Alien 5 won't be titled Alien 5, won't tread on Prometheus 2

[Corporal Hicks]

It wasn't the studio. That was Lindelof going "it'd be more awesome without Aliens" and Ridley going "duhhh, sure".

I was watching Furious Gods a couple weeks back, and I couldn't help but think about how rushed/awkward the Giger segment was. It's like they brought him in, showed him some designs, and pushed him out the door.

From what I remember he wasn't down in London long. Only the day, I think. And he almost didn't let Charles include it in the Blu-ray at all.

Wasn't aware of that. Was there some sort of tension between Giger and Ridley and/or Fox? I know a lot of the crew wanted to go in a more Giger-like direction, which Ridley didn't want to do for whatever reason.

I'm trying to find some quotes for you.

Hicks: Now, that sort of brings us onto something else. Giger. He's a pretty elusive guy and he's never really sort of liked to talk about his work on the films and as I understand it, he nearly didn't appear in the Prometheus set at all. Was there much footage of him that you didn't... couldn't include in the set this time?

Charles: Hmm, no, I mean, there's more footage of him in that meeting he had with Ridley. Might be interesting to see some day but in terms of the narrative point we're trying to make in the documentary. What you see is pretty much what was needed this time. But there was a lot of last minute scramble with Giger, in terms of getting his approval to include that footage. Just because it was so last minute, that didn't give us a lot of room to talk about adding more or to include more like you know, raw uncut moments of him and Ridley collaborating. It was just, it was basically, we had to, we had a date obviously because we can't miss the date and Giger... They were still working out his deal and you know, we had to get his approval and all that which is fine. That's the normal thing anyway.

http://www.avpgalaxy.net/website/interviews/charles-de-lauzirika/2/

Here's what I've got for the approval. Trying to find the info about his duration on location for Prometheus.

H.R. Giger had a little involvement in production. Ridley Scott said he worked on the movie for 11 months just creating some murals for the first chamber the characters come across. On the Prometheus Blu-Ray, Giger was seen meeting with Ridley Scott and he did some sketches of the creatures. Scott said some of his ideas were interesting but he didn't enough time to pursue them. No mention of Giger creating the murals was mentioned in the Blu-Ray features.

http://www.avpgalaxy.net/alien-movies/prometheus/trivia/

http://www.avpgalaxy.net/2011/12/17/ridley-scott-talks-prometheus-giger-xenomorphs/

So he did actually come to Shepperton. I must have mis-remembered that. Definitely didn't misremember the approval stuff though.

[Nightmare Asylum]

Hmm, interesting. I actually had heard the mural quote, back around the time of the film's release. Had no clue about the rights issues with the footage, though.

I'd be curious to someday see more footage of him working with the Prometheus crew, if they ever do get the opportunity to release it.

[T Dog]

It wasn't the studio. That was Lindelof going "it'd be more awesome without Aliens" and Ridley going "duhhh, sure".

Jon Spaights said in an interview that it came from very high up in Fox to remove the Aliens.
It's generally thought to be a "suggestion" from Tom Rothman himself.
Lindelof being the brown-nose that he is probably just reiterated that it would be a GREAT IDEA!!!!!

[Son Of Kane]

Ugh, Fox sometimes man.

[Corporal Hicks]

It wasn't the studio. That was Lindelof going "it'd be more awesome without Aliens" and Ridley going "duhhh, sure".

Jon Spaights said in an interview that it came from very high up in Fox to remove the Aliens.
It's generally thought to be a "suggestion" from Tom Rothman himself.
Lindelof being the brown-nose that he is probably just reiterated that it would be a GREAT IDEA!!!!!

Can you link me?

[NetworkATTH]

It wasn't the studio. That was Lindelof going "it'd be more awesome without Aliens" and Ridley going "duhhh, sure".

Jon Spaights said in an interview that it came from very high up in Fox to remove the Aliens.
Lindelof being the brown-nose that he is probably just reiterated that it would be a GREAT IDEA!!!!!

The people high up at Fox realized that Spaihts script was a bit of a mess. You had corn all over the place. The whole thing was cheesy. I assume, it was the point, since the direction going in, was to reflect on everything. But they went the other direction quick because they realized that direction wasn't working.

If you actually read the script before Lindelof you would be thanking him. The studio saw what was happening, and perhaps thought if this film bombed it was likely the end of everything they could make from this franchise, and quickly ran and got another screen writer and pulled Ridley aside and probably said something along the lines of "Hey, this is getting out of control, you need to limit some of the stuff going on, or this film will tank. How about, expand the possibilities by removing the Aliens. Set up a new set of creatures, things that you can do more with, so the films will have more to go on." And he probably agreed. And Lindelof said as much about the script before him, it had serious, serious flaws.

Not to say Lindelof's script is a shining monument to screen writing but to figure there's this grand Fox conspiracy to ruin Alien is ridiculous. Fox has money in mind, sure, but that's Capitalism, Capitalism involved in creativity is more the problem in regards to that.

If the remaining fans of Alien are anything to go by, nobody exactly even knows what they want out of an Alien film.

[Corporal Hicks]

If you actually read the script before Lindelof you would be thanking him.

Not really - Spaiht's script was much more consistant and a far better read than what ended up on screen in Prometheus. Sure, it was rough but it was only an earlier draft and David turned out far better in the finished product - something I attribute more to Fassbender than anything Lindalof did - and the ending was pretty poor (glad they moved it to another moon in Prometheus) but Engineers was a more solid attempt. None of the deliberate vagueness in an attempt to be intelligent.

[Son Of Kane]

Personally overall I just want complete abandon of AVP & A:R style films in the franchise, beyond that I'm just excited to see what we get.

[NetworkATTH]

If you actually read the script before Lindelof you would be thanking him.

Not really - Spaiht's script was much more consistant and a far better read than what ended up on screen in Prometheus. Sure, it was rough but it was only an earlier draft and David turned out far better in the finished product - something I attribute more to Fassbender than anything Lindalof did - and the ending was pretty poor (glad they moved it to another moon in Prometheus) but Engineers was a more solid attempt. None of the deliberate vagueness in an attempt to be intelligent.

Shaw/Watts gets impaled in the leg (legs tend to be mostly muscle on bone, ouch) by a giant tail from an Ultramorph after she buzzsaws it in the head, and acid spills out that does nothing but damage her helmet she has remove quick and is able to limp away, this being after of course, she gets a procedure that cuts her open and removes her fast growing fetus. Aliens come aliens go, and it is a complete and total wreck. If you had this film, I guarantee, you would not like it.

[Corporal Hicks]

As I said, the ending was poor.

Over all, though, no I don't agree with you at all. Prometheus was a wreck of a film. Engineers wasn't. It had much better characters. The basic plot was better (not some abstract mission funded because somehow Weyland thought he'd be granted eternal life but based on discovery and evidence pointing towards terraforming technology. The relationship between the creatures was made more sense - not some kinda things like Aliens, but not quite, but they look like them anyway. Actual prototype versions of the Aliens was far better than the ambiguous things in Prometheus.

But I think it's pretty clear we wont be agreeing on this.

[T Dog]

It wasn't the studio. That was Lindelof going "it'd be more awesome without Aliens" and Ridley going "duhhh, sure".

Jon Spaights said in an interview that it came from very high up in Fox to remove the Aliens.
It's generally thought to be a "suggestion" from Tom Rothman himself.
Lindelof being the brown-nose that he is probably just reiterated that it would be a GREAT IDEA!!!!!

Can you link me?

http://collider.com/prometheus-extended-cut-original-script/

Spaihts explains:

A lot of that push came from the studio very high up; they were interested in doing something original and not one more franchise film. That really came to a head at the studio – the major push to focus on the new mythology of Prometheus and dial the Aliens as far back as we could came down from the studio.

[NetworkATTH]

As I said, the ending was poor.

Over all, though, no I don't agree with you at all. Prometheus was a wreck of a film. Engineers wasn't. It had much better characters. The basic plot was better (not some abstract mission funded because somehow Weyland thought he'd be granted eternal life but based on discovery and evidence pointing towards terraforming technology. The relationship between the creatures was made more sense - not some kinda things like Aliens, but not quite, but they look like them anyway. Actual prototype versions of the Aliens was far better than the ambiguous things in Prometheus.

But I think it's pretty clear we wont be agreeing on this.

I think it was a good call for them to edit the script in a direction away from Spaihts script, because there were too many creatures, and the characters had too much serious lines impacting lines that fall short, and it really, maybe could have been better off with more re-writes, but I think going in the opposite direction was fine, better even. The film we got was no masterpiece, I don't watch the Theatrical cut, it's edited poorly, it reflects the largest faults of Lindelof's script. But how the characters act, is so unbelievable. This is also true for Vickers and David, who fall seriously flat and have are obvious Bond Villains. David especially is so f**king evil, there's nothing subtle to anything about him. There's nothing subtle about the script at all. Trying to force terraforming as the main interest is just a cheap tie in to Aliens, all the creatures feel like merchandising because of how quick they come and go. It is filled with ridiculousness and it takes itself way too seriously to boot.

Could there be a middle ground? Sure, absolutely. But Spaihts script as it is, would not be a good film, it feels very much like throwing ideas to the wall and seeing what sticks.

Yeah we disagree, but don't take it as I'm being mean or anything. I just really think ultimately by becoming more open minded to what they wanted to do, that we wouldn't have these disagreements anyways. Prometheus is such a sore spot for everybody.

[predxeno]

Come to think of it, if they made a Prometheus 2 that doesn't star Elizabeth Shaw then the sequel might actually have a chance of being liked by those who hate the 1st one.  What do you guys think?  Is there a chance of that happening or did I miss a news post saying Noomi Rapace already signed on for P2?

[Born Of Cold Light]

Come to think of it, if they made a Prometheus 2 that doesn't star Elizabeth Shaw then the sequel might actually have a chance of being liked by those who hate the 1st one.  What do you guys think?  Is there a chance of that happening or did I miss a news post saying Noomi Rapace already signed on for P2?

That wouldn't make any sense, as the story would go off the rails.  I'm actually really curious as to what will happen to Shaw and David, I just want the movie to be a little better than the last one.

[Naissus]

I hope they find a derelict world or colony and end up opening Pandoras box again.