Plot Hole?

[i] Why tow a refinery to Earth? The Nostromo was a commercial "tug boat" carrying 20,000,000 tons of mineral ore back to Earth. It would make perfect sense to have the refinery on the trip so during the length of the voyage you could do all of the refinery work to have the finished product arrive back at Earth. It would be very cost effective to do this. Something the Weyland Company would be interested in. [/i] yes, I was just a bit fuzzy as to whether they were going to Earth or to another colony... I know why they're towing the thing, I should have been clearer in my question. [i]The time difference of the trip is simple. Different tech levels. The "tug boat" making the trip in less time than the souped up Prometheus is not relevant. The fastest Ferrari can not keep up with the shuttle at 17,000 mph cruising speed. It is a wale compared to the Ferrari. It's space. Looks, size, shape ... none of it matters. [/i] Perhaps, but weight sure does. Getting 20 million tons up to speed is some effort! [i]At the beginning of Prometheus it shows a ringed planet. It looks quite a bit like the one at the beginning of Alien. LV_426 and LV-233 are more than likely near each other. [/i] The nearest they can be should be about 4.5 light years, if we are to believe what Lambert tells us about the location of LV 426. (in the Zet Reticuli binary system (which is a real system 39 light years from Earth, where as LV-223 is 34.5 light years away, according to the new film... (3.27 x 10 ^14 km ) Assuming they are roughly the same direction from Earth (which they may not be) then they could be as close to each other as Alpha Centauri is to our own Solar system. [i] The atmospheric similarities between the two are interesting.[/i] LV-426 - 10% Argon, 85% Nitrogen and 5% Neon (prior to Terraforming) LV-233 21 % Oxygen 70% Nitrogen 3 % Carbon Monoxide LV 233 is closer to Earths atmosphere than it is to LV-426's atmosphere surely? One thing that strikes me as odd, is the high CO level on LV 233 (not only is Carbon Monoxide slightly lighter than air, but in the absence of Volcanos and other natural sources, (or cars) it's not likely to be found at ground level, as it is lighter than air. We are told that LV 233 has no heat sources, which rules out volcanoes surely? In fact, given the amount of volcanic activity on LV 426, it SHOULD have more Carbon Monoxide in the atmosphere.

Not exactly because even though Prometheus is a prequel, it's still set in the 2090's where alien I believe takes place in 2037.

1) Not the same planet 2) ships are not necessarily going the same speed.

Aren't they in the same system though? Plus, Prometheus is faster than a towing vehicle.

Both have the LV number, but never said it the same system.

It takes years for the Prometheus because they don't have the technology yet of Lambert, Dallas, Ash, and Kane's time yet. The first movie, Alien, is well in the future of this movie.

Exactly Jacksom. I thought I read somewhere that ALIEN was dated 2037 and Prometheus at 2094. Strange The point is it should take LESS time for the Prometheus than it would've taken the Nostromo to go to and from that system. Unless, LV-223 is A LOT farther from LV-426. If that's been stated before, I missed it. From what I understand though, aren't they within the same system.

It never been established that they are in the same system. The only thing that is the same is that both are in the LV catalog and orbit a planet with a ring.

I'll have to check this but if I recall correctly, Alien takes place in 2124 I think, working back from dates given in Aliens, which happens 57 years later. And yeah the ten month thing seems odd, if indeed their destination is Earth (why tow a refinery to Earth?) In fact they were FURTHER away from Earth, because the LV 426 planet was desrcibed as being in the Zeta Reticuli system, which is 39 light years from us. LV 223 is 34.5 light years away, and I don't imagine that the Nostromo was built to outrun the Prometheus. Prometheus took 28 and a half months to make a 34.5 light year trip, and a towing barge pulling a refinery can do a 39 light year trip in ten months? Oddly in Aliens, before all the colony staff get killed, one of them makes a remark about taking 2 weeks to get a reply message from Earth. That seems very odd - seeing as how a signal travelling at light speed would take 78 years to get there and back. Either we assume faster than light radio as well as ships, or else James Cameron didn't bother with that detail (remember he got criticised by Neil de Grasse Tyson for getting the sky wrong on Titanic - which also had 'Hudson" in it :) )

I can't think of anything that made it certain thar lv426 and lv223 are even close to eachother. There could've been something I missed but I've seen all alien movies many times and prometheus twice. Just because they have the same first two letters doesn't necessarily mean they are close together.

Wiki says Alien takes place in 2122 so makes sense this was 2094. The planet code is one thing up for discussion. Apparently Ridley Scott and the writers said they had deliberately chosen to have a couple of plot holes in the movie to leave it for a sequel but kept the basic structure so people could enjoy the movie. So LV223 could be explained in a later movie, if not, we will never know! :(

Yes, Sir Ridley needs to clear some things up and make Lindlelof answer some questions before piling on one question after another. Sir Scott, will also need to put out some QUALITY death on the big screen. I've seen people burned, beaten, and thrown to death before. ALIEN had quality death. Even ALIENS had quality death even though it was implied of strongly shown(Cpl. Ferro, Vasquez and Gorman).

A number of possible answers. The first Alien film takes place in 2122. The sequels Aliens and Alien 3 both take place in 2179 Why tow a refinery to Earth? The Nostromo was a commercial "tug boat" carrying 20,000,000 tons of mineral ore back to Earth. It would make perfect sense to have the refinery on the trip so during the length of the voyage you could do all of the refinery work to have the finished product arrive back at Earth. It would be very cost effective to do this. Something the Weyland Company would be interested in. The time difference of the trip is simple. Different tech levels. The "tug boat" making the trip in less time than the souped up Prometheus is not relevant. The fastest Ferrari can not keep up with the shuttle at 17,000 mph cruising speed. It is a wale compared to the Ferrari. It's space. Looks, size, shape ... none of it matters. At the beginning of Prometheus it shows a ringed planet. It looks quite a bit like the one at the beginning of Alien. LV_426 and LV-233 are more than likely near each other. The atmospheric similarities between the two are interesting.

This is from the writer Jon Spaihts himself "Given that Prometheus is set prior to Alien, how did you devise a set of technologies that would appeal to an audience in 2012 without making Alien's 1979 vision of the future seem outdated? There's an inevitable trickiness around the chronology just because technology in the real world and technology in filmmaking have come so far in the years since the original Alien. But for me a lot of that is easily rationalized by virtue of the fact that the Nostromo, the original ship in Alien, is an industrial tug. It's a rust bucket that itself might be 150 or 200 years old at the time that we see it. The Prometheus is a state-of-the-art scientific exploratory vessel. So it's only reasonable that it be sleeker and technically vibrant." http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=ridley-scott-prometheus-alien

i have only seen the movie once, planing on seeing it 1 or more times. this is something i have not seen anyone touch on. in aliens, LV426 is shadowed by a ringed planet like "saturn"... well in the beginning of Prometheus it looks like they orbit a ringed planet with two moons... the larger moon is the one they land on "LV223". i had really wanted this to be LV426 "as im sure a lot of us did", but we all know from seeing the movie now that this is NOT LV420 "even tho it is a moon orbiting a ringed planet" like LV426. could the other smaller moon be LV426? probably not.