Pressure Suit design flaw?

You can only get into a cryo chamber after having removed a pressure suit. Is that a design flaw too? There is an airlock between the map room and the rest of the ship. It is, apparently, able to perform its intended function.

Flawed according to what happened in the script? It is very unclear; or not at all obvious, what the Engineers design specifications are regarding ANY of their constructed structures, mechanisms or vehicles- or even their bio-suits. They aren't like anything HUMAN on Earth. We have yet to see how the Engineers actually inter-act with a given environment, and don't (yet) know what drives their development of whatever technology. David (unlike any other crew member) was privy to their language etc, and could figure out how to operate doors and all the other devices he encountered. But did he know anything about how or why this technology "evolved"? All things considered, my take on this bio-suit/chair combination is that it is limited in it's function, and it's application is for one designed purpose. As noted above, It didn't seem to be constructed with the ability to keep it's occupant in stasis, or delay/prevent a terminal health condition's progression. Evidently, these situations weren't considered. Or, there wasn't enough forethought. Perhaps the chair/suit was existing technology that was later applied in a new direction. An example would be: Aircraft cockpits have chairs (seats) that provide easy access to control inputs and other less urgent switches. This was true in the first airplanes. Now we have space ships with cockpits set up the same way, even though most of the flight is often almost completely automated. Would Boeing; when contracted to construct a spacecraft destined to operate in a possibly hostile or toxic environment, design a whole new cockpit? Perhaps they would. But what would happen to the operator if/when some unforeseen circumstance took place? Therefore, the chair/suit didn't do very well for the Space Jockey in the original Alien. The implanted xenomorph was able to grow and bust out of the occupant of this chair/suit. On a related topic, it is noted several times elsewhere that the construction of the Engineer vessels seems to be visually the same as those areas taken over by the xenomorph and used as nests. Since this is part of the story, it suggests that the xenomorph and engineer species are related at some biological level- such as our friend the rat only dwelling within human populations. They (rats) cannot exist without human undergrounds as support. So, what I'm saying here is: The Xenomorph and Engineer evolved or were both created IN the same biological environment & WITH many of the same biologically evolved traits/strengths/characteristics. Therefore, the xenomorph's BIOLOGY can easily contaminate the Engineer's TECHNOLOGY. A "flaw" that the Engineers perhaps weren't able to correct, or didn't properly prepare for when they initiated the creation of the Xenomorph- if that's what they did.

ZZ, and others, do you remember this image from pre-prod? [img]http://www.prometheus-movie.com/media/concept_116.jpg[/img] it's labelled UNUSED but could explain initial appearance of biosuited runners in green holovision corridor. OR... these extra 'cryotubers' could have been 'somehow' co-pilots in an early design version. But this still doesn't expain the Pressure Suits, ya know, if these Elephant Chairs were also built in-situ like the Space Jockey navigator chair? Questions; answers?

I'm confused, I thought the movie was perfect...

patch, you could be right...

Regarding the trunk, it did extend when he was in the chair.

I don't believe there is any flaw with their suits. We don't even know how they function... But they look cool.

The shortened trunk bothers me too. This "flaw" is hard to accept since we all know Ridley is a detail-obssessed artisan. Unless, the whole design aesthetics is just that: it serves to give the audience a sense of the "alien-ness" of the culture and technology. It is not something we have to obsess over and rationalize. Having said that, there could be another reason for this discrepancy in design between ALIEN & PROMETHEUS "suits." The giant carcass in ALIEN does not belong to the Engineer's race. They are 2 separate races. The Engineers adopts their technology, their likeness, adapt it to their own liking. The pressure suits in front of the pilot/map room are not suits, they could be statues in honor of Elephantine race whose technology & knowledge ( genetic engineering) they steal just like the myth of Prometheus. There is also a possibility that the 2 races are involved in genetic mixing that a poster called Malakak mentions as part of Atlantean references in the story. The Atlanteans are known to conduct genetic experiments that give rise to the creation of humans, after a series of genetic monstrosities you heard about in myths, monsters, chimera etc.

One of the main arguments it seems most have between the difference in the suits seen in Alien and Prometheus is that of the size of the Engineer. Which has led some, such as Solaris above, to believe that there may be more than one race or that the Elders are larger in size that standard run-of-the-mill Engineers. The problem with this argument comes from the scene in Alien when Dallas, Kane and Lambert meet the dead Engineer... In the wide shots Ridley scott used his own children in scaled down versions of the crews spacesuits, giving the impression that the dead Engineer was between 12-15 feet tall, as seen here... [img]http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-G96PgPdG-gY/TlRgZ2t8R1I/AAAAAAAABLY/lvpC9KLDyA4/s1600/space-jockey-alien-1_1199392713.jpg[/img] Yet, mere seconds later we actually see Dallas stand next the dead Engineer, and as a result the impression of the Engineers size differs to between 8-10 feet, as seen here... [img][IMG]http://i888.photobucket.com/albums/ac89/snorkelbottom/sizecomparisonALIEN.jpg[/IMG][/img] The last image shows scale wise a dead Engineer closer in size to what we actually see in Prometheus. And when you take into account that Alien was Ridley Scotts second ever movie, and that he only used his children in suits to make the scale of the scene appear bigger on the silver screen, and the glaring contradiction in scale shown between the two shots, I think we can put down the use of his children in the wide shot as a nicely intended but ultimately ill thought through movie mistake.

Hey Folks, I found these cool pictures in AVP [img]http://i1157.photobucket.com/albums/p589/jokerdeldesierto/img13.jpg[/img] [img]http://i1157.photobucket.com/albums/p589/jokerdeldesierto/img23.jpg[/img] [img]http://i1157.photobucket.com/albums/p589/jokerdeldesierto/img22.jpg[/img] [img]http://i1157.photobucket.com/albums/p589/jokerdeldesierto/page20-1007-full.jpg[/img]

and the Bane style suit :p [img]http://i1157.photobucket.com/albums/p589/jokerdeldesierto/c002.png[/img] [img]http://i1157.photobucket.com/albums/p589/jokerdeldesierto/c001.png[/img]

I was wondering about this myself, regarding the size difference. When I look at the Engineer in the Suit, I was immediately struck with our own tribal cultures, in how we would (and to some extent still do) dress up, often imitating gods, beasts, what have you. Perhaps the reason for the design of the suit, that the SJs are bigger, and have the 'trunk' as a physical characteristic?

There's still something to the engineers being melded with their suits for me. Especially in the neck and arms

Just as Snorky said... I have covered this over and over and over. A major difference....... Directing Error by Ridley Scott. Ok lets look at the actual Props... The Space Jockey in Alien actual size (cant see Legs) but it appears to be about 12ft Tall. The Space Jockey Props in Prometheus and thats the ones hanging on the Walls, and thus the last image Mapusoul posted are about 10ft Tall. Now the Concept work showed the Engineers to be about 9-10ft tall, some concept works differ was some appeared near 12ft tall. Ridley Scot F-UP 1... Alien As Snorky said he used Children to play the Crew walking up to the Chair and this created the illusion that the Space Jockey was about 15ft tall. Ridley Scot F-UP 2... Prometheus He made a few errors in judgement by using actors with the Engineer Actor, and especially the Shaw Scenes. Noomi Rapace is only small about 5ft 3" Ian Whyte is about 7ft 2-3" in booster boots he would be about 7ft5"-7ft6" Ridley may have thought that having Small Shaw vs Engineer would give a illusion of his size.... but then we can work out his size especially in the scene he enters the Door as we see Vickers and Holloway in the movie next to same kind of corridors and using certain points on the wall and we can work out the height etc. Using this and Shaws Height we could work out the Engineer in that scene was 7.5ft Tall and a lot smaller than the Dead Engineer. The Ghost Engineer compared to David was about 8ft tall.... I think in hindsight Ridley should have done the LOTR Trick where he played actors who stood 5ft5" to 5ft8" to play as Hobits but make them appear smaller due to Special Effects Camera Trickery as they are in up coming Hobbits. This would then show the Engineers on screen as about 9-10ft tall and not lets say 8ft tops. So when i look at the Engineers in Prometheus compared to size of Chair and assuming Chair is same 16ft one as it was in Alien then when he suits up and stands near the chair the Engineer appears to be 8.5-9ft tall. So taking all into account the Engineers when suits and not would seem to vary from 8ft-12ft Tall. The aim for Prometheus was a Race of 9-10ft Tall Humanoids. But Humans are not all about 6ft Tall, we vary from 5ft-6.5ft on Average the Average Human would be about 5ft9", so if we say the Engineers as depicted in the movies range from 7.5ft (Smallest they appear to Humans Shaw vs Bob scene) to 15ft (the largest in Nostromo Crew approaching the Pilot Chair). That is a average of 11ft 3" but if we ignore the Shaw Scene and Children Actors in Alien then we get 8-12ft which is a average of 10ft. Bottom line i would assume the Engineer race average is 10ft tall Suited. Which is bang on with the Dead Engineer body and the Space Jockey Suits on the Wall. Also the Elders appear smaller... unless they are the same height as the Engineer in Prometheus which would make the Sacrificial Engineer taller. So all in all Engineers i assume range from 8 to 12ft tall.

Big Dave, some 'gut instinct' tells me that THE ELDER ENGINEERS are even taller than the ENGINEER PILOTS. Ya know?

[img]http://i.imgur.com/FVS75.jpg[/img] The above shows the Elders and the Sacrificial Engineer, the Elder looks smaller. Maybe the Engineers vary in size like we do? Or maybe the Elders are the same size as the Engineer on LV 223 and thus this would mean the Sacrificial Engineer is taller and maybe similar to the one on LV 426?

I think when it comes to their Pressure Suits do indeed fuse with the wearer and perhaps operates under a persons special biometrics. In other words it only works with someones own DNA and that it has some kind of way of linking it not by connecting molecularly. Instead linking it up on a cellular level using small nanotechnology. So I think you cant wear the 'Elephant Suit' unless you wear the Pressure Suit. They are very very highly advanced Extra Terrestrials with unkown amounts of knowledge. Im happy they have that awesome ET look and it makes them look spooky and frightening for me because of the ancient mysteries they convey just by glancing they're powerful.