The reason why the Engineer went on a killing spree!

Bonus points for the proper usage and spelling of the word druidic

It's an interesting theory, but I truly believe that the 2,000 year old engineers are wearing suits. It's clear they're wearing helmets (which fit in with their suits perfectly). I'm a bit confused though...you made a thread about why the Engineer goes on a killing spree but you go off on a tangent about other stuff. I have a theory why he went on a killing spree...because David said something to him along the lines of, "Go...go and complete your mission to eradicate humanity on Earth". Then he proceeded to decapitate David and kill everyone on his way to the cockpit. Oh, and the reason he went after Shaw after the crash was because he was PISSED

Thanks @ jdax lol And @CGamid, sorry it seemed like a tangent but the gist was that the last Engineer no longer had emotions and therefore didn't care about amoral act of killing in cold blood and killed Weyland and the others because they were in his way and he had to complete his mission. Whereas the ancient Engineer cared for life, otherwise why would he have provided the building blocks for life thru his sacrifice to start life on another planet.

It's a good theory. I believe something similar along those lines. The time span from the initial sacrifice of the Engineer to 2000 years ago seems like millions of years. In that time culture, religion, morality, and agendas can all change. I too noticed the awoken Engineer's neck and am not entirely convinced it was not a bio-organic synthetic being, though it might be a willing cyborg simply fitted with prosthetics. It is an awfully big change to go from creating one species to wiping one out in favor of a new construct (the Xenomorph). That kind of plan would mean a severe amount of de-humanization from their perspective for humanity. The awoken Engineer may have just seen us a wild pests to be eradicated, or it may actively hate us as Shaw believed.

I agree. It certainly appears that the Engineers have modified their physicality, during the enormous period of time between their seeding of life on Earth and the Prometheus project. I daresay the sacrifice Engineer didn't have to work out, to look as buff as he appears. He's been [i]engineered[/i] that way. These beings seem to have redesigned [i]themsleves[/i] along with their other creations. The cloak certainly wasn't organic....the environmental suits in the tunnel adjacent to the bridge look somewhat organic......but the surface details on the body of the engineer look [i]entirely[/i] organic.

Here's a different theory - The Captain of the Prometheus concluded that the pyramid/dome/entombed spacecraft was a military installation for biological warfare research. He assumed the Engineers placed the installation on this otherwise dead planet to isolate their home world from accidents. Well if this was a military installation prepping to voyage to Earth to transform all animal life on Earth back down the evolutionary tree, then the Space Jockeys were military. Suddenly being awakened after an unexpected 2,000 year stasis - and expecting to awaken at Earth to begin the destruction of Earth's animal life - the Space Jockey finds Earth humans in his bridge - and his shipmates no where in site. Any military man suddenly finding the targets of his mission loose on his bridge would of course kill the intruders immediately before they could interfere with his mission or damage his spacecraft. The opening sequence spacecraft which marooned the sacrificial priest Engineer on Earth looked different from the spacecraft Prometheus destroyed. The former was perhaps a exploration and scientific vessel - the latter a battleship. The dead Space Jockeys were running from the escaped squigglies of their bio-weapons research. When Prometheus arrived, the canisters were re-activated by the CO2 exhaled by the Prometheus team - remember there was high CO2 in the planet's atmosphere - but almost no CO2 in the pyramid. CO2 is a mark of animal life - and so the bio-weapon was triggered by the exhaled CO2. Maybe that's why the Space Jockeys were always wearing those elephant trunk masks - to recycle their own CO2 to avoid triggering their weapon.

Before I give my own theory I have to point out some things you missed. The guy in scene 1, is not from 2000 years ago. He's on primordial Earth... BILLIONS of years ago. The Space Jockey on LV 223 with the missing head has been dead for 2000 years according to Shaw's carbon dating machine. That's where the 2000 years comes into it. Now, you also need to realise that the mythology is not just a little backdrop for this story, a source for a good name and a few pretentious speeches by Weyland and others. It is a substantial part of the underlying plot, above which the superficial story of 16 humans and one android on a ship is presented to us. Consider this. The first big grey dude is a hairless, expressionless musclebound creature, that expresses no emotion at being dropped on a planet, with the sole purpose of finding a river where he can commit a suicide that rips him apart into little bits of floating DNA fragments. The other big grey dudes we see (some as holographic replays) are all pretty much identical to each other, no body hair at all, and show no emotion at discovering that three of the sarcophogus style stasis beds are ruptured, presumably by chestbursters. These guys do very dangerous work, far from home, and when not needed for work, can be put to sleep for a LONG time. Did you think that they might be worker drones? Are they all cloned, genetically designed strong male slaves that worship the engineers and do their bidding because they are designed to be obedient, brainwashed into obedience, and have constant reminders of the engineers OTHER creations which are aggressive highly adaptable viscious killers. Did you spot the Xenomorph mural in the Temple? Did you spot the mural on the ceiling, showing what seems to be two humanoid figures, but one has a facehugger on his head? Do you think that this might depict the REAL Engineers, and two of their creations.... kind of like the God reaching to Adam painting on the Cistene Chapel roof? Putting all that together, I think that the reason that the Engineer killed them is not because of some thing secret that David says. I think David said EXACTLY what Weyland asked him to do. Just imagine it from the point of view of the Space Jockey. Here he is, his entire live as a slave, his kind being asked to either make deadly weapons, or fly them around, or perhaps even melt themselves down depending on what the Engineer will command. Now after a long sleep what does he find? 5 figures from the planet he was supposed to destroy. The planet where the big grey dude was killed to seed life. These beings are not slaves, they are free to do what they like, except 1 of them. And he is a creation made by these humans, and they are using him to talk to the Space Jockey. And what does he say "My creator wishes you to make him immortal. " This must be an abomination on many levels. First off, the things he was supposed to kill turn up ON HIS BRIDGE and wake him from stasis. Instead of showing any type of fear they get their puppet to speak to them, and what do they demand? immortality, to be on a level footing with the gods. Apart from the obvious blasphemy, this also touches on something the Space Jockey might want for himself, but cannot have because of the Engineers. Perhaps, in fact the Engineers are not the ones who decided to destroy their own creation. Perhaps some of the big Grey Space Jockeys started to develop egos, and want freedom, and became jealous that they are expendable while the humans are free to pursue their own purpose in the universe - Perhaps, when David was asked by Weyland "tell him who I am" he's mentioned that while the Space jockey was asleep for 2,000 years, the Weyland empire has stretched to 60 colonies in space - thus making Weyland a 'creator of worlds', although a very mortal one. And now he wants immortality to top it off? And what future does the Space Jockey and his kind have? They might be ordered to war, and those urns are not stacked or shaped in a way that suggests dropping bombs or shaping torpedoes. The life cycle of a Xenomorph demands a host. Who do you think that is? Serving their masters by having their chest ripped open. Why not transfer that privilege to the humans by flying thousands of urns there, and infesting them? If I'm right in my hunch, then it should be obvious why the Space Jockey looked at the android, examined him, then ripped his head off, used it as a weapon to strike Weyland a fatal blow to the skull, before going after Jackson and then Dr. Forde.

@GigerFace 3.0 I like your theory. It explains why the first spacecraft we see during the movie is different from the other ones. Engineers evolved. Their objectives as scientists too. They became more and more possessed by science, and less and less careful about life (like us by the way). As for the killing, I'd say the last Engineers consider us as "hosts" for the Xenos or mere guiney pigs. Here is my theory: - at some point, they discovered they could create Xenos out of themselves (like the one at the end of the movie - which is the same as the one we see in the big room behind the giant stone head), maybe 40000 years ago - so they wanted to see if they could create them out of us. They came to earth to fetch some human beings (35000 years ago), and told the other ones where they wanted to bring them (hence the pictures/maps in the caves): the Engineers brought those humans to the scientific facility, not to their homeland - then, out of us, they created the other Xenos we know from the Alien movies. One spacecraft probably going to some system where other "humanoids" would serve as hosts, and full of those eggs, is discovered by the Nostromo. - then the desire to experiment the "holly goo" went totally crazy, and they wanted to try it on a whole planet (ours): not against us specifically, but on every living forms. But the goo killed the first.

The captain thought it was a military installation, but consider that it would be sensible to isolate ANY lab that works with potentially hazardous material. In addition, if we created another species in our image and nurtured it through evolution, would we give it our home address (where it could potentially eventually attack), or would we give the address of some rock in the middle of nowhere where we could safely make contact (and perhaps already had some hardened facility)?

[quote] The dead Space Jockeys were running from the escaped squigglies of their bio-weapons research. When Prometheus arrived, the canisters were re-activated by the CO2 exhaled by the Prometheus team - remember there was high CO2 in the planet's atmosphere - but almost no CO2 in the pyramid. CO2 is a mark of animal life - and so the bio-weapon was triggered by the exhaled CO2. Maybe that's why the Space Jockeys were always wearing those elephant trunk masks - to recycle their own CO2 to avoid triggering their weapon. [/quote] Actually there's a bit of an error by Holloway when he says that there was a toxic level of CO2 in the atmosphere. If you listen to Chance reading out the atmosphere composition, he mentions Carbon MONoxide (CO) not Carbon DIoxide (CO2) and Dr. Forde says that a few minutes in that would kill you. That's true for [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_monoxide_poisoning]Carbon Monoxide[/url], where at little over 1 % you'd be unconcsious after a few breaths and dead in minutes, but the level of [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_dioxide#Toxicity]Carbon DIOXIDE[/url] would have to be much higher to kill us that quickly. There is some merit to the idea that the CO2 has "changed the atmosphere" as Shaw put it, and it would be another example of Holloway's reckless behaviour putting them all in danger. However, we do have a severed head inside the doorway. Any CO2 inside his helmet would have leaked out by the neck when he was decapitated, and surely the CO2, which is heavier than air didn't rise so quickly as to interfere with the mural. I have a feeling (although I don't believe in mythology, but see it all over this plot) that there's a double meaning to 'changing the atmosphere in the room'. and that there is some other form of detection at play, and the room is REACTING to them in a way that it is designed to do. I have a feeling that there might also be a trap element to the temple. David could open the door, but is that all he does, or was there something he didn't know to do? I'm thinking here of the big green rock in the Altar/Control panel. Does it keep the goo and worms in a dormant state, much like a stasis bed would do for the Space Jockeys and humans? Was there a link between that green rock, and the green slime that David found on the control panel for the door, when he looked at the slime, sniffed it and said "impressive"?

I like how they've left it so mysterious as to why Prometheus ended up landing near a WMD facility. We could of course think, that they abduct people and bring them there for experiments, and that if these people get space travel sorted (while the Space Jockeys are sleeping on the job), that they will end up at a place designed to kill them. But consider the alternative. Holloway seems to be the one who interpreted the Star map and just about everything he does is reckless and wrong. His methodology stinks. He finds the matching stars - that's fine. THEN he chose the star MOST LIKELY to support life on an orbiting planet .... wait... why not check ALL the Stars that meet the criteria and not just the one that most resembles our sun. But that's what he said they did. Having eliminated 5 of the six stars using poor methodology, he then looks for a planet... and there's a ringed gas giant.... which isn't all the unusual... and it has a moon or two... also not that unusual. The fact that it has Space Jockey facilities seems to confirm that they've picked the right place, if you're still not being very scientific with your thinking. If this race can travel 40 light years to Earth, why would they not have outposts around their own neighborhood? Should we simply assume that finding any evidence of civilisation means that THIS is their homeworld that they wanted us to visit? No welcome mat, no homing beacon, just big domes with walls. Oh, and on top of the dome a long giant cyclindrical head with a scary skull. Does this say "come on in"? I think not. I had a look at the stats for the other stars named on the Hill's UFO Star Map (which Ridley Scott seems to be following closely.) Most of them have similar characteristics to our sun, and some have confirmed planets, some have suspected plantets. (NASA's budget cuts impacted heavily of the search for planets like this) Surely if instead of straight away picking only the MOST Similar star, a thorough evaluationn of each was done, they might have found themselves looking at the actual homeworld. But alas, arrogance and the quick fix (pride being a deadly sin) sealed Holloways fate.

@ Master Jo, I'm liking where your theory heads and it fills in some of the blanks my theory didn't cover. It's all together possible that the Derelict Juggernaut from ALIEN has been crashed on LV246 for 35,000 to 40,000 years and at that time, in stage of the Engineers technology, they used eggs as the means to sterilize a planet. And because of that crash the eradication of human life on earth was put on hold, only to picked back up some 33,000 to 38,000 years later when a more "nano tech" version of infection and eradication was developed with the introduction of the "black goop".

@ Hadley's Hope, you too bring up some interesting points which I think just gives more concrete support to how good a film Prometheus is. An underlining theme in Prometheus is imperfection and the capacity to make mistakes. Holloway made impulsive mistakes and the Engineers made mistakes to lead to their fates. Even David, in his unawareness of self yet simultaneous quest for perfection, made mistakes. Edit: this is a tangent as I want to point out that David's actions near the end seemed to come from a subconscious area which would in a way contradict Weyland's claim that David does not have a soul ;)

HEY! Everyone who has/is going to participate in this thread. Watch out for my next thread. It'll be related to this, in a way. Just remember what Mr.GigerFace 3.0 is saying right now! Please, just keep this in mind. I'll start it once my current thread has run it's course. I just can't let it slip right now. It's too important. But just keep the OP in mind. Remember what was said. I'll post it in the coming days. And i'm certain no one has had a theory even relatively close. But yeah, very nice thinking, there, GigerFace. Very nice. When you referred to the Engineer's "biology", it just instilled my theory. I'll post it eventually. Just not now. Excellent thread.

@ Prenihility, looking forward to your post!

Yeah. Hey, don't get too excited. A lot of things are subjective, lol. You might not like it. You never know. But honestly, it's more of a natural connection than a theory. Or rather, a theory coupled with that. But anyhow. @CGamid. You're theory supports David's line : Doesn't everyone want their parents dead? So, yeah... i don't know. Interesting... but him getting his head torn off, makes me torn, if that's the case :D. As for me, personally. I had already posted it; The Engineer had one HELL of a rude awakening. If the situation were NORMAL, then he wouldn't have flipped shit... Think about it. He woke up to people arguing, and being violent (Shaw getting hit), and yelling (all folks he's not familiar with, mind you). To top it all off, he's the only one left. Everyone he was associated with is dead. And if you pay attention to his facial expression once awoken, it's as clear as day. He had a very curious look about him whilst Shaw was talking, before getting rifle-butted. Plus, David most likely told him what Weyland wanted him to tell him. Which is what set him off. Someone there, asking for something so selfish, petty, and ridiculous, after all THAT commotion? COME OOOOOON!

Haven't read any post. I just want to point out that: "What about David told some bullshit to this guy? He also killed Charlie. AND remember his face when "the father" told Charlie he has no soul… One thing I would discard by now is that there is a difference between this grey guys.

sorry: told David he has no soul…

I skimmed through most of the posts here on this topic, so I just want to throw MY two cents in.... I would personally like to come to the conclusion here, based on what I read in this particular post, that the Engineer that was woken up by David and crew, stood up, gathered himself, realized that he was no longer a slave to the race above him, realized that the humans and David in front him allowed him to wake up, half-heartedly thanked David by rubbing his head, but then killed everyone in front of him so he could leave with nobody to stop him. He just wanted to get the hell off the planet, and made sure nobody would stop him when he got in the chair didn't think twice when Shaw ran away, he was just ready to get up and GO. He hopped in the ships chair immediately after he presumed all threats to stop him from doing so where dealt with, finally thought to himself he can go wherever, do whatever, create whatever life he wanted with the substances on board the ship, and become a God himself. 1 - He could care less about humans at the point and just wanted to leave and create beings that will worship HIM as the one true God. 2 - Maybe he was going to head to Earth, [i]not for the orders he and his crew where given 2,000 years ago[/i], but for a personal mission to wipe out this advanced race that was never supposed to become this advanced and get them out of the way making him the #1 living organism left in the entire universe. 3 - A combination of both of the above. All hell breaks loose but not for his benefit this time (the previous time being the events that wiped out all the other Engineers, leaving him as the lone survivor), when Prometheus crashes into his ship. 1 - Then he goes to the closest available ship due to breathing issues (he could only hold his breath long enough to reach the escape pod) 2 - He "knew" it was Shaw who shot his ship down and wanted revenge. Either way we all know the "Deacon" outcome. - - - Thanks guys for sparking my imagination again, and I'm sorry if I've duplicated someone else's response, it was not intentional but I just skimmed through the replies and rushed to get these thoughts down!

CUT TO: long lingering approach shot. Ancient Druidic Engineer drops his hessian robe, revealing his naked perfectly-sculpted Michelangelo-inspired body. He steps into a shower and reached for the 'cleansing product' branded BLACK PHOENIX. Undoes the cap and sniffs the open top. Pours the product into his hands and rubs it into his flesh. FADE TO: Engineer relaxing on a colourful deck chair, wearing plastic shades. Engineer's skin is softly transforming into that of the Engineer Pilot. Drinks a pinacolada from a tall glass; exhales, refreshed.