The Prometheus audio commentary by Damon Lindelof & Jon Spaihts has found its way online via an early copy of the film. In this extra feature, the Prometheus writers talk about pre-production, deleted scenes, Ridley Scott and more. Below you can find our quick summarisation of some of the things revealed in their commentary of the film:
- The Primordial ship was originally meant to be the Alien Derelict/Juggernaut ship in Lindelof’s draft, but Ridley Scott thought it would be cooler to show something else.
- The opening sequence was meant to be longer, showing a group of Engineers talking to each other in a proto-language.
- In most of Spaihts’ drafts, the black material that consumed the Sacrifice Engineer transmuted, flew away and bit a primitive woman/man. Their pupils dilated and you could see something change inside them. Another version included a salamander-like hand reach out of the water.
- There was a scene cut for financial reasons in which a submarine expedition are looking at a sunken city in the Mediterranean where they find a giant tablet with a star map on it. A different version of the script included an archaeological dig on Mars where they found ruins sharing similarities with ancient ruins on Earth.
- In some of Spaihts drafts, Holloway and Shaw went to visit Weyland in his private residence, a space station orbiting around Earth. Another one included the couple travelling to Mars and visiting Weyland in his home which had a view of the terraforming work taking place on the planet.
- Jon Spaihts imagined Holloway as an older person, perhaps inappropriately old for Shaw as a mate. Additionally Shaw was Holloway’s student at university.
- There was a scene were Milburn discovers a little worm and talks about how important this discovery is. Lindelof mentions that this would have kinda explained why he was so excited about his later encounter with the Hammerpede.
- Spaihts experimented with the idea that the Engineers saw in a whiter spectrum than human beings did. To David’s eyes, the ruins and catacombs showed interfaces that only he could see. Picking up clues that nobody else was picking up.
- In the script, when David breaks the Ampule open, they cut to David’s POV and showed the black goo at a microscopic level.
- In Spaihts version of the story, Holloway awakens a Facehugger while he is exploring the pyramid. He is implanted with an Alien, the “classic model”. The “Alien” burst out of Holloway during the love scene between Shaw and Holloway.
- Spaihts’ draft included a cargo hold filled up with Alien eggs, David discovers this area. This scene revealed the purpose of the Juggernaut ship which was on its way to Earth to undo the human experiment. When Shaw follows David into the vaults of the ship, he deliberately infected her with a Facehugger. He also took her helmet so she couldn’t run back to the ship and save her life by using the med pod. She still makes it back there by holding her breath and using compressed air.
- In the earlier draft by Jon Spaihts, a kind of classic chestburster is extracted from Shaw’s body during the med pod scene. The chestburster is then expelled from the pod and Shaw stays in there while it heals her. As she wakes up, she can see the monster grow up. Eight hours later the monster is full size and she’s watching it kill people through the glass.
- Lindelof mentions that there was a two page dialogue exchange between David and the Engineer.
- In Spaihts’ draft, the last Engineer died in the pilot’s chair. He had been infected and was carrying a Chestburster. It emerged from him while the Juggernaut was flying which caused the Juggernaut to falter on its path, allowing the Magellan ship to ram it. Shaw manages to eject from the ship just before the ramming took place. Then the Alien that just emerged from the Engineer comes out of the Juggernaut and the final action scene is Shaw being hunted by this creature.
- Towards the end of the film, Lindeof talks about a deleted scene in which Shaw asks David what it is that the Engineer said to him during their earlier conversation. David tells Shaw that the Engineer told him that they did not come from there [LV-223] but a place called “Paradise”.
Link To Post
Very interesting stuff to say the least. It makes me want to read Spaihts draft even more. Sounds like it would have been a far more entertaining movie if they'd have just done the proper alien life cycle stuff.
I wish they had gone with Spaihts' draft! :(
Wow, that sounds incredible. Everything they talk about that was deleted or changed would have been the way to go. It sounds like Spaihts actually knew how to please the fans. The medpod sequence would have been amazing, forcing Shaw to witness her crews death. The chestburst coming out of holloway during sex...THis would have all made for a more thrilling movie. Also, Milburn being excited about the worms....
The Derelect ship in the beginning, the Engineer dying in the chair...
Everything makes more sense! Its all so maddening.
Interesting...but shouldn't there have been two Aliens in the finale? The Holloway spawned Alien and the Shaw spawned Alien? Or is Holloway's offed as a chestburster?
This script should certainly make for an interesting read.
Very interesting stuff - don't know if it would have been better (Even if Milbs was excited to find the worm, he should have been excited to find the dead engineers too, ya know...they're extraterrestrials as well. Not to mention the derelict timeframe issue on how long its been there), but its interesting to know theres a version of Prometheus whose roots were much more closely binded with that of Alien.
Quote from: Nightmare Asylum on Sep 23, 2012, 05:05:25 PM
Interesting...but shouldn't there have been two Aliens in the finale? The Holloway spawned Alien and the Shaw spawned Alien? Or is Holloway's offed as a chestburster?
This script should certainly make for an interesting read.
And the engineer/space jockey chestburster.
a lot of things would be really really awesome to see but i still like the idea of the derelict in alien being millions of years old and so make the alien pretty old. also i'm scared the final act with shaw being hunted by the xeno would look to much like the last act from alien.
Quote from: Nightmare Asylum on Sep 23, 2012, 05:05:25 PM
Interesting...but shouldn't there have been two Aliens in the finale? The Holloway spawned Alien and the Shaw spawned Alien? Or is Holloway's offed as a chestburster?
This script should certainly make for an interesting read.
There were multiple drafts by Jon Spaihts. He didn't specify whether those two scenes were in the same draft on the commentary so anything is possible I guess. He said "the Alien came out of him and infected the exploratory ship" but he probably means chestburster anyway.
I dunno. Put in that context chestbursters and facehuggers do seem a bit jaded. It's very much a rehash and I can see why Ridley wanted to broaden it out. Engineers, hammerpedes, mutant Fifield and trilobite etc does make it feel like a far more expanded universe of possibilities due to the nature of a genetic weapon gone haywire. I think the classic monsters might have got in the way of that a bit. I'd love to have seen a cameo from something akin to Kane's son at the end, but if this is to be a trilogy there's plenty of time for that should it go in that direction.
Seeing these possibilities has actually made me appreciate Prometheus more. Still want an expanded cut, but wouldn't trade the story as is for more aliens.
Quote from: ikarop on Sep 23, 2012, 05:13:49 PM
Quote from: Nightmare Asylum on Sep 23, 2012, 05:05:25 PM
Interesting...but shouldn't there have been two Aliens in the finale? The Holloway spawned Alien and the Shaw spawned Alien? Or is Holloway's offed as a chestburster?
This script should certainly make for an interesting read.
There were multiple drafts by Jon Spaihts. He didn't specify whether those two scenes were in the same draft on the commentary so anything is possible I guess. He said "the Alien came out of him and infected the exploratory ship" but he probably means chestburster anyway.
Very true. Though I have to admit I think it was kind of interesting giving birth to the pseudo-facehugger in the film in a similar manner to how the average chestburster is birthed.
Would have been interesting if, rather than an actual chestburster, it was something more akin to a facehugger or trilobite that came out of him. Makes sense, given the infecting the ship quote. And it could have made for an interesting twist on the chestburster concept.
Now all is said and done, I just wish it stayed as a true Alien prequel and didn't deviate Into what became Prometheus. Fox shouldn't have pursued Scott so hard for director, I remember when it was speculated he'd only produce with his protege directing (I know Rinsch is getting bad press atm blah blah), But Scott's influence on the whole thing seems to have squandered what could have been a fanboy wet dream. f**kin' urns for Alien eggs man. God I don't think I'll be able to enjoy it on blu ray it's just one poor imitation with tenuous links
And I say this because Prometheus simply didn't thrill, my strings of adrenaline were barely strummed.
The Spaihts script sounds infinitely more superior than the final story that we got. What a shame.
It appears that alot of really great scenes cut/changed. :(
"There was a scene were Milburn discovers a little worm and talks about how important this discovery is."
^ This right here would have made a big difference in the film for me. It annoyed me like crazy that the source of the worms was never mentioned, and that new lifeforms were taken so casually instead of being the great new discoveries that they were.
Quote from: Ash 937 on Sep 23, 2012, 05:34:49 PM
The Spaihts script sounds infinitely more superior than the final story that we got. What a shame.
^ I don't agree, it's just fan-service and rehash, that's all. I wish Lindelof and Scott executed their ideas more thoroughly, meticulously and more consistently.
QuoteIn some of Spaihts drafts, Holloway and Shaw went to visit Weyland in his private residence, a space station orbiting around Earth. Another one included the couple travelling to Mars and visiting Weyland in his home which had a view of the terraforming work taking place on the planet.
This would have been cool, and they have done some weird thing like Weyland talking to them through a hologram which would've been young Guy Pearce.
Quote
Jon Spaihts imagined Holloway as an older person, perhaps inappropriately old for Shaw as a mate. Additionally Shaw was Holloway's student at university.
This would have worked better with the character the way the film presented him. You could have said that he was near the end of his career or something and not finding his gods would actually drive his older man to drink and behave in that way.
QuoteThere was a scene were Milburn discovers a little worm and talks about how important this discovery is. Lindelof mentions that this would have kinda explained why he was so excited about his later encounter with the Hammerpede.
Anything to build up Milburn, the worst scientist in the universe, was really needed.
QuoteSpaihts experimented with the idea that the Engineers saw in a whiter spectrum than human beings did. To David's eyes, the ruins and catacombs showed interfaces that only he could see. Picking up clues that nobody else was picking up.
Great idea that would have been awesome with the movie being in 3d. Imagine seeing through Dave's eyes and seeing stuff through Jock vision popping out.
QuoteIn Spaihts version of the story, Holloway awakens a Facehugger while he is exploring the pyramid. He is implanted with an Alien, the "classic model". The "Alien" burst out of Holloway during the love scene between Shaw and Holloway.
EEEWWW that would have been good to see. Your husband with another penis coming out of his chest while have sex.
QuoteSpaihts' draft included a cargo hold filled up with Alien eggs, David discovers this area. This scene revealed the purpose of the Juggernaut ship which was on its way to Earth to undo the human experiment. When Shaw follows David into the vaults of the ship, he deliberately infected her with a Facehugger. He also took her helmet so she couldn't run back to the ship and save her life by using the med pod. She still makes it back there by holding her breath and using compressed air.
I guess that would have been ok back when the movie was a straight Alien Prequel.
QuoteLindelof mentions that there was a two page dialogue exchange between David and the Engineer.
I can see what he thought of the scene when he first read it, "NOT VAGUE ENOUGH!"
Quote from: Salt The Fries on Sep 23, 2012, 05:50:19 PM
^ I don't agree, it's just fan-service and rehash, that's all. I wish Lindelof and Scott executed their ideas more thoroughly, meticulously and more consistently.
wait... a similar story to what he got would be considered "fan-service rehash" just because the inclusion of the Alien creature?
Quote from: Salt The Fries on Sep 23, 2012, 05:50:19 PM
Quote from: Ash 937 on Sep 23, 2012, 05:34:49 PM
The Spaihts script sounds infinitely more superior than the final story that we got. What a shame.
^ I don't agree, it's just fan-service and rehash, that's all. I wish Lindelof and Scott executed their ideas more thoroughly, meticulously and more consistently.
Yes - agree with that...
Quote from: Darth Vile on Sep 23, 2012, 05:57:28 PM
Quote from: Salt The Fries on Sep 23, 2012, 05:50:19 PM
Quote from: Ash 937 on Sep 23, 2012, 05:34:49 PM
The Spaihts script sounds infinitely more superior than the final story that we got. What a shame.
^ I don't agree, it's just fan-service and rehash, that's all. I wish Lindelof and Scott executed their ideas more thoroughly, meticulously and more consistently.
Yes - agree with that...
As do I. I mean, while a lot of it is pretty interesting, a bit too much just comes across as forced.
Then again, some of that could have been fixed with some rewrites, but I'm actually happy they moved a bit farther away from a traditional
Alien film.
The more they over think the plumbing, the easier it is to stop up the drain. Seems like everything we got in this film was over thought and unnecessary. Any of what was mentioned in thr breakdown was better than what we got. This movie is a whole lot of nothing...
Oh, I would have loved to see what Cameron's contributions were way back at the beginning of development.
Quote from: Wonderbrick on Sep 23, 2012, 05:49:01 PM
It appears that alot of really great scenes cut/changed. :(
"There was a scene were Milburn discovers a little worm and talks about how important this discovery is."
^ This right here would have made a big difference in the film for me. It annoyed me like crazy that the source of the worms was never mentioned, and that new lifeforms were taken so casually instead of being the great new discoveries that they were.
There were shots of the worms, which implied that the team brought them on their boots and while the visit in the head room, worms managed to slither to the black goo from the vases..
They should remake the movie, with Spaihts ideas. Now Ridley will need 2 more movies to fix the shit that Damon wrote.
Quote from: Darth Vile on Sep 23, 2012, 05:57:28 PM
Quote from: Salt The Fries on Sep 23, 2012, 05:50:19 PM
Quote from: Ash 937 on Sep 23, 2012, 05:34:49 PM
The Spaihts script sounds infinitely more superior than the final story that we got. What a shame.
^ I don't agree, it's just fan-service and rehash, that's all. I wish Lindelof and Scott executed their ideas more thoroughly, meticulously and more consistently.
Yes - agree with that...
I agree also. I just don't think Spaiht's draft brought enough to the table if this write up is anything to go by. The series would be in the exact same position it was before with nowhere to go and very little else to explore.
"In the earlier draft by Jon Spaihts, a kind of classic chestburster is extracted from Shaw's body during the med pod scene. The chestburster is then expelled from the pod and Shaw stays in there while it heals her. As she wakes up, she can see the monster grow up. Eight hours later the monster is full size and she's watching it kill people through the glass."
Do u know how amazing this scene would have been? She would have been Jonesy! SHE WOULD HAVE BEEN JONESY!
My god, everything I read about what could have been just pisses me off more and more.
Quote from: Sexy Poot on Sep 23, 2012, 07:12:19 PM
"In the earlier draft by Jon Spaihts, a kind of classic chestburster is extracted from Shaw's body during the med pod scene. The chestburster is then expelled from the pod and Shaw stays in there while it heals her. As she wakes up, she can see the monster grow up. Eight hours later the monster is full size and she's watching it kill people through the glass."
Do u know how amazing this scene would have been? She would have been Jonesy! SHE WOULD HAVE BEEN JONESY!
My god, everything I read about what could have been just pisses me off more and more.
Not really... The audience are already Jonesy. They/we get to see what the cat saw.
So Shaw being in a glass case looking around helplessly while an alien kills everything around her is at all like Jonesy?
::)
The finished film just gets more and more and more disappointing.
Quote from: Gilfryd on Sep 23, 2012, 08:03:22 PM
The finished film just gets more and more and more disappointing.
agreed
I enjoyed it, certainly, but I lament the possibilities lost.
yeah the original draft sounds great. but its what everyone was expecting and didnt really bring anything new to the table. im glad they went another way with it and showed the origins of the creature with the black fluid and eventually the creature in proto-form. as much as i wanted to see a classic xeno, i think this is better for the franchise. cant wait to see paradise.
so everything that would of made this a great movie got changed??
i would of loved to have seen that stuff in the final movie, im all for going in different directions but they could of expanded on what we knew whilst opening some questions, the final film made no sense and i worry that should damon be involved in the sequels, they will end up so much like lost, they will probably all come around and it was a dream.. blah blah blah....
shame as damon done to this what anderson done to avp....
All of that only to explain the film would have been done in almost two hours and a half.
Imagine some of this great stuff in the movie ; huh?
It would be great to watch that scene:
"In the earlier draft by Jon Spaihts, a kind of classic chestburster is extracted from Shaw's body during the med pod scene. The chestburster is then expelled from the pod and Shaw stays in there while it heals her. As she wakes up, she can see the monster grow up. Eight hours later the monster is full size and she's watching it kill people through the glass.
"
But at the same time...I don't know If I really wanted to see that.The classical Alien should not been involved early in the project , it was tactical from the point of view of production to avoid the inclusion earlier .The script was fine.But I still think It was the pace of the movie that inflicted a little damage in some parts of the movie too.
I have mixed feelings about it.
If thats what we're almost got I am even happier ridley took it in a different direction. That sounds alien:r level bad.
Quote from: wonkyfunk303 on Sep 23, 2012, 09:40:30 PM
so everything that would of made this a great movie got changed??
i would of loved to have seen that stuff in the final movie, im all for going in different directions but they could of expanded on what we knew whilst opening some questions, the final film made no sense and i worry that should damon be involved in the sequels, they will end up so much like lost, they will probably all come around and it was a dream.. blah blah blah....
shame as damon done to this what anderson done to avp....
I agree, but I would have liked to see a Hybrid of the two ideas. Still have some of the origins of man themes, but within the more ALIEN script. That's what I was originally really hoping for. I think Spaihts had some great Alien scenes that would have really made the fanboys happy, while Scott could have still toyed with his own ideas and expanding the legacy.
Over all I'm pleased that the orbit of the film got further way from the traditional Alien elements we all already know. Further into the unknown was the way to go and they went there. Next time they'll be going even further (Paradise) and all we can hope for is a tighter, more character driven, more concise script.
Chestbursters and facehuggers would have been too familiar and not as weird/scary. I'm not opposed to seeing them down the line in some form or fashion ... but I'd be disappointed if they took center stage again as the main threat. I dont' know if it's AVP that did this to me ... or simply wanting fresh designs/biology.
Quote from: Bat Chain Puller on Sep 23, 2012, 10:56:06 PM
Over all I'm pleased that the orbit of the film got further way from the traditional Alien elements we all already know. Further into the unknown was the way to go and they went there. Next time they'll be going even further (Paradise) and all we can hope for is a tighter, more character driven, more concise script.
Chestbursters and facehuggers would have been too familiar and not as weird/scary. I'm not opposed to seeing them down the line in some form or fashion ... but I'd be disappointed if they took center stage again as the main threat. I dont' know if it's AVP that did this to me ... or simply wanting fresh designs/biology.
I completely agree.
Quote from: Bat Chain Puller on Sep 23, 2012, 10:56:06 PM
Chestbursters and facehuggers would have been too familiar and not as weird/scary. I'm not opposed to seeing them down the line in some form or fashion ... but I'd be disappointed if they took center stage again as the main threat. I dont' know if it's AVP that did this to me ... or simply wanting fresh designs/biology.
Lifting the Black Oil from
The X-Files and throwing in some Space Zombies is hardly "fresh". I didn't want a straight Alien prequel either, but considering what we were given was even more disappointingly ersatz, I think I'd like facehuggers and chestbursters back, quite frankly.
Meh, I don't think you'd have liked it then either.
Spaihts' draft sounds much much better. Although it's fair to say as well that Lindelof's was badly executed and he probably intended for the tone to be darker and creepier.
I really like the idea of the archaeological dig happening on Mars, it would be amazing to start the human element of the story on another planet and then for their find there to link up with a find on earth would be incredible. It's Sci-Fi after all.
Show the explorers on a different planet please
Also I liked the idea of the primates being infected. If it's done well and isn't horrible cgi black goo wind then I'm all up for it.
I take it the story was originally supposed to take place on LV-426, yes? Is there anything in the commentary to explain the condition of the space jockey's remains a scant 30 years later?
That aside, I much prefer Spaihts' version.
I won't say it was necessarily
better, because we've got no idea what the dialogue and other stuff was like, but going by these ideas, it sounds like the production team decided they should ignore the golden if-it-ain't-broke-don't-fix-it rule. Change for change's sake.
Only thing I'm really confused about was what primordial humanity was meant to be undergoing when it received the infected bites. Mutating how?
Quote from: Bat Chain Puller on Sep 23, 2012, 10:56:06 PM
Chestbursters and facehuggers would have been too familiar and not as weird/scary.
But nothing we ended up
seeing was scary.
The traditional stuff, however,
could have been scary if it was portrayed effectively - which it hasn't been since the mid-1980s. Ridley Scott shot himself in the foot by declaring that such a thing would be impossible without even trying.
I prefer the convoluted wonderful and risky mess that is Prometheus as opposed yet another film featuring aliens and facehuggers.
While the ideas themselves are interesting, I can't just think about aliens in Prometheus without sighing. We've explored those creatures as much as we needed to.
And I don't know why people are so amazed at the Spaights script when all you know are small portions. Small out of context portions of Prometheus were also very good - you can't judge a whole film like that.
Nevertheless, like I might've said earlier - i really want to check out the script anyhoo.
But that's only because we've been inundated with trite and unsatisfying movies that didn't advance the alien mythos in any meaningful way. A movie that actually showed what we've been wanting to see without all the Ripley and Predator distractions would be welcome.
Giving the audience what they think they want is not a recipe for success. Remember, Prometheus is/was a successful film.
So were the Star Wars prequels.
Quote from: RaisingCane on Sep 24, 2012, 12:54:53 AM
That aside, I much prefer Spaihts' version.
Link me to
that.
Sounds like something a fan would come up with AFTER seeing Prometheus.
Anything different applies = insert Alien and or facehugger.
I can see how people who didn't like Prom would like it though because it just replaces anything Prometheus with something Alien.
Quote from: ThisBethesdaSea on Sep 24, 2012, 01:38:09 AM
I prefer the convoluted wonderful and risky mess that is Prometheus as opposed yet another film featuring aliens and facehuggers.
The Lindelof script isn't really anything original. It is "yet again" another mish-mash film of strange creatures encounters by poorly developed characters in an under-developed story. I can name you about a dozen sci-fi films just like this. Also you gotta keep in mind that Aliens and Alien3 were also films "featuring aliens and facehuggers" that we pulled off quite nicely by many fan accounts. I think that if Scott had directed the Spaihts version, we would've gotten another good Alien film. Instead, we got the "mess."
Some of it's quite interesting - like the Holloway age angle or the Weyland scenes, and the Millburn scene - but the whole facehugger/chestburster dynamic is tired. And as "just an Alien prequel" I think it would've turned the film as was into something on par with the terrible The Thing prequel, which just retrod old ground and was absolutely banal at best and dreadful at worst. Sheer "insert Tab A into Slot B for fanboy jizz" filmmaking - except no one cared exactly how that fire axe ended up in that door in John Carpenter's movie. We've seen the classic alien kill people like this over and over - facehugger, chestburster, alien grows and kills everyone. That's nice. I didn't need to see that. I prefer what we got onscreen in that area.
I also think that, while a great, visceral sequence in concept, the whole "Shaw runs back to the ship with no helmet by holding her breath" would've been savaged by viewers everywhere. Especially here. And I think the original draft has David being far too overtly nefarious - here, the character is far, far more ambiguous and fascinating, leaving the dynamic between him and Shaw intact, and wonderfully tenuous, for future films.
I also think that explaining the derelict outright in this film would've been a bad mistake. I'm glad they didn't. The inference is simple and obvious in the finished film - the Engineers lost control of their material, an outbreak occurred, many died while trying to escape. It's likely one such ship is the one in Alien. Done, and leaves a lot more room for both imagination and future films.
I'll tell you what would have been really weird and risky - showing some sort of proto-alien hybrid of one of the humans which still retained some sort of intellect and/or speech.
Also, allegedly, Vickers had next to no role in the original draft. She was a company drone there to antagonize and die. I think her revised character onscreen actually adds a great deal to the dynamics in the classic Alien fashion, simply by performance and inference - she's a favorite of a lot of people, myself included. So while I am the first person to take fault with Damon Lindelof in most other works, I feel he and Scott really heavily improved on a lot here. And I am also quite a fan of much of Spaihts' unfilmed writing.
Quote from: RaisingCane on Sep 24, 2012, 03:05:11 AM
But that's only because we've been inundated with trite and unsatisfying movies that didn't advance the alien mythos in any meaningful way. A movie that actually showed what we've been wanting to see without all the Ripley and Predator distractions would be welcome.
Not for me. I don't want to see another xeno movie just like I don't want to see another Michael Myers and or Jason V movie.
Quote from: Ash 937 on Sep 24, 2012, 05:31:35 AM
Quote from: ThisBethesdaSea on Sep 24, 2012, 01:38:09 AM
I prefer the convoluted wonderful and risky mess that is Prometheus as opposed yet another film featuring aliens and facehuggers.
The Lindelof script isn't really anything original. It is "yet again" another mish-mash film of strange creatures encounters by poorly developed characters in an under-developed story. I can name you about a dozen sci-fi films just like this. Also you gotta keep in mind that Aliens and Alien3 were also films "featuring aliens and facehuggers" that we pulled off quite nicely by many fan accounts. I think that if Scott had directed the Spaihts version, we would've gotten another good Alien film. Instead, we got the "mess."
Alien and Aliens - yes. All the others were a toal mess (IMHO). I'd rather get a flawed movie trying o do something different with that world/ universe, rather than more of the same...
i don't know if anyone of you actually heard this commentary, but there are MANY, many things that makes spaihts draft the better story arc.
although the commentary made clear that not lindelof was (fully) responsible for the mess prometheus became, but ridley scott w/ his last minute decisions.
i am absolutely for not having regular eggs, chestbursters, facehuggers, xenos; but that's what we got, but with a disappointing design...
so the movie has parts of spaihts draft in it, but with the best parts being removed and the good decisions that had been made are desultory executed.
"In Spaihts version of the story, Holloway awakens a Facehugger while he is exploring the pyramid. He is implanted with an Alien, the "classic model". The "Alien" burst out of Holloway during the love scene between Shaw and Holloway.
Spaihts' draft included a cargo hold filled up with Alien eggs, David discovers this area. This scene revealed the purpose of the Juggernaut ship which was on its way to Earth to undo the human experiment. When Shaw follows David into the vaults of the ship, he deliberately infected her with a Facehugger. He also took her helmet so she couldn't run back to the ship and save her life by using the med pod. She still makes it back there by holding her breath and using compressed air.
In the earlier draft by Jon Spaihts, a kind of classic chestburster is extracted from Shaw's body during the med pod scene. The chestburster is then expelled from the pod and Shaw stays in there while it heals her. As she wakes up, she can see the monster grow up. Eight hours later the monster is full size and she's watching it kill people through the glass."
If I had read a "leaked" script with these points in it, I think I would have thought it was fake. The alien bursting while making love is so amateur. I have a feel a lot of people around here might also have thought it was fake.
The compressed air bit just reminds me of the episode of intervention where the girl is addicted to huffing that stuff. All I can imagine is shaw totally wasted on compressed air. So bad.
http://www.youtube.com/results?client=safari&rls=en&q=compressed+air+intervention&oe=UTF-8&redir_esc=&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&tab=w1&gl=CA (http://www.youtube.com/results?client=safari&rls=en&q=compressed+air+intervention&oe=UTF-8&redir_esc=&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&tab=w1&gl=CA) you can pick your own video.
"insert Tab A into Slot B for fanboy jizz" lets make a T-shirt! :laugh:
It seems odd to me that there a lot of fans on this forum that justify Prometheus and claim that their reason for this is that they are sick of seeing Alien sequels with facehuggers and xenomorphs. If done correctly, there is still a lot of goodness to be had with those creatures.
Quote from: Ash 937 on Sep 24, 2012, 03:44:48 PM
It seems odd to me that there a lot of fans on this forum that justify Prometheus and claim that their reason for this is that they are sick of seeing Alien sequels with facehugger and xenomorphs.
I don't think its really people saying that the're sick of the old stuff, just that they welcome change, and that maybe the Alien that we know and love wouldn't have been a proper fit in
Prometheus.
Personally, given the nature of
Prometheus's story, I'm happy we got the creatures we did. The traditional Aliens and Facehuggers, as described by the writers, at least, wouldn't have worked as well, in my opinion. They seem a bit...forced, if you will.
Apparently, we had a good, original script that could have served us well but rather than give us a newish director (which has always been a staple of the series), the producers wanted Ridley and the writer from Lost who both seem to have big egos based on their past successes. What resulted from this is the thrashing of good script in favor of bad ideas backed up by a general sense of "expertise" that wasn't really that grounded to begin with. Enter Prometheus in its current state; a film that had everything going for but somehow managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Sure it was a financial success but so were films like Transformers 3 and Twilight....so I don't think that's really any logical way to back anything up and say that Prometheus is actually a good film.
Quote from: Ash 937 on Sep 24, 2012, 04:07:12 PM
so I don't think that's really any logical way to back anything up and say that Prometheus is actually a good film.
The only thing it takes to call a film good is an opinion.
But anyways, prior to the movie's release, Scott was the logical choice for a director from both the fans' and the studio's perspective. And Scott wanted Lindelof, so obviously Fox was going to let him have him. It was Scott's film, and he was free to alter it as he saw fit. No one was going to tell him otherwise.
Quote from: Ash 937 on Sep 24, 2012, 04:07:12 PM
Apparently, we had a good, original script that could have served us well but rather than give us a newish director (which has always been a staple of the series), the producers wanted Ridley and the writer from Lost who both seem to have big egos based on their past successes. What resulted from this is the thrashing of good script in favor of bad ideas backed up by a general sense of "expertise" that wasn't really that grounded to begin with. Enter Prometheus in its current state; a film that had everything going for but somehow managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Sure it was a financial success but so were films like Transformers 3 and Twilight....so I don't think that's really any logical way to back anything up and say that Prometheus is actually a good film.
The early scripts to me sounds alien vs predator bad and nearing AvP:R bad. Chestburter during a love scene? That is something out of a dark horse alien comic. Just bad. That would have been an eye roll on near the AvP:R level.
And in the end, like anyone at fox cares about making the hardcore fans happy. There are 16800 members here. If every member registered went to see it once, at average canadian ticket price, it is $168000. That to fox is the cost of running ads for a few evenings. It's nothing.
I doubt there's anything I or anyone else could say that would cause people who don't care for the film to agree that we have "backed anything up" that a film they dislike is good. However, plenty of people did like it, and the heavens remain above us. I will prepare my annotated references later.
I don't think the original script would've been a surefire hit at all. I'm not sure how The Thing prequel did last year, but it certainly was no critical success. A lot of it just feels very much like more of the same to me with the same old alien, and in many ways a lot of fanboy box-ticking - a facehugger! A chestburster! And yes, between the oxygen scene and the chestburster sex scene, it could easily become a cartoon (the first question anyone online would have is, 'how the f**k did she not get killed when the rabid chestburster emerges from the guy who's on top of her?').
Some of what was in the Spaihts draft is fine. And if he did initially set the course back to the space jockey, then he's very much to be commended for that. I've always found his unfilmed work to be great, and a lot of his general framework for the story - Engineers, expedition, Shaw/Watts, David, Weyland - is excellent and holds up well for the final film. But he also had a specific brief when he first came onto the project, which was to make a very standard "Alien prequel". And that's what his script is - just a prequel. Jockey, alien, crash, end. And that's simply not that interesting overall, at least not in what I'm reading here. It might make a Best Buy on-sale item in six to nine months, but it wasn't grabbing anyone on its own the way veering away from the standard tropes does, for better or worse. By refocusing even more on the space jockey and getting away from the alien proper vs. new monsters, as well as keeping characters like David more ambiguous, leaving the question of the derelict a bit more open, I think they opened up much more possibility.
I like Jon Spaihts, and I don't blame him for a lot of this bog-standard Alien stuff. He was given a simple job to prequelize the films, and he did it; his larger pitch, though, the bigger idea of the terraforming, life-creating Engineers was unique and sprawling, it hewed to Ridley Scott's original conception of the jockey and led to the film we got. It's in the nuts and bolts of the script and the storyline that needed to be bolder, and that call only came down to a writer after Scott could make it himself. And I'm glad it did.
Quote from: Xenomorphine on Sep 24, 2012, 01:00:44 AM
Quote from: Bat Chain Puller on Sep 23, 2012, 10:56:06 PM
Chestbursters and facehuggers would have been too familiar and not as weird/scary.
But nothing we ended up seeing was scary.
I find
nothing is as scary since being an uninitiated pre-Alien young person. But there are plenty of hipster-larva out there that are unable to hide their squeamishness caused by seeing a vagina/penis eel infiltrate the security of a space suit and orally rape it's occupants. Same thing with the Med-pod scene. Pound for pound there was more iconicly creepy/disturbing scenes in Prometheus. It's the perceived success rate per individual fan that calls into question whether it worked or not. (and deconstructed ad nauseum online.)
And Cvalda: There is nothing new under the sun. And that X-Files television show was the banner waving weekly embodiment of that notion.
Quote from: fiveways on Sep 24, 2012, 04:41:08 PM
The early scripts to me sounds alien vs predator bad and nearing AvP:R bad. Chestburter during a love scene? That is something out of a dark horse alien comic. Just bad. That would have been an eye roll on near the AvP:R level.
It's tough to see how that scene could have worked. It does seem like a rather obvious pre-teen Alien fan wish fulfillment sequence. And borders on the silly notions dreamed up for something out of a Species direct to DVD sequel.
But I think in the hands of a group of uncompromising genius, renegade film makers the scene
could have worked.
I prefer how Holloway went out in the film we got. Well done.
Spoiler
And the deleted scene afterwards would have made it even better.
Hardcore fanboys would've squealed at it. But I don't think there's any way to make a chestburster love scene (the very phrase is hilarious) seriously work. I do think the medpod scene is pound for pound the best in the series in terms of sheer visceral horror or tension since Jim Cameron.
Quote from: Bat Chain Puller on Sep 24, 2012, 05:06:43 PM
And Cvalda: There is nothing new under the sun. And that X-Files television show was the banner waving weekly embodiment of that notion.
Says the guy who never watched it ;)
Quote from: Bat Chain Puller on Sep 24, 2012, 05:06:43 PM
And Cvalda: There is nothing new under the sun.
But under the ground...
(https://www.avpgalaxy.net/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimg1.bdbphotos.com%2Fimages%2Forig%2Fc%2Ft%2Fctom61jjnatvmo1v.jpg&hash=1b784e6cab943ef2c39d99b3c2729d3b3b09588f)
I actually think that the urgency of the medpod scene makes more sense in the context of the original draft. Halloway's death would have shown Shaw what was in store for her if she had failed to get the alien removed in time.
I could never stand most of The X-Files, but it has its fans, including several ex-boyfriends. How the show got from its origins to their last movie ending on a Hawaiian luau is beyond me.
Quote from: Nightmare Asylum on Sep 24, 2012, 04:16:27 PM
The only thing it takes to call a film good is an opinion.
Very true, so long as we can remember too that the only thing it takes to call a film "bad" is also an opinion.
Quote from: Nightmare Asylum on Sep 24, 2012, 04:16:27 PM
But anyways, prior to the movie's release, Scott was the logical choice for a director from both the fans' and the studio's perspective. And Scott wanted Lindelof, so obviously Fox was going to let him have him. It was Scott's film, and he was free to alter it as he saw fit. No one was going to tell him otherwise.
This statement sounds so similar to the logic that Star Wars fanboys love to default on when they justify Episodes 1-3 and/or defend the Special Editions for Episodes 4-6 that it makes me cringe.
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 24, 2012, 05:28:36 PM
I could never stand most of The X-Files, but it has its fans, including several ex-boyfriends. How the show got from its origins to their last movie ending on a Hawaiian luau is beyond me.
...so that makes it okay to appropriate one of its most famous and recognizable plot points?
Because a malevolent black goo that had a hand in shaping the ancestors of mankind, that takes over and mutates its host--and is intended for the purpose of eventually wiping out humanity by a humanoid extraterrestrial race that walked the Earth before we did--is kind of a glaringly egregious lift.
Maybe Lindelof tried to explain that to Ridley, just like he did about Weyland and AvP, and got the same arrogant response.
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 24, 2012, 05:14:10 PM
Quote from: Bat Chain Puller on Sep 24, 2012, 05:06:43 PM
And Cvalda: There is nothing new under the sun. And that X-Files television show was the banner waving weekly embodiment of that notion.
Says the guy who never watched it ;)
Quote from: Nightmare Asylum on Sep 24, 2012, 05:16:43 PM
Quote from: Bat Chain Puller on Sep 24, 2012, 05:06:43 PM
And Cvalda: There is nothing new under the sun.
But under the ground...
http://img1.bdbphotos.com/images/orig/c/t/ctom61jjnatvmo1v.jpg
Chaos theory predicted you'd both respond as such! :laugh:
Cvalda.
Spoiler
I tried. I really did, initially. And over the years since I've managed to see every episode with the main draw Scully/Moulder dynamic intact. Even saw the first film in the theater.
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 24, 2012, 05:35:35 PM
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 24, 2012, 05:28:36 PM
I could never stand most of The X-Files, but it has its fans, including several ex-boyfriends. How the show got from its origins to their last movie ending on a Hawaiian luau is beyond me.
...so that makes it okay to appropriate one of its most famous and recognizable plot points?
Because a malevolent black goo that had a hand in shaping the ancestors of mankind, that takes over and mutates its host--and is intended for the purpose of eventually wiping out humanity by a humanoid extraterrestrial race that walked the Earth before we did--is kind of a glaringly egregious lift.
Actually, I never made that association myself. I was just commenting on my not being much of a fan of the series. I do think that kind of plot element - an alien device or organism which infects humanity - well-predates
The X-Files or its mythology. We can quibble about the visual, but gooey ichor isn't really a stranger to this franchise, either. This is the first I've heard of the outrage from the
X-Files fan base, certainly.
Just watch the first X-Files movie and you'll see. You don't even need to see the rest of the series.
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 24, 2012, 05:41:33 PM
Actually, I never made that association myself. I was just commenting on my not being much of a fan of the series.
And that was relevant how?
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 24, 2012, 05:41:33 PM
I do think that kind of plot element - an alien device or organism which infects humanity - well-predates The X-Files or its mythology. We can quibble about the visual, but gooey ichor isn't really a stranger to this franchise, either. This is the first I've heard of the outrage from the X-Files fan base, certainly.
It's not quibbling, it's pretty much the
exact same thing--the purpose of it, the function, the visual look,
everything. Moreover, it was something that was done fairly recently on a very visible scale by a wide audience. For something like Prometheus, that was supposed to be some kind of "creative rebirth" and a work of visionary science fiction to just go and lift wholesale an entire concept from
The X-Files just smacks of creative laziness at its most extreme.
Quote from: RaisingCane on Sep 24, 2012, 05:47:06 PM
Just watch the first X-Files movie and you'll see. You don't even need to see the rest of the series.
Exactly. It's almost comical. Prometheus is basically just
Fight the Future in space--except crap, with no wit or likeable characters, right down to the female lead being a scientist/Christian whose crucifix necklace proves to be a plot point.
I like to think of it as a mash-up of the first AvP and X-Files: FTF. :laugh:
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 24, 2012, 05:47:49 PM
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 24, 2012, 05:41:33 PM
Actually, I never made that association myself. I was just commenting on my not being much of a fan of the series.
And that was relevant how?
Forgive me, I'm searching for the appropriate Oprah gif to continue the discourse. Please hold.
QuoteIt's not quibbling, it's pretty much the exact same thing--the purpose of it, the function, the visual look, everything. Moreover, it was something that was done fairly recently on a very visible scale by a wide audience. For something like Prometheus, that was supposed to be some kind of "creative rebirth" and a work of visionary science fiction to just go and lift wholesale an entire concept from The X-Files just smacks of creative laziness at its most extreme.
I don't think it even remotely resembles
The X-Files beyond a cursory glance at that oil - an old trope - and to be very frank, while I respect that the show has its place in pop culture history and its many fans, I think the inescapable truth is that only hardcore fans or sci-fi buffs remember or care about that dense mythology today. It's been gone awhile. And I was forced to sit through quite a bit of that show in the name of love and friendship, including the first film which IIRC wasn't bad but wasn't genius either. (I don't want to talk about the second one. I feel like the showrunner was trying to stave off unemployment and maybe hoping to rebrand the show as a
Criminal Minds spinoff. That was just embarrassing.) But the later seasons, dear God.
My point, though, is that that whole gigantic plotline that evolved, particularly in the show's latter years, with its consortium or coalition or whatever it was, and the various men in dark rooms, the Native Americans, all the clones, poor Veronica Cartwright - I don't see what on Earth any of that has to do with
Prometheus or the Engineers. I don't see what it has to do with
anything, and obviously, at least 95% of the moviegoing audience didn't see any real connection to
The X-Files either. I think it's apples and oranges at best - and the idea of aliens seeding the world, harvesting humanity, all of that predates
both this film and that television show. And Ridley, certainly, has been banging on about the space jockeys being terraformers of life and planets since at least the early '80s. No one's accusing
The X-Files of ripping him off, nor would they; it's nonsense.
It may mean very much to you, and that's fair. But I think we can both acknowledge that this is, at best, a comparison that has come up pretty rarely even online, and it's possible, just possible, that for both the filmmakers and most of the larger audience, the mytharc of
The X-Files may not have even remotely come to mind re:
Prometheus.
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 24, 2012, 05:35:35 PM
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 24, 2012, 05:28:36 PM
I could never stand most of The X-Files, but it has its fans, including several ex-boyfriends. How the show got from its origins to their last movie ending on a Hawaiian luau is beyond me.
...so that makes it okay to appropriate one of its most famous and recognizable plot points?
Because a malevolent black goo that had a hand in shaping the ancestors of mankind, that takes over and mutates its host--and is intended for the purpose of eventually wiping out humanity by a humanoid extraterrestrial race that walked the Earth before we did--is kind of a glaringly egregious lift.
(https://www.avpgalaxy.net/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fassets0.ordienetworks.com%2Fimages%2FGifGuide%2Fclapping%2Ftaxidriver.gif&hash=682a3db855b2d47f05f8f92cb2ec79191d8bc51b)
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 24, 2012, 05:58:27 PM
I don't think it even remotely resembles The X-Files beyond a cursory glance at that oil - an old trope - and to be very frank, while I respect that the show has its place in pop culture history and its many fans, I think the inescapable truth is that only hardcore fans or sci-fi buffs remember or care about that dense mythology today.
Really? The Black Oil is an old trope? Please identify the work of fiction that came before that features a malevolent black goo of extraterrestrial origin capable of possessing, mutating and destroying human beings, used by a race of extraterrestrials that had a hand in shaping humanity, with the intended purpose of the black liquid as being unleashed on all of humanity to destroy us.
And it doesn't matter if Riddlez was talking about Space Jockeys terraforming or whatever--none of that above was ever something he talked about.
The X-Files got there first, and
did it better.
Prometheus was supposed to be an original science fiction epic. Instead its just a lazy rehash of suspiciously specific ideas that have been done better many times elsewhere--even by its own series before it.
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 24, 2012, 06:04:21 PM
Really? The Black Oil is an old trope? Please identify the work of fiction that came before that features a malevolent black goo of extraterrestrial origin capable of possessing, mutating and destroying human beings, used by a race of extraterrestrials that had a hand in shaping humanity, with the intended purpose of the black liquid as being unleashed on all of humanity to destroy us.
First off, we both know the goo was a tool for the Engineers, but we don't really know what the Engineers intended to use on humanity, or exactly why. I certainly have my suspicions, but they're not fact, and they're also not
The X-Files. We know they were experimenting with the goo, we know it was malleable, we know it went wrong. But we don't have anything remotely approaching the byzantine motivations and ploys of those aliens on
The X-Files, which if someone can explain it to me in two sentences or less, I will be thrilled. I pretty much tuned out when Annabeth Gish showed up. I quickly learned I can't tolerate Annabeth Gish.
The black goo/oil is a cursory visual reference which, again, I think is much more rooted in the visceral black and acid glop of most prior
Alien films and mythology than anything off
X-Files. But the larger point about tropes I was making is that the whole 'alien device/material infects and destroys humanity' plotline - that is as old as the hills. We both know that. It predates film and television.
You're moving the goalposts around a lot in the hopes of somehow winning a subjective pop culture debate which is, I think, mostly purely an eye of the beholder thing - and neither of us can win that. You don't like it. Fair. You think it's a ripoff of your favorite TV show, fine. I don't see it, and I think most people didn't see it, and I think it's just possible there's a vast gulf of difference between the two of our opinions and the actual facts, wherein neither of us might be absolutely, unreservedly right.
QuoteThe X-Files got there first, and did it better.
Well, I beg to differ. But let me know when they greenlight Part 3.
So then Cvalda, why are you continuing to talk and discuss a film you dislike so much? What's the point? You disliked it, others didn't, and many loved it. End of.
Good words SpeeedyMax!
As a big fan of the Xfiles....yes, I noticed a similarity, but the way in which the goo was used is different. The black goo in the x files wasn't used to turn people into aliens until the release of the first film, where as in Prometheus, it's a catalyst for DNA transmutation. There's a large difference in how the device is used.
Utlimately, who cares? There are countless films that use the same idea. Some suck, some are brilliant. I think the black slime was effective in Promethues, and the very very least of the films issues.
Quote
Prometheus was supposed to be an original science fiction epic. Instead its just a lazy rehash of suspiciously specific ideas that have been done better many times elsewhere--even by its own series before it.
Don't forget about those "Big Ideas". This film has BIG IDEAS said Ridley, "it's not a small film".
Well actually Ridley, you have about 1/3 of a story, your film spends most of it's time in two locations, the majority of the character development has been edited out and the stuff you've left in is ripped from the X files and elsewhere.
Seems like a pretty small movie to me.
People still talk about how much they hate Alien 3 and that came out in 1992.
Unless this forum is supposed to be a Prometheus-loving circle jerk, I think a negative counterpoint should be expected.
I think people can and should say whatever they like. I certainly do.
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 24, 2012, 06:13:58 PM
First off, we both know the goo was a tool for the Engineers, but we don't really know what the Engineers intended to use on humanity, or exactly why. I certainly have my suspicions, but they're not fact, and they're also not The X-Files. We know they were experimenting with the goo, we know it was malleable, we know it went wrong. But we don't have anything remotely approaching the byzantine motivations and ploys of those aliens on The X-Files, which if someone can explain it to me in two sentences or less, I will be thrilled.
Release black oil virus on humanity, which destroys them all. The end.
It's not that difficult.
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 24, 2012, 06:13:58 PM
But the larger point about tropes I was making is that the whole 'alien device/material infects and destroys humanity' plotline - that is as old as the hills. We both know that. It predates film and television.
Kudos then to
Prometheus for forging such an original path!
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 24, 2012, 06:13:58 PM
You're moving the goalposts around a lot in the hopes of somehow winning a subjective pop culture debate which is, I think, mostly purely an eye of the beholder thing - and neither of us can win that.
Hardly. I'm pointing out that huge portions of Prometheus's mythology are more less the same as The X-Files, which they
are--and you just basically say "Nuh uh!" and then use the old "everything has been done before anyway!" excuse, which is a) not true and b) lazy. You can't even give a solid example of the black oil turning up before The X-Files, and defend your point with huge generalizations.
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 24, 2012, 06:13:58 PM
Well, I beg to differ. But let me know when they greenlight Part 3.
Sure thing! And let me know when they greenlight Prometheus Part 2!
I guess my point is when you're (seemingly) trying to convince others that your opinion is the correct one (which I've certainly been guilty of from time to time) that's what I have a problem with.
Quote from: ThisBethesdaSea on Sep 24, 2012, 06:24:51 PM
I guess my point is when you're (seemingly) trying to convince others that your opinion is the correct one (which I've certainly been guilty of from time to time) that's what I have a problem with.
It's a forum. People are going to argue different opinions. Get over it.
Back on track guys. The forum is built for both views, and you're welcome to hash them out, so long as we don't get overly irate and off-topic.
I'd rather discuss my differing viewpoint then argue about it. :)
Quote from: ThisBethesdaSea on Sep 24, 2012, 06:31:07 PM
I'd rather discuss my differing viewpoint then argue about it. :)
That's more like it :)
I can sorta forgive Ridley Scott for this stuff. He's above it all. He lives in his own creative bubble.
But Lindelof is a hip, young Hollywood writer. He obviously knew about AvP and I have a hard time believing that he was unaware of the black oil from X-Files.
I'll play Devil's advocate here.
On one hand originality is over-rated, mood and execution are everything. I would objectively say, having seen a ton of films that Prometheus was a largely poorly executed movie, bred in a system where money triumphs over art.
On the other hand it's hard not to see the parallels between the black goo and the black oil from the x files. It's functions and ultimate purpose.
Nor is it hard to see the parallels between Scully and Shaw, a red haired scientist with deep christian beliefs, both impregnated with extra-terrestrials. There is also a recurring cross motif running throughout. I'll say that I found this very cringe worthy in Prometheus.
Anyway guys and gals, turn down the heat on the debate, it would be fun if we could have beers and argue versus being faceless words on a computer screen.
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 24, 2012, 06:23:18 PM
Release black oil virus on humanity, which destroys them all. The end.
It's not that difficult.
...I'm pretty sure that single sentence doesn't explain all the clones, the Indians, the weird warring factions of aliens, that shapeshifter played by Brian Thompson, all the weird experiments, the human collaborators, the colonization thing and so on. I had no idea what the f**k was going on, but what I was clear on is that the mythology of that TV show was a great deal more complex than that. But I'm letting it go. Point being, it's just a
tad different.
QuoteKudos then to Prometheus for forging such an original path!
You're right. Both
The X-Files and
Prometheus are guilty of revisiting a basic science-fiction concept - aliens interfering with humanity and wreaking devastation - guilty along with at least hundreds of other books, films, and television programs. Let's call the police. Or the fire department. The similarities pretty much end with the basic concept for me.
QuoteHardly. I'm pointing out that huge portions of Prometheus's mythology are more less the same as The X-Files,
Again: aliens, wars, clones, colonies, shapeshifters, Indians, his dead sister, that baby, the Russian chick, the smoking man...you're right, it's like looking into a mirror!
QuoteYou can't even give a solid example of the black oil turning up before The X-Files,
I just discussed the black goo. You're ignoring it because you can't respond to it without ceding the slightest bit of your logic, which really isn't very logical anymore. You're fighting to fight, and I'm an idiot for enabling it.
Quoteand defend your point with huge generalizations.
Yes. I'm the one generalizing because I do not think
Prometheus is a wholesale ripoff of the insanely convoluted story of
The X-Files. I'm not sure we could even get a majority ruling on that one from most of the
X-Files fanbase, but good luck.
I'll say it again: we're both convinced we're totally right, but in truth this has really become a subjective argument neither of us can win against the other. We're convinced our views are right, nothing will deter either of us, and the reality is there is likely a vast expanse of difference between either of us and our takes and any of the filmmakers. There is no objective absolute to be found here, at least not with us. Pretending there is by bickering at each other is pointless. The difference between us is, I don't
care if you differ from me. That happens. There aren't enough hours in the day for me to be that bothered, and I would think it's a waste of your time as well when you know nothing can move me anymore than I you. We agree to disagree.
QuoteSure thing! And let me know when they greenlight Prometheus Part 2!
Are you
sure you don't want to bet money?
Prometheus cribbed a major aspect of X-Files lore. The fact that it didn't crib all the trimmings doesn't diminish that.
Yeah, good luck with that, man.
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 24, 2012, 06:38:18 PM
I just discussed the black goo. You're ignoring it because you can't respond to it without ceding the slightest bit of your logic, which really isn't very logical anymore.
No, because all you said was "it's drawn from the acid and the glop of the prior movies", which makes sense because Alien drool and acid is black and infects people and turns them monstrous and is a bioweapon intended to destroy humanity. Your point was beautifully argued, truly.
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 24, 2012, 06:38:18 PM
Yes. I'm the one generalizing because I do not think Prometheus is a wholesale ripoff of the insanely convoluted story of The X-Files. I'm not sure we could even get a majority ruling on that one from most of the X-Files fanbase, but good luck.
And yet there are other posters in here admitting the obvious similarity while you steadfastly deny it. Moreover, I never mentioned Indians or any other aspects of The X-Files mythology, which is just you dragging out a desperate strawman to distract from the fact that you have no solid argument against the stuff I pointed out that is the same. Your argument is basically "but it didn't have
all that other stuff, so it's not the same!!!1!", completely ignoring the already sizaeable overlap that
is.
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 24, 2012, 06:38:18 PM
There aren't enough hours in the day for me to be that bothered, and I would think it's a waste of your time as well when you know nothing can move me anymore than I you.
And yet here you are.
I've said I think the similarities are extremely superficial and really come from larger, classical sci-fi 'alien intervention' concepts which both these properties appropriated for their own ends. The X-Files itself bore a fair similarity to series like Nigel Kneale's Quatermass or Kolchak: The Night Stalker which paved the way for it, but never was it said to have thieved from them, because it didn't. They all were drinking from the same conceptual well. We both know the X-Files took a much larger, dense track with its storyline and mythology, and that's not nitpicking or desperate in the slightest. If you don't agree with me about the visuals, that's fair, but we're never going to agree so that's that. As I've tried to say repeatedly, but you seem to think there is still some way to 'make' me agree with you or cede to your will. I'm afraid that won't be happening.
And yes, here I am. This may shock you, Cvalda, and if so I apologize, but I really don't come here for you, or rather to antagonize you. I come here to discuss whatever I like about the franchise. I don't associate this forum with you or your opinions, and it really doesn't matter that much to me if people disagree with me. I argue my opinions, but it has very little to do with my ego. I invest my ego entirely in my frenzied, paranoid terror about my hair, looks and future prospects. The rest is really not that serious, and none of us need permission to speak.
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 24, 2012, 06:54:50 PM
I've said I think the similarities are extremely superficial and really come from larger, classical sci-fi 'alien intervention' concepts which both these properties appropriated for their own ends. The X-Files itself bore a fair similarity to series like Nigel Kneale's Quatermass or Kolchak: The Night Stalker which paved the way for it, but never was it said to have thieved from them, because it didn't. They all were drinking from the same conceptual well. We both know the X-Files took a much larger, dense track with its storyline and mythology, and that's not nitpicking or desperate in the slightest. If you don't agree with me about the visuals, that's fair, but we're never going to agree so that's that. As I've tried to say repeatedly, but you seem to think there is still some way to 'make' me agree with you or cede to your will. I'm afraid that won't be happening.
Clearly, considering that entire paragraph above still didn't say anything meaningful in regards to the black oil subplot that this whole argument was about in the first place.
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 24, 2012, 06:54:50 PM
And yes, here I am. This may shock you, Cvalda, and if so I apologize, but I really don't come here for you, or rather to antagonize you. I come here to discuss whatever I like about the franchise. I don't associate this forum with you or your opinions, and it really doesn't matter that much to me if people disagree with me. I argue my opinions, but it has very little to do with my ego. I invest my ego entirely in my frenzied, paranoid terror about my hair, looks and future prospects. The rest is really not that serious, and none of us need permission to speak.
I was more making a point of your "I don't care yet here I am replying with big ol' paragraphs" routine.
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 24, 2012, 07:01:02 PM
Clearly, considering that entire paragraph above still didn't say anything meaningful in regards to the black oil subplot that this whole argument was about in the first place.
I've asked and answered that multiple times on multiple levels; you just say I'm wrong because you want to keep it going.
QuoteI was more making a point of your "I don't care yet here I am replying with big ol' paragraphs" routine.
Yes, I'm a rambling blowhard on my best day. But I still don't care all that much about this. And as I have said repeatedly, this is a subjective argument that is going in circles and getting us nowhere. Here, I'll tell you what: if it means that much to you, you can have the last word next and you can still claim that you've 'won' the argument. Go for it. Make your day. I need to eat lunch.
I don't think we'd be criticizing Prometheus for being so derivative if it hadn't been marketed as some sort of wholly original, high concept, sci-fi art film when it's really just another "chariots of the gods" fantasy in a pretty package.
Isn't the Black goo intend to change things instead of destroy them? This is what i understood, the Black goo transform organic things in biomecanical things.
Yes. Prometheus smacked of 1960's science fiction cliche. (As it's Alien predecessor did with equal parts 10 little Indians horror flick) Both did what they set out to do by and large. To have nebulous similarities to other science fiction elements from other derivative science fiction films/shows is to be expected.
The mysterious black goo was not unlike the mysterious green slime of many campy space movies. Most notably 1968's The Green Slime.
Quote from: Mechafist on Sep 24, 2012, 07:33:00 PM
Isn't the Black goo intend to change things instead of destroy them? This is what i understood, the Black goo transform organic things in biomecanical things.
The black oil does that too. (http://x-files.wikia.com/wiki/Black_oil#Mutation)
Mind you, this is what happened in the 1998 movie that I mentioned earlier, not just in some one-off television episode that only fans would remember.
Quote from: Mechafist on Sep 24, 2012, 07:33:00 PM
Isn't the Black goo intend to change things instead of destroy them? This is what i understood, the Black goo transform organic things in biomecanical things.
It destroyed that Engineer at the beginning.
Basically, it just does whatever the writers want it to (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AppliedPhlebotinum) without explanation.
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 24, 2012, 07:40:57 PM
Quote from: Mechafist on Sep 24, 2012, 07:33:00 PM
Isn't the Black goo intend to change things instead of destroy them? This is what i understood, the Black goo transform organic things in biomecanical things.
It destroyed that Engineer at the beginning.
Different substance. They look different, are contained in different cases and do different things.
Quote from: Bat Chain Puller on Sep 24, 2012, 05:06:43 PM
It's tough to see how that scene could have worked. It does seem like a rather obvious pre-teen Alien fan wish fulfillment sequence. And borders on the silly notions dreamed up for something out of a Species direct to DVD sequel.
But I think in the hands of a group of uncompromising genius, renegade film makers the scene could have worked.
If the two of them were going at it and suddenly it burst out of him without warning then yeah it wouldn't work, I think it would work better if say they were having sex and Holloway starts having chest pains so Shaw thinks hes having a heart attack and runs to get help, then the chestburster comes out while shes away looking for the medic that way he wasn't on top of her when it happened.
Quote from: Gazz on Sep 24, 2012, 07:43:35 PM
Different substance. They look different, are contained in different cases and do different things.
Got a link to back that up? They are both black liquid that is drinkable. They both reconfigure the host's DNA.
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 24, 2012, 07:44:55 PM
Quote from: Gazz on Sep 24, 2012, 07:43:35 PM
Different substance. They look different, are contained in different cases and do different things.
Got a link to back that up? They are both black liquid that is drinkable. They both reconfigure the host's DNA.
http://youtu.be/-x1YuvUQFJ0 (http://youtu.be/-x1YuvUQFJ0)
Quote from: RaisingCane on Sep 24, 2012, 03:22:52 AM
So were the Star Wars prequels.
Yeah..But you must realize which refers to the film and Alien series ... Prometheus was a breakthrough .. not a setback.
Because of crap like the AVP series and the last Alien's Jenet everything related to the Aliens was already turning slapstick.
The great truth that nobody expects anything from Alien, as it was expected with the SW films.
Quote from: RaisingCane on Sep 24, 2012, 07:55:50 PM
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 24, 2012, 07:44:55 PM
Quote from: Gazz on Sep 24, 2012, 07:43:35 PM
Different substance. They look different, are contained in different cases and do different things.
Got a link to back that up? They are both black liquid that is drinkable. They both reconfigure the host's DNA.
http://youtu.be/-x1YuvUQFJ0 (http://youtu.be/-x1YuvUQFJ0)
I'm sorry, but this isn't even reliable at all. Right now I'm watching ( idk why) but the only time it's mentioned that it could be different is in the beginning, and even then it's asking the question if it's the same black good or not.
Before I watched that video, I didn't even know that the black goo and the sparkly green goo were meant to be different. Am I mistaken?
Black goo is completely different than green goo. Green goo is what stores/activates/whatever the Engineer's hologram security system.
Dear god this is silly.
Quote from: RaisingCane on Sep 24, 2012, 07:37:03 PM
Quote from: Mechafist on Sep 24, 2012, 07:33:00 PM
Isn't the Black goo intend to change things instead of destroy them? This is what i understood, the Black goo transform organic things in biomecanical things.
The black oil does that too. (http://x-files.wikia.com/wiki/Black_oil#Mutation)
Mind you, this is what happened in the 1998 movie that I mentioned earlier.
It's cliche, but not a bad idea.
Ridley could've done much better use of it and of course he could've done something far more creative.
Oh i haven't watched this season yet ;D
Am i the only one who likes X-Files here?
Lindelof references that Shaw is Mulder and Holloway is Scully in the commentary.
Nobody saw that coming. :laugh:
He also says that all the Ridley Scott editing choices were "genius".....
for f**ks sake....
...if he sucks ridley's dick any harder, he'll break his teeth.
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 24, 2012, 08:14:41 PM
Black goo is completely different than green goo. Green goo is what stores/activates/whatever the Engineer's hologram security system.
Dear god this is silly.
I thought the sparkly green goo is just what the black goo looked like close up. Kinda like how red human blood looks black in the dark.
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 24, 2012, 07:44:55 PM
Quote from: Gazz on Sep 24, 2012, 07:43:35 PM
Different substance. They look different, are contained in different cases and do different things.
Got a link to back that up? They are both black liquid that is drinkable. They both reconfigure the host's DNA.
Eh, I'm looking at the film now and can clearly see a difference in colour between substances.
One is kept in an ampule surrounded by green liquid.
The other is kept in a ritual pot surrounded by a dissolvable mercury like substance.
One is Black, Gold and Silver (Sacrificial substance).
The other is solid Black (Ampule). We see no trace of silver or gold in this substance or in it's container.
They both reconfigure DNA but one results in Xenomorph type creature hybrids (the worms, Fifield, the hugger, the Deacon) and the other results in the human race. Perhaps they are derived from the same source but it seems clear to me we're dealing with two different substances here. The only connective tissue being that they use similar methods to meet their radically different ends.
Quote from: Blacklabel on Sep 24, 2012, 08:15:46 PM
...if he sucks ridley's dick any harder, he'll break his teeth.
I'm sure many of the users here will be happy to take his place once his jaw gets tired. :D
Quote from: RaisingCane on Sep 24, 2012, 08:12:56 PM
Before I watched that video, I didn't even know that the black goo and the sparkly green goo were meant to be different. Am I mistaken?
That wasn't even being questioned in the last page. Cvalda said that the Black goo that the Engineer drank in the beginning was the same as the urns/vases that Shaw and co. found inside the "temple."
Quote from: Gazz on Sep 24, 2012, 08:22:01 PM
They both reconfigure DNA but one results in Xenomorph type creature hybrids (the worms, Fifield, the hugger, the Deacon) and the other results in the human race. Perhaps they are derived from the same source but it's clear to me we're dealing with two different substances here. The only connective tissue being that they use similar methods to meet their ends.
So, in other words... they still just do what the writers want them to as an easy plot device. Stuck on a story element whilst writing? "We have a goo for that."
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 24, 2012, 08:27:21 PM
Quote from: Gazz on Sep 24, 2012, 08:22:01 PM
They both reconfigure DNA but one results in Xenomorph type creature hybrids (the worms, Fifield, the hugger, the Deacon) and the other results in the human race. Perhaps they are derived from the same source but it's clear to me we're dealing with two different substances here. The only connective tissue being that they use similar methods to meet their ends.
So, in other words... they still just do what the writers want them to as an easy plot device. Stuck on a story element whilst writing? "We have a goo for that."
The only way I can find a way for it to make sense is that the Black Goo seen in the temple was in its "raw" form, while the one that was used in the opening scene was a more developed black goo that somehow was changed in order to kill someone and have them...create...life...ah f**k it.
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 24, 2012, 08:27:21 PMSo, in other words... they still just do what the writers want them to as an easy plot device. Stuck on a story element whilst writing? "We have a goo for that."
Splendid! I can incorporate Engineer goo into my Sulaco egg theory (http://www.avpgalaxy.net/forum/index.php?topic=9.msg1483278#msg1483278) now!
So this is what Alien fandom has been reduced to: debating different kinds of goo.
Thanks, Prometheus.
I hope Paradise introduces us to a new kind of goo the way Aliens showed us the queen.
I want a goo that makes toast.
Pleeeeeease.
Like the mood slime from Ghostbusters 2?
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 24, 2012, 08:27:21 PM
Quote from: Gazz on Sep 24, 2012, 08:22:01 PM
They both reconfigure DNA but one results in Xenomorph type creature hybrids (the worms, Fifield, the hugger, the Deacon) and the other results in the human race. Perhaps they are derived from the same source but it's clear to me we're dealing with two different substances here. The only connective tissue being that they use similar methods to meet their ends.
So, in other words... they still just do what the writers want them to as an easy plot device.
The green activation substance is way way way too easy a plot device. It's inclusion feels cheap and adds very little.
But I personally see no problem with the sacrificial substance or the ampule bio-weapon goo. The fact that we would meet our end in a similar way in which we were created and at the hands of the same makers no less seems entirely consistant.
Quote from: ShadowPred on Sep 24, 2012, 08:31:33 PM
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 24, 2012, 08:27:21 PM
Quote from: Gazz on Sep 24, 2012, 08:22:01 PM
They both reconfigure DNA but one results in Xenomorph type creature hybrids (the worms, Fifield, the hugger, the Deacon) and the other results in the human race. Perhaps they are derived from the same source but it's clear to me we're dealing with two different substances here. The only connective tissue being that they use similar methods to meet their ends.
So, in other words... they still just do what the writers want them to as an easy plot device. Stuck on a story element whilst writing? "We have a goo for that."
The only way I can find a way for it to make sense is that the Black Goo seen in the temple was in its "raw" form, while the one that was used in the opening scene was a more developed black goo that somehow was changed in order to kill someone and have them...create...life...ah f**k it.
The black goo in the temple appears to simply be a bio-weapon with an end game that results with Xenomorph type creatures. It requires the sacrifice of a host. It appears the Engineers were sacrificing humanity in order to create the Xenomorph (destroying to create).
The opening black/gold/silver substance results in Engineer type creatures (humans) and also requires a sacrifice in order to harvest DNA (destroying to create).
They are clearly similar substances in their methods (hence my assumption they are both derived from the same source) but are tailored towards completely different ends. At least that's the sense I made of it.
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 24, 2012, 08:23:12 PM
Quote from: Blacklabel on Sep 24, 2012, 08:15:46 PM
...if he sucks ridley's dick any harder, he'll break his teeth.
I'm sure many of the users here will be happy to take his place once his jaw gets tired. :D
I hope you are not refering to me... :D
Uhm...So, the green goo is probably produced by the Deacon.
And the Black goo? by the Engineers :P
What color was the goo that Halloway infected Shaw with?
I remember black with some slight hint at a very dark red.
Quote from: RaisingCane on Sep 24, 2012, 06:40:23 PM
Prometheus cribbed a major aspect of X-Files lore. The fact that it didn't crib all the trimmings doesn't diminish that.
Let's just talk about this X files lore specifically, but let's go a step further and talk about alien infection.
1. Star Trek 2 uses the bug in the ear, i.e. parasite investation of a human host
2. The Puppet Master, parasite attachment, infection of a human host
3. Dream Catcher, parasite infection of a human host
4. The X Files Film, black goo, aka, parasite infection of the human host
So, clearly even ALIEN plays in a familiar territory. I don't think Prometheus absconds the X Files, they're just similar threads, that's all. In my opinion :)
You're ignoring the fact that the Black Oil from The X-Files is also a bioweapon from alien beings that are planning to wipe out humanity via mass release of it. And also that those aliens existed on Earth before humanity. And also that the black oil had a hand in shaping humanity in the first place.
It's not just a simple case of "oh, they both infect people."
If I didn't know better, I'd suggest that Lindelof may have written Prometheus as a sequel to The X-Files. The goo/oil is THAT similar in function and behavior.
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 24, 2012, 09:12:45 PM
You're ignoring the fact that the Black Oil from The X-Files is also a bioweapon from alien beings that are planning to wipe out humanity via mass release of it. And also that those aliens existed on Earth before humanity. And also that the black oil had a hand in shaping humanity in the first place.
It's not just a simple case of "oh, they both infect people."
Can you please tell me which episode it is ??? Would love to see it.
Quote from: Snowdog on Sep 24, 2012, 09:18:46 PM
Can you please tell me which episode it is ??? Would love to see it.
It's multiple episodes across multiple seasons. It's like a huge part of the series' mythology.
Or you can just watch
Fight the Future.
Oh, look, other people are here. Let's see...
Well, first, I wouldn't really cite Internet reviews as a source. That said,
ShadowPred, I believe the stuff on
The X-Files was in fact alive - a sentient virus which - well, let's see at Wikipedia:
Quotean alien virus that thrived underground on Earth, in petroleum deposits. The virus is capable of entering humanoids and assuming control of their bodies. It has sentience and is capable of communicating. It was revealed to be the "life force" of the alien colonists, which they seemingly used to reproduce their kind, as well as infect other alien races in order to conquer the universe.
The Syndicate in cooperation with the alien Colonists developed a delivery mechanism that would be used to introduce the virus into an unsuspecting public upon colonization. Africanized bees, extremely aggressive that would sting indiscriminately, would carry the black oil virus through a transgenic corn crop specifically engineered to carry the virus and to attract the bees. The bees would be released on colonization and the infected human beings would become a slave race. The Syndicate, however, secretly tried to create a vaccine to protect themselves, which they codenamed "Purity Control." While the Purity Control project ultimately fails, a rival Russian shadow group was successful in developing a weak vaccine which eventually fell into the hands of the Syndicate.
The plot to cooperate with the alien colonization plan was implemented with the aim of being given access to the black oil for the transgenic corn, in order to perform experiments with it in an effort to develop a vaccine. This attempt was semi-successful, as the "weak vaccine" administered to Scully while in the Antarctic alien ship was able to cure her infection and cause the entire ship to depart its underground residence. After the events of the 1998 film, the Syndicate, as well as Mulder and Scully learned that the black oil can either take over a host's body or incubate within other life forms, including humans. Once infected with the gestational form of the black oil virus, a human host gestates the immature alien form after 96 hours, or sooner if the surrounding temperature is raised significantly, killing the host in the process.
I can barely understand half of that shit, but almost none of that is what I understood the stuff in
Prometheus to be. That stuff was a biological tool the Engineers apparently used to create or transform life, something which grew beyond their control and later fell into the wrong hands. They also apparently used it to fashion material to raze planets. This is ancient, classic sci-fi story stuff - the power of otherworldly gods sent down to smite mankind. The similarities to the
X-Files are superficial at best, I think, and end there.
As Bat Chain said several pages ago and much better than me, all of this stuff, from both this film and
X-Files, is really sourced in much older science fiction -
Green Slime, The Blob, and then further back to a host of literature and fiction prior. Both works deal in that idea of transformative artifacts of alien masters and admittedly, have a similar visual cue, although I think that goes way back with the
Alien films. It's how the stories use this plot device that largely differs, and in the television show I think the above speaks for itself. Again, it's apples and oranges. Different stories, different aims, same classic trope. If you see plagiarism, you see it, if you don't, if you don't. Life goes on.
And as for the other remarks, the cordial flattery is appreciated, guys, but Ridley Scott's a little old for me and I always played the trombone better than I gave head (and I was shit at the trombone). Plus I can't quite forgive him for
A Good Year (or
Someone to Watch Over Me).
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 24, 2012, 09:21:41 PM
As Bat Chain said several pages ago and much better than me, all of this stuff, from both this film and X-Files, is really sourced in much older science fiction - Green Slime, The Blob, and then further back to a host of literature and fiction prior. Both works deal in that idea of transformative artifacts of alien masters and admittedly, have a similar visual cue, although I think that goes way back with the Alien films.
Except that The Green Slime doesnt possess anyone and turns into this...
(https://www.avpgalaxy.net/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.scifi-movies.com%2Fimages%2Fdata%2F0000262%2Fimage4.jpg&hash=f8f565aadefa3f58269acd732b8abb5229b37d42)
...and The Blob is just...a blob.
So basically, aside from a completely tenuous connection in that they are both somewhat formless, they have nothing at all in common really with the Black Oil or Black Goo.
Apples and oranges, dear. I have to go find my old trombone.
Quite an argument you've got there.
Wait until you've seen the trombone before you jump to conclusions.
Quote from: Vulhala on Sep 24, 2012, 09:28:14 PM
Wait until you've seen the trombone before you jump to conclusions.
That's what I'm saying.
Is it rusty?
Quote from: RaisingCane on Sep 24, 2012, 09:34:54 PM
Is it rusty?
Oh, most certainly, but it's no patch on Ridley Scott. I work in media, not elder care.
I'll just leave this here:
How Prometheus Ripped Off The X-Files (http://en.paperblog.com/film-tv-how-prometheus-ripped-off-the-x-files-248744/)
From the article:
QuoteIf you still need more proof, you're probably a die-hard Ridley Scott fan who will not be swayed.
Pretty much.
Also, Googling "Prometheus X Files ripoff" gives you 12,300,000 hits. It's not like only a few people noticed.
In fairness, "is Obama a Muslim" is at 308,000,000 hits, so let's take that as we will.
And that random online opinion column is great, but it's just one more dude's opinion on the Internet. I really don't care about it anymore than you care about mine. So once again, we have the dilemma of the unstoppable force and the immovable object. That said, I told you before you could have the last word, and you can have it as many times as you like.
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 24, 2012, 09:21:41 PM
Oh, look, other people are here. Let's see...
Well, first, I wouldn't really cite Internet reviews as a source. That said, ShadowPred, I believe the stuff on The X-Files was in fact alive - a sentient virus which - well, let's see at Wikipedia:
Quotean alien virus that thrived underground on Earth, in petroleum deposits. The virus is capable of entering humanoids and assuming control of their bodies. It has sentience and is capable of communicating. It was revealed to be the "life force" of the alien colonists, which they seemingly used to reproduce their kind, as well as infect other alien races in order to conquer the universe.
The Syndicate in cooperation with the alien Colonists developed a delivery mechanism that would be used to introduce the virus into an unsuspecting public upon colonization. Africanized bees, extremely aggressive that would sting indiscriminately, would carry the black oil virus through a transgenic corn crop specifically engineered to carry the virus and to attract the bees. The bees would be released on colonization and the infected human beings would become a slave race. The Syndicate, however, secretly tried to create a vaccine to protect themselves, which they codenamed "Purity Control." While the Purity Control project ultimately fails, a rival Russian shadow group was successful in developing a weak vaccine which eventually fell into the hands of the Syndicate.
The plot to cooperate with the alien colonization plan was implemented with the aim of being given access to the black oil for the transgenic corn, in order to perform experiments with it in an effort to develop a vaccine. This attempt was semi-successful, as the "weak vaccine" administered to Scully while in the Antarctic alien ship was able to cure her infection and cause the entire ship to depart its underground residence. After the events of the 1998 film, the Syndicate, as well as Mulder and Scully learned that the black oil can either take over a host's body or incubate within other life forms, including humans. Once infected with the gestational form of the black oil virus, a human host gestates the immature alien form after 96 hours, or sooner if the surrounding temperature is raised significantly, killing the host in the process.
I can barely understand half of that shit, but almost none of that is what I understood the stuff in Prometheus to be. That stuff was a biological tool the Engineers apparently used to create or transform life, something which grew beyond their control and later fell into the wrong hands. They also apparently used it to fashion material to raze planets. This is ancient, classic sci-fi story stuff - the power of otherworldly gods sent down to smite mankind. The similarities to the X-Files are superficial at best, I think, and end there.
As Bat Chain said several pages ago and much better than me, all of this stuff, from both this film and X-Files, is really sourced in much older science fiction - Green Slime, The Blob, and then further back to a host of literature and fiction prior. Both works deal in that idea of transformative artifacts of alien masters and admittedly, have a similar visual cue, although I think that goes way back with the Alien films. It's how the stories use this plot device that largely differs, and in the television show I think the above speaks for itself. Again, it's apples and oranges. Different stories, different aims, same classic trope. If you see plagiarism, you see it, if you don't, if you don't. Life goes on.
And as for the other remarks, the cordial flattery is appreciated, guys, but Ridley Scott's a little old for me and I always played the trombone better than I gave head (and I was shit at the trombone). Plus I can't quite forgive him for A Good Year (or Someone to Watch Over Me).
I, uh...I'm not arguing anything about the Black Goo/Slime about Prometheus and X-Files...I have only been adding my say about the Black Goo in Prometheus. I never once even mentioned X-Files on this...why am I being singled out in BOLD lettering?
Because trombone. That's why.
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 24, 2012, 09:40:32 PM
That said, I told you before you could have the last word, and you can have it as many times as you like.
And yet you keep posting.
I apologize - I was only bolding your name to indicate a screen name, something I do from time to time, though admittedly not consistently. Just an odd online affectation.
As for why I pointed it out to you, I was responding to something you were discussing with Gazz (see?) a few pages ago, something about the review not "proving" the TV show and the film didn't use the same black gunk. If I misread it, my bad.
Trombone, what?
*looks back a page*
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6j4rCOzXJZg# (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6j4rCOzXJZg#)
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 24, 2012, 09:44:22 PM
I apologize - I was only bolding your name to indicate a screen name, something I do from time to time, though admittedly not consistently. Just an odd online affectation.
As for why I pointed it out to you, I was responding to something you were discussing with Gazz (see?) a few pages ago, something about the review not "proving" the TV show and the film didn't use the same black gunk. If I misread it, my bad.
I am so terribly confused right now, I think I'll just take my leave so far.
Oh, and before things get too out of hand, I suggest to get back on topic soon.
Quote from: ShadowPred on Sep 24, 2012, 09:46:53 PM
Trombone, what?
*looks back a page*
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6j4rCOzXJZg# (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6j4rCOzXJZg#)
I take any and all "Prometheus fans = cocksuckers" jokes in good spirit. I live on the edge, what can I say.
QuoteOh, and before things get too out of hand, I suggest to get back on topic soon.
I like the topic too.
The topic is not about the Goo! Read the thread's title...this goes for everyone.
Quote from: ShadowPred on Sep 24, 2012, 09:50:56 PM
The topic is not about the Goo! Read the thread's title...this goes for everyone.
Cool, cos the last few pages have bored the shite out of me.
I actually only JUST saw that this argument has been going back FAR LONGER than I thought. It made me cry.
Quote
from the article in question
"Black oil that turns an arguably normal person into a violent being. Check.
Yeeeah, but not qute.
X-files did that and they ripped off
Alien by having the 'violent being part' come out of the infected person's torso.
Full circle once Prometheus came around.
Alright people, use this fresh new page to get back on topic for once. Some crap about writer commentary and such.
Holloway didn't seem especially violent.
Writer commentary looks to be purdy good. Like what they have to say. The more Alien(s) script written by spaihts didn't do much for me.
God damn, reading Speedymax postings is like wiping your ass with silk. Totally cured my hang over.
I was a massive X-files fan. Never once thought back to the black stuff until you guy's brought it up.
X-files - Black goo that seems to have some sort of intelligence, can control a host or exit.
Prometheus - Black goo that destroys shit and turns people into half alien zombie snakes.
Similarities - It's black?
Wait, you forgot - it's gooey.
And an ancient alien bioweapon designed to destroy all life on Earth. From aliens that perhaps started life here in the first place.
But we musn't let all those obvious similarities get in the way of our other, more important goo debates, such as which goo does what and why.
The Alien universe has truly benefited from these remarkable mythos developments.
Quote from: SM on Sep 24, 2012, 11:54:29 PM
Wait, you forgot - it's gooey.
No that's the green goo. Diet goo. Goo zero.
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 24, 2012, 11:59:24 PM
And an ancient alien bioweapon designed to destroy all life on Earth. From aliens that perhaps started life here in the first place.
As I remember it, there's a scene in one of the episodes that shows the black goo - v1.1 - X-files edition, that infects some sort of early primate. Actually I think that might even be in the movie?
I don't think the X-files ever links the V1.1 goo to the origin of human life - Could be wrong, been yonks since I watched it.
Quote from: Highland on Sep 24, 2012, 11:49:49 PM
God damn, reading Speedymax postings is like wiping your ass with silk.
Possible sig line imminent.
I will reiterate, though, that I think they clearly showed that the goop's sole purpose was never simply to destroy. It was a mutagen; it had all sorts of transformative and even ritualistic aspects for the Engineers. They used it to experiment, to break down and build up life; any slight change in atmosphere or particular contact could create radically different effects. They used it to create and to destroy, and David and co. f**ked about with it. And sometimes, as is implied to be their plan for Earth, they destroyed to create (as David says).
Quote from: Highland on Sep 25, 2012, 12:00:08 AM
As I remember it, there's a scene in one of the episodes that shows the black goo - v1.1 - X-files edition, that infects some sort of early primate. Actually I think that might even be in the movie?
I don't think the X-files ever links the V1.1 goo to the origin of human life - Could be wrong, been yonks since I watched it.
From Wikipedia:
QuoteAccording to the series mythology, an extraterrestrial lifeform, known in the series' mythology simply as the Colonists, were originally present on Earth in the early stages of human evolution.
The movie then goes on to state that the black oil was the first lifeform on this planet, and "walked the Earth before dinosaurs", etc.
Aaaand from The X-Files wiki:
QuoteA theory concocted by doctor Sacks and FBI Special Agent Dana Scully is that the black oil came to Earth prehistorically on a meteor from Mars that also carried the first building-blocks of life to Earth. The virus then thrived on Earth and infected primitive humans, completely changing their physiology and transforming them into alien life-forms themselves. In the planet's last ice age, these aliens died and the virus lay dormant underground until it resurfaced during Earth's current geologic period.
Hmm..., I like this, but at the same time I like the new direction, as long as a sequel happens. If a sequel does happen, I hope it ties in to Alien more directly, because at this point the alien franchise is dead.
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 25, 2012, 12:26:59 AM
snip
I don't think any of that stuff actually happens though. Now that I watched (used google) it again the primates just come across a dead alien so that would contradict the meteor theory. Then you'd have the conflict, that if the black goo hitched a ride on a Bruce Willis meteor, how come it's got ships and a grand plan to take over the world? #Villain voice#
I do clearly remember a scene where krycheck (spelling) spits the black goo out of his eyeballs and into an alien ship.
I always thought the black goo in the X-files was the alien, it wasn't responsible for anything other than looking out for itself - bit like "The Thing"
The goo in Prometheus seems more like a chemical as opposed to a life form.
Quote from: Highland on Sep 25, 2012, 12:43:58 AM
I don't think any of that stuff actually happens though. Now that I watched (used google) it again the primates just come across a dead alien so that would contradict the meteor theory.
The meteor stuff happens before the movie. The black oil is found all over the planet. When the homonids in Fight the Future discover it, it has already been here since the beginning of life on Earth.
Quote from: Highland on Sep 25, 2012, 12:43:58 AM
Then you'd have the conflict, that if the black goo hitched a ride on a Bruce Willis meteor, how come it's got ships and a grand plan to take over the world? #Villain voice#
Because it had a couple billion years to get to that point?
Quote from: Highland on Sep 25, 2012, 12:43:58 AM
I always thought the black goo in the X-files was the alien, it wasn't responsible for anything other than looking out for itself - bit like "The Thing"
It does a lotta things--kinda like the black oil in
Prometheus, actually! Except it actually has defined motivations and purposes.
Quote from: Highland on Sep 25, 2012, 12:43:58 AM
The goo in Prometheus seems more like a chemical as opposed to a life form.
But they still have much the same function and appearance.
prometheus could have been a classic if they would implement more character development from the draft and have a little bit more action or terror in it...wich the draft shows, it could have been done even without an actual xeno
QuoteThe meteor stuff happens before the movie. The black oil is found all over the planet
.
Is that actually on film though? Where'd the alien come from then?
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 25, 2012, 12:53:21 AM
Because it had a couple billion years to get to that point?
So then you'd have to ask why not just make the planet Black Goo City with Black Goo public bars? Why bother with the secrecy and hidden ships and agenda's if you've been ruling the roost for a billion years? Why even bother letting the humans get advanced just so you can then wipe them out?
I guess if they did build ships then where are they going?
To me it the X-files always made the point of saying these guy's exist, they are coming to get us one day but I never thought watching the show that they were somehow responsible for creating anything - other than cool sharp stick things.
Anyway, I don't really remember enough about the show to get into an in depth evaluation so I'll just chuck my vote in as "No"
Based on what I've read and heard so far, I'm already liking Spaihts' draft better. Can't wait to read the full draft.
Well, it's just one blow after another. First the numerous concepts that didn't make it into the film (many of which are better than what we got), then the deleted scenes and now this.
A lot of it just sounds really derivative to me, and a few scenes described are way too OTT. I think the larger framework - the Engineers, the expedition - is gold, which luckily is what they worked from, but all the classic alien shit they pushed into it needed to go AFAIC. And fortunately it did. They had him working in too small a box, until they realized what they really wanted, or rather what a man with Scott's name value could get away with demanding. But that often happens with a writing job.
I really look forward to reading it regardless. There's certainly stuff I'd like to have kept in the early scenes. And an older Holloway could've been a plum role for someone like, IDK, Ralph Fiennes?
An older Holloway would've meant we would've disliked him right from the outset, rather than the build up to disliking him.
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 25, 2012, 01:48:00 AM
snip
Plus it still doesn't expand any further than Alien did. It's basically Alien all over again with a new cast but rather than the Jockey being dead, he's alive.
On that, reading it again, what's the Engineers role in the Spaihts draft? It seems like an Alien movie with a random SJ show up?
Quote from: SM on Sep 25, 2012, 01:54:22 AM
An older Holloway would've meant we would've disliked him right from the outset, rather than the build up to disliking him.
Not necessarily. Rapace is 32, her character is thereabouts, or mid-to-late twenties if anything. Seems perfectly fine for her to have an older lover/partner (Speedy invoked Fiennes, who is 49 - not that bad). Unless they were going to deliberately make him an opportunistic sugar daddy I see no reason to dislike him for being older. Some people have great relationships and are separated in age by a decade or more.
But how often are they favourably portrayed on film? Older men in mentor/ teacher type roles with younger girlfriends generally give off a creepy vibe, because there's always the assumption they left their wife and family to chase the younger tail.
They could do a romantic comedy prequel about them as archaeologists to show not only how they discovered clues to the origins of the human race, but keys to each others' hearts as well.
Only if has many twists and turns that aren't at all predictable as they navigate the treacherous waters of life and love until they finally discover that what they always wanted was right in front of them the whole time and are reunited in the rain at the end.
Quote from: SM on Sep 25, 2012, 02:33:22 AM
But how often are they favourably portrayed on film? Older men in mentor/ teacher type roles with younger girlfriends generally give off a creepy vibe, because there's always the assumption they left their wife and family to chase the younger tail.
Indiana Jones was a pedophile and everyone liked him.
Quote from: SM on Sep 25, 2012, 02:39:13 AM
Only if has many twists and turns that aren't at all predictable as they navigate the treacherous waters of life and love until they finally discover that what they always wanted was right in front of them the whole time and are reunited in the rain at the end.
Ohhh, perfect! And the ending in the rain can fade out into a similar looking Engineer cave drawing before going to the credits, so that everything comes full circle.
Oh, and best plot twist ever. Peter Weyland tries to break them up so that Shaw can focus on her work. The irony is, the discovery is made because they stayed together. True love, man. True love...
The final frame has the cave drawing changed to Holloway pointing to a love heart.
QuoteIndiana Jones was a pedophile and everyone liked him.
Only in a scene that got cut.
Quote from: SM on Sep 25, 2012, 02:33:22 AM
But how often are they favourably portrayed on film? Older men in mentor/ teacher type roles with younger girlfriends generally give off a creepy vibe, because there's always the assumption they left their wife and family to chase the younger tail.
It's definitely a pitfall. I guess it depends on how the writers wanted older Holloway to come across. It could be done sympathetically ... then again it could've been intended that he was her father's university friend and ... all sorts of things like that.
Honestly, it didn't take me long to sense that Halloway was a tumbling dickweed anyway.
Quote from: RaisingCane on Sep 25, 2012, 03:31:29 AM
Honestly, it didn't take me long to sense that Halloway was a tumbling dickweed anyway.
I think, because of Cvalda, I went in with that notion already pre-programmed and utterly unshakeable once the film got on with it.
They should have cast Josh Holloway as Halloway. At least then he'd have been a charismatic dickweed.
Quote from: Valaquen on Sep 25, 2012, 02:14:20 AM
Quote from: SM on Sep 25, 2012, 01:54:22 AM
An older Holloway would've meant we would've disliked him right from the outset, rather than the build up to disliking him.
Not necessarily. Rapace is 32, her character is thereabouts, or mid-to-late twenties if anything. Seems perfectly fine for her to have an older lover/partner (Speedy invoked Fiennes, who is 49 - not that bad). Unless they were going to deliberately make him an opportunistic sugar daddy I see no reason to dislike him for being older. Some people have great relationships and are separated in age by a decade or more.
Exactly. Just because he's older doesn't mean he's a pedophile or instantly unlikeable. In fact, I would have preferred an older partner to the typical douche-jock cardboard cutout.
A more mature character than Holloway would have been great to see. And his death would have made more of an impact with him being a likeable character.
According to what's on the first page, it sounds like the implication for an older Holloway was that he had been her teacher, she his student, and that power dynamic dominated their relationship. That is an old story and an intriguing one to tell. Then he dies horribly, and she asserts herself and steps up as the heroine.
It sounds to me as though old or young, the character was very much focused on his glory and his needs from the expedition. I think it would have been very interesting for him to be older, but I don't think it was there to make him more sympathetic at all, and I seriously doubt it would've. I think it would've simply made it that much thornier and edgier an interplay, this old elder/younger academic clash and the power issues therein. And the younger Holloway already patronized Shaw at times. The implication in the original posts says that an elder Holloway sees this as his last chance.
I always thought Holloway was arrogant and a bit too controlling with Shaw. But I didn't think he was an evil man, per se. The only time I passed a judgment about him was when I saw the film. He was a manchild, and he was foolish, but despite his flaws he loved Shaw and he didn't deserve to die. The older version would likely have had a lot more interesting sexual and gender politics, but I don't think he'd have been more sympathetic at all. And that's fine by me.
Quote from: RiddleMeTheus on Sep 25, 2012, 03:56:24 AM
Quote from: Valaquen on Sep 25, 2012, 02:14:20 AM
Quote from: SM on Sep 25, 2012, 01:54:22 AM
An older Holloway would've meant we would've disliked him right from the outset, rather than the build up to disliking him.
Not necessarily. Rapace is 32, her character is thereabouts, or mid-to-late twenties if anything. Seems perfectly fine for her to have an older lover/partner (Speedy invoked Fiennes, who is 49 - not that bad). Unless they were going to deliberately make him an opportunistic sugar daddy I see no reason to dislike him for being older. Some people have great relationships and are separated in age by a decade or more.
Exactly. Just because he's older doesn't mean he's a pedophile or instantly unlikeable. In fact, I would have preferred an older partner to the typical douche-jock cardboard cutout.
A more mature character than Holloway would have been great to see. And his death would have made more of an impact with him being a likeable character.
Hardly. As I said, when has the older mentor having the relationship with the younger student ever been portrayed as healthy?
Quote from: SM on Sep 25, 2012, 04:53:17 AM
Quote from: RiddleMeTheus on Sep 25, 2012, 03:56:24 AM
Quote from: Valaquen on Sep 25, 2012, 02:14:20 AM
Quote from: SM on Sep 25, 2012, 01:54:22 AM
An older Holloway would've meant we would've disliked him right from the outset, rather than the build up to disliking him.
Not necessarily. Rapace is 32, her character is thereabouts, or mid-to-late twenties if anything. Seems perfectly fine for her to have an older lover/partner (Speedy invoked Fiennes, who is 49 - not that bad). Unless they were going to deliberately make him an opportunistic sugar daddy I see no reason to dislike him for being older. Some people have great relationships and are separated in age by a decade or more.
Exactly. Just because he's older doesn't mean he's a pedophile or instantly unlikeable. In fact, I would have preferred an older partner to the typical douche-jock cardboard cutout.
A more mature character than Holloway would have been great to see. And his death would have made more of an impact with him being a likeable character.
Hardly. As I said, when has the older mentor having the relationship with the younger student ever been portrayed as healthy?
So because you haven't seen films where a relationship with a bigger age gap than you're used to seeing in films is healthy, all films have to portray those relationships as unhealthy?
There are couples with 20+ years between them that are in fantastic relationships and couples who are the same age and in unhealthy relationships.
Quote from: Bat Chain Puller on Sep 24, 2012, 05:06:43 PM
I find nothing is as scary since being an uninitiated pre-Alien young person. But there are plenty of hipster-larva out there that are unable to hide their squeamishness caused by seeing a vagina/penis eel infiltrate the security of a space suit and orally rape it's occupants. Same thing with the Med-pod scene. Pound for pound there was more iconicly creepy/disturbing scenes in Prometheus. It's the perceived success rate per individual fan that calls into question whether it worked or not. (and deconstructed ad nauseum online.)
We're clearly going to have to agree to disagree. :)
Hammerpede stuff was brutal, but I go to watch a '
Predator' film for brutality. I go to see an '
Alien' film for nightmarish viciousness. Ultimately, the famous advert with the reversed audio on it turned out to sound a heck of a lot more disturbing than what we actually got - which I think I predicted would be what might happen. Either way, I didn't find it
scary and the sight of it going in the mouth cuts away relatively quick. It looks like instant death.
Compare that with, say, the insectoid pit in the remake of '
King Kong'. Remember how the guy dies by being gradually consumed by giant maggot-like creatures? There was a whole bunch of stuff in that scene which was scarier by several magnitudes than anything we saw in '
Prometheus' - and that goes for the Hammerpede scene, too. It's violent, yes. Not disturbing/scary.
The 'abortion' scene was better, but again... Relatively clean. It wasn't nearly as tense as I thought it might be. The most alarming thing about it seemed to be the precarious hold of the robotic device on the creature, rather than the removal, but nothing happens with that.
But as I've written elsewhere, none of this would have necessarily mattered if the production team had been honest and said they were just going to try and do the best they could. Instead, Ridley Scott warned in several interviews that there would be things which would make Lambert's death pale by comparison, said he was going "to scare the shit" out of us and that there was supposedly no way to make the original Alien design effective - with HR Giger, himself, on set - only to apparently perceive that the Deacon looked miles better.
That's why '
Prometheus' ends up being a bit of a disappointment on the horror film front - which is precisely what it was being hyped up as (when not having the emphasis placed on how supposedly revolutionary, epic and full of hard science it would be).
This is
not to say that the film doesn't have its positive points. It certainly does and I really liked a lot of the visuals. It just doesn't succeed in the scare department for me, that's all.
Like I said a few posts back, the changes from the original Alien to other creature designs
could have made sense if there was a legitimate plot reason for that, but it honestly looks like the reason for that was change for the sake of itself. They broke the if-it-ain't-broke-don't-fix-it rule.
Quote from: Blacklabel on Sep 24, 2012, 08:15:46 PM
Lindelof references that Shaw is Mulder and Holloway is Scully in the commentary.
Interesting...
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 24, 2012, 08:27:21 PM
So, in other words... they still just do what the writers want them to as an easy plot device. Stuck on a story element whilst writing? "We have a goo for that."
:laugh:
Quote from: RiddleMeTheus on Sep 25, 2012, 06:02:42 AM
Quote from: SM on Sep 25, 2012, 04:53:17 AM
Quote from: RiddleMeTheus on Sep 25, 2012, 03:56:24 AM
Quote from: Valaquen on Sep 25, 2012, 02:14:20 AM
Quote from: SM on Sep 25, 2012, 01:54:22 AM
An older Holloway would've meant we would've disliked him right from the outset, rather than the build up to disliking him.
Not necessarily. Rapace is 32, her character is thereabouts, or mid-to-late twenties if anything. Seems perfectly fine for her to have an older lover/partner (Speedy invoked Fiennes, who is 49 - not that bad). Unless they were going to deliberately make him an opportunistic sugar daddy I see no reason to dislike him for being older. Some people have great relationships and are separated in age by a decade or more.
Exactly. Just because he's older doesn't mean he's a pedophile or instantly unlikeable. In fact, I would have preferred an older partner to the typical douche-jock cardboard cutout.
A more mature character than Holloway would have been great to see. And his death would have made more of an impact with him being a likeable character.
Hardly. As I said, when has the older mentor having the relationship with the younger student ever been portrayed as healthy?
So because you haven't seen films where a relationship with a bigger age gap than you're used to seeing in films is healthy, all films have to portray those relationships as unhealthy?
There are couples with 20+ years between them that are in fantastic relationships and couples who are the same age and in unhealthy relationships.
So because you have seen people in real life where a relationship with a bigger age gap than you're used to seeing, that's exactly the way they're generally portrayed in film?
Handy tip - we're not talking about real life.
Quote from: SM on Sep 25, 2012, 06:08:10 AM
Quote from: RiddleMeTheus on Sep 25, 2012, 06:02:42 AM
Quote from: SM on Sep 25, 2012, 04:53:17 AM
Quote from: RiddleMeTheus on Sep 25, 2012, 03:56:24 AM
Quote from: Valaquen on Sep 25, 2012, 02:14:20 AM
Quote from: SM on Sep 25, 2012, 01:54:22 AM
An older Holloway would've meant we would've disliked him right from the outset, rather than the build up to disliking him.
Not necessarily. Rapace is 32, her character is thereabouts, or mid-to-late twenties if anything. Seems perfectly fine for her to have an older lover/partner (Speedy invoked Fiennes, who is 49 - not that bad). Unless they were going to deliberately make him an opportunistic sugar daddy I see no reason to dislike him for being older. Some people have great relationships and are separated in age by a decade or more.
Exactly. Just because he's older doesn't mean he's a pedophile or instantly unlikeable. In fact, I would have preferred an older partner to the typical douche-jock cardboard cutout.
A more mature character than Holloway would have been great to see. And his death would have made more of an impact with him being a likeable character.
Hardly. As I said, when has the older mentor having the relationship with the younger student ever been portrayed as healthy?
So because you haven't seen films where a relationship with a bigger age gap than you're used to seeing in films is healthy, all films have to portray those relationships as unhealthy?
There are couples with 20+ years between them that are in fantastic relationships and couples who are the same age and in unhealthy relationships.
So because you have seen people in real life where a relationship with a bigger age gap than you're used to seeing, that's exactly the way they're generally portrayed in film?
Handy tip - we're not talking about real life.
(https://www.avpgalaxy.net/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fmedia.tumblr.com%2Ftumblr_m7kgy50sB31qmgw1m.gif&hash=3963da892c1221af93ad13d557128163a4cc286f)
Handy tip - it's not good to generalise. Did I once say that all films portray relationships realistically? No.
I was simply saying that just because you haven't seen films with a big age gap in a relationship being portrayed as healthy, it doesn't mean they don't exist.
They may be in the minority but the point is that it doesn't mean Prometheus has to be like that if hypothetically it did go the other route with Holloway.
Personally, I think the medpod scene is incredibly nightmarish and disturbing. I think it's up there with anything in the first two films, and it's a huge part of the reason I rate Prometheus third in the franchise. That whole sequence still scares me.
I do think they mismarketed it a bit, at least in the press quotes (the trailers were masterful and awed a few old hands in the business I know, though I think a couple ultimately showed too much). It's less of a scare factory and more of a science-fiction adventure film with horror elements. It's not simply "Texas Chainsaw in space," which was the brief on Alien. There is a haunted house of sorts, and a chamber of all sorts of weird horrors - and I think they were right to get away from the same old series iconography, simply because this adds so much more future variety and possibility, as well as the fear factor that even hardened fans had no idea what the f**k was going to be in that chamber or that ship or coming out of Shaw's belly - but overall the movie is more broad and dreamy in its scope, more of an exploratory thing. (I also think that there was plenty of plot reason for them to be different, other than the above audience and future film issues; it demonstrates that the Engineers were profound biogeneticists, experimenting with a variety of different lifeforms and monstrosities, and that the alien we know is just one of many dangers.)
The music, the tone is often very different, deliberately so. It's a larger cosmic story. There's the horrific elements juxtaposed with the space-age romanticism, or the identity politics and ongoing enigma of someone like David, and that's what fascinates me about the film. It's just a very, very different piece of work. And so I agree up to a point that it was misrepresented as, say, "Alien plus." But for me it's perfectly okay that it wasn't.
QuoteHandy tip - it's not good to generalise.
Why are you doing it then?
QuoteI was simply saying that just because you haven't seen films with a big age gap in a relationship being portrayed as healthy, it doesn't mean they don't exist.
Name some, 'cos I can't think of any. Closest I can think of is Jurassic Park, but there's no mentor/ student dynamic there despite the undetermined age gap with Alan and Ellie. They're equals. We always end up with the older man who comes off as creepily lusting after the young student, who treats her with condescension and she ends up being treated better by someone nearer her own age. Not terribly to clever to paint a target on Holloway as 'Marked For Death' in the first couple of minutes. And similarly paint a woman who you want to be intelligent as emotionally weak.
QuoteIt's less of a scare factory and more of a science-fiction adventure film with horror elements.
Sums up Aliens too.
Quote from: Valaquen on Sep 25, 2012, 03:53:46 AM
I think, because of Cvalda, I went in with that notion already pre-programmed and utterly unshakeable once the film got on with it.
Don't blame me :D
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 25, 2012, 06:14:13 AM
Personally, I think the medpod scene is incredibly nightmarish and disturbing. I think it's up there with anything in the first two films, and it's a huge part of the reason I rate Prometheus third in the franchise. That whole sequence still scares me.
It was a solid scene but hardly enough to put it above Alien 3. And... it was mostly expected. Which greatly lessened the nightmarish factor.
Trailers: Few glimpses of Shaw in pain. Medpod scanning.
TV Spot and 1 trailer: Shaw's stomach swelling.
Ridley: "I want to keep it a secret but there's a scene that rivals the chestburster scene in Alien. Lulz, I bet you can't guess what it is. Is my hint not obvious enough?"
A lot of fans knew what to expect just by seeing the trailers.
Quote from: SpeedyMaxx on Sep 25, 2012, 06:14:13 AM
I do think they mismarketed it a bit, at least in the press quotes (the trailers were masterful and awed a few old hands in the business I know, though I think a couple ultimately showed too much). It's less of a scare factory and more of a science-fiction adventure film with horror elements. It's not simply "Texas Chainsaw in space," which was the brief on Alien. There is a haunted house of sorts, and a chamber of all sorts of weird horrors - and I think they were right to get away from the same old series iconography, simply because this adds so much more future variety and possibility, as well as the fear factor that even hardened fans had no idea what the f**k was going to be in that chamber or that ship or coming out of Shaw's belly - but overall the movie is more broad and dreamy in its scope, more of an exploratory thing. (I also think that there was plenty of plot reason for them to be different, other than the above audience and future film issues; it demonstrates that the Engineers were profound biogeneticists, experimenting with a variety of different lifeforms and monstrosities, and that the alien we know is just one of many dangers.)
The music, the tone is often very different, deliberately so. It's a larger cosmic story. There's the horrific elements juxtaposed with the space-age romanticism, or the identity politics and ongoing enigma of someone like David, and that's what fascinates me about the film. It's just a very, very different piece of work. And so I agree up to a point that it was misrepresented as, say, "Alien plus." But for me it's perfectly okay that it wasn't.
Your writing above was better than the entire film's dialogue in Ridley's "director's cut."
Quote from: RiddleMeTheus on Sep 25, 2012, 06:27:20 AM
A lot of fans knew what to expect just by seeing the trailers.
The thing is, the film was not just made for us fans (nor did most of the general audience dissect the promo material the way hardcore fans did). And I think that scene is a real show-stopper - it certainly knocked out my theater - but that the whole film is also vastly superior overall.
QuoteYour writing above was better than the entire film's dialogue in Ridley's "director's cut."
I write in a different aspect of the field BTS these days, but thanks for the compliment. :) Still, I disagree.
Quote from: RiddleMeTheus on Sep 25, 2012, 06:38:16 AM
Quote from: SM on Sep 25, 2012, 06:23:21 AM
Name some, 'cos I can't think of any.
http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_maksb7g7yt1r8jvb3o2_500.gif
I call BS.
Look, just because you haven't seen any films like that, doesn't mean they're not out there. This may be difficult to believe but not every film follows the Hollywood mold. Most films do but not
all of them.
It's pointless to argue with you when you're set on believing otherwise.
That's why I'm not going to bother taking the time to type out a long response.
Quote from: ShadowPred on Sep 25, 2012, 06:42:18 AM
Quote from: RiddleMeTheus on Sep 25, 2012, 06:38:16 AM
Quote from: SM on Sep 25, 2012, 06:23:21 AM
Name some, 'cos I can't think of any.
http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_maksb7g7yt1r8jvb3o2_500.gif
I call BS.
You call BS on what?
That you can't name one single movie that has what you are arguing for. If I were to say that some movies have so and so, I would definitely be able to name at least one of them.
QuoteThat's why I'm not going to bother taking the time to type out a long response.
A short one would suffice.
I really think you'd struggle to portray a teacher/ student relationship as healthy, because it's still viewed as something of a taboo even among consenting adults.
Quote from: ShadowPred on Sep 25, 2012, 06:46:19 AM
That you can't name one single movie that has what you are arguing for. If I were to say that some movies have so and so, I would definitely be able to name at least one of them.
Fine.
Lost in Translation > A relationship where both characters grew.
Shelter > Mentor/student type relationship where the younger character grew and they ended up together.
As Good As It Gets > A relationship where both characters grew and ended up together.
Relatively mainstream films depicting relationships with an age gap in a healthy/positive light.
I don't see what was stopping you from posting that before.
The whole insane goo color/plagiarism discussion's starting to sound pretty good.
I've not seen Shelter, so I'll take your word for it, but Lost In Translation and As Good As It Gets don't really qualify with what we're talking about here.
Neither have the teacher/ student thing, and Lost... starts to veer into the sordid and therefore unhealthy because she has a husband already.
Quote from: Xenomorphine on Sep 25, 2012, 06:05:56 AM
Quote from: Bat Chain Puller on Sep 24, 2012, 05:06:43 PM
I find nothing is as scary since being an uninitiated pre-Alien young person. But there are plenty of hipster-larva out there that are unable to hide their squeamishness caused by seeing a vagina/penis eel infiltrate the security of a space suit and orally rape it's occupants. Same thing with the Med-pod scene. Pound for pound there was more iconicly creepy/disturbing scenes in Prometheus. It's the perceived success rate per individual fan that calls into question whether it worked or not. (and deconstructed ad nauseum online.)
We're clearly going to have to agree to disagree. :)
The best possible outcome really. If only all disagreements could end in such a way.
Quote from: Xenomorphine on Sep 25, 2012, 06:05:56 AM
Hammerpede stuff was brutal, but I go to watch a 'Predator' film for brutality. I go to see an 'Alien' film for nightmarish viciousness. Ultimately, the famous advert with the reversed audio on it turned out to sound a heck of a lot more disturbing than what we actually got - which I think I predicted would be what might happen. Either way, I didn't find it scary and the sight of it going in the mouth cuts away relatively quick. It looks like instant death.
The
concept of the scene was chilling, but had I been in charge there would have been no music. Just the close, intimate sound of the struggle and suffocation. I do agree with you that the reverse audio left a lot more to the imagination. And mine imagined something a lot more creepy than what we ended up with.
Quote from: Xenomorphine on Sep 25, 2012, 06:05:56 AM
Compare that with, say, the insectoid pit in the remake of 'King Kong'. Remember how the guy dies by being gradually consumed by giant maggot-like creatures? There was a whole bunch of stuff in that scene which was scarier by several magnitudes than anything we saw in 'Prometheus' - and that goes for the Hammerpede scene, too. It's violent, yes. Not disturbing/scary.
I just thought the insect pit scene was awesome. Scary never entered my mind. I suppose for a younger audience member, sure. I did love the slow, hopeless consumption of Lumpy the cook. It was disturbing because it made you feel what it would be like. Credit to the actor and the effects team ... and for having the balls to go in close and linger on the proceedings. The music also was low key and hauntingly serine for what was unfolding on screen. By and by I thought both scenes were sufficiently chilling but again, I can't say either was truly scary.
Quote from: Xenomorphine on Sep 25, 2012, 06:05:56 AM
The 'abortion' scene was better, but again... Relatively clean. It wasn't nearly as tense as I thought it might be. The most alarming thing about it seemed to be the precarious hold of the robotic device on the creature, rather than the removal, but nothing happens with that.
It could have been bloodier. I especially liked the calm, inquisitive "it's finally out" beat ... where it seems mostly a benign little tumor thing ... then the sac breaks and all that amniotic fluid splashes down into the gaping incision in her belly. Alarming and nasty to say the least. Again, the concept of what is happening is just perfectly insane and a welcome addition to the other iconic scenes through out the series.
Quote from: Xenomorphine on Sep 25, 2012, 06:05:56 AM
But as I've written elsewhere, none of this would have necessarily mattered if the production team had been honest and said they were just going to try and do the best they could. Instead, Ridley Scott warned in several interviews that there would be things which would make Lambert's death pale by comparison, said he was going "to scare the shit" out of us and that there was supposedly no way to make the original Alien design effective - with HR Giger, himself, on set - only to apparently perceive that the Deacon looked miles better.
That's why 'Prometheus' ends up being a bit of a disappointment on the horror film front - which is precisely what it was being hyped up as (when not having the emphasis placed on how supposedly revolutionary, epic and full of hard science it would be).
But you can always trust Ridley to be Ridley on the subject of the crazy things that quite frequently come flying out of his mouth. He is almost a carnival barker. He's trying to get you to go into the tent. He's also writing checks against Alien and having to deal with the scare conversion between 1979 and 2012 audiences.
I was never convinced that Ridley felt the original Alien design worked as a man in a suit. The way he shot the creature worked wonderfully because he didn't want to show too much. I have no idea what he was thinking with Deacon. It worked for me because it was just enough an alien ... yet not at all.
Quote from: Xenomorphine on Sep 25, 2012, 06:05:56 AM
Like I said a few posts back, the changes from the original Alien to other creature designs could have made sense if there was a legitimate plot reason for that, but it honestly looks like the reason for that was change for the sake of itself. They broke the if-it-ain't-broke-don't-fix-it rule.
I felt there was enough reason for the change. There were no eggs to be found. No facehuggers. So it stands to reason that the very unique process that led to the Deacon would result in such a unique creature.
I'm actually more worried for future episodes where Trilobites and Deacons will be the new facehuggers and Aliens. I hope the film makers honor what feels like an intentionally different looking beast and not fall back on them as 'the new normal.'
What alarms me the most is that the Deacons cry at the end is virtually the same as the cry we heard in the tunnel right before we saw the holographic video images of the Engineers running for their lives. :-\
I never heard a cry during the holograph sequence, or at least, I never associated any noise with that. I'll have to go back and look.
I doubt that they'll just swap out the old monsters for the new ones. I think they know that's not feasible. I think it's more likely they'll just keep making more weird shit, more new monsters. Which is fine with me. The giant trilobite in particular strikes me as a bit of a one-off - or you only bring it out for Christmas, that is to say, the third act.
I listened to the whole commentary yesterday and it seems that besides removing the classic xeno,eggs,facehuggers the scripts weren't to different. Also it seems that in the script there were a lot of character build up for everyone. Some of that got filmed,and some of that just cut from the shooting script before they started filming. One big thing that keeps repeating in the commentary was: '' we had a scene to better flesh out a character, but ridley left it on the cutting room floor,we had more character development but ridley..., the scene was bigger and provided more info on a certain thing but ridely...., we had this in the script and we shot it but ridley didn't want to waste time on too much talk and wanted to go straight to the action(i heard this specific line about 3 times) so he deleted it from the movie''
The scene with alternate Firfield was cut it seems not because of the monster cgi design, but because it ruined the pacing of the movie and the scene where shaw finds weyland on the ship.
The reason why the weyland -yacht scene was cut was not because of budgetary reasons but because they didn't want to reveal that weyland was on the ship too early in the movie. the water scene that was cut because of monetary reason was the one with the submarine and the city ruins in the sea.
There are a lot of cool things, and my impression is again that the script wasn't bad at all, but the edits done in post production spoiled the end result. Either way i still enjoyed the movie and i would rate it as 7.5 or even a 8.5 considering all the stuff that was cut. Hopefully we will get after a few years a extended cut, and the sequels will add more to this new mythology
And another thing. The alien prequel was more expensive to make( just look at all the concept art with all those massive rooms and scenery). And it would have been a direct prequel to alien. This way the movie goes in another direction and starts a whole new franchise- big money here, 3 movies instead of one
Quote from: Bat Chain Puller on Sep 25, 2012, 07:01:30 AM
Quote from: Xenomorphine on Sep 25, 2012, 06:05:56 AM
Quote from: Bat Chain Puller on Sep 24, 2012, 05:06:43 PM
I find nothing is as scary since being an uninitiated pre-Alien young person. But there are plenty of hipster-larva out there that are unable to hide their squeamishness caused by seeing a vagina/penis eel infiltrate the security of a space suit and orally rape it's occupants. Same thing with the Med-pod scene. Pound for pound there was more iconicly creepy/disturbing scenes in Prometheus. It's the perceived success rate per individual fan that calls into question whether it worked or not. (and deconstructed ad nauseum online.)
We're clearly going to have to agree to disagree. :)
The best possible outcome really. If only all disagreements could end in such a way.
Quote from: Xenomorphine on Sep 25, 2012, 06:05:56 AM
Hammerpede stuff was brutal, but I go to watch a 'Predator' film for brutality. I go to see an 'Alien' film for nightmarish viciousness. Ultimately, the famous advert with the reversed audio on it turned out to sound a heck of a lot more disturbing than what we actually got - which I think I predicted would be what might happen. Either way, I didn't find it scary and the sight of it going in the mouth cuts away relatively quick. It looks like instant death.
The concept of the scene was chilling, but had I been in charge there would have been no music. Just the close, intimate sound of the struggle and suffocation. I do agree with you that the reverse audio left a lot more to the imagination. And mine imagined something a lot more creepy than what we ended up with.
Quote from: Xenomorphine on Sep 25, 2012, 06:05:56 AM
Compare that with, say, the insectoid pit in the remake of 'King Kong'. Remember how the guy dies by being gradually consumed by giant maggot-like creatures? There was a whole bunch of stuff in that scene which was scarier by several magnitudes than anything we saw in 'Prometheus' - and that goes for the Hammerpede scene, too. It's violent, yes. Not disturbing/scary.
I just thought the insect pit scene was awesome. Scary never entered my mind. I suppose for a younger audience member, sure. I did love the slow, hopeless consumption of Lumpy the cook. It was disturbing because it made you feel what it would be like. Credit to the actor and the effects team ... and for having the balls to go in close and linger on the proceedings. The music also was low key and hauntingly serine for what was unfolding on screen. By and by I thought both scenes were sufficiently chilling but again, I can't say either was truly scary.
Quote from: Xenomorphine on Sep 25, 2012, 06:05:56 AM
The 'abortion' scene was better, but again... Relatively clean. It wasn't nearly as tense as I thought it might be. The most alarming thing about it seemed to be the precarious hold of the robotic device on the creature, rather than the removal, but nothing happens with that.
It could have been bloodier. I especially liked the calm, inquisitive "it's finally out" beat ... where it seems mostly a benign little tumor thing ... then the sac breaks and all that amniotic fluid splashes down into the gaping incision in her belly. Alarming and nasty to say the least. Again, the concept of what is happening is just perfectly insane and a welcome addition to the other iconic scenes through out the series.
Quote from: Xenomorphine on Sep 25, 2012, 06:05:56 AM
But as I've written elsewhere, none of this would have necessarily mattered if the production team had been honest and said they were just going to try and do the best they could. Instead, Ridley Scott warned in several interviews that there would be things which would make Lambert's death pale by comparison, said he was going "to scare the shit" out of us and that there was supposedly no way to make the original Alien design effective - with HR Giger, himself, on set - only to apparently perceive that the Deacon looked miles better.
That's why 'Prometheus' ends up being a bit of a disappointment on the horror film front - which is precisely what it was being hyped up as (when not having the emphasis placed on how supposedly revolutionary, epic and full of hard science it would be).
But you can always trust Ridley to be Ridley on the subject of the crazy things that quite frequently come flying out of his mouth. He is almost a carnival barker. He's trying to get you to go into the tent. He's also writing checks against Alien and having to deal with the scare conversion between 1979 and 2012 audiences.
I was never convinced that Ridley felt the original Alien design worked as a man in a suit. The way he shot the creature worked wonderfully because he didn't want to show too much. I have no idea what he was thinking with Deacon. It worked for me because it was just enough an alien ... yet not at all.
Quote from: Xenomorphine on Sep 25, 2012, 06:05:56 AM
Like I said a few posts back, the changes from the original Alien to other creature designs could have made sense if there was a legitimate plot reason for that, but it honestly looks like the reason for that was change for the sake of itself. They broke the if-it-ain't-broke-don't-fix-it rule.
I felt there was enough reason for the change. There were no eggs to be found. No facehuggers. So it stands to reason that the very unique process that led to the Deacon would result in such a unique creature.
I'm actually more worried for future episodes where Trilobites and Deacons will be the new facehuggers and Aliens. I hope the film makers honor what feels like an intentionally different looking beast and not fall back on them as 'the new normal.'
What alarms me the most is that the Deacons cry at the end is virtually the same as the cry we heard in the tunnel right before we saw the holographic video images of the Engineers running for their lives. :-\
Main problem is scary varies so much for different people. I can't honestly remember the last time a film scared me. Things like Blair Witch or Seven I found incredibly tense, but I don't know if I call them scary. Bits of Prometheus were tense and the abortion scene was uncomfortable to say the least, but again I wouldn't call it scary.
My wife however, isn't a fan of horror flicks so when she does watch one, she'd call it scary.
Scary is shit that gives me nightmares. Which only happened with a couple of films a very long time ago as a kid.
The banal thing about it is, the calculation Ridley made on plot vs. character in the pacing has been made with thousands of movies over the years, including some very, very good ones - including Alien itself. There are cases where I wish they'd kept stuff in on every film I've seen like that, but also cases where I see why they made the cut despite something being a nice scene. Prometheus is no different. Happens all the time.
I do agree with zuzuki that the final film significantly opens up the franchise to possibilities. I also think that a lot of hard bottom line calculations were made re: screening allocation, ratings vs. time compromises, and the future of the series. And in the end, I think even after what was clearly some violence done to some of the better scenes for the sake of this math, Scott found the correct equation for that end result. I really loved the final film, but I'm definitely looking forward to a longer cut.
The Weyland yacht scene still sounds so incredibly batshit and sublime. I wish there'd been a way to do it without spoiling the plot twist for most of the general audience.
Quote from: Valaquen on Sep 25, 2012, 03:53:46 AM
Quote from: RaisingCane on Sep 25, 2012, 03:31:29 AM
Honestly, it didn't take me long to sense that Halloway was a tumbling dickweed anyway.
I think, because of Cvalda, I went in with that notion already pre-programmed and utterly unshakeable once the film got on with it.
(https://www.avpgalaxy.net/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fstatic.fjcdn.com%2Fgifs%2FMy%2Breaction%2Bto%2Bjersey%2Bshore%2Bcancellation_4bef83_3784999.gif&hash=f53e2cbc0e72f47c9ca3250e8840a81126082519)
©Cvaldaware2012 - The Leading Product in Cult of Personality Programming
Quote from: Space Sweeper on Sep 25, 2012, 09:22:15 AM
Quote from: Valaquen on Sep 25, 2012, 03:53:46 AM
Quote from: RaisingCane on Sep 25, 2012, 03:31:29 AM
Honestly, it didn't take me long to sense that Halloway was a tumbling dickweed anyway.
I think, because of Cvalda, I went in with that notion already pre-programmed and utterly unshakeable once the film got on with it.
©Cvaldaware2012 - The Leading Product in Cult of Personality Programming
Really, Val? Really?
That...product seems to be pretty popular around here.
Perhaps it's where Bioware got the idea for indoctrination? :laugh:
I hope you got some credit for that Cvalda. :P
Was a time when practically all leading men were older than their leading ladies in film.
Was also a time when avuncular characters were a mainstay of TV, before such relationships started to be portrayed as creepy, probably thanks to alt comedy trying it's hardest to ruin convention in the 1980s.
Quote from: Space Sweeper on Sep 25, 2012, 09:22:15 AM
©Cvaldaware2012 - The Leading Product in Cult of Personality Programming
someday i'll get you too
Quote from: Gash on Sep 25, 2012, 05:37:20 PM
Was a time when practically all leading men were older than their leading ladies in film.
Was also a time when avuncular characters were a mainstay of TV, before such relationships started to be portrayed as creepy, probably thanks to alt comedy trying it's hardest to ruin convention in the 1980s.
This is too meta for me bro
In all seriousness, yes, there was such a time. And Bogart and Bacall were and are a legendary Hollywood couple despite an age difference that is still a tad unseemly - I think she was just out of high school. But the teacher/student dynamic is a different kind of take on this relationship. And as expressed in the early draft here, and when explored in film or television, it's generally done so in a way that highlighted the disproportionate power balance which the student - usually the woman - has to overcome. One example off the top of my head, Julia Roberts in
The Pelican Brief loses her lover/mentor and foundation and most forge ahead on her own. But that's the most benign take I can recall. Almost invariably it's presented as being a somewhat negative relationship that the heroine/student must emancipate herself, either violently or organically, from to truly come into her own. I suspect it would've been done much the same in
Prometheus with Shaw and an older Holloway. I personally have no problem with that, and think it would've been an interesting dynamic to play out within the film. But I never had much of a problem with Logan Marshall-Green either. He did the job.
Quote from: Cvalda on Sep 25, 2012, 05:38:36 PM
Quote from: Space Sweeper on Sep 25, 2012, 09:22:15 AM
©Cvaldaware2012 - The Leading Product in Cult of Personality Programming
someday i'll get you too
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gvdf5n-zI14#ws (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gvdf5n-zI14#ws)
Just because something is done a certain way most of the time, it doesn't mean every film has to follow the same mold. I do agree that Holloway would probably still be unlikeable if they were shooting Spaihts' draft - since Ridley would still be calling the shots. But the wiser decision would have been to make Holloway more likeable thus allowing us to feel affected by his death and have us rooting for Shaw.
I somewhat suspect they may have aged him down in the hopes of making him more likable. And though it may defy board logic, there's people online who seem to have enjoyed the guy. I personally could take him or leave him, but I didn't outright hate him or anything. There was a lot of preconception going in which I personally didn't bother with. To me he just seemed to be an arrogant guy who got some karma, but who was still a decent person who didn't deserve to die by fire. People are like that, they're contradictory.
Girl with the Alien Tattoo?
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0091630/ (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0091630/)
Black Goo of an alien origin enters through the mouth and turns people into zombies.
there is another one that I have in my mind that I remember form childhood. Black goo running down that walls.
EDIT: It's Amityville horror.
Quote from: RiddleMeTheus on Sep 25, 2012, 06:17:13 PM
Just because something is done a certain way most of the time, it doesn't mean every film has to follow the same mold. I do agree that Holloway would probably still be unlikeable if they were shooting Spaihts' draft - since Ridley would still be calling the shots. But the wiser decision would have been to make Holloway more likeable thus allowing us to feel affected by his death and have us rooting for Shaw.
It was still a relatively moving scene, IMO. Although yes, making him more likeable could have increased that. But alas...
Prometheus for me is a beguiling mess. I enjoyed it the more I saw it, but it played it so safe, so much so that you could see it in the editing and most of the choices that were made. It was clear that Fox had more control then Ridely did.
I do find it funny how one person's opinion about the X Files comparison puts so many in a tizzy. Who gives a shit? The person in question loathed the film. That one device didn't sink the film for them. This should come as no surprise that the ammunition is unending.
Personally, I loved it and disliked it. The portion of the film that was derailed is impossible to side-step and it dumbs down (for me) so much of the good that is lost. But, the beauty of art is the opinions it culls, none right, none wrong.
Amazing. so Spaiths was a genius and had amazing ideas and bewteen lindelof and ridley they butchered it and created that...well....that. BRAVO!
He's a great writer. But genius the original script was not. It was way too on the nose IMO, starting with setting it on LV-426.
Genius compared to the other two at least.
I need to go back and listen to it, but Lindelof says something to the effect of "sorry for being so cryptic about the Alien connection, but I can't really talk about it right now" huh?
Quote from: ThisBethesdaSea on Sep 26, 2012, 01:29:32 PM
Prometheus for me is a beguiling mess. I enjoyed it the more I saw it, but it played it so safe, so much so that you could see it in the editing and most of the choices that were made. It was clear that Fox had more control then Ridely did.
I do find it funny how one person's opinion about the X Files comparison puts so many in a tizzy. Who gives a shit? The person in question loathed the film. That one device didn't sink the film for them. This should come as no surprise that the ammunition is unending.
Personally, I loved it and disliked it. The portion of the film that was derailed is impossible to side-step and it dumbs down (for me) so much of the good that is lost. But, the beauty of art is the opinions it culls, none right, none wrong.
(https://www.avpgalaxy.net/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frubiksmaster.freeforums.org%2Fimages%2Fsmilies%2Fbackpedal.gif&hash=fc7820e30d27d3300357bf54162f69a836cb7f53)
People that create give a shit. Writers give a shit. Filmmakers give a shit. The thousands of people struggling like hell to market their own wildly creative and well-made products give a shit.
You don't, though, do ya? Don't give a shit that the two biggest points of the film, one being the mystery goo that was both ripped-off while being unexplained to the point of absurdity, and the other being the Engineer whose very soul and meaning were
cut from the final film, were totally empty and ineffective for what everyone thought the film was trying to convey?
BethesdaSea
don't give a shit!
Quote from: RagingDragon on Oct 10, 2012, 09:37:35 PM
People that create give a shit. Writers give a shit. Filmmakers give a shit. The thousands of people struggling like hell to market their own wildly creative and well-made products give a shit.
I do write for a living and work hard in the industry, I do write for film, and yet I liked it. As did my boss, who is a filmmaker, and plenty of people I know. So it's not just the bean town rubes, hmm? There's no need to paint anyone as vacuous know-nothings who don't understand
true art. Let's calm down and take another series of deep cleansing breaths, shall we? Would you like some tea?
It's valiant of you to defend your yapping puppy sidekick :laugh: but what you've said has very little relevance to my post. True art? What are you talking about? I'd love some tea.
I'm talking about storytelling basics, here. Rookie mistakes that can be pointed out by anyone. They require much less than an expert surrounded by experts such as yourself. ;D The black goo thing is significant, and this significance should be clear to any writer.
It's a trend to want to avoid overt plagiarism, especially when your Director and the marketing around your film are toting it as some second-coming for science-fiction. It would be different if it were some secondary plot device, but it's the main crux of the entire film and could well end up being the origin of both humanity and the Alien.
Pretty big deal to me, and I'm obviously not alone.
Quote from: RagingDragon on Oct 10, 2012, 10:20:14 PM
It's valiant of you to defend your yapping puppy sidekick :laugh:
My what? Dude, he seems like a nice enough fellow, but we don't talk and I don't have a clue who he is. I just come here for the drugs and free ass. And also discussion of scary science-fiction movies.
As for any claims of plagiarism, that sad old debate over the black stuff killed at least one big thread for pages and pages before the moderators clamped down on it for behavior and some unfortunate ragequit kicked in for people. Me, I don't see a point in revisiting it now for more drama. Suffice to say that I said my piece then, as did plenty of other people - to me, it's an old, old horror/sci-fi trope that goes way back which bears a few superficial similarities to the property you mentioned but does not, IMO, equate to the same thing in the final analysis. And I don't think the general public really thought that either. Some people disagree, and that's their business, but the last lockdown proved it wasn't something everyone would agree on, and that's okay.
There are no cold, hard metrics to prove a garden-variety Internet argument about a movie some people like and some people don't. The closest we could come, if we wanted to be lazy (I don't) is a critical and financial averaging - the film did well financially and did pretty decent critically, but reception was definitely divided nonetheless. So in the end we're back where we started. Some people like it, some people don't, and I doubt the Senate is going to convene a subcommittee over whether or not
Prometheus is objectively a scientifically proven "good" or "bad" movie.
I don't consider myself an expert on anything, anywhere, but I did take exception to the tacky belittling of the guy, and the allegation that anyone who would dare like the movie or its plot is just a philistine who does not understand art, film or hard work. Because that's just not so. And honestly, it's just
not that serious. Like Hitchcock said, "Ingrid...
it's only a mooovie."
QuoteI'd love some tea.
Fantastic!
Yeah, so around 1:09:14 on the commentary, Lindelof says:
QuoteAt some point, I'm sure I'll talk extensively about why everybody needed to be so cagey about the prequel-ness of this movie, but uh... this commentary is probably not the time or the place
I'm a little confused by that statement. Was Fox enforcing their confidentiality agreement by holding their family hostage? ???
I just wanted to say my piece. The goo bothered me, but I feel it's a minor problem. It's what they did with the damned goo, or failed to do.
To me, goo + Engineer were the point of the entire story. That's what I wanted to see. Hell, the goo is already responsible for human life (in some form) and obviously also responsible for the Xenomorphs. That moves it from sci-fi trope to central plot hinge.
Don't want to muddle the thread, though. The Senate convening is a mighty fine idea.
Dat tea?
(https://www.avpgalaxy.net/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fohellnawlblog.com%2Fnewohnblog%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2012%2F04%2FSULU.jpg&hash=f48188de938bb417d33ba8d6b1e7a716195d46f4)
Listening to the commentary right now.
One of Jon Spaihts favorite scenes in the script was when Fifield and Milburn argue so much that they ignore their tracking devices and get lost somehow.
(https://www.avpgalaxy.net/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi0.kym-cdn.com%2Fphotos%2Fimages%2Foriginal%2F000%2F175%2F315%2FPicardDoubleFacepalm-1.jpg%3F1316330080&hash=a76737fc38b66c2b89cf8b6713048800c7e7f18c)
Actually that was one of Lindelof's favourite scenes.
Actually he say's one of his favorite scenes is when they pussy out and want to go back to the ship, my mistake, but tremendous horror cliché boys. Top writing there.
He say's there's a scene cut where it shows them getting lost.
Quote from: tmjhur on Oct 15, 2012, 11:01:42 AMOne of Jon Spaihts favorite scenes in the script was when Fifield and Milburn argue so much that they ignore their tracking devices and get lost somehow.
At least that would provide
some kind of explanation. They are catastrophically stupid after all.
Yea it was all just a little misunderstanding here. When Fifield said that he loved rocks the Prometheus crew recruiters assumed he was a geologist. However we all know when Fifield said that he loved rocks, what he really meant was that he loved crack cocaine.
Quote from: whiterabbit on Oct 16, 2012, 02:52:37 AM
Yea it was all just a little misunderstanding here. When Fifield said that he loved rocks the Prometheus crew recruiters assumed he was a geologist. However we all know when Fifield said that he loved rocks, what he really meant was that he loved crack cocaine.
Money and rocks.
Makes sense!