Engineer's motives: why they hate us.

Screenplay of the movie is a disaster as well as his writer. I have a other question, why did they make pictographs in caves on Earth to call us?, what for? There is not any answer, because man who wrote this movie does not know himself, even Blu- Ray edition can not draw any conclusions of this.

It's really very simple, Mateo. Lindelof left plenty of ambiguities in this movie because he wanted to give a certain sector of the audience the opportunity to use their minds, and the sector that requires spoon-feeding the opportunity to hate him personally. He said as much before the movie hit the theatres (listen to his commentary). I'd say he absolutely succeeded on both counts.

The way I see it they share a similar cold relationship to humans as humans have for example David. It can become easily obsolete and easily replaced. What bugs me is why they left us for so long without coming back. With their technology its like us not checking our cctv for 2000 years!

William/89 Engineers do share the same relationship as humans have for androids, except we allowed androids to be better than us, whereas Engineers wanted to keep us in check. The reason they didn't come to earth for 2000 years is because everyone on the Juggernout was killed off. Other ships could've easily been aimed at other planets scheldued for extermination, who knows. Not to mention why stone age men left cave paintings of Engineers pointing to that particular solar system. Either they wanted to warn us about those 'military base' planets or it's a huge plot hole.

Im sorry @Kastiron but the original Space Jockey in Alien has been on that planetoid way longer then 2000 years. In fact Mr. Scott has speculated that the crashed Juggernaut has been there hundreds of thousands of years.

@zzplural › I would have to synchronize my watch with Lindelof. The engineer has been sleeping 2000 years, what humanity did so wrong two thousand years ago? When Jesus was crucified and died? Does the Deacon representing Jesus? That's all in conclusion from this gibberish. Very fitting conclusion. [img]http://s019.radikal.ru/i613/1210/a1/598f32db1b37.jpg[/img] [from Scottt's interview / Empire magazine August 2012]

That does not mean that the downed Juggernaut in Alien was headed towards earth to bomb the planet with alien destruction. If the Engineers did plan that, it wasnt the original Space Jockey who was going to under go that mission. Why do people live to tie in Alien with Prometheous. Everybody wants to be Sherlock Holmes and solve the riddle of the original Space Jockey with there odd theorys and speculations that do not make sense. They live to make what we already know more complicated then it already is. Yes the Engineers did want to bomb earth 2000 years ago. But does that mean it was that one ship that they sent. Come on people if they wanted to bomb earth they would of sent an armada of ships to do it.

@Mateo "Ar one stage" but I think they made the right decision. It was always about curtailing the Roman Empire as well. Now I believe that's the main reason they were mad at us; the Roman Empire who were slaughtering those who stood against the Emperor and the Empire's beliefs. They weren't mad at all humans, just their chaotic leaders and Empires/kingdoms that were spreading their colonies and influence. Treating the other humans poorly. Emperors don't have to step off the throne... thus they rule until they die. Weyland wanted to live and rule forever... The engineers would not have liked that in this view. In the overall story we may see the kingdom themes morphed into Empire themes. And David morphed from the closest thing to a prince into a King, then into an Emperor for a short while. Because even an Emperor has an expiry date and will die or be undone/overthrown eventually-- falling off the throne. In this story some of the kings/Emperors are naked and think they have the best clothes on. Others were naked and accepted their fate.

Will we ever find out the real answer? I don't know. I would bet, though, that any species —not only humans — that tries to dominate a planet will end up being nasty. It seems to me to be a necessary evolutionary trait for making it to the top. Surely the Engineers would know this. Statistically, we're not going to turn out good by chance alone. Perhaps the same is true of a species that tries to dominate a galaxy.

It's right there in that quote Mateo posted. "sent down to try to curtail the Roman Empire. They send an emissary. Emissary then gets killed by the potential enemy and the Roman Empire becomes the enemy. Only the jesus part is pretty much taken out, so we're left with the Romans. It goes on to say the planned destrution of earth was "retaliation for the crucifixion." Retaliation against humanity but mainly for the acts of the Roman Empire who become an enemy. At this point they sought to destroy and re-create us and "upgrade" us possibly to make sure our Empires don't spread into space... or to prevent the advancements and new things the Romans created and re-created from continuing and allowing us to become a threat while united under a chaotic leader who will not give up his rule, like an Emperor or King. Even if the Jesus part is completely taken out we still have the 2000 years ago thing which places us right where this Empire is gaining its early power. The Engineers would have been aware of the actions of this Empire. It doesn't only have to be about jesus, the romans were killing people left right and center and spreading their empire through domination like a virus. Jesus would have been sent down to meet with them but ends up standing up against them. The other Engineers would have already been aware of the romans if they sent an emissary down to deal with them in some way. Again if you take Jesus out this is one of the biggest things happening around that time. And it already would have been a part of the Jesus-Engineer thing. If it had been revealed Jesus was an engineer it still works with the themes because Jesus is described as a king of man-y different things, standing up for people and fighting an Empire...

So, Space Jesus was an ALBINO GOLIATH of a character, standing anywhere from 3m to 5m tall? You'd think that would have been mentioned in The Good Book, "And lo, did Jesus move across the desert with enormous length of thigh and clouds upon his lofty, shimmering brow." Etc...

its fictional, Jesus wasnt really a 7ft tall alien either that or nobody could tell he was alien maybe they just thought he was a bit anemic. i think the Jesus thing ties into the sequal remember Shaw still has faith maybe she'll explain to the engineers that not every human agreed with Jesus' death and the brutality of the roman empire. thats if she makes it to Paradise.

And if the jesus story is the one they go with I wonder how they will explain his resurrection. I have a feeling Shaw may insult the engineers not by just turning up on their home-world but by asking who made them too :D After all her faith remains because she knows something created them too. As for getting to paradise, why do I have a feeling some rescue ship is going to chase after them and perhaps follow them. I cant imagine the movie will only have Shaw and David.

may be they (engineers) are not our creators and some other life form is thats kinda using them (engineers) to fulfill their agenda think about it.

I know why the Engineer was angry! They woke him up and did read the sign on the pod that said "Do Not Disturb!" That's why he was so pissed off and ripped David's head off. I bet David didn't even say good morning would you like coffee with sugar and some bacon sausages and eggs easy done or sunny side up? lol

The Last Engineer is angry,,,because he is the Last Engineer!1!! No more partying with his buddies,,,or Poker nights,,,or dates with lady Engineers,, Heck I would be pissed too..

I just finished reading "Aliens Original Sin” by Michael Jan Friedman and it brought up an interesting explanation/spinoff of the Xenomorph Engineer relationship. Basically it boils down to the fact that the Engineers AKA: Pilots/Space Jockeys/Mala'kak are becoming incapable of reproduction. They know that the Xenomorph species are more than experts on the ways of mass reproduction even in the harshest conditions. So they deliberately create Xenos for bio-engineering reasons. It was said in the book that the Mala'kak do not want to create these Xenos from Mala'kak hosts so they are in need of humans...lots and lots of humans. Because of this, a symbiotic relationship (lol pun) was formed with a group of humans called Earthgov AKA Loki (I find that name curious now after reading interviews with Ridley Scott in which he refers to the Engineers as "Dark Archangels”) From what I gathered, the relationship works like this: The Mala'kak have a number of planets that they claim as their own throughout the universe. They allow Earthgov(Loki) to temporarily harvest these planets for various valuable resources in exchange that Earthgov will eventually let the Mala'kak use the humans as hosts for Xenomorph breeding (unbeknownst to the humans obviously). Then the Mala'kak will “harvest” these herds of Xenos as DNA experiments that would ultimately end in the revitalization of the Mala'kak’s reproductive capabilities. It was also mentioned in the book that the Mala'kak actually tinker with their own DNA in hopes of gaining other benefits of the aliens themselves. Which is also the reason for the slight differences in the Xenos in this particular book. Personally I think this is why the Mala'kak on LV-223 has similar skin to the xenos. This book also explained that the Nostromo was intentionally sent to LV-426 to bring back a xeno, however, Weyland Industries was not the group that discovered the distress beacon (It wasn’t really a distress beacon or a warning, it was a “Hey come get me message”). Weyland Industries was actually notified by Earthgov (Loki) of the existence of a crashed Juggernaut and sent the Nostromo to bring back a Xeno based on that communication. Obviously Earthgov was notified about it from the Mala'kak. So yeah, who knows if this will fit into the whole Prometheus vision that Ridley has but I think it would be pretty damned cool if he did tie certain facts from the novels in the overall lore of Prometheus. Anyhow, I know these spinoff books/novels aren’t "official" or anything, but they still offer very cool insight to the entire Alien/Prometheus Universe. Thanks for reading!

*sigh* This has already been cleared up by Ridley. Jesus was not an Engineer, it was just an idea. The answer is pretty obvious to me, imo. "Sometimes to create, one must first destroy." Remember that quote? We humans were the bridge/host to their next great creation(s), ie xeno's. I do believe we at one point were beloved pets, which explains why they came to visit from time-to-time. You have to check on your flock. But when we got ripe (physically/intellectually peaked) it was time to start the xenomorphysis. The question for me is, why would they choose to eliminate us on the belief that we are starting to disobey or become uncontrollable, only to create xeno’s which are more powerful, less controllable, and more deadly? This wouldn't make sense, so that's why I think they were just ready for the human race to get ripe before they started to use us as xeno hosts. And that human ripeness was about 2000 years ago. This brings me to my next head scratcher: the purpose of the cave drawings. The more I think about it the more I think it was an “We come from this location and will continue to return from this location until it is time for us to make you into something better.” I don’t think it was an invitation because they never intended for humans to become advanced enough to travel the stars. Someone mentioned a theory about the engineers wanting to foster the reproduction DNA strand from the xeno because the Engineer race can no longer reproduce, IE, they're dying. I don't think this is the case either. If it was then they would just focus more into humans because we can reproduce quite well, have identical DNA, and are less volatile in nature compared to the xeno.

"..The question for me is, why would they choose to eliminate us on the belief that we are starting to disobey or become uncontrollable, only to create xeno’s which are more.." I think the first part might be answered by the Engineers' own history,, I have read enough to think that the Engineers actually rebelled,,separated froma Creator race,, Seeing the human development,,sort of reminded them of their own rebelious background, The last part about Xenos,,is a bit hard to explain..in the Bio developemknt field mutant offsping can happen. No planning involved..just the wrong creature of the Engineers,, Xeno's take hold,,can survive extreme weather..and can turn on their creator.

Makor01@; Which interview did you read that?

[i]"Someone mentioned a theory about the engineers wanting to foster the reproduction DNA strand from the xeno because the Engineer race can no longer reproduce, IE, they're dying. I don't think this is the case either. If it was then they would just focus more into humans because we can reproduce quite well, have identical DNA, and are less volatile in nature compared to the xeno."[/i] I was just staring a theory that the author of that book put out there. Also, as I said...they arent doing it for the soul purpose of reproduction...maybe thats how it started but they figured out they can inherit other things from the Xenos.... @ Maeto: http://www.prometheusforum.net/discussion/1575/ridley-scott-engineers-they-are-dark-angels/p1

You hit it right on the head, Kast Iron. Watch the deleted scenes on the collectors' edition DVD and you'll see. They have missing dialogue there between the engineer, David, and Weyland at the end, before he attacks them! Weyland's words are just unbelievable, and they make it so that the engineer can guess them without needing a translation.

"..The answer is pretty obvious to me, imo.." I read just about all the posts on this thread and the above quote must have appeared 4 or 5 times each with different explanation for the events. It is obvious that there is not an obvious explanation as to what is going on. Hoever i would enjoy reading explanations from your point of view. "Why They Hate Us" is a great question. The Engineers hate us because we are different. We travel together. WE talk to each other, even criticize each other. Humans are trying to be constructive/evolving and not destroying. In other words they hate us because we are human and the Engineers/Creators are not.

"So, Space Jesus was an ALBINO GOLIATH of a character, standing anywhere from 3m to 5m tall? You'd think that would have been mentioned in The Good Book, "And lo, did Jesus move across the desert with enormous length of thigh and clouds upon his lofty, shimmering brow." well the idea would maybe be that the 'angel' that told mary she was going to have a child was the engineer and the child (jesus) whilst 'different' would appear human

well anyway if i was asked to work the idea into a storyline thats how id explain it

So the Engineers creasted us and sort oc checked in to see how we are doing. They wanted humans to evolve, develop, learn and become more like their creators. But they didn't want an human to learn enough to want to leave earth? And that is why they wanted to eliminate us? If they didn't want us to be a threat to them then why leave the maps.? I am seeing that maps may have been posted by ancient humans but the thinking that they are are an 'invation' seemed flawed to me. They could be a hundred different explanations for the pictographs. In Biblical terms would we have even gone to LV-223 if Shaw was not have been so motivated? I mean left on our own we can think of a billion different places we could have flown to and not even be a hint of threat to the Engineers and their world. If the engineers did leave the pictographs with perhaps a hint of their world then shame on them for even cracking the door open for humans to fly the Prometheus. If that door was never there then the Prometheus could be exploring real worlds with great potential for storylines. For example Predators!

That's an interesting angle Maxironchin!  

I'm not disagreeing per se but I don't think anyone truly knows what killed of the Neanderthals.  I believe most people of North European origin contain some Neanderthal DNA in them.  As some Asians contain 'Peking man' DNA.

So perhaps we 'bred' them into extinction?  Which isn't so bad! Another theory I have read is that we basically hunted and ate them so . . . who knows! ;)

I get the feeling, in Ridley's world, all life on Earth - not just humans - was created via the black goo.  Were we intended?  Helped to evolve?  Now those are questions I'd love to know the answer to :)