great technological capability.
He may have "hated" the humans - or he might have just realized "We didn't wipe out the rodents and now they're on my ship!?!? The admiral's gonna be pretty pissed! I'll take my anger out on these stupid things then go clean up this mess {destroy/corrupt-the-DNA of the Earth/humans}."
No, if it was just an experiment one of them wouldn't sacrifice himself to be part of the new people on earth. Obviously if he drank the DNA cocktail, he knew he was dieing for it and would be reborn in a thousand lifetimes on earth. It's more religious than that if you will. So saying that, earth wasn't just an experiment. Would you kill yourself for an experiment? No, you would if you were contibuting to a new race though... very deep meaning behind that self sacrifice on early earth.
wans't the dead alien 2000 years old or something? long before man's space travel nd even some of the more horrific events of humanity.
They shouldnt have to explain the timeline because it is self evident. 2000 years ago a faction of the engineers decided for whatever reason that Mankind was a threat and needed to be purged before they evolved further. It's obvious that even at the birth of Christ (and who was Christ? could be that Christ was actually an engineer that we turned on and killed, so that is the reason they decided to wipe out mankind). Whatever the reason, the decision was made by only a handful of engineers to wipe us out. Not the engineers on the whole. Unless their little biotech got out on their homeworld and wiped them out. Either way they obviously didn't come after us again.
I see a lot of people referencing "Jesus" as to being an engineer. Funny. Yes, I think I should present that idea at the next Church meeting here locally. "Your GOD is an Alien!" I love it. LOL
As for a lot of comments about the Engineer in the beginning "Self Sacrifice" and knowing he would be reborn? Knowing they were creating life? No. Nope sorry.
Lemme lay down the law here. You don't create a Bio-Weapon that can eradicate life all the way down to breaking the molecular peptide chains in DNA and KNOW you'll create life from it. The Bio-Weapon was made the ELIMINATE ALL LIFE, Specifically ENGINEER LIFE. The engineer guy may have drank that shit willingly as a test subject, guinea pig, maybe he was living a life sentence for porking the head guys daughter or something, who cares! The point is, The Alien craft watched until he drank. After that they got the hell out of dodge and left him to die. DIE. Gone. Kaput! They weren't sitting around watching for new life! THAT was an Accident.
So for everyone who keeps spouting that the engineers created humans on purpose, You're wrong and the evidence is clear. In the land of Fantasy Film - I'm shattering your reality of hope and some sense of belonging. Realize that REALITY is not this film. But the film is made well (For the most part) You are not in the film. Your life experiences are not deemed unworthy just because I claim that in the movie, humans were an accident. And if you take offense still, then I take that back. Maybe you were an accident.
But my opinion still stands because, as it is, I live in the United States and I'm entitled to an opinion, and entitled to tell everyone else theirs is BS as well! I love it.
P.S. feel free to call me on my BS as well. I recently watched the movie again, and found some things out I was in error about. the planet is LV-426, not 429. And the beheaded engineer's body was carbon dated as being dead for 2000 years. So timeline approved. It was in the movie. Too bad the last engineer in the stasis cell didn't wake up sometime during that 2000 year sleep and finish off the rest of earth huh... wonder why...
@Kerry Robert Williams Jr
Here's some common sense dolled out for those that do not have it:
People make reference to Jesus because they put the time exactly at 2000 years (when Jesus was walking around), uh duh.. ok so that is out of the way.
So an alien (engineer) who is smart enough to build a ship and fly light years to our planet woudlnt have a clue as to what he was drinking (that is why he drops his robe in the cold and drinks it in his underwear, right)? And no, the ship is leaving once they see he's made it to the waterfall.
The same nuclear technology we use for energy could be used to destroy our planet ten times over. So yeah I'm sure the biotech he drank to create life on earth could be used for weapons (and they state that in the movie and you still don't get it). It was on purpose and was self sacrifice. He disrobes and drinks the stuff in his underwear. Derp!
So you don't think they were monitoring what was going on, on earth after they flew away? It would take millions of years to see the outcome from the results of that drink he drank
What did you think, a human pops up at the base of the waterfall and starts walking around? What would he eat? What shelter would he have? How would he breed?
What that guy drank started ALL life on earth with the map to "someday" "possibly" become "mankind" through evolution. They watched and came back to study/monitor/watch us (hence why they find evidence in caves).
Geeze.. lay down some logic instead of suedo law..
We share DNA because we are the same, because this advanced race knew what they were doing, not poisoning a guinnea pig, but adding the beginnings of life on earth.
He couldn't have set an alarm, he had to wait until someone opened it, what would he do if the bioweapons were still out there when he woke up?. Derp!
They show videos of engineers running from something, from their own weapon that was let loose on them, by someone who wanted to stop the destruction of earth. Yes one of their own kind turned on them to stop it. Because someone on that ship didn't agree with killing us 2000 yrs ago. Derp!
So to pop your small brain bubble, you just dont get it. Natural selection has been taken out of our gene pool, obviously it shows here in this forum.
And yes, you like many here in the U.S. are entitled to have no intellect, common sense or logic. Enjoy that 🙂
Spot on...nice.
I can't understand why guy peirce as mr weyland was made up to look old, why didn't they use an older actor? Or was it because there was to become some youthful transformation of his character, I'm a little lost.
There was going to be a scene where David looked in on Weyland's dreams while he was in cryo, just as he did with Shaw. He was going to see a young Weyland on his yacht, cavorting with women, etc., but the scene was dropped and Guy Pearce was already signed on to play the role.
Weyland was a trillionaire. I don't know how accurate this is resource is ("http://alienanthology.wikia.com/wiki/Alien_Universe_Timeline), which is why he was able to fund such a project. His wealth was acquired from a life of innovative research and discovery in science. Wealthy and old, but not necessarily successful?
If you remember from the Alien movies, particularly, Alien 2, and 3, BISHOP - The Android - is created in the Image of Weyland. The Actor that played Bishop is much older now, and could not fill the part I'm sure. So a new actor was brought in to portray Weyland in Prometheus, and undoubtedly will have a full memory scan (as they can watch their dreams at that point) and will for the future of the company, probably step in and act as if he is actually Weyland in the next movie.
Some on earth might know what the mission was, and in the best interests of the company, The next son of Weyland may have been given orders to assume control of the company under certain directives, should the actual father Weyland not return.
In Alien Vs. Predator, Mrs. Yutani, the head of a global weapons dealership, obtains one of the predators shoulder cannons... Thats a biggie.
Weyland corp ends up purchasing and merging with Yutani Industries creating Weyland Yutani - "The Company" and I'm sure with the knowledge that the mission to LV-426 never returned, Yutani's influence in the company, and penchant for weaponry, is intrigued. Weyland Yutani contact the Nostromo, and ask them to follow a distress signal... one fabricated by the company. Unknown to them, they set down on LV-426 and get infected by the aliens. The rest you may have seen.
LV-223 is the moon in this story. Like "Back to the Future 3", this branch of the mythology can take us to many places. For example...wouldn't you LOVE to have stellar cartographers take a whack at the Engineers' "planetarium"? I would. Weren't there several other known systems in their database?
Plus, we learned from "AVP" that the LV-426 xenomorph is much older than the one in "Prometheus" and has been on Earth for many thousands of years, and of a different "species".
We've gone 300 years beyond the original "Alien" with "Alien Resurrection", but no mention of contact with either Predators or Engineers has taken place as humanity has moved out into the galaxy. Based upon the events of the "Prometheus" sequel, we may learn what happened to the Engineers (Elizabeth and David give them a little payback, maybe???" but that leaves the Predators unheard of.
At the time of "Prometheus", the derelict on LV-426 had been there long enough for the pilot to have fossilized. Why didn't the Engineers try to find why one of their ships was overdue...or was the derelict their version of the USS Indianapolis?
So many questions...
Let's wrap this up by going back to LV-223 (it's atmosphere is close enough to Earth's that it could be terraformed with plant life) and unmask the reason the Engineers wanted to kill us.
Yeah, I figured The engineer killed the human and David because of his selfish request, proving that man was an epic FAIL and selfishness and greed took over therefore they needed to be eliminated.
Shouldn't have to come get answers from random blogs on the Internet. The movie failed. Awesome special effects and atmosphere but just crap incoherent plot.
Considering that chimpanzees are a 97% DNA match with humans and look much more different than the Engineers, I think they look about perfect for a species that evolved on a totally different planet. I'm guessing they had lower gravity, seeing as they grow so much taller than we do. And re: Guy Peirce is going to show up in a sequel as a younger version---otherwise why go with the 'bad makeup not really old' look?
Correct, and it's been discovered that the gift of speech is made possible by ONE gene in an entire genetic make-up. Of all life on earth, humans are the only carriers. So if we have that one peculiar gene in common, you're probably a human being. So the fact that they looked different didn't really bother me. They said they were human. Not synonymous. More of a vague classification. And really No different than how everyone on earth looks different from each other.
Instead of speculating that Jesus was an Engineer, knowing what we know now the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah fit in very well with this mythology.
I disagree with the Engineers' homeworld being lower in gravity than Earth. In "Andromeda", Dylan Hunt was a "heavy worlder" and was considerably stronger than Earth-born humans. Heavier gravity requires a proportionally stronger frame and strength to move that frame.
I think that what David said was somehow lost in translation, like Sheldon speaking Cantonese.
Still...I couldn't help but watch the movie through the eyes of the Mystery Science Theater crew. It's sad that out-of-the-box the movie was a parody.
knowing that makes the movie make more sense, obviously. Still regrettable that this and other plot points weren't so unclear while i was actually watching the movie.
Actually this movie is starting to make sense when you read the plots for Alien, Aliens, Alien 3, Alien Resurection, Alien vs Predator; Alien vs Predator: Requiem. It will be interesting where they take us in a sequel. How will the Engineers tie into Predator. Read the plot for Alien vs Predator. So it is starting to make sense that the Weyland corporation was also interested in biotechnology not just extending the life of Peter Weyland. The 2 movies of Alien vs Predator are prequels to Aliens.
Someone please read and give some insight to what they think.
AVR and AVP:R aren't canon.
Yeah seriously dude, if you'd actually paid any attention to the avp flix, you'd have noticed that they were essentially just cashing in on two extremely popular horror franchises, same as freddy v jason, i mean, come on ,in avp they refer to the aliens as serpents! They couldn't be more insectoid unless you actually turned them to ants, hive mind,queen, drones need to protect queen (alien 3) i could go on, went off topic a little there, point is avp is NOT part of the alien story
Sadly, AvP is a strong running force of the Alien franchise.
I couldn't disagree more. First, the artistic concepts for Alien and Predator are both H.R. Giger. Saying they just "mixed em up to make a horror movie," shows you might not be familiar with that connection - and that connection is literally the heart of both franchises.
Second, they make movies to make money and to entertain. People really need to understand the "willing suspension of disbelief". Its one thing to point out factual errors in "based on a true story" genre - it's another to tear fiction to shreds because small plot points seem to contradict. If youre gonna use that kind of critical thinking - start applying it to history books, newspapers, and "peer review. I have, and I can tell you - the Alien and Predator franchises have less holes than History channel or Science channel documentaries. I believe a woman can give herself a c-section in a machine before I believe slaves built the Great Pyramids with copper tools as tombs.
Third, I can see pretty clearly how all the Alien and Predator movies came together in Prometheus. Perhaps the Predators are the same as the Engineers, who sought to improve themselves, or became "victims" of one of their experiments gone wrong - or perhaps the Predators are the enemy of the Engineers, the real motivation for their weapons research being a conflict with the Predators. I thought this made sense seeing 1) the size and fighting style (or attitude) of the Engineer gave me the distinct impression of a Predator, and 2) The guy who mutated and started attacking the loading bay crew - he also seemed to have that "Predator" fight in him, as well as a mutated skull that "kinda" looked like a human crossed with a Predator.
Fourth, humans have clearly been engineered, and not very well. To start with, half of them believe we "evolved" from apes, and the other half believe humans started when a magic guy made a clay statue and said "abracadabra!" Despite great potential in each individual, humans are easily misled into harming themselves for the benefit of those harming them. Even just accepting there are more questions than answers would be a huge step forward into common sense for modern humans. Its so bad these days that people actually have no problems with "peer review" telling them how to live and how not to. . . the blind leading the blind. Another mass have no problem being to how to live and how not to by "priests." And these guys don't have to have happy families or successful children or successful marriages - these guys might even be pedophiles - but they quote some old book. Its that easy to fool humans into slaving for one bad interest or another.
But what do I know, I wasted 20 minutes writing a stupid blog comment on a bad movie?
Ridley Scott hates the AVPs. The SciFi channel has made better movies. Predator was great, but it's beneath innovation of Alien.
Anyone else find themselves watching the Prometheus Blu-Ray? Questions are answered!
First and foremost this is science fiction. A great idea to meld the two franchises one the ultimate morph the other the ultimate predator. Human species smack in the middle.
Second it is natural for the rational mind to interpret continuity within the scope of its understanding. In so far as to who mathematically design the pyramids the Egyptians and Nubians (see: lower Egypt if confused.) The manual labor was provided by a combination of The Egyptian empire territories, conquered nations, slaves, roaming tribes like the Hebrews of the time looking for work. Fact. (The Hebrews did not have a nation at the time, according to the old testament and their own Torah. They said god years later told Moses to tell them to commit genocide and take those human beings possessions. Six more times after that by the way.) Don't discredit the African people of that region and their contribution to the achievement of our species. Who showed the Romans how too build? Who showed the Chinese how to build? From the tone of your dialog you must think human construction started with aliens or Europeans.
Third stick to the sci-fi. You were really grooving with the explanations regarding Predators, battle Engineer's incorporation scenario. Although the time continuum has to be tinkered with a little concerning the era. The interpreted story of Predators coming to this small backwater planet when they did, time frame definition was off in AVP. An easy fix really.
Forth. Now I have just wasted 10 min. Writing a reply too someone's comments on a sci-fi film.
Oh sweet mother of heaven if the sequel has anything to do with predator I will kill a bus full of elderly people. That shit Is not canon. Avp and it's offspring are not Canon, the simple idea that they could be is insulting. Look at the ducking plot for avp 2 it was a crappy mainstream horror film. Jesus I'm disgusted just thinking about predator being even remotely cano.
I think it seems to make sense that all of the Engineers' anger stems from mankind not finding life sacred enough. This can have religious undertones if you want, but doesn't have to. All of our murder and warfare, etc, anger them because it's us throwing away life. They know how sacred life is, because they seeded it in the entire universe, flying around and giving their own lives to seed new life. Then here we are, throwing it away. The request from Weyland was just the final kick in the nuts.
I liked the movie. I've seen it twice. The regular one and 3D. Some things I noticed. The alien ship(s) found in the Alien movies was Engineer technology, not the alien creatures. I used to think that the aliens were a space faring species who lost their knowledge and reverted back to savagery.
Also in the opening scene of Prometheus, the guy who drank the stuff and melted. He had on a brown robe kinda like a monk would wear. Maybe he was one of the Engineers priests. Also possibly the Engineers who the Prometheus crew found were military types. If the surviving woman can make it to the engineers homeworld, she may find some not so hostile (initially anyway) engineers to communicate with.
The answer to why there was a change from friendly engineers to hostile engineers may have a very familiar explanation.
Perhaps the engineers that seeded earth and returned to give wisdom and guidance did not have permission to do so. They are to be punished for their misbehavior/hubris by the destruction of earth. The engineers responsible for earth prevent this by unleashing biological weapons on the others.
Seems like a very human scenario to me.
the engineer was probably a random soldier i think he killed them just because he could, he did not even doubt about it... we dont doubt about killing mosquitoes.
Engineers' genes are similar to ours, so they should think like us. The engineers were already under threat by something, based on the panicking holographs and reanimated, exploding head. It's not a great leap to think that they created what was threatening them. When something you've created tries to kill you, you might be inclined to question the wisdom of letting anything you've created continue to live.
Put yourself in the engineer's shoes. All of the sudden some of your creations wake you up from cryostasis, and a life form that your creations created says blah, blah, blah in your native language. What would you do? I would kill everything in the room, lock it down, blast off, and nuke the planet from orbit.
I don't get the hatred for the plot of this movie simply because it is not entirely clear why certain things happened. That is not indicative of a bad movie plot. If a movie has scenes that are demonstrably impossible or very unlikely, then it probably has a bad plot. Prometheus does not have such scenes. The reason people like movies like Prometheus is precisely because they are plausible. Go make another Phantom Menace video review, you trolls!
I believe that what started out as a brilliant concept for a movie/story failed completely in at least the writing and editing stages.
Side character pilot 1 to side character pilot 2 before they ram Prometheus into the alien ship: "Guess that bet's off, huh?" Yes, please reference the bet you made earlier in the movie, which was your only previous memorable line, if not your ONLY other spoken line in the entire movie. Your self-sacrifice for all of humanity means nothing to me. Not even a one-dimensional character, and didn't feel any of the characters made it all the way to the 3rd dimension. A lot of potential, but terrible character development.
Who else cringed at the way Charlize Theron called Weyland "...father!"? Only one of many uncomfortably unsubtle revelations of information from writer to audience throughout the film. Oh, and Weyland made the trip because he's old and doesn't want to die? Wow, didn't see that coming. Cliche enough?
There was no turning back for me once Noomi Rapace and the black captain had their little talk somewhere after halfway through the movie. She had just given birth to an alien monster, and he had just killed the red-headed guy who had come back from the dead and killed a whole lot of people. This talk was RIGHT AFTER these two events, yet neither of them seem shaken or mention these events AT ALL. Then as the captain starts talking and filling her back up with some kind of hope, they cue the cheesy inspirational theme music-- music that DOESN'T FIT the feel of the scene. It's like we got to a climax in the story, and then there's this random lull in the middle of it. That uplifting music shouldn't come back into the film until all these horrible things stop happening at the very end of the movie.
There's all these intense scenes, and then the tension is left behind afterward every time-- no chronic tension at all. No gravitas in a lot of scenes that should have been heavier, made the audience feel a certain way. Events happened too quickly, and there were never really any aftermaths, any consequences.
Great idea for a movie. Terrible execution. Splendid special effects, though. Hope the Director's Cut makes everything flow together more smoothly and makes up for a lot of these shortcomings.
Having the character of co-pilots not well developed wasn't a problem for me. My mind was occupied by the character development of David, Shaw, and Janek.
I generally like Theron, but the Vickers character was a huge disappointment. My favorite worst line was, "You sonaofb$%^h...cut me off" when David turns off his video feed. Her reaction stuck out as the worst acting in the entire movie. There must be something to her weird behavior. David has a robot sister that survived the spacecraft squish?
The Shaw/Janek scene worked for me. Janek was out of breath at the beginning of the scene. Shaw had taken a shot, taken pills, and talked to Weyland since delivering baby Squidward. I call that character development.
I agree that it was more sci-fi than horror--way less tension than Alien. I would not be surprised if they edited it to be less scary to pull more audience. Still, the monsters were pretty amazing. A little snake hyperextends your elbow to break your suit, gets cut in half, squirts acid, grows a new head, and enters your suit. That's bread and butter for an Alien fan.
Your experience was clearly different than mine, but terrible execution is overstating it a bit. Have you forgotten about the execution of other sci-fi prequels? It's like an alien took control of Lucas for the first 3 and left before the last 3, right?!
Ghatanothoa, what you call "character development" is actually a perfect example of something anyone with a shed of intelligence would decry as a GLARING PLOT INCONSISTENCY.
Protagonist extracts monster from own body. Tells no one. Yes, that's exactly what would happen.
Character development my axe...but I guess you thought Millburn's painfully fakey southern accent at the beginning of the film which magically disappeared wasn't terrible execution either...
Toolio, "monster" was a tiny squidward. "Monster" was thought executed via some poison gas. It's not a huge leap to think that Shaw would want to keep her pregnancy private. She was certain she could not trust David. Infected people get torched. Nothing glaring here.
Millburn may as well be Scientist #3. I barely noticed him until he did an excellent job dying. Well done, sir.
There were plenty of plot inconsistencies as there are with most movies, but I think you're looking the wrong places. What about the mapping expert getting lost? That was my favorite.
I guess you missed the part where they went into the temple, and everyone had very little with them. The vehicles stayed outside. At some point David attempts to open a door that had cut off an engineers head. But before he does, he has to get 15 feet into the air. How? Well... the flat space ladder ofcourse! Stowed neatly up his... ahem, facilities, he somehow comes about a full blown Straight Ladder, which the movie shows him set against the wall, climb up, and then start messing with the entry panel. ...maybe it was invisible ladder. I think the book was better. Oh, wait. No book. Therefore, almost the entire movie, written on the fly, and you improvise. I liked it with all it;s faults and inconsistencies. In fact, I'm gonna go watch it again. For some reason, movies like this make me so comfortable, I sleep like a baby afterwards.
I think... and this is nothing more than my mind taking a little day-dream-walk here... in the opening of Prometheus, there is an Engineer standing on the edge of a chasm, beside a waterfall. There is a spaceship in the distance. They are observing. I've seen this scene before. People watching from a protected bunker, from a great distance, safe and secure, watching to see what happens.
The engineer is a volunteer. He is a Guinea Pig, testing a new weapon... a weapon that is designed to infiltrate and combine with the hosts DNA, and then utterly rip it apart on the molecular level. It is a biological weapon. Nothing is hidden. The Engineer removes his robe, sets the dish down, and opens it. The top melts away revealing the biological weapon inside.
Now... I do believe that the Engineers, being a far superior race, (Just look at them) have the muscle, the strength, the stamina, and probably the biological equivalent of a Lamborghini for an immune system. Quick regeneration, advanced metabolism, super fast healing... But this biological weapon is designed to defeat all of that.
The Engineer drinks it down, fully expecting it to be another failure... or maybe something painful, or agonizing even, but NOTHING has ever killed one of them before other than total obliteration, physically.
The weapon takes hold... the engineer feels it;s affects quicker and stronger than anything before... the stuff surges through him, overwhelming his body's defenses. He falters, he stumbles, grabs his head... Now he realizes that he will not survive. The weapon is perfect... he falls forward as his leg disintegrates under his remaining weight. He hits the water...
They show his DNA strand as it becomes infected, and shreds into pieces. The weapons has destroyed him, down to the very last cell... But it hasn't.
You see moments later a DNA Snippet, untouched by the biological weapon, and protected by the swirling water... it repairs itself, and divides... and divides, regenerating as best as it can... The beginning of life anew... the beginning of mankind.
The engineers did not create us on purpose. We are their unwanted children, rejects, half of their whole. We are the race that has come near to total extinction time after time, and yet we survive.
The cave painting were not an invitation. They were a warning. Death comes from the heavens. Death comes from this place. Do not go there. And if they come... Run and Hide. Hide and Survive. Only death follows.
And I would suspect that HUMANS are the least of the engineers competition in the universe. We've already seen the predators, and their stature. Could they be derived from the engineers? Nah, but a rival race? Sure. And they train on the proving grounds called earth. The same place the engineers periodically try to wipe out. The same place the engineers tested their weapon. And they train against the creature that was unleashed by that weapons offspring created by it's genetic impregnation of an engineer itself... The Alien Species.
Anything I left out? If you ask me questions, I might be able to explain what I think. I'm not associated with the production of writing of any of the materials. I just love to write and create. Hit me up!
Luv the comments here. I'll include that the dead engineers here died 2000 yrs ago and seem to have been in the process of building up enough bio-weapon in the cargo bay to unleash on earth.
But why?
I've read elsewhere that it being Christmas is supposed to mean something. Multiple earth cultures from multiple time periods have encountered the engineers. which means they must have visited earth many times to witness/lead our development. They would have been seen by pre-tech earthlings as gods, or at least important leaders. And these god-like leaders repeatedly mention a place (that gets drawn as a star location). But apparently something happened 2000 years ago that caused the engineers to no longer think us worthy of life. I've read speculation that perhaps Jesus was one of these engineers. Along our development we invented weaponry and fought war after war among ourselves. And along the way these leaders may have tried in vain to turn us away from constant warring. And 2000 years ago we turned on one (or more) of them and crucified Jesus. So they may have then determined that this particular bio experiment (mankind) was a failure and decided to wipe the planet and start fresh.
So at their long term bio-engineering facility they build up a cargo full of "planet wiping bio-weapon"... but something goes wrong and the weapon gets free. The engineers would then have either done something to fight/limit/eradicate the bio-weapon and/or leave. Making the atmosphere toxic could probably have gone a long way towards limiting/preventing/eradicating the bio-weapon. The engineers fought back in the toxic environment wearing helmets to breath. Many engineers are killed in the process (pile in corridor with chest wounds). Hopefully all of the bio-weapons are either contained or destroyed. The few engineers left trapped in the toxic environment, use stasis chambers to survive in the only manner left to them.
2000 years go by. The only bio weapon remaining in this facility are contained. The atmospheric generators have begun to stabilize a localized atmosphere. Mankind arrives and accidentally unleashes the contained bio weapon. The grand bio engineer awakens and meets us for the first time, and three things seem to happen.
1- He recognizes us as "offspring" but disdains our petty reasons for the journey
2- He recognizes that he cannot risk us spreading the bio-weapon.
3- He of the "builders of life" comes face to face with an artificial-non-life created by these intellectually stunted offspring.
He disposes of everyone present he can get his hands on, and proceeds to complete his mission. His ship is blown out of the sky. He analyzes the situation and decides to finish the job of disposing of the offsspring before anything else. But never makes it to whatever he would have done after that. Presumably he would have tried to complete his mission using another of the remaining engineer ships.
The "engineer alien" tore off the robot's head and killed everyone when he talked to him because it was inevitable with this particular alien, no matter what you said to him, because his mission was to destroy all human life on earth. We were the biological threat deemed too high to let live. We were too much like them, and would possibly surpass them or match them some day. This was a military installation, and that alien killed everyone when he realized who and what we were.
*Also to add to the plot further, there seemed to be some kind of mutiny(this is why there was a pile of alien bodies and video of them running away from a threat). There was a fight between those that wanted us to be obliterated, and those that saught to protect us. Their weapons didn't get out and destroy them accidentally, one (or more) of them unleashed it to stop the human killing faction (and succeeded) from purging human life on earth. Until we showed up and opened his life support, helping him to wake up to complete his mission to destroy life on earth again.
This prequel explains everything having to do with all the following sequels. Even the Predator movies. There are many planets with alien life (throughout the known universe/beyond) that have evolved themselves and their technology, DNA being the key manipulative factor (they even advance themselves through DNA enhancement). I suspect that the Predator race and the human like (our DNA match/predating ours) aliens were enemies, and that there are planetary wars where whole worlds are raped of life with weapons like the cache we see in these ships on this military hub on planet G.
The opening scene is earth prior to any intelligent life, and as with any race there are good people who want to create life (in this case their own image by drinking a cocktail of DNA meta. and falling into the waterfall to spread the beginnings of new life.), and those that are bent on destroying it if it holds a threat (and we all know military minds see everything as a threat, especially their own shadow or the dark).
The key factor to take into consideration here is that this alien race created bio weapons of mass destruction. You could say that we (human beings sharing their DNA) are the most dangerous organism they could dream up. Hence, that would be a good reason to destroy all human life on earth. We were evolving (and at about the time of 1 A.D.), they could see we would progress into a technological threat with the means to explore space and deliver similar weapons upon them, so they (possibly a military arm of their society/government) decided to strike first.
One thing I've learned over the years about people around me that relates to this is the fact that if they pass judgement on me, think I am capable of something horrific, when it isnt true at all, it is because they themselves are that way. It's what we know about ourselves that makes us afraid.
*"The predators" have a right of passage, they believe that they must prove out their genes as true and strong by pitting themselves against the greatest known bio weapon created, the "ALIENS" or "Genomorphs", at the age of ascension. Thereby keeping their race strong through the process of "natural selection".
There is much more to the connection of humans on earth, the predators and our creators, but I am not going to write a book here. These are my thoughts on why the alien wakes up only to kill everyone.
I tend to agree to the opinion that at first the engineer seemed ok with David's question, up until he touch his hands over David's head (I suspect he might want to tell David by telepathy about the whole history of human creation), but then he realized that David was a robot and from this moment there were many interpretation like others have mentioned here.
There was never any indication that the alien engineers communicated by telepathy. In fact, they had a "Spoken language", you know the one that the david was speaking to the alien engineers? If they had advanced past spoken language to telepathy they would have had no spoken language.
If you look at that scene carefully you'll see malice in his eyes while he's patronizing the human with a stroke on the head. Once he knew who we were (his mission was to destroy us, which is why they were plotted for earth with bioweapons, and he was going to carry it out) he started killing us. And if you think they hate robots, look around their ship, they had all kinds of automated systems.
Okay. Well, I've read a lot about the movie, the language sequence, what David said to the Engineer, etc etc. Here are a couple of points I would like to emphasize for the people wanting to comment.
1.) In the beginning of Prometheus, the Engineer standing on the cliff, whether he is there by his own will or not, test subject or unknowing Guinea Pig, he KNOWINGLY opened a biological container. He watched the surface melt away, and willingly drank it. Okay, fine, good. Then he seems quite amazed, shocked even, that his body cannot metabolize the stuff... it's working, and FAST. He holds his arm up and watches it start to decay. His mind starts to go, he can't stand, his leg crumbles, he's halfway to nothing before he falls in the waterfall. Okay, everyone got that? And then.... in an UNTESTED, Unregulated, without any control situation, environment, some of his DNA start to regenerate. Cells start to multiply. This is not on purpose. This is what happened by accident. Humans. Imperfect offspring born of a will to survive on a cellular level, against biological war and weaponry.
2.) Geiger and Scott both have great ideas for the franchise. Ultimately, this involves three things. Humans, Predators, and Aliens. Maybe now 4, include the Engineers. You cannot say Predators and Aliens are separate. There's been numerous references to both in all the movies. Predators through history have waged war against the aliens as a right of passage on proving grounds with Nuclear weapon failsafes in case they get overwhelmed. These planets are not earth. The Aliens in the Ice temple (Alien Vs Predator - 1) were on earth. So consider that a fact. Aliens are already on earth, and have been so, since... Oh! Gee! Since the Engineer fell into the water! Aliens and Humans both created from the same point.
3.) A safe assumption is to put both Engineers and Predators as warring races. They are both Huge, powerful, one sleek white pasty faces, the other wild ravenous jungle things. One bleeds glowing white, the other glowing green. Maybe, they are both offspring races from another parent race somewhere else in the Universe. Both Engineers and Predators have advanced weaponry, suits, biology, spacecraft, and faster than lightspeed travel.
4.) As far as the Engineers coming to earth on previous occasions... well. Evidence suggests that. The cave paintings. But who is to say that they came in peace? Humans - hehe - have been compared to cockroaches. We will survive, we will find a way. So Maybe the engineers have come before and waged war with the humans, only to be killed or drove back? Or.... maybe the engineers aren't the ones who were making the cave paintings. Maybe Predators were showing humans and warning them of where the Engineers were and to hide if they came. Predators are a warrior race, and they respect warriors, even if they are human. We've seen this in the movies. Danny Glover gets a gun as a trophy. Arnold gets a laugh and a Boom. In A Vs P1, A Predator shows a human how to use an alien skull as a shield against the acid, and the tail as a weapon against the Aliens. It's not too far fetched to think Humans and Predators haven't teemed up before.
5.) Lastly... lets say the Engineers have come back before. They find Humans but they have not come prepared to wipe the planet out. They observe, they watch, they teach a bit, but we are ultimately less than equal. Maybe engineers use us as slaves. Maybe they are the Ancient Egyptian Gods we see in paintings and pyramid carvings. Their Helmets represented by birds or wolves, etc. Then at some point the humans rebel. they kill their gods, and develop weaponry of their own. Now they are a threat to the engineers and they decide to wipe out the humans with the Bioweapon they have had, and continue to make. But at some point the BioWeapon gets unleashed at LV429, and the engineers outside of stasis die. So the wipeout is delayed.
Some questions I have of my own.
1.) If the engineers at LV429 died, why didn't the rest of their race come to clean up? We are talking a lot of years since the mess went down... or are we? remarkably well preserved head of the engineer? Who's to say they didn't die a week before Prometheus arrived?
2.) If the Engineers wanted to wipe out earthlings, even if they had an incident at a weapon manufacturing facility, why didn't they move on that? Seems to me like the idea that the misshap incident on LV429 was more recent than we think.
3.) But then after that. it's Many years between that and the arrival of the Nostromo... and then more years of processing and terraforming that happen on LV429 before the colonial marines arrive...
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