They're Remaking 'Alien' -- the 'Prometheus' thread

the complication is there's no plot

https://encrypted-tbn2.google.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTcroJcXmIUdkV-cPNl3soykOK8MCaDKCSFVhjrgwsPAxL_VTw15Q

can we shop David + xenomorph into that bed plz

Annoyed SF writer/biologist Peter Watts: http://www.rifters.com/crawl/?p=3211

Enjoyed the Watts article almost as much as the io9 one

Maybe not the best H.G. Wells books, but maybe my favorite one: http://www.strangehorizons.com/reviews/2007/01/star_begotten_a.shtml

Pardon what may seem like a digression, but having found a website that lists the chapter titles for said book, they are simply too charming not to share

• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• Note on the Text
• The Mind of Mr Joseph Davis is Greatly Troubled
• Mr Joseph Davis Learns about Cosmic Rays
• Mr Joseph Davis Wrestles with an Incredible Idea
• Dr Holdman Stedding is Infected with the Idea
• Professor Ernest Keppel takes Up the Idea in his Own Peculiar Fashion
• Opening Phases of the Great Eugenic Research
• The World Begins to Hear about the Martians
• How These Star Begotten People may Presently Get Together
• Professor Keppel is Inspired to Foretell the End of Humanity
• Mr Joseph Davis tears up a Manuscript
• Notes to Introduction
• Notes to Star Begotten

I think I've watched like half an episode of lost so I'm no expert here, but I'm wondering if part of the problem w/ lindelof as movie screenwriter is that he doesn't have the discipline needed for short-run characterization. TV's all about sprawl, if you don't flesh out a character completely in an hour you've got 12 more to work it out, introduce other dimensions, etc.

since lindelof's shorthand is rusty his film characters come off as mercurial ciphers, maybe?

• Dr Holdman Stedding is Infected with the Idea
<3

good poll fodder imo

dudes maybe this is obvious but i was sort of idly wondering how the aliens can gestate in a bath of human gastric acid, which will dissolve practically anything, and i remembered - they have acid for blood! they LOVE acid!

yes, the summer of 1989 was a special time for xenomorphs throughout the galaxy

I just saw this and I thought it was good. Lots of little annoying things but overall I liked it alot.

BUT my step dad has an elephantine memory and said that the movie reminded him of this Outer Limits episode:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Zanti_Misfits

and once again we circle back to forbidden world

― nuts spats (Austerity Ponies), Monday, June 18, 2012 11:59 AM (Yesterday)

belated lols

Saw this tonight -- what an entertaining load of singin' and dancin' malarkey.

Hello my baby hello my honey

http://www.forbes.com/sites/carolpinchefsky/2012/06/20/5-scientists-share-their-baffled-reactions-on-the-bad-science-in-prometheus/

Bill Chadwick, Geologist, John Milner Associates

The first thing the geologist says is, “I’m in it for the money.”

[A pause that I interpret as puzzled silence.] Uh, typically not.

lol

hahah

so many lols

In one scene, a biologist encounters an alien creature that looks like a giant phallus. The biologist refers to it as a “she.” What would you call a creature that resembles a giant phallus?

A “he.” Definitely.

Yeah, the amount of deadpan in that article is as if every scientist interviewed was deeply British

The first thing the geologist says is, “I’m in it for the money.”

[A pause that I interpret as puzzled silence.] Uh, typically not.

On the other hand, geology does sometimes strike me as one of the more mercenary branches of physical science. I mean, these are people with a fundamental understanding of the carbon cycle and yet many of them are still more than happy to work for the likes of Exxon Mobil etc

The psychologist saying that, yeah, people do put together unbalanced teams and people get mentally ill and try to kill each other in real life was pretty great.

via io9.com, your source for all things trying to rationalize Prometheus:

In the scene where David addresses the remaining Engineer, he talks in an unfamiliar language that we later learned was a combination of real languages. And now, that bit of conversation has been translated.

The Bioscopist notes that when David is learning the "building blocks" of language, a hologram appears to teach him Proto-Indo European Linguistics. The man in that hologram is Dr. Anil Biltoo of the University of London. The Bioscopist located Biltoo and acquired this translation:

Here's the line that David speaks to the Engineer, and the consultant's translation of it:

/ida hman?m a? kja nam?tuh zd?:taha/…/gh??vah-pjorn-?ttham sas da:t? kredah/

A serviceable translation into English is:

"This man is here because he does not want to die. He believes you can give him more life."

Biltoo also revealed that there was a much longer conversation filmed that was eventually cut for the final edit. But we will have to wait for the DVD to see if Ridley Scott decides to include it among the director's cut or deleted scenes.

THANK GOD THAT MYSTERY IS SOLVED I ASSUMED HE WAS ASKING FOR A GAZPACHO RECIPE.

I really hoped the translation was "kill this sad sack of shit"

"Please rip off my head and beat this man to death with it, for the lulz."

the initial discussion language log is p cool, linguists at play trying to figure it out, Dr Biltoo dropping by to tell them how they're doing.

put an 'at' in there after 'discussion'.

The psychologist saying that, yeah, people do put together unbalanced teams and people get mentally ill and try to kill each other in real life was pretty great.

― mh, Thursday, June 21, 2012 9:08 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

^ I thought so too. Also, that teams are put together who do not meet each other until they're on site.

Once again, rolling our eyes at stuff that actually happens.

this wasn't exactly a run of the mill scientific expedition but fair enough i suppose

once again, the world rolls its eyes at stuff that actually happens.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X3BV2u8YWps

In one scene, a biologist encounters an alien creature that looks like a giant phallus.

to be fair, it was a giant phallus with a vagina on its face.

i thought this was great. f u haters.

there are some clunks around the way obv (foot washing scene was garbage, old man makeup looked like shit) but i think the main thing here is that people are forgetting that whatever nonsense comes out of lindelof and scott doesnt make a difference abt what the movie is, to get all reader response criticism on yall. ive got a pretty solid interpretation of the movie that revolves around davids prime motivation consistently being the destruction of the human race, and im pretty sure im right no matter what the dudes who made the movie think.

that sounds flip but i am not actually kidding.

Michael Fass-Bender

http://ih2.redbubble.net/image.10732811.5429/fc,220x200,black.jpg

been thinking about the david->ash->bishop android progression, and the irony that the most robotic (bishop) is the least dangerous, and the most human (david) is the least reliable. ash was obv dangerous but he was a robot carrying out bad orders. david on the other hand seems to be working his own agenda - did he poison holloway merely because he didn't like him? and between his passive-aggressive sniping and full-blown wonder at the engineer's star globe, he possesses an emotional range. I think someone mentioned the connection to AI upthread and it's a valid one, the idea of a robot driven by its own desires (both named david incidentally).

the struggle between the creation and its inventor is also a theme that gets mirrored - humans/androids, engineers/humans - obv some debt to frankenstein; or, the modern promtheus as well.

kinda get the feeling this movie will get reevaluated down the line, maybe after ridley's final cut is released? like the shining. people hated the shining when it came out! there's a lot of stupid stuff in there, but it's also beautifully shot and works in spite of its silliness.

David didn't poison anyone, he needed a guinea pig to test that stuff on and the guy said he'd do "anything!"

i think davids intentions are darker than that - i think getting the dude to say he would do anything was just an enjoyable further internal dig for david. i think the "doesn't everyone want to kill their parents" (or however it was written) line from david was a pretty big flashing neon sign abt what his intentions are and were throughout.

his motivation isn't clear tho - why does he need a guinea pig? the "anything" convo could just be more of david's needling.

xp jjj otm etc

yeah that "everyone wants to kill their parents" line is telling

true, that

i need to rewatch it to nail some things into place, but if you look at it with the perspective that at some point david has decided that it is in his/the general best interest to destroy his creators, it makes a lot of sense. in fact its the only argument for why david wants to cryosleep shaw and perform the operation back on earth.

i keep wanting to lay out my 13-point plan for why i think david wants to end humanity but it feels a little like shouting into a empty room at this point. this is what i get for waiting to see the movie for a bit i suppose.

after a second viewing vickers becomes a more sympathetic character, would've been interesting if they honored the fire by making her more central. I remember when first seeing alien back in the day, ripley came off as a total brittle officious - apologies to aerosmith - bitch. but that was the genius of alien, making ripley unlikeable made her high probability alien food but the film turns that on its head when our gruff sensible beardo leader gets eated in an airshaft.

would've prefered an end where vickers + noooomi form a begrudging mutual respect and fly off together all girl power with a dude's head in a bag, coulda been scott's in-the-future-thelma-and-louise-get-away-with-it message.

memorial me + jjj talk about prometheus thread

another thing I noticed on a second viewing - the engineer at the beginning of the film is a perfect specimen until he takes the black goo and mutates. but the aggressive engineer at the end of the film has signs that he's been partially mutated, he has a black furrow down his spine and a weird honeycomb on his neck.

xpost -- I'm reading it all, EIII, just not chiming in.

Don't see how a plausible interpretation of the movie makes up for a generally appalling script full of unrealistically asinine characters and scenes that just don't connect with each other.