Elizabeth Shaw - the great-grandmother of our beloved Xenomorphs ?

I think the Xeno or an even more sinister relation already exists...

I assumed that the derelict found on LV-426 would have been the ship that Shaw and David escaped from LV-223 on. Remember that what we knew for years as the Space Jockey (in appearance) is revealed to be the Engineer space suit and not the Engineer itself. If the ship malfunctioned causing a crash, it's likely that Shaw may have had to put on one of the Engineer's suits (as her suit would have been nearly depleted of oxygen by then, she had only a couple minutes of oxygen left towards the end of the film anyway). It's all speculation on my part, but I think it's likely that she could have been re-infected with the goo or possibly impregnated by a remaining one of those snake-like creatures -- leading to a possible chest bursting episode shortly after they crash on LV-426.

I thought it was always assumed the crashed derelict on LV-426 had been there for a very long time, and the events of Prometheus are happening when the derelict on LV-426 is already there and has been for a while. Not sure if Ridley Scott has specifically said this, or if others have just mentioned it in interviews.

Ridley has stated that the derelict on LV-426 did NOT crash, it landed there - at this stage we have no idea if LV-426 and LV-223 are even in the same star system let alone orbiting the same planet. It is clear that this is not a direct prequel and through the following 2 sequels we will eventually get to LV-426. Need to be patient and have faith (pun intended!) I for one would have been very disappointed if Prometheus had ended at LV-426 as there would have been no-where else to go - we already know the story from there!

It was never revealed that the Space Jockey was just a suit or what was contained within the suit. It could well be Shaw in that suit for all we know. We were told in Alien tho that it had been dead for a long long time... We are dealing with a space faring race here with many ships. It could be totally not connected with the characters we've been introduced to in Prometheus and I expect that would be the case. Prometheus does show evolution to a certain extent - just not as we would expect with science as we currently know it. This is why it is great scifi. It shows a possibility... and perhaps a warning. Evolution is fast if you can get your head around genetic engineering being a form of evolution. Speed of development is a plus to any creation as it means its key reason for survival in an ever changing universe of change. If you can keep up the pace you survive... parallels to darwinism and survival of the fittest. If you get there first you have an advantage. Back on topic - two different planets, there is so much scope right there to expand the universe that it seems pointless to speculate. They could make it anything they wanted to.

Shaw can't be the Space Jockey - she's too small.

While this is a cool concept and I want to believe it it doesn't explain why the jesus/xeno statue/wall painting is found in the pyramid. If Shaw was the mother and in a sense crated the xenos how would the Engineers know that before it happened? Or maybe they did and that's why they were trying so hard to kill all the humans, to prevent us from creating the xenomorphs.

The xeno as we know it already exists, the Mural proved that and the original Giger designed Facehuugger is present on the mural attached to a humanoid face...

you can find the Giger FH design on the lower part of the Mural, which I posted yesterday.. [url=http://www.prometheus-movie.com/community/forums/topic/7371]Mural Reveals Original Facehugger and humanoid host[/url]