Origin of the Space Jockey suits

Interesting take. I've wondered about the sj suits that appear in the hallway before the Control Room but can't quite figure out if they are in fact suits or perhaps statues. But the fact that the remaining engineer gets into the chair dispels the notion that there may be two distinctly separate races of engineers. Or have I totally lost whats left of my mind?

the space jockey we meet in the film has been in stasis for atleast 2000 yrs so the SJ suits we encounter in the other alien movies are an advancement of that suit. the suit is made of an organic substance that molds into their skin but what it is made of or how it is applied to the body is beyond me.

I have always been one that stresses that the Space Jockey in Alien, and the Engineer in Prometheous are two distinct races. In saying that I think that the elephantine Space Jockey in Alien is not wearing a suit at all. It is his skin that makes up the outer part of his body. In other words the Space Jockey is not wearing a suit. It is his skin that we see. Now the what the Engineers wear in my opinion are suits that after time become part of the skin. The suit attaches itself to the skin and becomes one with it.

Katiel238, why do you think the ship on LV-223 is more advanced than the one we see on LV-426? Isn't it also possible that the juggernaut in Alien escaped LV-426 when something went wrong on LV-223, only to crash on LV-426. Somehow I'm having a hard time believing that there also is an intelligent race that looks like the elephantine creature in Alien. I watched the blu-ray bonusmaterials disc this last weekend. Within the ten first minutes of it Ridley states that he "wonders why no-one ever wondered about the elephantine creature that the crew of Nostromo found on the juggernaut" and that "that wasn't an alien, that was a suit". This is why I strongly believe that IF there is an alien life-form that looks like the Space Jockey suit, it's far more possible it's a cow or some sort of other big barnyard animal.

OldGuy, yes the SJs in the hallway are something I've wondered about too. My opinion is that they are suits. Maybe even the suits that the dead engineers would have worn?

Rubirosa, Yes, you're going to have to let this one go. Ridley also mentions that he thinks it was a clever idea that the original SJ was a humanoid in a suit (or words to that effect).

Ridley has even way before Prometheus said the Space Jockey was a suit, only Prometheus revealed that the occupant was more Human looking. He has since said that the Space Jockey was a brother to the Engineers in Prometheus and about within 200 years of the fall of LV 223 2000 years ago that Space Jockey was carrying a Bio Weapon Cargo to a undisclosed location but one of the Cargo had been compromised and got to the Pilot and he thus had to set a course to the nearest baron place to Quarantine the Cargo and set off a Warning. Of course that leaves Ridley having to explain the size of this Space Jockey that was claimed to be 26ft tall but then the ones in Prometheus are claimed to be 9ft and we actually see the Space Jockey was actually 15ft tall and the Engineers 8ft tops. This inconsistency has to be addressed in future as while Ridley can pull the "oh they are the same race card" how he is going to explain a at least 75% size difference? But what Ridley says means nothing if its not shown in the movie, which means he can by all means go back and redesign the Engineers and explain that some are larger or that indeed the Space Jockey was not the same as the Engineers. The way i would explain it would be like,.... well we share DNA with them and descended from their genes. so while we can have our Danny Devitos and Ian whytes why cant the Engineers vary from 8-15ft tall just as a person can from 4-8ft etc.

Oh back to the suits... Well in the opening scene we see the Engineers have no Bio Mech, no Suits no Bio Mech looking ships..... This scene could be many many Millions or even near a Billion years ago..... Alien and Aliens is set well in the future and Prometheus the downfall of LV 223 was about 2000 years ago, the first clues to the outpost left for us 35'000 years ago. Ridley said the Tech behind the Juggernaught was Millions or years old, whats that... 2M, 5M, 50M 100M? Thats a longer than after basic life on Earth started to evolve into complex life. So who is to say that some Engineers had came across something that they then used to create the Bio Mech, maybe the Xeno is a Organism that they re-engineered not only the genetics but also how these creatures build their nests etc.... Or maybe some other way they came across a Bio Mech, and the Xeno was a creation maybe on accident from that Bio Mech. I think that from a constructive point of view the Space Jockey Suits and Xenos have some kind of relation and how the Derelicts are built also as some connection to well the process of materials the Xeno uses to create nests and cocoons etc. There has to be some connection... Either one was created from the other, or something else created the both?

...so, easily put, you more or less agree with me? :D

To answer your question, Throcken, breeding creatures so that one can use their skins sounds too primitive to me. I imagine that certain Engineers are born with skin like that, have some means of transforming their own skin, or have an advanced bio-material that can mesh with their own tissues. But herding creatures and harvesting their exoskeletons? It doesn't work, for me.