The Origins of the Space Jockey Race

i have the following theories/ideas on the SJs -The large seat the SJ is sitting in is a telescope launcher that is designed to fire the xenomorph eggs/black ooze to anywhere in the galaxy. -the reasons for this are: the company were trying to take away the xenomorph/black ooze (fire in the Prometheus mythology), and so this was to be their punishment. -the SJs are either creators of the human race, or what is left of the creators (since themes of world building are very prominent in the alien franchise, why not race building?) that is why there are large human face statues (possibly a blue print or the original creator) -I think the SJs or engineers, are called so because they engineered the human race, and have also created something else that would turn into the xenomorph. -They are definatly the 'ancient astronaut' seen at the beginning of the new trailer. -either that or they are big smurfs in fancy suits... and Gargamel is a god.

Robots made the SJ

Well that's an interesting point. Who is The Space Jockey? Myself I prefer the name Engineer. Simple and to the point. The mystery is what makes it so interesting. My theory is that they have mastered the biological ways of creating life. Creating life throughout the universe. However, they don't view others as equals. They are like Gods. Failed Gods. Some kind of event wiped them out. I prefer the mystery. It works out better that way.

@ninjacop I remember very well Ridley said it was a suit. But the space jockey head as seen in picture 3 definitely seems to be an actual head, and not a helmet. And the humanoid/space jockey mutant seen in picture 2 seems definitely to have a human or practically human head, while his arms seems to indicate he IS wearing a SJ suit. Guess we both need a professional detail spotter to be sure:-) RS regarding time travel: my first source was the fake script, so I took the wrong logical route, at least initially. However, in the meantime, I believe RS said something - I think it was one of the interviews - when asked about some scene, I think the one with Shaw and Vickers fleeing from the crashing derelict, but it may have been somewhere else - that they are present at "our beginnings", or some phrase like that, I remember turning it over in my head and thinking how it strongly suggested time travel of some kind - if so, it may be actual Prometheus survivors and/or mutants who start all the Pleiades-related civilizations mentioned in the trailers (I hope not - way too cheesy). I believe the creature in pictures 1 and 2 is either Holloway or Weyland, either mutating into a space jockey or having mutated itno something close enough to a SJ to be able to use SJ technology. I may be totallly wrong. But it's fun to keep guessing...

Maybe the space jockeys are other humanoids summoned this temple in a similar way, only they arrived much sooner and have since been running their own experiments and creating a trap for future spacefarers. Perhaps the ampules acted as depositories of all species on Earth for us to find so to explain our ultimate origin. However, the SJs have been very busy altering the contents of these ampules so to make their contents parasitic. It could well be that the crew get infected by the parasite only to turn into grotesque versions of creatures that currently or once inhabited Earth. Maybe the SJs found the temple and wished to destroy the human race a some time ago, but lacked access to the Star Charts that would point out the location of Earth (and other planets the Engineers seeded). The SJs too may be creations of the Engineers only to wipe out the Engineers upon finding the planet or found the temple already to be long abandoned. Either way as a last minute precaution the Engineers deactivated all their technology including the Star Charts that would point out the location of all the planets seeded. It could be David who reactivates the Star Charts only for the SJs to take this information to accelerate their destruction of Earth: instead of waiting for humans to come and take the biological parasite back with them, they now can deliver it directly and possibly also deliver it to other planets seeded by the original Engineers. edit: The Space Jockeys may have a superiority complex and cannot handle the discovery that they were not the only beings to receive the gift of intelligence. Their motivation to trap the temple and destroy all other seeded creations is to ensure they are the only species remaining with the gift. As I wrote above already, they may have already wiped out the Engineers stationed at the temple and may be hell-bent on destroying their creators as well. Indeed. How would we handle it if human-kind and all life on the Earth was someone else's registered trademark?

My theory Is that SJ were dying so they restored themselfs or theirs dna on those ampules and when the ampules came to contact to another lifeform, It would rewrite the dna of the organism and then would turn the organism to a SJ or a variation of a SJ.

I agree with GhoseCove. I think Space Jockeys are the ultimate scientists of the universe. Their vast knowledge of biology and technology enabled them to seemlessly merge with machines. They spark life on planets across the universe and monitor the progress of civilizations until said civilizations are advanced enough to decypher the 'invitation'. Upon which they wipe them out and the process starts all over again. Space Jockeys do it for research. I also think they treat humans like test subjects, we're the lab rats and we're not allowed to have their technology. If we even try to take it, all hell will break loose.

Perhaps it is just me, but it seems only the last of the photos above show a true space jockey. In the first two, the body seems similar enough, but the head appears too humanoid - no sign of proboscis or altered skull shape. By the look of the legs, the humanoid is the same one who threatens Shaw in one trailer scene; apparently, someone (Holloway? David? Weyland?) is either turning into a sj or turning into one to a sufficient extent to be able to use their technology. If we could guess correctly which of the two is the case, it may help crack the sj mystery too. The first case (entirely turning into a sj) would have quite different implications than turning into a hybrid of human or android with sj. I remember Ridley once talked about how, on the Alien set, everybody felt the space jockey creature there was benevolent. Yet he has also stated that the derelict ship was a bomber. These two do not seem to mesh together. The sj there appears to have been chestburst, which is another apparent contradiction. Tough cookie to crack. It is also possible that different sjs have different ideas about other species. Imagine you were a whale: what would you think of humans? The human race contains both Captain Ahab and Greenpeace, does it not? It will also be interesting to see how the time travel bit plays itself out. The idea that life may have come to Earth from somewhere else is long-standing (the so-called panspermia theory). I've never liked it simply because it does not solve the problem, only pushes it one floor further away (life still had to start somewhere, so the same questions remain, only the setting is changed. One of the big questions in biology is whether life is ubiquitous throughout the universe (in which case it would be an inherent property of the universe itself, weird but not needing special explanation), or rare/unique. If it turns out rare (have to wait for Mars probe result or even further than that), then it becomes almost too improbable. In that case, Scott's ideas about time travel and advanced races tinkering with the past becomes very interesting, even though mind-boggling. Why aren't they all around us, if they can time travel? Why is their world (in Prometheus) either dead or dormant? In cosmology, there is now much discussion of the possibility that the big bang was preceded by a big crunch (which had been preceded by yet another big bang etc.). If this is so, then life may have been created by advanced races of the universe's previous cycle, and then somehow pushed through the big crunch and the big bang in order to leave something behind those races in the next cycle of the universe (and perhaps eventually recreate themselves, if they were so inclined). Perhaps the sjs were around before the big bang, and then pushed an ark-like thingy - such as the dead planet in Prometheus - through the big crunch and the big bang in order to seed the new universe with life, and then...either recreate themselves by altering newly evolved species, or, when the time is right, wake up...

@Wirrn You have to remember though that what we've seen as the SJ is a suit. The huge blue thing standing up/crouching we've seen in the trailers is probably the SJ in the suit. We also see the creature in the first pic walking across the map room towards David, and in comparison is huge. -When has RS mentioned time travel, don't think ive read anything about that?. but he has gone onto say that the SJ is a suit,

It's all a bit confusing for me now to make a reference to a space jockey race since Ridley said that the space jockey is really a suit, so maybe that's all we are referring to , a suit, unless something else rears its head

@Kast Iron I assume the SJs wait in stasis until their test subjects return home? How would we explain the humans being allowed access to the temple and the ampules? Would this be part of the test? I can't believe the SJs would allow the humans to fiddle around with the ampules if they wished to limit access to their technology. It would have to be a trap of sorts...part of the final stages of their testing or punishment for even trying to steal the technology. Maybe they would be more gracious hosts if simply had not touched their things and simply acted subservient.

@Kast Iron That´s kinda how I see the plot too. Although I think there might be a higher force above the engineers, that we haven´t seen or heard off (and maybe we never will). I see the engineer as the practical worker, not the leader.

I really can´t see any resemblance between Holloway and the blue guy, they have no similar features. How exactly does this suggest anything?

The engineer/blue guy may be a different form of the tadpole/blue tail that is removed from Shaw. I mean, how do you know that instead of a xeno exploding from the chest of the SJ suit, it wasn't just the SJ itself in xeno-like form forcing itself out of a suit that had locked her/it inside?

Photo 2: Top of the SJ chair shows the helmet assembly fixed upright, in an open position. Photo 3: The helmet assembly has lowered and engaged the pilot's head, in the closed position. It's a helmet, not a head.

Something tells me that the Blue guy isn't the SJ. I'm wagering that it's a mutated human.

@Ninjacop. Scot stated that it's a suit. But something tells me that it's just not that simple where the SJ is this blue Humanoid figure. To me this would be very disappointing, seeing that in the Alien movie, the SJ seemed to have very defined/detailed features, despite being fossilized. Look at the head in the Alien movie. that doesn't resemble a metallic like dome that we see here. It looks more organic in the first movie. Perhaps it's like a second skin that resembles what the creature actually looks like? I'd hope so.

Something is telling me that Scot isn't letting us know about the SJ features. He knows that we have this desire to know, going back to 1979. He's been pretty tight on the movie.

Perhaps they were created as soldiers to protect the engineers from outside invaders. And at some point, they became self-aware and decided to overthrow their creators. In reference and agreement with other members here, the Space Jockeys set a trap for our group of explorers. What's next is to infect them so that they can destroy their own homeworld. However, since the humans seem to find a way to steal the Gods technology, the Space Jockeys decide to make a run for Earth and seed it with deadly life. Of course, these are points that have been made, yet there are several ways to interpret and add a different take on such cool concepts.

We saw dead SJs lying on floor, there are live SJs walking around. Once we figured out this two conflict scene, then only we think about their origin.