Prometheus - Spoilery thread of Spoilers

hbi2k wrote:

Yeah, let's create a WHOLE PLANET of whatever monstrosity happens when you infect Engineers with black goo.

Humans?

Just saw it and I loved it. To me this movie has the same basic premise as the first two: Weyland Corp. wants something. They send an expendable crew with the wrong people/tools for the fake job they're given along with a synthetic which has the real mission. The crew is picked so they hopefully won't get in the way, and might even unknowingly be steered into helping things along.

David's job is simple. Use the hand-picked crew to discover as much as he can about the engineers and arrange a meeting between them and Weyland if possible. This is for the express purpose of extending Weyland's life - or at least to let him see his creators before he dies. From the first scene with the 'geologist', it seemed to me like - other than a couple of mission critical positions - these folks weren't chosen because they're "employee of the month" types. They were more likely chosen based on their psych profile and the ability to steer them into situations where they will further Weyland's actual goal. David had years to read into their subconscious thoughts and decide how best to use them.

Through some trumped-up glitches in technology and 'whoops' moments, David is able to get the crew to mostly do what he wants. The synthetic human accomplishes his mission. Unfortunately the engineer only appears to see an uppity creation that has grown conceited enough to expect answers of its creators, and has developed the technology to become a threat.

I think it's fine that the characters don't matter in a movie which is essentially saying that humanity doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things. The idea of our importance in the universe is a conceit. The thought that we can somehow have all of the answers is one, too. Those conceits help us in some ways and hinder us in others, but ultimately we're still fooling ourselves as we tend to do in a lot of the make-believe structures that we create for humans to live, work, and play in.

LouZiffer wrote:

Great stuff!

Bravo! I love that summary.

WipEout wrote:

I assumed she meant to append "ask questions" with "and then f*ck up their world."

With the question being: "How do ya like them apples?"

By the way, I also loved the moment when the immensely expensive surgery unit stated that it was configured for male anatomy only. It's on Weyland's daughter's lifeboat, or rather... the one she's keeping warm for him.

I forgot to add that this film pretty much put a nail in the coffin regarding my interest in 3D as anything beyond a gimmick that adds nothing to the film other than an additional fee.

It's not that it was badly done in this film. On the contrary, it was quite restrained. But that's the point: If it's not annoying or distracting in some way, I completely forget it even exists after a while.

LouZiffer, while I like your reading of the movie, I think you're putting a layer of intent on top of David that isn't in the script. He's following Weyland's orders, apparently, but he spends most of the time hiding from the crew so he can explore on his own. The only two people he acts on are the archeologists, really.

hbi2k wrote:

Yeah, let's create a WHOLE PLANET of whatever monstrosity happens when you infect Engineers with black goo. That sounds like a REAL bright idea.

Just nuke them from orbit. It's the only way to be sure.

As a reason to do dumb things revenge is a pretty obvious one.

kuddles wrote:

I forgot to add that this film pretty much put a nail in the coffin regarding my interest in 3D as anything beyond a gimmick that adds nothing to the film other than an additional fee.

It's not that it was badly done in this film. On the contrary, it was quite restrained. But that's the point: If it's not annoying or distracting in some way, I completely forget it even exists after a while.

I'm not sure I agree. I think a lot of the impact of the more spectacular scenes was aided, subtly, by the 3D, without making me go, 'Whoa 3D.' It's a real YMMV situation, but my reaction is the opposite to yours, it actually makes me hopeful for 3D as a method of enhancing the work.

So, saw this yesterday. Big fan of Scott in general. Big fan of the first two (maybe three, but relaly two) Alien films. Big fan of Fassbender, and love Idris Elba.

And honestly, I found myself laughing out loud through 2/3rds of the movie. Forget plot holes or inconsistencies, I found the whole thing to be comically terrible. Scene after scene instead of being shocked I just burst out laughing. I wasn't alone in this, I went with two friends, and stone cold sober, we all just found it slasher-pic funny.

I don't think that was the creators intent.

While I can get behind all of the interesting discussion in this thread, I find it hard to actually care much. I would have rather read a book following the same plot and be discussing that, honestly.

The movie was a fun sci-fi action horror thing. Now to business.

1) That monk Engineer in the beginning... He watched the ship carrying the rest of his people away from Earth fly away, then he drinks some goo that breaks him down in to DNA that falls in to the water and from that DNA humanity eventuall evolved. Anyone else make those conclusions?

2) I am also confused by why the Engineers made the starmaps to the weapons factory. Pointing back to their home I would understand. Maybe it was a warning? Although, "See that star that you can't understand or travel to for thousands of years and would never find without my help...don't go there." Worst warning ever. The only thing that makes sense is that it's a trap, although even that trap would only spring on the ship that traveled there.

My theory: It's a long con to teach humans self-reliance. We created you, you found out and thought you had a protector out there, well guess what, we f***ed you over. The universe isn't fair, and thanks to us there are these dangerous a** Aliens out there. Grow up and build more guns.

3) Why did the Engineers create the Aliens in the first place? The Aliens are a pretty freaking effective rung on the evolution chain, so it makes sense that they would make something like that as a result of some biological or medical experiments, but use them as a weapon? The last thing I want to do to my enemy is turn them in to a horde of self-spawning zerg.

The only scenario I can see is if you're fighting a high technology enemy with some nasty weapons. You infect them, them bomb them to dust once they become Aliens who can't operate the anti missile turrets or whatever. Kind of obtuse, but maybe they had a bunch of very advanced enemies who had terrible quarentine proceudres and pattern recognition skills.

lostlobster wrote:

LouZiffer, while I like your reading of the movie, I think you're putting a layer of intent on top of David that isn't in the script. He's following Weyland's orders, apparently, but he spends most of the time hiding from the crew so he can explore on his own. The only two people he acts on are the archeologists, really.

I never said that David overtly manipulates each individual. His interactions with the crew and actions which affected them all appeared to have the same goal in mind, though. I think the crew was likely expected to further Weyland's goal on their own with a few nudges on David's part to help them along. After all, they were selected for that purpose. (Consider today's reality TV and that selection process as a general model.) Also, rightfully or not I attributed several a couple (now that I think more about it) of convenient communication outages to him as he was on the ship and off-screen during them.

Squee9 wrote:

The movie was a fun sci-fi action horror thing. Now to business.

1) That monk Engineer in the beginning... He watched the ship carrying the rest of his people away from Earth fly away, then he drinks some goo that breaks him down in to DNA that falls in to the water and from that DNA humanity eventuall evolved. Anyone else make those conclusions?

I did as well. Although Scott suggests it could be anywhere, the clear implication is that is Earth and the dude just seeded life on it.

Squee9 wrote:

2) I am also confused by why the Engineers made the starmaps to the weapons factory. Pointing back to their home I would understand. Maybe it was a warning? Although, "See that star that you can't understand or travel to for thousands of years and would never find without my help...don't go there." Worst warning ever. The only thing that makes sense is that it's a trap, although even that trap would only spring on the ship that traveled there.

My theory: It's a long con to teach humans self-reliance. We created you, you found out and thought you had a protector out there, well guess what, we f***ed you over. The universe isn't fair, and thanks to us there are these dangerous a** Aliens out there. Grow up and build more guns.

Why point directly to your home? Who knows what/who will be coming for you? Point to some intermediary place, or a single location in a chain of locations. It's a map of a route, not the direct destination. In theory, the waystation they were pointed to would have been manned, but something bad happened...

rabbit wrote:

And honestly, I found myself laughing out loud through 2/3rds of the movie. Forget plot holes or inconsistencies, I found the whole thing to be comically terrible. Scene after scene instead of being shocked I just burst out laughing. I wasn't alone in this, I went with two friends, and stone cold sober, we all just found it slasher-pic funny.

It would've helped if the characters weren't slasher-pic stupid.

If Alien is a haunted house movie in space, Prometheus is a mummy movie on another planet. And like a mummy movie, it's heavily dependent on its characters to behave in impulsive and irrational ways that are entirely at odds with their personalities. Some of the philosophical ideas and characters presented in the movie are interesting, but if the whole thing were re-skinned with a nearly identical plot centered around Atlantis or ancient Egypt, it wouldn't be getting half so many butt-pats.

HedgeWizard wrote:
Squee9 wrote:

The movie was a fun sci-fi action horror thing. Now to business.

1) That monk Engineer in the beginning... He watched the ship carrying the rest of his people away from Earth fly away, then he drinks some goo that breaks him down in to DNA that falls in to the water and from that DNA humanity eventuall evolved. Anyone else make those conclusions?

I did as well. Although Scott suggests it could be anywhere, the clear implication is that is Earth and the dude just seeded life on it.

Perhaps Scott says it could be anywhere because it didn't have to be earth. The engineers were doing this on a number of habitable planets/moons, and the intro describes part of the process that could be involved. Over the course of the movie the characters discover that earth was one of those places.

LouZiffer wrote:
HedgeWizard wrote:
Squee9 wrote:

The movie was a fun sci-fi action horror thing. Now to business.

1) That monk Engineer in the beginning... He watched the ship carrying the rest of his people away from Earth fly away, then he drinks some goo that breaks him down in to DNA that falls in to the water and from that DNA humanity eventuall evolved. Anyone else make those conclusions?

I did as well. Although Scott suggests it could be anywhere, the clear implication is that is Earth and the dude just seeded life on it.

Perhaps Scott says it could be anywhere because it didn't have to be earth. The engineers were doing this on a number of habitable planets/moons, and the intro describes part of the process that could be involved. Over the course of the movie the characters discover that earth was one of those places.

I agree with that entirely.

Squee9 wrote:

I am also confused by why the Engineers made the starmaps to the weapons factory. Pointing back to their home I would understand. Maybe it was a warning? Although, "See that star that you can't understand or travel to for thousands of years and would never find without my help...don't go there." Worst warning ever. The only thing that makes sense is that it's a trap, although even that trap would only spring on the ship that traveled there.

I'm not convinced it's meant to be a weapons factory, though. The beginning of the film establishes that the material can be used to create life of all kinds, including humans. There is just something involving the circumstances of the events of the film (open to interpretation) where the only life being created at this point seems to be hostile creatures.

kuddles wrote:
Squee9 wrote:

I am also confused by why the Engineers made the starmaps to the weapons factory. Pointing back to their home I would understand. Maybe it was a warning? Although, "See that star that you can't understand or travel to for thousands of years and would never find without my help...don't go there." Worst warning ever. The only thing that makes sense is that it's a trap, although even that trap would only spring on the ship that traveled there.

I'm not convinced it's meant to be a weapons factory, though. The beginning of the film establishes that the material can be used to create life of all kinds, including humans. There is just something involving the circumstances of the events of the film (open to interpretation) where the only life being created at this point seems to be hostile creatures.

This is the link I needed. It makes sense that they have a stockpile of hyper-evolution fluid, then later that evolution fluid evolves in to the Aliens by mistake. This solves the map issue by making it not a map to a weapons facility, but just a regular facility with some proof hanging around that the Engineers made humans.

It also solves my issue of the Aliens as a weapon. They weren't a weapon, they were an evolution fluid that evolved dangerously.

Next issue, why did the Engineer immediately attack the humans?

Squee9 wrote:
kuddles wrote:
Squee9 wrote:

I am also confused by why the Engineers made the starmaps to the weapons factory. Pointing back to their home I would understand. Maybe it was a warning? Although, "See that star that you can't understand or travel to for thousands of years and would never find without my help...don't go there." Worst warning ever. The only thing that makes sense is that it's a trap, although even that trap would only spring on the ship that traveled there.

I'm not convinced it's meant to be a weapons factory, though. The beginning of the film establishes that the material can be used to create life of all kinds, including humans. There is just something involving the circumstances of the events of the film (open to interpretation) where the only life being created at this point seems to be hostile creatures.

This is the link I needed. It makes sense that they have a stockpile of hyper-evolution fluid, then later that evolution fluid evolves in to the Aliens by mistake. This solves the map issue by making it not a map to a weapons facility, but just a regular facility with some proof hanging around that the Engineers made humans.

It also solves my issue of the Aliens as a weapon. They weren't a weapon, they were an evolution fluid that evolved dangerously.

Next issue, why did the Engineer immediately attack the humans?

I think no matter what, the Engineer attacked because of whatever David said. If his intention was always to attack humans, why did he simply stand there until David said something? That, and whatever David said clearly startled the guy into action.

ClockworkHouse wrote:
rabbit wrote:

And honestly, I found myself laughing out loud through 2/3rds of the movie. Forget plot holes or inconsistencies, I found the whole thing to be comically terrible. Scene after scene instead of being shocked I just burst out laughing. I wasn't alone in this, I went with two friends, and stone cold sober, we all just found it slasher-pic funny.

It would've helped if the characters weren't slasher-pic stupid.

If Alien is a haunted house movie in space, Prometheus is a mummy movie on another planet. And like a mummy movie, it's heavily dependent on its characters to behave in impulsive and irrational ways that are entirely at odds with their personalities. Some of the philosophical ideas and characters presented in the movie are interesting, but if the whole thing were re-skinned with a nearly identical plot centered around Atlantis or ancient Egypt, it wouldn't be getting half so many butt-pats.

To be fair, the characters in Alien weren't overly intelligent either.
One of your coworkers has been attacked by an unknown alien organism that stuck an appendage down his throat for a while and then died. Do you:
A) Give him a thorough medical examination to make sure the alien didn't leave anything behind.
B) Quarantine him.
C) Decide everything's fine and go eat dinner.

Squee9 wrote:

Next issue, why did the Engineer immediately attack the humans?

Think of it this way:

He is clearly part of a civilization that believes in the power of self-sacrifice and who created the humans. In fact, they literally gave up their lives to create them. Something in the relationship with humans went horribly wrong, to the point where they wanted to exterminate us, and also resulted in his crewmates all being dead and him being frozen for thousands of years.

He's awakened by not only a human, but a smug businessman who doesn't give a damn about anything other than to say "If you don't mind, I would like some immortality."

The entire film seems to revolve around the fact that we as humans just naturally assume we're the centre of the universe and there is something special about us, and refusing to take any other perspective.

muttonchop wrote:

To be fair, the characters in Alien weren't overly intelligent either.
One of your coworkers has been attacked by an unknown alien organism that stuck an appendage down his throat for a while and then died. Do you:
A) Give him a thorough medical examination to make sure the alien didn't leave anything behind.
B) Quarantine him.
C) Decide everything's fine and go eat dinner.

Oh, totally. I'm not saying that Alien is free of stupid decisions, but Prometheus is positively jam-packed with them. At the very least, Alien has the excuse that its characters aren't trained scientists but, in Ridley Scott's words, "space truckers."

Although didn't Ash give Kane a post-alien examination and said everything was okay? Or did I make that up to cover a plot hole?

I'm with you so far Kuddles, but...

The Engineers want to destroy humanitiy, sure. So if it's a weapons facility I'm back at the, "why draw a map to your weapons depot?" problem.

If that stuff isn't a weapon, why is he flying it to Earth to destroy the humans?

Another industry person comments on Prometheus.

I would LOVE to have been in that "story department of a major studio" and heard the conversation deconstructing the movie.

Squee9 wrote:

I'm with you so far Kuddles, but...

The Engineers want to destroy humanitiy, sure. So if it's a weapons facility I'm back at the, "why draw a map to your weapons depot?" problem.

If that stuff isn't a weapon, why is he flying it to Earth to destroy the humans?

Much like a claw hammer isn't a weapon by design, there are properties to each that allow them to be used for nefarious purposes, and no properties to either that prevent such usage.

2) I am also confused by why the Engineers made the starmaps to the weapons factory.

I took that it's not weapons factory, just an outpost of Engineers. And the "map" basically is like label "Made by Outpost X-32whatever"

3) Why did the Engineers create the Aliens in the first place? The Aliens are a pretty freaking effective rung on the evolution chain, so it makes sense that they would make something like that as a result of some biological or medical experiments, but use them as a weapon? The last thing I want to do to my enemy is turn them in to a horde of self-spawning zerg.

Actually, I could see such a weapon working. It's actually kinda elegant. First, it assimilates all the life on planet, using native dna to adapt perfectly to the new world. Once the Aliens have overrun the world after couple of years, Engineers either spray something or trigger in some other way a very specific trigger which kills all the Aliens. They are genetic witch doctors, they certainly have worked a "backdoor" in their genetic code. An off button. So it's not even so much a weapon as cleaning solution for Petri dish the size of a planet.

After the Aliens assimilate all life on the planet, the Engineers send in a special breed of Xenomorph-eating gorilla. Then, when wintertime rolls around, the gorillas simply freeze to death.

Most wrote:

So it's not even so much a weapon as cleaning solution for Petri dish the size of a planet.

And it's organic!

kuddles wrote:
Squee9 wrote:

Next issue, why did the Engineer immediately attack the humans?

Think of it this way:

He is clearly part of a civilization that believes in the power of self-sacrifice and who created the humans. In fact, they literally gave up their lives to create them. Something in the relationship with humans went horribly wrong, to the point where they wanted to exterminate us, and also resulted in his crewmates all being dead and him being frozen for thousands of years.

He's awakened by not only a human, but a smug businessman who doesn't give a damn about anything other than to say "If you don't mind, I would like some immortality."

The entire film seems to revolve around the fact that we as humans just naturally assume we're the centre of the universe and there is something special about us, and refusing to take any other perspective.

Sounds good, but needs something about Pinocchio's daddy issues and the lack of subtitles. I think David probably said something to set him off, but there's no way to be sure what exactly it was.

Well I don't think any of the stupid decisions were out of character at all. I think it has been said before that these people were picked for specific reasons and being careful wasn't one of them.

They were all prone to rash decisions based on their guiding motivation. Some were beholden to money. Others were beholden to discovery. Others were beholden to prove their importance. Others were beholden to the need to prove their wild theory correct.

Vickers may have been the most rational but she was there to be present when her father failed. And when the father's dream proved true, she was there to watch it blow up in his face.

fangblackbone wrote:

Well I don't think any of the stupid decisions were out of character at all. I think it has been said before that these people were picked for specific reasons and being careful wasn't one of them.

They were all prone to rash decisions based on their guiding motivation. Some were beholden to money. Others were beholden to discovery. Others were beholden to prove their importance. Others were beholden to the need to prove their wild theory correct.

Vickers may have been the most rational but she was there to be present when her father failed. And when the father's dream proved true, she was there to have it land on her face.

FTFY