Why Is The Space Jockey in ALIEN Much Larger Than The Engineers?

The SJ in the suit we see in the preview is not the same size as the original SJ; you can tell if you look at the length of the arm and the height of the head relative to the back of the chair. There is a photo that shows statues or suits of two different sizes. Those on the left are much larger than those on the right. [url=http://www.prometheus-movie.com/gallery/view/img/47][img]http://www.prometheus-movie.com/media/prometheusmovie_11512_5.jpg[/img][/url] If you ask me, those on the left look bigger. I know the closest one on the left is closer than the closest one on the right, but it still looks bigger. Look at the feet. Ridley doesn't overlook details like that. If you've been reading the articles so far, especially the recent french translation, you know there is no way RS would be paying attention to all the minute details the articles describe and miss this one or decide to ignore it. My guess is the larger SJs are something that will remain secret until after the movie is out. For all we know, they live 1000 years and grow the entire time. There is definitely mention of age differences between the SJs in the movie. The sacrificial SJ, which is the one in the opening sequence, is said to be a young one. I don't remember any direct relation to size, but it's logical to think the older ones might be bigger. And it's been stated many times now that the creature we know as the Space Jockey is just one of the large humanoids, called the Engineers by RS, wearing the bio-mechanical suit that must be worn to pilot the ship.

I guess it's because the Jockey in Alien wasn't supposed to interact with humans, it was meant to be huge and make it an eye opener for the audience. The Jockeys in Prometheus had to be smaller cos they get into fight with the crew. It would look ridiculous, the Alien Jockey would stomp the crew with it's feet. Its not an angle thing, think about it. Although I bet Scott will have an explanation for the size difference, cos he knows we know.

Neurion.....or anybody else for that matter.... If I was flying along through space and suddenly realized that I was infected with a deadly parasite that in a short space of time was going to kill me, I would land my ship and set a beacon warning anybody and everybody not to attempt to board my vessel because I know the exact nature of my little buddy....he always comes groups. After that I would kill myself, not waiting for what I know will be a worse death. But there's a problem...there's no way to kill myself because I'M GROWN INTO MY SHIP ....WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO, STRANGLE MYSELF WITH THESE ARMS BECAUSE THEY ARE ALL I GOT???? Sure would be great to be able to get out of this chair....TOO BAD I AM FULLY INTEGRATED INTO THE SHIP ITSELF...guess I just have to just sit here and die horribly, ...if only...

Very, very true Asgardian Playboy! You're logic makes perfect sense to the apparant filming inconsistencies. And I am sure Ridley Scott will have a reasonable explanation as well. Good call on that comment! ( irbese )

If I could get up and kill myself because I have a deadly parasite inside me....I would. I would rather die by my own will rather than the way the parasite will kill me. But I can't get up....I'm growing out of the chair I am in....what do I do? Strangle myself with these big ass arms? Oh well, whatever, Nevermind....

What if the size of the Space Jockey in Alien was an error on their part? Maybe the Space Jockeys are really just naturally seven feet tall. The reason for the size of the one in Alien is partly because of how it's augmented to the chair....eh I dunno...

Neurion, this has bothered me from day one. But, since we haven't seen the film yet, we've got to give RS the benefit of the doubt I suppose. If however they go back to that scene in this film or the next and that SJ is smaller, than I'll yell WTF?

I'm sure someone's mentioned that this has been talked about before and in those early threads it was brought up that the Engineer that the chair attaches to in the Pro trailers is WAY smaller than the one in Alien. So I don't think it grows bigger after chasing Shaw. Unless of course he gets in the chair BEFORE he chases Shaw. Personally, I wouldn't mind if it's just a design change and the Engineers aren't the exact same size and have the long ass arms like they do in Alien. I don't think that will be the case because RS usually has a reason behind EVERYTHING in his films. I even heard him say, and I'm paraphrasing, something like "humor is great in film but it has to have a reason and make sense. Humor for humor's sake isn't my style." Like I said those weren't his EXACT words but those are close and it was something to that effect.

Its true, Ridley Scott may have in some ways, backed himself into a corner of sorts and now he has got to creatively write himself out of it . I'm certain he can do it! :- )

Maybe what we know as the space jockey in Alien is considered a god by the space engineers. That may be one of many reasons the engineers attack the humans. Remember in the clips were we see the elephantine head, or mask in the possession of the humans in the laboratory. One of the humans might have taken (stolen) the head from the lair of the engineers, pissing off the engineers in the process.

RS did not "back himself into a corner." Idiotic fans might back him into a corner in their own minds with their even more idiotic expectations but that's not his problem.

OK let's be serious. Ridley has a 140 mil. bugdet to make an R-rated Scifi-Horror movie. He doesn't give a shit about size and so on. All he thinks of is make a plus, and scare people. Understand the man, he got to make money and if to do so he have to change some things to make it work. It's all buisness and a bit of passion, and since he's hoping for a sequel to prometheus he got to make compromises. He will make the sequel and Cameron will rewrite his books to make good scifi, and by the time Avatar 2 comes out it will be the best thing ever. One pushes another to the limit like in the old days, that would be wonderful.

See, his arms are not near as long nor is he as tall... [img]http://www.prometheus-movie.com/media/prometheusX_screencap4.jpg[/img] [img]http://i1203.photobucket.com/albums/bb381/jmichinock/Space-Jockey-pg-99.jpg[/img]

I'm wandering whether the size can be explained from the way they breed. My theory for a long time is that Jockeys are parrasites, intelligent ones none the less. But my idea is that they are the little worms you see in Holloway's eye. So they can be different sizes based on what species they infect......

By th way, as a mediocre earner I just imagined what's it like to have a couple of hundreds of million bucks to get a project done, don't you think it's crazy these numbers? I mean, we struggle each day in the area of tens and hundred dollars, and these guys got this numbers and sometimes they get frustrated if it doesnt work out. I get carried away by this amount of money that is spent nowadays.

All this talk of The Derilict Space Jockey and how he fits into The Chair I just had a thought... What if the Space Jockey from Alien hade been floating around in space as Ripley had done but for many thousands of years, got caught in the planetoids gravitiational pull and smashed down onto the rocky outcropping where we find it in Alien?

@Id Rather... Best explaination yet...and I hope it's NEVER explained in a Prometheus film.

Two chairs in those pictures are not the same chair, so that's not the most accurate of metrics. In one of the trailers. you can see one of the crew looking down at a very tiny SJ-like figure. Then you have the one attacking Shaw, which is large human sized. Then the holograms in the orrery which are a little bit bigger than that. Then the statues, which look to be similar in size to the jockey in Alien. This leads me to believe that either that SJs come in different sizes, from smaller human size to giant size; or there are two different races of humanoid on that planet.

I wish people would do a little research before posting.

I do hope there will be continuity between Alien and Prometheus. I will be truly disappointed if Ridley doesn't have a space jockey the same size as in Alien. I'm sure I'm not the only fan that doesn't want some BS about there being two different sizes of space jockey's, or perhaps they grow over a very long period of time as someone has already suggested, how absurd would that be? Also another concern is, I always had hoped we would someday see an "Xeno Planet", a planet of their own, that they come from, not being created by some type of "engineers". Now what kind of place would that be? That would be the story!