What would be a proper ending for David?

Started by Immortan Jonesy, May 06, 2018, 11:17:49 PM

What would be a proper ending for David?

1. David creates the biomechanical Alien, and then it is destroyed by his creation.
7 (12.5%)
2. David creates the Queen, and then it is destroyed by his creation
0 (0%)
3. David is destroyed by the Engineers.
5 (8.9%)
4. David is destroyed by the Space Jockey of LV-426.
1 (1.8%)
5. Somehow, David becomes the Space Jockey of LV-426.
2 (3.6%)
6. After discovering that he was recreating an imperfect version of the Alien created by the Engineers, David commits suicide.
5 (8.9%)
7. David has his own "Tears in rain" monologue, and then he dies.
0 (0%)
8. David is killed by Walter.
1 (1.8%)
9. Beheaded and burned with a flamethrower by Daniels.
0 (0%)
10. David is killed by Tennesse.
0 (0%)
11. David is killed by Covenant's computer "Mother".
0 (0%)
12. Somehow, David's consciousness is transferred to Ash.
2 (3.6%)
13. David transfers his consciousness to Jonesy (see Altered Carbon).
0 (0%)
14. He performs his own version of hell (like Satan) on Origae-6 and plans to travel to Mankind's Eden on Earth to release the chaos and corrupt the God's creation.
5 (8.9%)
15. After meeting the creator of the Black Goo, David was transformed into a fetus, and became a Star Child.
1 (1.8%)
16. After becoming a Starchild, David is able to manipulate space-time and ends up creating the Engineers and triggering a cosmic paradox.
1 (1.8%)
17. David is killed in a motorcycle accident like his hero  T. E. Lawrence.
3 (5.4%)
 18. He ends up like the titan Prometheus, tortured for eternity.
6 (10.7%)
19. David survives and has a key role in a sequel set in the distant future of the timeline, post Alien Resurrection.
3 (5.4%)
20. Similar to the previous option, but with David meeting Ripley / Ripley 8.
1 (1.8%)
21. David is hunted by a Predator, and his head ends in a Yautja trophy room.
1 (1.8%)
22. In a final battle on LV-426, David infects the Engineer flying the Derelict - and the Derelict lands on David.
1 (1.8%)
23. David's journey ends in an LV-223 infested by Deacons.
0 (0%)
24. An unknown or ambiguous fate.
2 (3.6%)
25. David dies trying to achieve the ideal of the Ubermensch through his Perfect Organism.
1 (1.8%)
26. A facehugger can successfully impregnate David, after the android becomes a real boy (probably an Engineer thing).
0 (0%)
27. David got infected by a new kind of morph, which can use a robot as a host.
0 (0%)
28. David finds the most complex experimental facility ever built by the Engineers (the source of the AI that we nicknamed black goo) and he transfers his robotic consciousness to the alien machine creating the original Space Jockey in the process.
1 (1.8%)
29. Similar to the previous option, but with David being turned into the sacrificial Engineer from the beginning of Prometheus.
0 (0%)
30. While David is creating his army of Xenomorphs in Origae-6 (using the Covenant's colonists as guinea pigs in his experiments and as hosts for his deadly creations), the synthetic android is eventually confronted by the Engineers in an epic battle.
2 (3.6%)
31. David dies but discovers that Black Goo is like dinosaur DNA preserved in amber: the genetic material of a long gone lost world inhabited by the morphs (or xeno-like-beings) or even by the true Space Jockeys (the Engineers were charlatans, after all).
0 (0%)
32. Everyone is a robot, except David. And in an unexpected twist, it is revealed that the whole setting of the prequels it is, in fact, one of the Westworld's theme parks.
2 (3.6%)
33. Before his death, it is revealed that David is an Assassin fighting against the Order of Knights Templar (Weyland Yutani) and the Engineers are in fact "those who came before". Ie, David's trilogy is actually a crossover.
0 (0%)
34. David becomes a sacred idol for the Engineers in the form of a giant monolithic head.
1 (1.8%)
35. David is going to achieve, until a certain point, the Weyland's goal: immortality by transferring his robotic consciousness to MU-TH-UR 6000 and maybe other machines such as Ash. Ie, a parasite just like his creation.
1 (1.8%)
36. The same as above but with living human host (like Carter Burke for example), and in a post-credit scene it is revealed that Robert Morse is David.
0 (0%)
37. He wakes up and realize it was all just a dream, everything from Prometheus and Covenant.
0 (0%)
38. As the above option, but the dream is Alien: Covenant ... since David has been in a coma for 10 years on LV-223 after being beheaded by the Engineer. For more understanding read the Reply # 90.
0 (0%)
39. He needs the Lambert treatment.
0 (0%)
40. David creating the ultimate Mother Queen that becomes god to engineers while David fall into eternal dreaming state
1 (1.8%)

Total Members Voted: 56

Author
What would be a proper ending for David? (Read 21,629 times)

TC

David's android character arc is the main reason why the 3rd prequel needs to be made.  If Covenant was a very shallow film and the ending was simply "...and the bad guy wins" then that would be a valid end (and no 3rd film necessary).

But there's a deeper layer to this particular bad guy. Scott and the writers were laying out a philosophical message, embodied in David's motives, that is yet to be properly concluded. Those motives being the fulfilment of David's "Will to Power", i.e. his rise to Ubermensch, as described in Friedrich Nietzsche's 19th century philosophy.

Lest anyone think I'm getting wanky and making a rather tenuous connection, I will point out that this subtext was first introduced in Ash's speech in Alien '79: "...A perfect organism...I admire its purity; a survivor unclouded by conscience, remorse or delusions of morality." The writer, Walter Hill, was describing Neitzsche's "superman" or Ubermensch, the superior being who has outgrown the need for God's values of morality, charity, or compassion.

QuoteWH: And of course, our best character was the Alien.
FI: Can you elaborate?
WH: For example, David and I joked about calling him/her Nietzsche, you know, Beyond Good and Evil. Seriously, that was one of the things in making the thing fly – we articulated that notion in a way that got to the audience.

https://alienseries.wordpress.com/2014/11/22/interview-with-walter-hill-2004/

In other words, "Perfect Organism" is Walter Hill's code for Friedrich Neitzsche's "Ubermensch."

Nietzsche was, as is well known, the favourite philosopher of Adolf Hitler, and inspired Hitler's belief in Nazi Aryanism and fascism in general. Ridley Scott's next film featured a super-race of Nexus 6s, one of whom was Roy Batty (blue-eyed and bleached blonde hair), designed to harken to Hitler's Aryan super-race. This imagery was recycled (Scott did a lot of this in Prometheus) in Michael Fassbender's look for David; David is another one of Scott's Aryan androids.

Regarding David's feeling for Shaw, Nietzsche says that the Ubermensch feels emotions, but does not let them get in his way. So it's plausible that David loved Shaw, but inflicted his atrocities on her anyway. Remember, one of fascism's guiding principles is, "by whatever means necessary." Love would not have barred David from doing whatever he felt needed to be done.

At one stage Scott was keen on directing a film version of Tristan and Isolde (an opera by Richard Wagner), and would have been aware of the association between Hitler, Wagner and Nietzsche. Hence David's choice of Wagner's Das Rhiengold/Entry of the Gods into Valhalla, played at the end of Covenant.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/richard-wagner-a-composer-forever-associated-with-hitler-a-892600.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nietzsche_contra_Wagner

So David tries to live up to the ideal of the Ubermensch. Not only does this explain the philosophy underpinning his behaviour, but also the desire to sire his progeny, the "perfect organism"; i.e. the xenomorph. But can Covenant really be the end of the story? If so, then doesn't that make Scott's message a demonstration of the superiority of fascist philosophy? Yuech! I'd like to believe that it only seems this way because the prequel plot is unfinished. The final act is where the storyteller's cards are truly revealed. I want, and I hope, that Scott will show us how flawed David really is.

TC

whiterabbit

How's David going to die?

His batteries are going to overheat and catch fire.

SM

Quote from: TC on May 07, 2018, 06:06:12 AM
David's android character arc is the main reason why the 3rd prequel needs to be made.  If Covenant was a very shallow film and the ending was simply "...and the bad guy wins" then that would be a valid end (and no 3rd film necessary).

But there's a deeper layer to this particular bad guy. Scott and the writers were laying out a philosophical message, embodied in David's motives, that is yet to be properly concluded. Those motives being the fulfilment of David's "Will to Power", i.e. his rise to Ubermensch, as described in Friedrich Nietzsche's 19th century philosophy.

Lest anyone think I'm getting wanky and making a rather tenuous connection, I will point out that this subtext was first introduced in Ash's speech in Alien '79: "...A perfect organism...I admire its purity; a survivor unclouded by conscience, remorse or delusions of morality." The writer, Walter Hill, was describing Neitzsche's "superman" or Ubermensch, the superior being who has outgrown the need for God's values of morality, charity, or compassion.

QuoteWH: And of course, our best character was the Alien.
FI: Can you elaborate?
WH: For example, David and I joked about calling him/her Nietzsche, you know, Beyond Good and Evil. Seriously, that was one of the things in making the thing fly – we articulated that notion in a way that got to the audience.

https://alienseries.wordpress.com/2014/11/22/interview-with-walter-hill-2004/

In other words, "Perfect Organism" is Walter Hill's code for Friedrich Neitzsche's "Ubermensch."

Nietzsche was, as is well known, the favourite philosopher of Adolf Hitler, and inspired Hitler's belief in Nazi Aryanism and fascism in general. Ridley Scott's next film featured a super-race of Nexus 6s, one of whom was Roy Batty (blue-eyed and bleached blonde hair), designed to harken to Hitler's Aryan super-race. This imagery was recycled (Scott did a lot of this in Prometheus) in Michael Fassbender's look for David; David is another one of Scott's Aryan androids.

Regarding David's feeling for Shaw, Nietzsche says that the Ubermensch feels emotions, but does not let them get in his way. So it's plausible that David loved Shaw, but inflicted his atrocities on her anyway. Remember, one of fascism's guiding principles is, "by whatever means necessary." Love would not have barred David from doing whatever he felt needed to be done.

At one stage Scott was keen on directing a film version of Tristan and Isolde (an opera by Richard Wagner), and would have been aware of the association between Hitler, Wagner and Nietzsche. Hence David's choice of Wagner's Das Rhiengold/Entry of the Gods into Valhalla, played at the end of Covenant.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/richard-wagner-a-composer-forever-associated-with-hitler-a-892600.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nietzsche_contra_Wagner

So David tries to live up to the ideal of the Ubermensch. Not only does this explain the philosophy underpinning his behaviour, but also the desire to sire his progeny, the "perfect organism"; i.e. the xenomorph. But can Covenant really be the end of the story? If so, then doesn't that make Scott's message a demonstration of the superiority of fascist philosophy? Yuech! I'd like to believe that it only seems this way because the prequel plot is unfinished. The final act is where the storyteller's cards are truly revealed. I want, and I hope, that Scott will show us how flawed David really is.

TC

+1

ChrisPachi

QuoteLove would not have barred David from doing whatever he felt needed to be done.

So like Nietzsche David is excitingly un-tethered, but in the end miserably inconsistent.

The proper ending for David was having his head removed, but since that didn't do it, let's see it removed again... by Daniels; it plops to the floor, an ironic smile on its face.. it speaks: "... I love y..." FLAMETHROWER



Baron Von Marlon

Quote from: OpenMaw on May 07, 2018, 05:44:56 AM
I think everybody get's why David killed Shaw.

I get it, I just don't like it. The character could have been so much more.

I agree.

https://www.avpgalaxy.net/forum/index.php?topic=59650.0

Quote from: TC on May 07, 2018, 06:06:12 AM
David's android character arc is the main reason why the 3rd prequel needs to be made.  If Covenant was a very shallow film and the ending was simply "...and the bad guy wins" then that would be a valid end (and no 3rd film necessary).

But there's a deeper layer to this particular bad guy. Scott and the writers were laying out a philosophical message, embodied in David's motives, that is yet to be properly concluded. Those motives being the fulfilment of David's "Will to Power", i.e. his rise to Ubermensch, as described in Friedrich Nietzsche's 19th century philosophy.

Lest anyone think I'm getting wanky and making a rather tenuous connection, I will point out that this subtext was first introduced in Ash's speech in Alien '79: "...A perfect organism...I admire its purity; a survivor unclouded by conscience, remorse or delusions of morality." The writer, Walter Hill, was describing Neitzsche's "superman" or Ubermensch, the superior being who has outgrown the need for God's values of morality, charity, or compassion.

QuoteWH: And of course, our best character was the Alien.
FI: Can you elaborate?
WH: For example, David and I joked about calling him/her Nietzsche, you know, Beyond Good and Evil. Seriously, that was one of the things in making the thing fly – we articulated that notion in a way that got to the audience.

https://alienseries.wordpress.com/2014/11/22/interview-with-walter-hill-2004/

In other words, "Perfect Organism" is Walter Hill's code for Friedrich Neitzsche's "Ubermensch."

Nietzsche was, as is well known, the favourite philosopher of Adolf Hitler, and inspired Hitler's belief in Nazi Aryanism and fascism in general. Ridley Scott's next film featured a super-race of Nexus 6s, one of whom was Roy Batty (blue-eyed and bleached blonde hair), designed to harken to Hitler's Aryan super-race. This imagery was recycled (Scott did a lot of this in Prometheus) in Michael Fassbender's look for David; David is another one of Scott's Aryan androids.

Regarding David's feeling for Shaw, Nietzsche says that the Ubermensch feels emotions, but does not let them get in his way. So it's plausible that David loved Shaw, but inflicted his atrocities on her anyway. Remember, one of fascism's guiding principles is, "by whatever means necessary." Love would not have barred David from doing whatever he felt needed to be done.

At one stage Scott was keen on directing a film version of Tristan and Isolde (an opera by Richard Wagner), and would have been aware of the association between Hitler, Wagner and Nietzsche. Hence David's choice of Wagner's Das Rhiengold/Entry of the Gods into Valhalla, played at the end of Covenant.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/richard-wagner-a-composer-forever-associated-with-hitler-a-892600.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nietzsche_contra_Wagner

So David tries to live up to the ideal of the Ubermensch. Not only does this explain the philosophy underpinning his behaviour, but also the desire to sire his progeny, the "perfect organism"; i.e. the xenomorph. But can Covenant really be the end of the story? If so, then doesn't that make Scott's message a demonstration of the superiority of fascist philosophy? Yuech! I'd like to believe that it only seems this way because the prequel plot is unfinished. The final act is where the storyteller's cards are truly revealed. I want, and I hope, that Scott will show us how flawed David really is.

TC

Didn't know that. Thanks for the info.

tleilaxu

Quote from: TC on May 07, 2018, 06:06:12 AM
David's android character arc is the main reason why the 3rd prequel needs to be made.  If Covenant was a very shallow film and the ending was simply "...and the bad guy wins" then that would be a valid end (and no 3rd film necessary).

But there's a deeper layer to this particular bad guy. Scott and the writers were laying out a philosophical message, embodied in David's motives, that is yet to be properly concluded. Those motives being the fulfilment of David's "Will to Power", i.e. his rise to Ubermensch, as described in Friedrich Nietzsche's 19th century philosophy.

Lest anyone think I'm getting wanky and making a rather tenuous connection, I will point out that this subtext was first introduced in Ash's speech in Alien '79: "...A perfect organism...I admire its purity; a survivor unclouded by conscience, remorse or delusions of morality." The writer, Walter Hill, was describing Neitzsche's "superman" or Ubermensch, the superior being who has outgrown the need for God's values of morality, charity, or compassion.

QuoteWH: And of course, our best character was the Alien.
FI: Can you elaborate?
WH: For example, David and I joked about calling him/her Nietzsche, you know, Beyond Good and Evil. Seriously, that was one of the things in making the thing fly – we articulated that notion in a way that got to the audience.

https://alienseries.wordpress.com/2014/11/22/interview-with-walter-hill-2004/

In other words, "Perfect Organism" is Walter Hill's code for Friedrich Neitzsche's "Ubermensch."

Nietzsche was, as is well known, the favourite philosopher of Adolf Hitler, and inspired Hitler's belief in Nazi Aryanism and fascism in general. Ridley Scott's next film featured a super-race of Nexus 6s, one of whom was Roy Batty (blue-eyed and bleached blonde hair), designed to harken to Hitler's Aryan super-race. This imagery was recycled (Scott did a lot of this in Prometheus) in Michael Fassbender's look for David; David is another one of Scott's Aryan androids.

Regarding David's feeling for Shaw, Nietzsche says that the Ubermensch feels emotions, but does not let them get in his way. So it's plausible that David loved Shaw, but inflicted his atrocities on her anyway. Remember, one of fascism's guiding principles is, "by whatever means necessary." Love would not have barred David from doing whatever he felt needed to be done.

At one stage Scott was keen on directing a film version of Tristan and Isolde (an opera by Richard Wagner), and would have been aware of the association between Hitler, Wagner and Nietzsche. Hence David's choice of Wagner's Das Rhiengold/Entry of the Gods into Valhalla, played at the end of Covenant.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/richard-wagner-a-composer-forever-associated-with-hitler-a-892600.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nietzsche_contra_Wagner

So David tries to live up to the ideal of the Ubermensch. Not only does this explain the philosophy underpinning his behaviour, but also the desire to sire his progeny, the "perfect organism"; i.e. the xenomorph. But can Covenant really be the end of the story? If so, then doesn't that make Scott's message a demonstration of the superiority of fascist philosophy? Yuech! I'd like to believe that it only seems this way because the prequel plot is unfinished. The final act is where the storyteller's cards are truly revealed. I want, and I hope, that Scott will show us how flawed David really is.

TC
Didn't know about that interview, that's pretty cool and I wholeheartedly agree with the Xenomorph as Übermensch interpretation.

Immortan Jonesy

Immortan Jonesy

#36
Quote from: ChrisPachi on May 07, 2018, 03:01:56 PM
The proper ending for David was having his head removed, but since that didn't do it, let's see it removed again... by Daniels; it plops to the floor, an ironic smile on its face.. it speaks: "... I love y..." FLAMETHROWER

David playing "Entrance of the Gods into Valhalla", while he is being beheaded with piano strings by Daniels (or Shaw, one can dream).




Quote from: TC on May 07, 2018, 06:06:12 AM
David's android character arc is the main reason why the 3rd prequel needs to be made.  If Covenant was a very shallow film and the ending was simply "...and the bad guy wins" then that would be a valid end (and no 3rd film necessary).

But there's a deeper layer to this particular bad guy. Scott and the writers were laying out a philosophical message, embodied in David's motives, that is yet to be properly concluded. Those motives being the fulfilment of David's "Will to Power", i.e. his rise to Ubermensch, as described in Friedrich Nietzsche's 19th century philosophy.

Lest anyone think I'm getting wanky and making a rather tenuous connection, I will point out that this subtext was first introduced in Ash's speech in Alien '79: "...A perfect organism...I admire its purity; a survivor unclouded by conscience, remorse or delusions of morality." The writer, Walter Hill, was describing Neitzsche's "superman" or Ubermensch, the superior being who has outgrown the need for God's values of morality, charity, or compassion.

QuoteWH: And of course, our best character was the Alien.
FI: Can you elaborate?
WH: For example, David and I joked about calling him/her Nietzsche, you know, Beyond Good and Evil. Seriously, that was one of the things in making the thing fly – we articulated that notion in a way that got to the audience.

https://alienseries.wordpress.com/2014/11/22/interview-with-walter-hill-2004/

In other words, "Perfect Organism" is Walter Hill's code for Friedrich Neitzsche's "Ubermensch."

Nietzsche was, as is well known, the favourite philosopher of Adolf Hitler, and inspired Hitler's belief in Nazi Aryanism and fascism in general. Ridley Scott's next film featured a super-race of Nexus 6s, one of whom was Roy Batty (blue-eyed and bleached blonde hair), designed to harken to Hitler's Aryan super-race. This imagery was recycled (Scott did a lot of this in Prometheus) in Michael Fassbender's look for David; David is another one of Scott's Aryan androids.

Regarding David's feeling for Shaw, Nietzsche says that the Ubermensch feels emotions, but does not let them get in his way. So it's plausible that David loved Shaw, but inflicted his atrocities on her anyway. Remember, one of fascism's guiding principles is, "by whatever means necessary." Love would not have barred David from doing whatever he felt needed to be done.

At one stage Scott was keen on directing a film version of Tristan and Isolde (an opera by Richard Wagner), and would have been aware of the association between Hitler, Wagner and Nietzsche. Hence David's choice of Wagner's Das Rhiengold/Entry of the Gods into Valhalla, played at the end of Covenant.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/richard-wagner-a-composer-forever-associated-with-hitler-a-892600.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nietzsche_contra_Wagner

So David tries to live up to the ideal of the Ubermensch. Not only does this explain the philosophy underpinning his behaviour, but also the desire to sire his progeny, the "perfect organism"; i.e. the xenomorph. But can Covenant really be the end of the story? If so, then doesn't that make Scott's message a demonstration of the superiority of fascist philosophy? Yuech! I'd like to believe that it only seems this way because the prequel plot is unfinished. The final act is where the storyteller's cards are truly revealed. I want, and I hope, that Scott will show us how flawed David really is.

TC

+1 now I'm starting to like this interpretation of the plot.

Paranoid Android

Paranoid Android

#37
Quote
Nietzsche was, as is well known, the favourite philosopher of Adolf Hitler, and inspired Hitler's belief in Nazi Aryanism and fascism in general. Ridley Scott's next film featured a super-race of Nexus 6s, one of whom was Roy Batty (blue-eyed and bleached blonde hair), designed to harken to Hitler's Aryan super-race. This imagery was recycled (Scott did a lot of this in Prometheus) in Michael Fassbender's look for David; David is another one of Scott's Aryan androids.
The aryan race isn't supposed to have bleached hair though. It's supposed to be naturally blonde. The natural part is kind of the whole point of the Nazi race theory. This pretty much disqualifies David, as Prometheus makes a point out of him not really having blonde hair. On top of that, all four Replicants in Blade Runner are Nexus 6. One of the four is Leon, and he's not exactly your typical aryan stereotype. Finally there's the fact that all Replicants were designed to operate as slave labor, which is the role given to the Slavic races according to the Nazis.

motherfather

Wow, good job thinking up all those endings :-)

The closest I could find, was Walter kills David. But I'd rather the Covenant a d all uf its crew get swallowed by a supermassive black hole. They are a bunch of simpletons. Who'd want a planet colonized by those dum-dums?

Immortan Jonesy

Immortan Jonesy

#39
Quote from: motherfather on May 07, 2018, 09:30:15 PM
Wow, good job thinking up all those endings :-)

The closest I could find, was Walter kills David. But I'd rather the Covenant a d all uf its crew get swallowed by a supermassive black hole. They are a bunch of simpletons. Who'd want a planet colonized by those dum-dums?

I just added six new options to the poll. I'm really curious to learn if David's canonical destiny is going to be like some of these ideas that we've been discussing in this thread. As long as the last chapter of David's trilogy finds its way to reach the big screen, of course :)

TC

TC

#40
Quote from: Paranoid Android on May 07, 2018, 06:43:06 PM
The aryan race isn't supposed to have bleached hair though. It's supposed to be naturally blonde. The natural part is kind of the whole point of the Nazi race theory. This pretty much disqualifies David, as Prometheus makes a point out of him not really having blonde hair. On top of that, all four Replicants in Blade Runner are Nexus 6. One of the four is Leon, and he's not exactly your typical aryan stereotype. Finally there's the fact that all Replicants were designed to operate as slave labor, which is the role given to the Slavic races according to the Nazis.

My bad. I didn't make my meaning clear enough.

I'm not saying Roy Batty or David, in their respective story worlds, are literally Aryan, or literally Nazis, or literally fascists, or have even heard of Nietzsche.

As characters in works of fiction, much of what they do, the words they say, how they dress, style their hair, etc. is symbolic, designed to nudge the audience's understanding of theme in the proper direction. It's immaterial whether or not blonde hair is natural or bleached, only that it reminds the audience (perhaps only subconsciously) of another idea - that of the Aryan model.

Incidentally, Ridley Scott didn't invent the metaphor of "android as Nazi" himself. Philip K Dick, the writer of "Do Androids Dream...", came up with that idea. It was what inspired him to write the novel in the first place.

https://galaxypress.com/inspired-philip-k-dick/

TC

Paranoid Android

Paranoid Android

#41
Quote from: TC on May 08, 2018, 01:43:49 PM
My bad. I didn't make my meaning clear enough.

I'm not saying Roy Batty or David, in their respective story worlds, are literally Aryan, or literally Nazis, or literally fascists, or have even heard of Nietzsche.

As characters in works of fiction, much of what they do, the words they say, how they dress, style their hair, etc. is symbolic, designed to nudge the audience's understanding of theme in the proper direction. It's immaterial whether or not blonde hair is natural or bleached, only that it reminds the audience (perhaps only subconsciously) of another idea - that of the Aryan model.
No, I got what you were saying. Which is why I never accused you of saying anyone in any film is literally Aryan, a Nazi or a Nietzsche fan.

I completely agree with what you wrote about symbolism, which is exactly why you trying to parallel Replicans/David with the Aryan model is fundamentally flawed. The reason your argument is flawed is context. Merely having a character being a white male with blonde hair isn't enough to nudge the audience towards associating the character with the Aryan model. Otherwise your claim would be true about literally any blonde white male in the history of fiction.

The context of David's blonde hair has absolutely nothing to do with Nazism. He paints his hair blonde and shapes his haircut a certain way because that's what the character of  T. E. Lawrence looks like. There's a good reason why the film also has him watch Lawrence of Arabia and recite lines from the film: David emphasizes with Lawrence because, much like Prometheus David, Lawrence also struggles with his identity and finds himself in a position of a split allegiance between the British and his Arabian comrades (in David's case, it's between the Humans he was designed to serve, and his own android kind).

In Blade Runner the visual imagery you refer to doesn't work at all because only one of the four Nexus 6 Replicants even fits the blonde male Aryan model, and, again, because the context of Blade Runner places Replicants as a whole as sub-humans; Not as the ultimate humans. Replicants aren't the dominant force in the film - they are the oppressed, and in that regard they have more in common symbolically with the Jews than with the Nazis.

In the case of Covenant...yeah, I'm pretty much with you there. Covenant David is space Hitler and is a completely different character. The Aryan/Nazi symbolism does fit there because the context is similar: A blonde haired male that commits Genocide and wipes out entire races because he supposedly views himself as "superior".

dallevalle

death by his creator ( Human's)

Jonesy1974

Quote from: TC on May 07, 2018, 06:06:12 AM
David's android character arc is the main reason why the 3rd prequel needs to be made.  If Covenant was a very shallow film and the ending was simply "...and the bad guy wins" then that would be a valid end (and no 3rd film necessary).

But there's a deeper layer to this particular bad guy. Scott and the writers were laying out a philosophical message, embodied in David's motives, that is yet to be properly concluded. Those motives being the fulfilment of David's "Will to Power", i.e. his rise to Ubermensch, as described in Friedrich Nietzsche's 19th century philosophy.

Lest anyone think I'm getting wanky and making a rather tenuous connection, I will point out that this subtext was first introduced in Ash's speech in Alien '79: "...A perfect organism...I admire its purity; a survivor unclouded by conscience, remorse or delusions of morality." The writer, Walter Hill, was describing Neitzsche's "superman" or Ubermensch, the superior being who has outgrown the need for God's values of morality, charity, or compassion.

QuoteWH: And of course, our best character was the Alien.
FI: Can you elaborate?
WH: For example, David and I joked about calling him/her Nietzsche, you know, Beyond Good and Evil. Seriously, that was one of the things in making the thing fly – we articulated that notion in a way that got to the audience.

https://alienseries.wordpress.com/2014/11/22/interview-with-walter-hill-2004/

In other words, "Perfect Organism" is Walter Hill's code for Friedrich Neitzsche's "Ubermensch."

Nietzsche was, as is well known, the favourite philosopher of Adolf Hitler, and inspired Hitler's belief in Nazi Aryanism and fascism in general. Ridley Scott's next film featured a super-race of Nexus 6s, one of whom was Roy Batty (blue-eyed and bleached blonde hair), designed to harken to Hitler's Aryan super-race. This imagery was recycled (Scott did a lot of this in Prometheus) in Michael Fassbender's look for David; David is another one of Scott's Aryan androids.

Regarding David's feeling for Shaw, Nietzsche says that the Ubermensch feels emotions, but does not let them get in his way. So it's plausible that David loved Shaw, but inflicted his atrocities on her anyway. Remember, one of fascism's guiding principles is, "by whatever means necessary." Love would not have barred David from doing whatever he felt needed to be done.

At one stage Scott was keen on directing a film version of Tristan and Isolde (an opera by Richard Wagner), and would have been aware of the association between Hitler, Wagner and Nietzsche. Hence David's choice of Wagner's Das Rhiengold/Entry of the Gods into Valhalla, played at the end of Covenant.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/richard-wagner-a-composer-forever-associated-with-hitler-a-892600.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nietzsche_contra_Wagner

So David tries to live up to the ideal of the Ubermensch. Not only does this explain the philosophy underpinning his behaviour, but also the desire to sire his progeny, the "perfect organism"; i.e. the xenomorph. But can Covenant really be the end of the story? If so, then doesn't that make Scott's message a demonstration of the superiority of fascist philosophy? Yuech! I'd like to believe that it only seems this way because the prequel plot is unfinished. The final act is where the storyteller's cards are truly revealed. I want, and I hope, that Scott will show us how flawed David really is.

TC

Really interesting post and I completely agree with the last couple of sentences.

Wweyland

His mind should start malfunctioning more and more (already hinted at in Covenant) and basically die of Android Alzheimers, a sad little death for that evil bastard. Or perhaps he realizes this and chooses suicide instead.

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