PaperModelers.com

Go Back   PaperModelers.com > Papermodelers' Bar and Grill > The CardBoard Lounge

Reply
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
  #21  
Old 08-20-2017, 08:49 AM
airdave's Avatar
airdave airdave is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Apr 2009
Location: Ontario Canada
Posts: 14,246
Total Downloaded: 257.44 MB
While it is true that the opening theatrical scenes of Prometheus leave a lot to your imagination
and do not explicitly reveal that the Engineer is on Earth,
it has been explained that it is in fact early Earth
and that the Engineer is using the "black goo" to introduce his own DNA into Earth's eco-system.

Apparently, a considerable amount of deleted scenes help explain a lot of the missing details in Prometheus.
The Bluray release of the film includes many of these scenes and fills in some of the blanks.

Quote:
Wondering why the Engineer at the start of the film killed himself for no apparent reason?
If you look at the alternate beginning scene on the Blu-ray, you find that this was actually a sacrificial ceremony attended by multiple engineers.
Once the Engineer breaks up into tiny pieces and falls into the river, you're shown a few extra seconds of footage
that explains that the sacrifice was meant to boot up the human evolutionary journey.
So, the Engineers are not "seeding" the Earth.
They are just affecting the evolution of life on Earth.
(Brings me back to the Wheat...which did NOT come from the Engineers! lol)

There is apparently no explanation for why the Engineer is so surprised by his own disintegration
after ingesting the "black goo"...but I would explain it as just a lack of understanding (on his part)
of exactly how the process would feel and take place?

...
Simple facts to keep in mind:
Alien...created and produced by Ridley Scott (according to him, a stand-alone film)
Aliens/Alien3...not produced by Ridley Scott, not part of his storyline.
Predator(PredatorvsAlien)...absolutely nothing to do with either storylines.
Prometheus/Covenant...Ridley Scotts attempt at prequel/parallel story inspired by the original Alien film.

Although you may be able to uncover story inconsistencies between Alien and Prometheus
(made almost 40 years later I might add) the connection is simple and obvious.
The inspiration was Alien's biggest question: what/who is the Space Jockey?
This is the question raised when the movie first came out.
And thats the story Scott was telling us...but the fans and the Studio still insisted on an Alien connection and backstory.
And this is where Scott has understandably started to stray from the original concept.

The original Alien creature was not explained...it didn't need to be.
All we were expected to know was it was a lifeform that had evolved to be the ultimate killer/hunter/survivor.
Basically unstoppable.
Now, trying to explain the Xenomorph's origins is (in my opinion) what is messing up the story.
I think the Alien should have remained just another lifeform that the Engineers had encountered in their travels, just like Earthling's did.
A dangerous lifeform.
__________________
SUPPORT ME PLEASE: PaperModelShop
Or, my models at ecardmodels: Dave'sCardCreations
Reply With Quote
  #22  
Old 08-20-2017, 12:21 PM
gotham's Avatar
gotham gotham is offline
Member
 
Join Date: May 2015
Location: Elgin, N.E Scotland
Posts: 2,242
Total Downloaded: 2.75 GB
Dave - with you on the Alien. It exists, it's a born survivor / killer, end of. Also, this explaining the 'Space Jockey', wrong wrong wrong.! The whole point of 'Alien' is that everything is alien, the planet, the crashed ship, the alien, it's humand experiencing alien things out there in the 'verse for the first time.
__________________
"It's all in the reflexes."
Reply With Quote
  #23  
Old 08-20-2017, 12:43 PM
Revell-Fan Revell-Fan is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Mar 2010
Location: Vreden
Posts: 1,228
Total Downloaded: 1.39 GB
Quote:
Originally Posted by airdave View Post
it has been explained that it is in fact early Earth
and that the Engineer is using the "black goo" to introduce his own DNA into Earth's eco-system.
I'm not so sure about that. All the (so-called) scientists () claim that Earth must have been visited by an ancient space race and that they had left an "invitation" only because of the cave murals etc. Everything else was simply made up by them; they did not deliver ANY proof of their theory. As Ridley himself said:

Quote:
'That could be a planet anywhere. All he’s doing is acting as a gardener in space. And the plant life, in fact, is the disintegration of himself. ...'
from: Prometheus Unbound: What The Movie Was Actually About: cavalorn

Reply With Quote
  #24  
Old 08-20-2017, 04:23 PM
airdave's Avatar
airdave airdave is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Apr 2009
Location: Ontario Canada
Posts: 14,246
Total Downloaded: 257.44 MB
gotham...after seeing Alien, back in the 70s, most fans were amazed by the space jockey scene.
I know I was.
Visually it was a stunning scene...a masterpiece of model making, sets and cinematography.
It was a notable artwork created by Geiger, that was carefully recreated for the film.
But it was a fairly unimportant scene within the story.

And yet, we all wanted to know more about whatever it was.
I remember wondering if it was just a statue...
or was it a fossilized alien, or was it a dead alien in a space suit?
And how big was this alien supposed to be?
So many questions. lol



So, yes...thats what Ridley Scott decided to tell the story of.

And if he had stuck to that, I think he would have made a much better film.
And a whole new story that didn't rely on the Xenomorph backstory.
The Xeno-Alien could have just shown up it to provide some extra thrills.
Instead, this whole Weyland and David story has taken over and made a mess of it all.
And then David...creating the Alien...has created discussions, like this, that don't help. LOL
__________________
SUPPORT ME PLEASE: PaperModelShop
Or, my models at ecardmodels: Dave'sCardCreations

Last edited by airdave; 08-20-2017 at 04:37 PM.
Reply With Quote
  #25  
Old 08-20-2017, 04:36 PM
airdave's Avatar
airdave airdave is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Apr 2009
Location: Ontario Canada
Posts: 14,246
Total Downloaded: 257.44 MB
I love Ridley Scott's films.

But one thing I have learned over the years, is don't listen to Ridley.
In various interviews, he changes his answers, he makes stuff up as it comes,
he twists to current ideas and changes his mind often.

In five years, he'll have another explanation about things in Prometheus.
LOL
Just like he did with Blade Runner.
Deckard is now a replicant! lol lol lol

...
I am only quoting what I know from the film, what I read online, and what is in the Bluray DVD.
The story (in Prometheus) is that Earth was visited at somepoint in its evolution by this alien race (the engineers)
who maybe visited other worlds and introduced their evolutionary controls there too?
They used a black goo, which dissolved one of the aliens (into Earth's water).

Why they left a map to their homeworld, on our planet, doesn't really make any sense,
but if they hadn't, then our heroes would not have been able to go there.
So, it was just a necessary part of the script.

David reveals in Covenant, that the engineers changes did not work as they intended
(whatever their intentions might have been)
and that they had planned to go back and undo things by introducing the black goo again.
basically wiping out the life on Earth.

Whether you like it or not, thats what we know.
__________________
SUPPORT ME PLEASE: PaperModelShop
Or, my models at ecardmodels: Dave'sCardCreations
Reply With Quote
Google Adsense
  #26  
Old 08-20-2017, 10:19 PM
whulsey's Avatar
whulsey whulsey is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Jun 2007
Location: Miami, AZ
Posts: 8,839
Total Downloaded: 65.34 MB
Since "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep" is one of my all time favorite books, don't even get me started about Blade Runner...and this upcoming sequel. And as far as the logic lines in the whole Alien thing.
Attached Thumbnails
Movie talk: Covenant ...WTH?-god_kills_catgirl.gif  
Reply With Quote
  #27  
Old 08-21-2017, 03:14 AM
Revell-Fan Revell-Fan is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Mar 2010
Location: Vreden
Posts: 1,228
Total Downloaded: 1.39 GB
Quote:
Originally Posted by airdave View Post
But one thing I have learned over the years, is don't listen to Ridley.
In various interviews, he changes his answers, he makes stuff up as it comes,
he twists to current ideas and changes his mind often.

In five years, he'll have another explanation about things in Prometheus.
LOL
Just like he did with Blade Runner.
Deckard is now a replicant! lol lol lol
Yep, I fully agree! Just take a look at the egg transformation scene in Alien's DC... The Queen was a bit more logical, but why the transformation? Because it looked eerie... and cool...

The strange thing about Prometheus is, despite its obvious flaws (beginning with them taking off their helmets) I think it is one of the most fascinating films I have ever seen. I have seen it about 100 times (no kidding; mostly as a background noise while papermodeling). It has all ingredients for a classic: Extraordinarily good actors (Fassbender always delivers), a fast-paced story and overwhelming images (the landscapes, the breath-taking shots of the spaceship above the thunderstorms and through the clods, the sand storm, the sets), awesome score - boy, that was not cheap.
Reply With Quote
  #28  
Old 08-21-2017, 05:10 AM
airdave's Avatar
airdave airdave is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Apr 2009
Location: Ontario Canada
Posts: 14,246
Total Downloaded: 257.44 MB
Yeah,l I love Prometheus.
Not in the same way I ever loved Alien.
But I still enjoy it.

Like many of Ridley's films, its full of nitpicking moments.
Every movie has those.
But its a package deal...and in the end, Ridley puts together an entertaining package.
Regardless of its flaws.
__________________
SUPPORT ME PLEASE: PaperModelShop
Or, my models at ecardmodels: Dave'sCardCreations
Reply With Quote
  #29  
Old 08-23-2017, 09:57 PM
catopower's Avatar
catopower catopower is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Oct 2014
Location: San Francisco Bay Area
Posts: 152
Total Downloaded: 10.08 MB
Hi All,

I'd like to jump in here, though I'm not big at discussing the Alien/Engineer universe in depth. So, first off, I know these are just films designed to entertain/make money. Keeping to a story line is really secondary to those first goals, so I understand that there will be continuity issues and all.

I love Alien. It's one of the few times I read the movie novelization before I saw the film. Enjoyed the book, loved the film. Gieger's work was so different, creepy and awesome. The grit, the isolation, the suspense will always make it a classic. The space jockey scene was one of my favorites – a creepy, mysterious discovery.

I enjoyed Aliens for it's different approach to dealing with the Alien(s), military technology, learning a bit about the colonies, a new spacecraft (Sulaco), terraforming, Weylan Industries, etc. After that, I got bored with the franchise.

I did enjoy Aliens vs. Predator, but disappointed that it ended up not longer fitting into the backstory. Made for great fun on the screen and in computer games though!

Prometheus was odd and it was very different in feel from anything else. It was almost uplifting in some ways because of the idea of finding our immediate creator. Also, as a film, it's one of those that I can easily put on in the background over and over again as I'm doing something else (model making, etc.). So, I've actually seen it dozens of times.



So, I just saw Alien: Covenant. It was interesting, and even intriguing as I knew I was learning something about what followed Prometheus and something about the Engineers. The story was okay, but it's one of those things where I just found too much of it to be annoying.

First, okay, couples in space is fine, but for a film, everyone wants to rescue their partner, makes things worse, someone else gets in trouble, their partner gets sucked in... you know. Then, it was also extremely contrived, a neutron burst was it? Just happens to disable the ship close enough to the Engineer's planet that they just happen to notice is habitable. Then, without any contamination protocol, they land and put everyone in danger. Thus starts the new cycle of death.

I love the part where the main character, who's name I don't know because I didn't find any character interesting enough to care about, she's dangling underneath the craft by all the engine blasts and manages not to get fried by any of them. I also get tired of the writers killing off characters from a prior film "in transit" to the next story out of sheer convenience. I think Jonesey was the only incidental character to survive between two films... There are other things I didn't like, but that's just like/dislike.

But, among the weirdness was, why, 10 years after the Engineers are killed off, did the cities crumble completely? Okay, people gone, cities would still stand. These were our creators, their technology must be everywhere. Wheat fields, fine, no machinery for harvest? No storage facility? No housing? And, if this is the Engineer's homeworld, the ones on the other side of the world didn't hear about what was happening? Or did everyone on the planet all gather to the arrival of one of MANY of their ships to herald its arrival? And what's the big deal about it's arrival? And, why do there have to be gigantor storms as part of every movie plot?

Okay, that's my rant!

Clare
__________________
Clare
He's a --> HE

Blog: shipmodeler.wordpress.com
Reply With Quote
  #30  
Old 08-24-2017, 07:05 AM
gotham's Avatar
gotham gotham is offline
Member
 
Join Date: May 2015
Location: Elgin, N.E Scotland
Posts: 2,242
Total Downloaded: 2.75 GB
'Alien' is still the best - it depicts a living nightmare. The crew of the Nostromo wake up at the start of the film, and Rilpey ( and Jones the cat ) go back to sleep when everything's over at the end. During the film/nightmare the crew have to deal with so many alien things (as if in a dream) .'Aliens' steals the 'nightmare' idea to some extent with Ripley asleep at the beginning and going back to sleep at the end again, but it is essentially Cameron on his Nam trip - to be followed by Avatar (Pocahontas in space with Nam thrown in again). 'Alien3' is different, but still more of the same - is Ripley 'cursed' to continually wake from sleep and face an Alien ? Talk about bad luck, 3 times ! At least she breaks the cycle at the end by killing herself - only to even have her thunder stolen there with the Queen chestburster coming out as she falls, it killing her first.
I view Prometheus a bit like the 2nd batch of Star Wars films (probably the 3rd too), not entirely required to be seen.
__________________
"It's all in the reflexes."
Reply With Quote
Google Adsense
Reply

Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off

Forum Jump


All times are GMT -6. The time now is 08:34 AM.


Powered by vBulletin®
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.

Parts of this site powered by vBulletin Mods & Addons from DragonByte Technologies Ltd. (Details)
Copyright © 2007-2023, PaperModelers.com