Invite us to their planet then kill us?

I think the purpose could be so that, if they seeded us here, the signal to THEM that we were "ready" (for what? That's the question, isn't it?) would be that we sought them out via all the info they gave us...

But why wouldn't they remain in communication with us all those years? Why leave everything shrouded in mystery? Unless we're some kind of experiment. Maybe they have a running bet to see if they can create their own inteligent species. Maybe they wanted to see how far we can go on our own, how much we can develop and evolve. Plant the seeds and watch the tree grow. These space jockeys are an odd bunch.

Not only they did leave a map ...they did help us for millennias ( that was said by the artistic creator ) ... so ...something is missing here ....

Frantz, When you say artistic creator, you mean giger?

We were never meant to go there in the first place. SJ's dont want the human race to discover their secrets or existance. Perhaps the SJ's didn't think we would ever peice the puzzle together or have the means of finding this particuliar part of the galaxy. It makes sense when you see the biomechanoid security features and the SJ's fighting or trying to escape. The deralict spacecraft is likely the doomsday ship for earth that never gets a chance to leave from what I gather. If a particuliar society found out the secrets of it's existance. Managed to find out where they come from and actually found the individuals and base where they are staying.....eradication is likely the outcome. Of course all our ideas thus far are based on a 2:30 trailer.

I have said this over and over and over and over and I just do not get why people do not get it... We get there and WE STEAL from them !!! We do not go there as part of slaughter, everything is FINE until we break ONE OF THE TEN COMMANDMENTS as a matter of a fact which i find hysterical right now and we take some of what is their most sacred and valued possession from them, they don't like it and don't want or have to like it, they are trying to Seed and un Seed the Universe. Terra Forming The Universe as they do to their liking, this is a Malevolent Race of beings they are EVIL beyond what we understand, If you steal from someone who isn't Evil in life you are going to have a hard enough time about it eventually, but steal from malevolent and EVIL beings what do you suppose they are going to do ask to you to sit down for Tea with them? This whole thing is about the crazy whacked out ARROGANCE AND STUPIDITY of Mankind with regard to the Universe!!!

and I am just throwing this out there as an example... What is your opinion of NASA overall...?... Cause mine is that for as long as that Space Agency has been Alive, it is has been LYING TO, CHEATING, and MISREPRESENTING, THE PEOPLE OF THIS EARTH AND WHAT THEY DO THEMSELVES AT NASA. IMO NASA IS THE SINGLE BIGGEST OBSTACLE TO SPACE EXPLORATION...ALL THEY HAVE DONE FOR A HUNDRED YEARS ALMOST IS LIE AND CHEAT AND SCREW UP ON THE GRANDEST OF SCALES. THEY ARE PUPPET OF GENERATIONS OF CORRUPT AMERICAN GOVERNMENTS AND POLITICIANS WHO DO NOT WANT YOUR MONEY SPENT ANY WAY YOU WANT IT SPENT. AND ESPECIALLY SPACE EXPLORATION. ALMOST 90% OF WHAT IS DONE AT NASA AS FAR AS I CAN TELL IS COVERT AND A SCAM !!!

Spartacus, From the last images from the russian featurette, it seems that things start to go south well before anybody has the time to steal anything...

I had forgotten about that! It could be that they never meant to cause us harm until we did something to upset them, by stealing from them or tampering with stuff in the temple, as you implied Sparta.

Yea and as someone mentioned before, "We were never meant to go there in the first place", they really did NOT invite us, "I Was Wrong" really means, wrong about them, their intentions, about being Invited and especially it being "O.K. sure yea fine", to bring some of their VIALS/URNS on board our ship.

[quote]Spartacus, From the last images from the russian featurette, it seems that things start to go south well before anybody has the time to steal anything...[/quote] Just FYI...Everything in All 4 Featurettes now is completely out of sequence.

also I think a completely different movie is being released in Russia...lmfao...as punishment of that country's internet activities...lmfao.

Sparta, But if we really weren't invited, why leave behind their address (starmap)?

Or, possibly, the race we find on LV-426 is not the same race of beings that engineered mankind on earth, and left the invitations. If they left similar invitations on each planet they seeded, it would only be a matter of time before one of their creations would evolve to the point of wanting to conquer and become their creators. By force if necessary. This is their Promethean curse.

@ want-to-see-prometheusNOW! Your question is important and the dilemma fundamental - I also, with some others, have been struggling with it for a while. I find it so fundamental that I have formed the conclusion that the resolution of that question is obviously a cornerstone of the Plot. @BioShock I cannot make interpretations like, "We were never meant to go there", or, "It was a warning", stand up in my mind - as, if we were never meant to go there, why invite us? The communicate that was left for us could not look less like a warning and, if they'd rather they were left in peace, why point out their home on a Star Map? It's like declaring that the plaques we attached to our Pioneer spacecraft were a "warning".... Furthermore, if they would rather they were left in peace, why communicate their Home or even their existence, at all? Humans would be none the wiser and their privacy is guaranteed. @Spartacus That would seem to me, to be just too literal: The movie is called Prometheus. The ship is called Prometheus - therefore it is necessarily humans that follow the Greek myth theme and do the, "stealing"? I don't think the signposts will be that clear. I'd hope not.

@Forever War I'm sure it is. We've over thought this to abstraction and now sometimes its fun just seeing what I can make fit into known parameters (which are few) @Windwood While it's true that the Judeo/Christian God is never depicted as a 100 foot tall human, I'm not sure accusing the entire community of ignorance is the most diplomatic way to communicate that.

@Necrofan Except that you can only be annihilated, once? Where is the repetition in that curse?

We have to ask ourselves, as the AC DC song so eloquently puts it, "who made who?" We don't know the answer yet. But I could see the Engineers being the original sinners in this tale, being the true, original thieves from the divine. And Peter Weyland's character is just an example of where their biological meddling with their new stolen creation-tech ends up; with a super-race bent on conquering and/or becoming their creators. This happens to be the end result, no matter how many times they attempt to make a perfect race.

The crew examine samples aboard the Prometheus, David pulls something out of an urn. I think it's already crystal clear that we steal something from our "creators", or like Ridley said himself, "dangerous elements that, in a heartbeat, are capable of eviscerating all of them" whatever that means.

allinamberclad, I think you make some good points, although I do think Sparta's conclusion is a possibility. Necrofan, I was thinking along the same lines. Whatever visited us may have been destroyed by another alien race. I had not considered that it could have been one of their own creations. But that certainly could be a possibility. Hey remember the space jockey discovered in Alien with it's bones bent outward. Destroyed by what we assume to be one of its own creations.

Amberclad, true, a being can only be annihilated once, but an entire civilization could be attacked over and over, by its own creations. Just a thought.

we do not know that the Jockeys had a bloody thing to do with ANY of those artifacts, that whole thing could even be a PLOY by the TED company to begin with to get more guenny pigs into space and do their bidding for them. And it sure looks like that is exactly whats going on from the trailers. It is inf act still the same old "Greedy" corporation that The Good Dr. spouted of in Alien Resurrection, and it's now even farther back in time when it was more likely to be even far more sinister in it's intentions. and another thing, not one of those tablets shows anything similar looking to a Space Jockey, we don't even know what a Space Jockey even looks like yet, and neither do they when they suddenly all of the sudden on earth find tablets we have all missed for the last g0d knows how many hundreds or thousands of years...I think that whole meeting over the tablets in the trailers is yet another example of The Company's sinister agenda to acquire a TERRA-FORMING WEAPON and lying to get "expendables" to do their bidding for them and their intentions. !!!

and we were CLEARLY never EVER meant to go anywhere.

@Necrofan But in that scenario, you simply substitute one God, for a greater One? [And I didn't say, "being"? Your comment referred to a "race" - and, in reply, that was my context]. Nevertheless, you have, in a way, expressed a version of something that has been gnawing at the back of my mind - but that has to do less with, "who are the Gods", and more to do with the notion of the Order of Things.

Very similar to what many people theorize will happen to us humans when true AI is achieved; what scientists call the singularity. Objective numero uno for this new intelligence would be to achieve either equality with or superiority over its creator.

".I think that whole meeting over the tablets in the trailers is yet another example of The Company's sinister agenda to acquire a TERRA-FORMING WEAPON and lying to get "expendables" to do their bidding for them and their intentions. !!!" Oh my god, dude I had not considered this! You might be right! That would make a nice plot twist and a big surprise...

Amber, not so much a literal God being, but a flaw in the intelligent design from the engineers that pushes their creations to become God themselves. That they are created in God's own image, and therefore are of, or like God. These posts are all just Saturday morning conjecture by me and nothing else...

just a thought, everything you said is quite valid, i just feel the signs are there that point t this all in another direction...But FYI I respect this opinion of yours and am just taking the opposite view so we can hash it through...either way it is sure gonna be fun to see what Ridley decided to do with all this part of it.

We may find out the truth soon enough but what could be the reasons and who is to say they want to wipe us out? They may just want to use us as hosts. I would find it strange that they want to wipe us out just for the sakes of it but wait till we get there, why? Surely they could wipe us out before then. So here are some reasons i think it could be... 1) The Engineers left clues for us, so that we would one day go to their world, as a trap. They need mankind for some purpose to further their own agenda. But why wait so long? a) Did they need us to evolve to the level to be able to venture into space? b) Maybe something happened to to their race that meant they could not harvest us, so they indended to come earlier but just could not, but that dont make sence because even with few left they still set off to go to Earth in this movie. 2) Maybe some Engineers had gone off and created us, without the other Engineers knowledge or permision maybe the set of Engineers who created us had died out or was punished by the others. Therefore. a) Maybe the other Engineers do not know about us. b) They never thought the other Engineers creation would ever be able to venture and find the Engineer homeworld. 3) Was the Engineer race nearly wiped out by some Bio Weapon or other creation they created, eventually they managed to contain that threat but, the Crew and Weyland etc Unleash that threat again or simular. Maybe they vistit Earth to Seed us after the event that wiped them nearly out (Xenos) knowing that some day that they could use us to repopulate their race. Why go to that hassle and let us find them, well maybe because at that time only a handfull of Engineers are left and their resources low and thus they hybernate and wait for us to go to them. Who knows.....