I'm still curious about the relief of the xenomorph on the wall myself. If they're just supposed to be another bio-weapon or black goo mutation, why are they the only ones that share the same Giger-esque ribbing and bio-mechanical look as the Engineers? In the "Art of" book, Ridley talks about the mutations taking on the form of their hosts, but it was shown pretty clearly in the movie that the bio-mechanical detail was only part of a bio-suit, and the Engineers look much more human underneath. So I don't think the xenomorphs could have gotten it that way. Maybe they were some kind of special creation the Engineers patterned after themselves or something. Or maybe they even come from the same home planet...
Maybe the Xenomorphs aren't bio-engineered weapons at all. Maybe they're just an organism that the Engineers know about. Those big vases were just full of xenomorph sperm.
Was wondering that myself. It is possible that, in order to successfully sacrifice themselves for the creation of new life via the black goo, they had to purge some inner demon/all negative energy. Perhaps the mural of the proto-xenomorph is a warning to the Engineers, what could happen if any negative energy remained within them and attempted to use the black goo without being properly prepared. The facehugger/squid thing that came out of Shaw definitely had the same pointy-headed look to it that the proto-Alien had (matching the mural), so it could already be considered corrupt. The corrupt nature of humans had infected Holloway's "seed" and was further corrupted when gestating within Shaw. The squid further carried that corruption to the Engineer at the end who, himself, may have also been one of the corrupted "fallen angels" of that race that wanted to see our entire species extinguished. What we see emerge from his guts is the result of that collective corruption and negative energy, as predicted by the mural.
He's one of the big proponents of the Ancient Alien theory. He's on the History Channel and on any other channel (TLC, Discovery) along with a bunch of other folks that has shows produced on the topic. Very much the mouthpiece of the overall movement - and the most polished. Just wish he would get that damn hair under control.
Don't get that either. I would have thought that they'd be pissed for another reason like people starting to believe in Jesus and worship him instead of them.
Based on my previous post - My take was that maybe the "mission" Jesus undertook was to teach the Romans the need for self-sacrifice, with the hopes that our species may have become an advanced-enough civilization to grasp the concept. To paraphrase one of the mantras in the movie - "Every king must die" - perhaps it was hoped that whoever was serving as Caesar during that time may have been compelled to die for the Greater Good of civilization. Methinks the Engineers heavily underestimated their creations' instinct for self-preservation - a potentially unique adaptation to our species during its development on a hostile Earth - an adaptation they didn't foresee.
Thank you, I figured it was something like that...does he actually look like a Centari intentionally then?
I was wondering that. Though, parts of the biosuit on the pilot himself seemed integrated with his skin. Also, why do the hives the xenos make resemble the Engineers' structures? Maybe the xenos were a mere engineering tool...to create structures. "We pale giants are too lazy to build, let's make some worker ants. But what if they breed incontrollably? We'll engineer them so they require hosts to breed." So the xenos are their David's, their artificial lifeforms. Or not. The ALIENS don't seem designed for digging tunnels. Acid for blood is messy, too. They'd need a kill switch to make sure the aliens could be eradicated when their job was done. And we don't know the end stage of Alien metamorphasis. We think we do. At some point the hive changes into something else, maybe the Newborn alien in Resurrection wasn't a hybrid, maybe it was the next step in the xeno "life cycle". hell, maybe it was the kill switch. It kills all the xenos.
I just got home to find the book Prometheus: The Art Of The Film waiting for me from Amazon. This is a really nice book and I'm looking forward to reading it. Maybe I'll also get some clues regarding some of the thinking that went into the film. I also picked up Aliens: Colonial Marines Technical Manual. Another nice book with lots of tech about the stuff we saw in the film as well as stuff we didn't get to see.
If anyone's heard of it, Kevin Smith's new Blip TV series "Spoilers" covered this movie last week. In the show Smith has taken a group of people to see a movie and then he has a session where they discuss aspects of the movie, followed by Smith's own reactions and then usually a relevant interview. (For Prometheus it was David Lindeloff (sp?.) The show itself isn't too bad but Smith seems a bit... too... "hopped up" than how he usually is, like he's trying too hard to be an excited show host. Decent enough show, though. Spoilers with Kevin Smith
Of course there are. But the majority of them are not in a position to tell the director of a film what works and what doesn't, let alone a director of Ridley Scott's calibre. Expecting that some wardrobe assistant is going to kick down Ridley's door to tell him his script doesn't make any sense is ridiculous. Likewise, studio execs have their say, sometimes for good and sometimes (usually) for ill. There's not much to be done about that either. It's just the nature of the business.
^^^ Probably one of the reasons the final cut was trimmed down by almost 30 minutes for theatrical release. I will honestly never understand this mentality.
Why don't you understand it? The people paying for the film to be made have a say in how it gets made. I don't know that I necessarily like that particular aspect of it all, but it is what it is.
To be fair a lot of films recently are bloated and could use a trim. Though they seem to trim the wrong films and of the wrong things.