Ultimate Lindeloff is a douchebag ruined Prometheus thread!

I will go first...... The Fifield and Milburn Debacle..  i will not tackle reasons for they wanted to leave after seeing the Ghost Engineers and Dead Bodies as well as Fifield puts it he studies Rocks and Milburn Life... both of them have nothing to contribute towards Giant Dead Alien Bodies and what could have killed them off.... nope they never signed up for that....

But in Lindeloffs Draft Fifield was a Botanist he left because...

"I was hired for this op as a botanist, Doc -- And I don’t see any plants. What I do see is crazy shit running around and giant dead bodies, so I’m going back to the ship."

FIRST UP.... GETTING LOST!

Yes how does Fifield get them lost when he deployed his Pups to Map the Complex thats a bit of a silly way for someone who knows how to Map things to get lost....

I think maybe i have wrong draft here, but another has the reason... hang on... think it was Spaights.... yep.. and it explains that one of them forgot to bring the Map Reading Module with them....  

That explains why they got lost.... David and others did not because we can assume David would remember the way out.

so yeah Guess Lindeloff did not give good reason for getting lost...

2ND HAMMERPEDE PETTING!

Yes Milburn picking up and petting the Hammerpede, was for some a silly scene that a Biologist would not do...

But Lindeloffs draft this time does give better reason...

-----------------------------------------------------

Fifield, meanwhile, is getting something entirely different from his straw... exhales a LUNGFUL OF SMOKE into his helmet -- taps his wrist -- FWAAAASH! -- The smoke VENTS out through the suit’s EXHAUST. Millburn can’t believe his eyes

MILLBURN (CONT’D)What the hell’re you doing?

FIFIELD (isn’t it obvious?)Smoking

MILLBURN You put tobacco into your respirator?

FIFIELD Sure, man. Tobacco

Mllburn looks at him. Fifield grins goofily. Draw your own conclusions. Then

(This could indicate that Fifield was not smoking Tobacco at all).

FIFIELD (CONT’D) Hey.  Don’t move.

Millburn TENSES.  Nervous --

MILLBURN What do you mean “Don’t move?”  What’s --!?!

FIFIELD -- Just calm down.

Fifield crosses over to him, gently reaches behind Millburn’s
head and DAMN -- Carefully removes an AWFULLY BIG CENTIPEDE

MILLBURN JESUS -- Get it off me !

Fifield holds it up -- Christ -- It’s at least TWO FEET LONG.  THICK.  It’s head looks like a HAMMERHEAD SHARK.   The  centipede glistens in the liquid from the MUCK at their feet - - muck from the broken AMPULES

FIFIELD She’s a big one huh?  Must’ve been drinking the soup we’re standing in

MILLBURN  Just get rid of it.

FIFIELD Shhhh. I think she likes you.

Fifield turns the Centipede towards Millburn, LAUGHING --

FIFIELD (CONT’D) C’mon. Give her a kiss

MILLBURN -- Goddammit, put it d--

-- AND JESUS IT HAPPENS FAST. In a SECOND, The centipede SHOOTS onto Millburn’s ARM -- COILS ITSELF AROUND all the way up to His SHOULDER

FIFIELD What the...?

MILLBURN -- OH GOD GET IT OFF!!!

Fifield is suddenly no longer stoned. He reaches forward, digs his hands into the centipede, but --

IT REARS IT’S HEAD -- HISSES LIKE A COBRA! Fifield steps back, FREAKED THE FUCK OUT as Millburn STUMBLES BACKWARDS, CLAWING AT THE CENTIPEDE BUT

--Now’s it’s JAWS UNHINGE LIKE AN ANACONDA -- It’s mouth wraps around Millburn’s HAND AND WRIST as the rest of it’s SEGMENTS abruptly LOCK DOWN AND TIGHTEN

-------------------------------------

This SHOWS that Fifield was Stoned and so acting unrational and we have to bare in mind that the same draft they encounter a few inches long Centipede they pick up and call it "our first Alien"  They also was not in the Ampule Room when the Urns started to leak and so would maybe have no knowledge of how the Black Goo came to be no the floor and thus had no real reason for major concern about it the slick of Black Oil.

I feel that indeed a combination of Spaights Draft showing that they forget the mapping device and the Hammerpede Scene above as well as including the earlier Scene of finding a Smaller Centipede would all have made the Fifield and Milburn shenanigans make more sense....

Shows that another writter or someone to come in and assess Lindeloffs draft and Spaights and merge elements together as in this post would have helped and especially if it was Shot as in a amended draft.. these would have ironed out some of the flaws..

I am meaning to one time, take parts of both drafts and add them and edit them together with a few changes i will make or add, to give what i feel would have presented a much greater overall draft.... when i have time to do so

I have always liked the ideas Lindelof brought to the script/movie. People want a scapegoat, sadly, and he got blamed.

Yes the mapping equipment in Spaihts draft becoming just a no issue in Lindelof's draft is an obvious issue but i wonder why Fifield and Milburn never discusses why they got lost ??

PAGE 41

INT. MAGELLAN, BRIDGE - DUSK Fifield’s voice crackles over the COMM. Lousy connection -- FIFIELD (OVER COMM) ... Do you wanna write it down? JANEK I think I can remember it. 40. (CONTINUED) FIFIELD Good. You just tell them we said -- FU YOU. Janek LAUGHS. At least they’re in good spirits. JANEK Copy that. Keep your heads down, boys. We’ll come get you in the morning. And as Janek KEYS OFF THE COMM, looks over at the HOLOGRAM OF THE PYRAMID, just STARTING TO FORM, WE CUT TO:

I dont see anything about them getting lost or discussing it or talking about mapping equipment ?? They dont actually discuss any of that ??

Dave are you suggesting that it was intoxication from pehaps smoking weed that got them lost?  But Milburn is the map expert here isnt he ?? Why didnt he take the lead or did he just blindly follow Fifield without thinking ??

The only issue I had with F and M was the comic aspect of their characters. The exposition about their actions was excised from the script but still easy enough to grasp. It's all the same thing, just streamlined. The sense of panic could have been ramped up a bit, but that's all I was missing. Sadly, that scene along with many others was diluted by totally spoiling the movie for myself. Had I gone in cold (a virtual impossibility these days) I sure their predicament would have been far more stressful to watch.

Wow, I just spent an hour writting a really detailed post that was eaten by the forum. Oh well.

Basically I can forgive those silly, parts, especially given what you present in the script. What ruins the movie for me is that way the beginning presents this really big idea but then convultes everything by introducing this ambiguous, magic bullet black goo which awkwardly forces itself into every major plot point, inferring everything is connected, and then leaving most of the questions unanswered.

I know the web is full of hypothesis and interpretations, but given how many different readings there are, and how silent everyone invovled in the project has been about clarifiying anything concrete, while we assume these issues will be resolved over two more films, just feels lazy/fishy/bad to me.

And given the way LOST pretended to have a grand plan that never really panned out and ended in the most obvious way everyone expected from the beginning isn't a huge boost in confidence this film/trilogy isn't headed down the same road.

Lindelof hasn't the best writing, it shows in the dialogues or a few facilities. But we must recognize that the theatrical cut was too short, brutal. If Prometheus has lasted 150 min it would have been much more solid and clear to everyone. Everyone is at fault, it is a team effort.
I see no problems for the suites, the ideas don't come from Lindelof but Ridley Scott.

@Grovel

I am a VET at this mega posts... lol i would type it out and always copy all the text, just hit Ctrl A and Ctrl X so your post disapears you know for sure you got it then, you can then paste it into a Word Document or Notepad or what ever first, or not as it would be saved to clipboard.. then you sign back in and paste..

As this site has a auto log out after so long and that means you lose what ever you was typing if you take too long

"And given the way LOST pretended to have a grand plan that never really panned out and ended in the most obvious way everyone expected from the beginning"

I agree to a degree, yes things got a bit messed up i think they never sat back and had a Blue Print on a idea of how all this connected..... Where did the Goo come from, how is it connected to the Xeno, how is it connected to the Urns and the Start of the movie, what was the purpose and how does it connect with the Xeno and how does the Engineers and their Tech connect to the Xeno etc...

If they knew for 100% the answers they wanted to give to those, and then chose to fit the movie around those principles laid in Stone and not tell us the connections but they do know them for themselves... maybe it would have been better.

But it just seems not a lot of thought went into it, or maybe too much, or they have a idea run with it then curveball it and have a "what if this happened" attitude and then end up with none of it actually connect to each other.

Spaights draft was thought out, he knew exactly what he was doing, their is no secret the connections are not as vague at all....

For best results i try to take everything in Prometheus and see if i can use Star Beast and Spaights drafts to then make sense and whe i use those as a Tool and Gigers work and ideas then things kind of make sense... but thats not to say that the sense i make of using them is actually what Fox and Ridley are trying to show because it seems to me they keep changing their minds all the time about what everything is and means..

I can futher explain... but many of my posts would explain it.

Seems a lot of ideas and Props was bassed of ideas for Spaights drafts, that never fitted with the ideas of Lindeloffs and final Shooting script.

Haha, I usually do write out posts in Text Edit, but I already have a lot of them open filled with other ramblings, I overlooked this one.

I decided to rewatch the film the other day and it lead me here to see if anyone had finally nailed down definitive answers. In rewatching the film, going in a second time with very low expectations I wasn't as disappointed (although everything about Shaw being impregnanted makes me cringe). It's such a beautfiul sci-fi movie from an art direction stand point. David could be the best AI character since Hal- Fassbender steals the show. I notice a lot more tension in the expression of Vickers and Janek (Idris Elba's character). The Engineers look amazing. The way Giger's art style influences everything is perfect.

I'll overlook the inconsistency with the black Goo and everything feels better. Just going to pretend the engineers intended to use Xenomorphs to wipe us out, but they got wiped out and wait for the next movie :)

Sorry, I'll stop derailing this thread and go read script before I post again.

Neither is Lindelof a douchebag nor did he ruin Prometheus.

For starters, Lindelof is a much more accomplished writer than Jon Spaihts, whose only writing credit before the first draft of Prometheus was the classic sci-fi masterpiece[/sarcasm] The Darkest Hour.

And then comes the part where viewers unnacustomed to subtly layered scripts in summer blockbusters falter: Lindelof's work manages not only to insert the very DNA of the beloved Alien franchise in the fabric of the action in Prometheus but also offers a consistent illustration of the theme of rebellion against one's creators/parents and its consequences. 

One would think that after all these years people interested in the franchise would already be familiar with Scott's decades long dedication to world building and atmosphere over strict plot mechanics and also the in-depth readings of Lindelof's writing in sites like CHUD and Reflections on Cult Movies and TV Classics.

But no: some of you stick to an infantile grudge stemming from the audacity of the filmmakers of not giving you a rehash of Alien without any room for suggestion and interpretation. Perhaps Prometheus should've been written by a hack like David Koepp or Ehren Kruger and directed by Roland Emmerich or Rob Cohen. It would've been uncontroversial, easily digested and utterly meaningless.

@GustavoHR

The Title of this thread is a misleading one.....  i made it because and not so much on here but on Facebook and other sites a lot of people disliked Prometheus and they also blammed Lindeloff for the movie making little or no sense...  the also blame him for tone down the Xeno elements....

I made this thread to discuss Lindeloff and how did he exactly ruin in some eyes Prometheus...  which i then highlighted that Lindeloff is not in charge of what we get on Screen and that also people should read his draft Paradise and then they would see his draft does not have as many of these plot holes and inconsistancies.  And then if they ask themselves if the movie went to screen EXACTLY AS his Final Draft had then the movie would have been different and less confusing....

His draft had been redone to a Shooting Draft and then its Fox and Ridley who make changes and Ridley who then puts that to Screen and Fox who then decide what to Edit out of it etc.

But Lindeloff has been the Scapegoat and reading some of his comments he has taken the Blame in Part when in reality the BLAME is not his...

Yes parts of the story is not as Spoon Fed or as Coherent as Spaights but its by no means as incoherent and or as ambigious as what was finally shown on Screen.

I did not like Lindeloffs involvement because of how the movie came out and then looking at some similar things to Lost...  but i have not seen the Drafts for Lost and so things that happened on screen could be JJ Abrahams doing to the writting that Lindeloff had done, i dont think JJ made a good job of some elements of Star Treks either.

Here is how i believe and can be wrong.... how the Prometheus Process happened...

2002 Ridley Scott and James Cameron had collaborated on ideas of how to do another Alien movie that would explore who the Space Jockey was...  But in 2004 Fox seemed more interested in persuit of a crossover Alien vs Predator movie instead.

Scott and (especially Cameron) then stopped work on their planned Alien 5 movie as they thought that AVP series would damage the Franchise and Credibility of the Aluen Franchise.

2009 plans got underway for Ridleys idea of a Alien Prequel that would feature and explain the Space Jockey and his Race... Fox would only persue it if Ridley directed the movie himself.  Jon Spaihts was hired to write the script after sitting down withe Ridley Scott to discus ideas for a  Alien prequel, a series of drafts was done by 2010 after earlier ones was done and a movie planned for 2011 but this was put back and futher work had began on the drafts.

A lot of Preproduction work and Concept work was done for the movie based of Spaights draft in April 2010

Ridley was said to be pleased with the Final concept finished June 2010 and ideas and was scheduled to start Production on the movie in the fall and shoot early 2011 but then Fox had changed its mind and wanted to change the draft to make it be less Alieny they hired Lindeloff to re-write the Draft of Spaights and tone down the Xeno connections and concentrate more on the Engineers and their Technology and Agenda.. Ridley thought this was a good idea as the Xeno had been covered a lot and the Space Jockey (Engineers) was something that had never been explored.

Scott and Lindeloff had collaborated on ideas and changing Drafts untill a Final One was aproved by Fox in March 2011 and then shooting  began shortly after.

It is this Process where any changes that appeared on movie from Lindeloffs Drafts was made, and then futher elements was edited or cut and even re-shot latter in which Lindeloff had no say in what happened.

Some of Lindeloffs ideas and changes where much better ideas... on screen they came across as in-coherent however in the draft they was not as such not as much at least...

Not as contradicting and also more detailed.....

Remember the Eye Worm of Holloways? This is a thorn in the side of the movie, it kind of makes little sense..... but then i have kind of made sense of how this could be... but then my explanation then adds a slight contradiction to some ideas i have to explain other elements....  If the Eye Worm Scene never happened it would be one peice of the puzzle out of the way that would make the rest fit more Perfect!

But here is the thing!!!!! Lindeloffs Draft never had the Eye Worm at all!!!

Fox are the ones who made a mess of the movie, they latter released a Weyland File trying to make sense and explain how the Black Goo Worked...  but this file made no sense really and contradicted most of the stuff we saw on Screen....

If we look at Spaights way the Scarabs worked and his explanation to Engineers running off to jump into the Pitt and then Lindeloffs ideas for the Goo and the running away Engineers from his draft and add them together and ignore the EYE WORM Ignore the Fifield Attack as on screen but look at Lindeloffs draft and also Holloways infection as in Lindeloffs draft... and throw out the FOX Weyland Black Goo File.

Then things start to make  a HELL OF A LOT MORE SENSE!

@Grovel

Feel free to check my posts but there are many lol, or PM me with any Questions about the Movie... or start a thread to ask any and we can all answer them...

I have came up with ideas and answers that to me make sense... a few ideas i came down to say a few ideas for the same Question as far as possibilities and i can on any subect give you my INTERPRETATION and also what i think FOX was trying to show us!

So feel free.... the only Question that proves a problem is Engineers END GAME Agenda and 100% Origin of the Xeno but i have ideas for them just this is a difficult one because we dont have the clues fully.... but a trip to Paradise should give these...

"I'll overlook the inconsistency with the black Goo"

No need to!  We just need to ignore the Fox Weyland File and Eye Worm and its not hard to figure out!

I wont go into detail as covered it before.... Goo + Scarabs same thing! lets call it Mutagen A or X lol....  The substance breaks down and infects DNA of the Target that consumes it, molecule by molecule the Target is broken down into molecules of DNA strands infected with a evolutionary accelerant...  this new chemical substance contains the DNA of the Organism that comsumed the Bio-Former Mutagen... it is broken down into a new compound that comprises of the Organisms DNA and a Accelerant.. this new substance then infects any Organism it comes into contact with be that basic life or complex and it rapidly evolves the Organisms DNA to take on the traits of the seeded DNA in the Mutagen while keeping ane evolving the best traits of the DNA of the infected Organism.

The Engineers DNA was broken down via the Bio-Former into a new substance that contained the Evolutionary Accelerant and Engineers DNA that infected and mutated basic Life on a Planet to either kick start the evolution of basic Organisms to Complex or... to create basic Organisms (which is doubtful but i can explain in detail latter).

On LV 223 we see a chemical within the Unrs that seems to pass on Xeno traits or related and not Engineers.... what we have here is a substance that is pretty much the same as the broken down Engineers DNA at the start of the movie.. only this stuff is not released into a Water Fall but collected into the Urns.... and it has Xeno DNA

When looking at the Deacon Mural in Cruciform pose which is to represent Sacrifice and is same pose the Sareficial Engineer had taken at the start of Spaights Draft!  We can see that the stuff in the Unrs are most likely the result of Sacrificing the Organism in the Mural the Deacon.... in the same fasion that the Engineer was Sacrificed at the start!

The Original Shot had the same Sacrificial cup on the Altar in front of the Mural that was used in the Sacrificial Scene at the start of the movie... but was later replaced by a Green Orb that made no sense!

Thats the Nut Shell explanation Grovel but i have a detailed one thats 3X longer lol

I will have to one day make a Prometheus Explained Topic by me! as many sites and videos have tried to but they kinda failed a bit...

Mine is more thorough and detailed and more spot on! but maybe thats blowing my own Trumpet a bit.. and also my Prometheus Explained would most likely be longer than the Prometheus Drafts.. i reckon as a Word or PDF in standard font size your looking at 100 pages at least ;)

@GustavoHR

So very well expressed and I agree completely. It took me quite a while to get to that same point, as I was irritated by elements of the script that has been hashed-out so many times in this forum. But yes, it does not follow the summer blockbuster simplicity or linearity, and that's part of what makes it so great. 

Then 100 pages it is but please do Dave !! 

We both seem to agree that on most of the problem areas but you are much more qualified then me to write it. i just basically tried to bring all the broad stroke together. the basic issues. now refinement is needed and i feel there are people still more qualified like you that needs to do that. i am no writer of any quality but i wanted to Honor Scott and the franchise as no one deliberately makes a bad movie and Scott i believe wouldnt willingly do something substandard . maybe i am too serious but i felt that it needed adressing.

Perhaps it was all just a marketing ploy to get people to revisist the whole franchise.

However as to this thread i totally agree that a lot of late changes when even principal photography was happening came in.

lindeloff therefore cannot be blamed for the prometheus we got.

i still feel if Scott had a big say in any of this why did he spend 8 drafts with Spaights before introducing Lindeloff. that still bothers me and we have it on record that Spaights claims(or at least the author of the article) that Ridley wasnt happy with moving away from the xeno.

I often wonder why people want a scapegoat at all if they dont care at all.

Great thread

Yes Lindelof did mess it up a bit but I feel the main driver was Ridley and at his age its no wonder it all got a little muddled - even the titan that is Ridley must be struggling to keep it all together these days. And that was one of Ridleys mistakes he should leave the story telling to someone else as such and do what he did in Alien just provide the stage as such if you know what I mean. Lindelofs work has always been blindingly obvious in its attempts to be vague yet has magnificent meaning...honest it does govnor type stuff like a modern painting painted all white one side arguing it has tremendous meaning and artistry and the other side with brains saying no its a load of bull you've been had :D ! Lindelof might have been trying to do the right thing even but I feel it got pulled in different directions by Ridley who had not thought this world through one bit you can hear this in the directors commentary on the blu ray! People would of loved it if it were pretty much the exact same film just without all the mistakes!!!

Ha ha I think Ridley is doing just fine.

Alright, so, page one of Lindlfs draft:

A blinding white light (a cliche even before Close Encounters). The horseshoe shadow. The gang plank (because a Juggernaut sure would have a gang plank) hitting the water with a THWASH! The mysterious, predictably robed figures. Ugh.

But Spaight's vision of this scene is no less hokey. All those drafts, but Ridley, who many vilify for his role in the story of Prometheus, took all that bland material and honed it into a breathtaking, otherworldly dreamscape, a cloudy nightmare at once beautiful and brutal and utterly alien.

You feel that the air is untainted and cool and sweet in a way no modern human will ever know. The horseshoe becomes a saucer/seed vast and eerie and sliding restlessly on a cushion of God knows what energy before becoming erect and sauntering into the clouds. All this, while the Engineer, who is inexplicably and elegantly framed a mile or so away from the saucer without a gang plank in sight, opens a dish of something no sane person would ever swallow and does just that, and dissolves. No scarabs, no frog hand emerging from the water, none of that crap, just a huge, horrifyingly surreal moment saturated with subtext. Only Ridley could have pulled that off with such style and grace. I could go on similarly about the rest of the movie as well.

Having said all that, I think Lindelof did a great job streamlining and retooling Spaights' story into something at once classic and new. While the writing itself is silly, the ideas are solid. But I really want to come out swinging for Ridley, here. People need to remember that Spaights' story would have been similarly re-imagined. I'd rather have Ridleys movie than all the scripts put together.

I think it's common to trash the work of world class artists from the anonymity and safety of one's keyboard, and certainly with little or no achievement of ones own to point to. If Ridley is getting more eccentric in his dotage (and that's a big if, it's short sighted to assume age equals incompetence), so what? Like other great artists, his work becomes more fascinating, and science fiction is the perfect format for this to be expressed in. Bring it! I'd rather have a daring, artful, surreal blockbuster than what we usually get. I'm just thankful they get made at all.

About Holloway's eye worm: is it possible he didn't impregnate Shaw, but simply ejaculated one of those things into her?

And maybe they removed the Sacrificial Bowl from the pyramid scene because it was resolved that those particular Engineers wouldn't have one? The green thing is confusing, but that's probably the point. They could have left it out, a lot of other things were cut, so it's possible there is actual meaning behind it. Whatever, in the spirit of the original Alien there's much we aren't meant to know, that's what makes it mysterious and otherworldly, which is the whole idea.

I would expect more of the same in the sequel, if Ridley has anything to say about it. With luck, it will be another gorgeous, creepy, cerebral blockbuster. How many of those are there?

End of the day.... we dont know the full process of how the movie was made.... seems Lindeloff cant be blammed, while his draft had a bit of goofy characters, some lines in the movie never came from his draft.... so maybe not all the cheesy parts are to be blamed on him.

We dont know the Process as the Final Movie does have a lot of changes from even Lindeloffs draft the movie has many elements from his Final Draft but add some elements from Spaights and yet it has other elements from neither unless they used some previous ideas from Lindeloffs earlier drafts?

Ridley is the one who then checks what to keep and shoot and change, he is responsible for putting the movie to Screen... but we need to remember the biggest player is FOX

They could want Prometheus 2 to show us the Engineers and Goo are created by..... PREDATORS!

If Ridley disagrees with this, but its what FOX wants to show and do, then Ridley either has to play Ball... or they would find someone else... If Ridley does not want Xenos and Explanations.... but Fox wants Xenos and Predator Gods then ultimately its what Fox wants  that we get.....  i think they would work with what Ridley wants but ultimately its FOX who own the Franchise and its up to them what they want to show or not show and how they want to proceed with things..

And so it could be them who had the biggest effect on what we ended up for the first movie.

About Holloway's eye worm: is it possible he didn't impregnate Shaw, but simply ejaculated one of those things into her?

There is not a single mention or link to the Eye Worm in any of the drafts that i have seen, i have only seen 3 mind... so who knows... It was something that made things a bit complicated...

But then i have a explantion....... Spaights draft = Nano Scarabs.. Lindeloffs a Black Goo... why not that the movie shows us Nano Worm/Organism that acts as Spaights draft but it looks like a Goo because of how small it is.... if you look at Sperm under the Microscope its like tiny Tadpoles..... now if you look at average amount of Sperm in a Cup it looks like a Sticky near clear but cloudy Goo.....

The Mural showed what looked like Worm things in the background the same is with Gigers Alien unused Mural...   So we cant rule out that the Goo is just microscopic Wormy like Organisms.. one which came into contact with Shaws Egg and other that grew large and came out of Holloways Eye....

Here is a interesting concept from Prometheus..

We see tiny Worms similar to the Eye Worm...

Looking at this shot it appears the Concept Prop could be Holloway which could support the Worm Theory i guess?

"And maybe they removed the Sacrificial Bowl from the pyramid scene because it was resolved that those particular Engineers wouldn't have one"

This is just a post production change that i just cant understand.... the Original Shot was the Sacrificial Bowl and its this shot that allows things to make sense and also fit in with Spaights and Lindeloffs drafts... The change to the Crystall i dont think fits in or makes sense and confuses things but so does some of the other changes Fox made, including releasing the File to explain the Goo.

I think a lot was not thought through with the Movie.... i think that they started work on Props for Spaights drafts and ideas from his draft.... then when that was worked on but his draft dropped they then went with Lindeloffs but used Props that fitted with Spaights draft.

For example..... Lindeloffs drafts i have read two... only seems to be one to get online now, none of them explain or show us the Pile of Engineer Bodies....  they only describe the One and other draft there is this one and more behind it but never a seen of Bodies pilled up infront of the Door.... nope that Scene is taken from Spaights draft.

So if ideas of Spaights draft for those Boddies are then as the Props may had been worked on, and placed in the movie to then try fit in with Lindeloffs work could cause some confusion...

Another thing is....... The Deacon Mural as far as i can remember... Spaights and Lindeloff never even explained anything like this in their drafts they only described the Frescos vaguely.

So again the Mural could had been a Easter Egg but one in plain sight that takes up a lot of one of the movies biggest Money Shots... a nod towards Xeno DNA in that Temple and a nod to something similar to the Deacon at the End...

But maybe as it never appeared in any drafts as far as i am aware, so its just a Giger peice of Artwork that was added as Easter Egg? who knows but does this fit in with what Lindeloff or Spaighst ideas where.... so we thus get another Clue we use for Clues that may actually not had been connected at first!

Another Example Chest Busted Cryo Pods of the Engineers.... and we could be led that Chest Busted Organisms chassed down the Engineers and atacked them... hense Hollogram Scene of about a dozen running away from something...... then the piled up bodies...

Yet if work comenced on these to fit with Spaights draft then its even more easy to fit in as in Spaights draft every Engineer is infected it is just the Last Engineer had got into Cryo Sleep before the Chest Buster could develop to a level to be a threat....

Once he is awoken the process is then speeded up as the Engineer is not in a Hypersleep Freeze... this Engineer curses the Humans and David and says they have caused his death by waking him up he would now see his infection take its Toll....

Ridley hasn't made a great film since matchstick men :p ... But I'm still a massive fan I'll be at the premier of Martian with all things crossed! 

Lol just came across this (old one but a good one) I must admit I'm not as harsh as these guys but they speak allot of truth (and a few mistakes but I guess this was after one viewing and they didn't want to watch it after a few minutes) : 

I wonder if one day lindelof might say ha ha I did actually mess up the script on purpose I was having a big row with Ridley and or fox at the time...would be so funny!

Although I'm still rooting for the sucker punch move ... part 2 explaining why evening and everyone was so dumb...mind control!

@djamelameziane

I respect your opinion and each to their own, some on here will not agree however but hey that does not make your views invalid at all ;)  I think Ridley has made some ok movies and i have not watched them all because certain movies have not been my kind of type of movie...... but he has made some that are actually quite good, but i agree he has not made many great movies but thats my opinion... but i dont think Prometheus was bad....  the more you study it and more you watch it the more it grows on you.  A lot like the 1982 The Thing.

As far as Lindeloff goes he has taken the can for the movie and script, he has been the Scapegoat and he has accepted and taken the blame but he also does not really care what people think.

But if you read Lindeloffs Draft well the only one i can find anymore which is in the Original Post, then iif you read this and imagine this being put to Screen exactly as it was in the Script...

You will see some of the stuff was not as messed up... for One as i put in my first reply it shows that Fifield was stonned and he picked up the Hammerpede and pointed it towards Milburn and then it attacked Milburn, so it was not as a silly case as we saw in the Movie...

Also the video above i dont think they have studied the movie as much as many, and they are nit picking and the way they pulled this movie apart they would find faults with Star Wars... or any other movie... i think they basically are disapointed they never had a Porn Corn Movie like Alien Resurection or the Alien vs Predators, and also disapointed the movie did not explain how why and when these Engineers came into contact with the Xenos...

I could pick apart their failure to understand some elements more than they have picked at them...

For one i will pick out the disapointment for OLD MAN WEYLAND... what these guys fail to realise is that Pearce was not picked for just being a Old Man, i mean who is gonna pick a Younger Guy to play a Old Man in a movie... (OK Bad Grandpa lol)

They fail to see that the movies draft had a Scene of Weyland being Younger, this Scene was going to be shot, they even spent a lot of money on a Set... now did they shoot it or not? We cant be sure..... but they did schedule to shoot a Weylands Dream Scene and so it would been better to cast a Younger Actor then apply OLD MAN MAKEUP Than try and and make a casted old actor look younger or cast a additonal Actor to play a younger Weyland..

That is why we had Guy Pearce, Ridley liked his Acting Skills and Accent and thought he was ideal for the role and he was signed up and contracted and shooting began and the movie was due to have Younger Weyland Dream Scene, but it was to be shot latter, so they shot scenes of Old Man Weyland with the intention of latter shooting and using the Dream Scene but for some reason this Scene never happened, it was either not Shot or was but not used...

Was they then through shooting of the movie and after Pearce had studdied the Script, to then say oh last minute we are not shooting the younger Scene and sorry we now dont need you and then look for another older Actor?

And i dont think the Old Man Weyland was as bad as some make out!

Interesint stuff although much of what is said here has been said previously with the possible exception of one very vocal defense of Lindelof and his wriiting style.  @BigDave and I (and other 'regulars') have frequently covered this territory but I'll add something that perhaps hasn't been articulated clearly here. 

When it was announced that Ridley would revisit the Alien franchise that he began, many of us were thrilled that we would finally learn the backstory regarding the "space jockey" - you know, the 15 foot tall guy sitting in the chair on LV-426 with his chest bones protruding and his spinal column appearing on the front of his body instead of his back?  Yeah, that one.

What we received however wasn't his backstory but a grand vision of how sentient life began on some planet - maybe Earth, maybe not.  And later we discover that cave paintings all over the world show the same thing - a big guy pointing to something on the wall or ceiling that our heroes decide must be a star system unknown to the locals when the drawings were made.  Does this shed any light on the space jockey above?  No but Ridley et al attempt to address this by developing a story whereby shorter and prettier versions of the space jockey are developing a biological weapon on a moon in the same system.  Does this add anything significant to the original story?  Of course not - and Ridley tells us subsequently that Prometheus was never really about the space jockey anyway.

What we see is a mashup of multiple writing styles and stories, some of which are coherent and some that simply miss the point.  But you can't fault the visual design which remains impressive years later.

"But you can't fault the visual design which remains impressive years later."

some interesting comments and i will touch up on them now, but first the above... and i think its relevent to your post..  There is a flaw with  the Visuals and that is our as you put it Smaller more Pretty Space Jockeys.

The intention was 15ft, Spaights draft they was 15ft Lindeloffs they was 12ft and finally they decided to make them supposed to be 10ft tall, when surely they would know we would notice the size difference? ahh but the Space Jockey Grew out of his Chair, as if he was some Giant Space Tampon lol That would fix that!

What happened was they failed to present to us a sense of Scale to fool us about a 10ft race of Engineers.... this is not the first time this happened, in Alien our Space Jockey was supposed to be 26ft tall and to achieve that Scale Ridley cast Child Actors as the crew walk upto the Space Jockey and Enter the Pilot Room... this shot shows us how magnificent and huge the Space Jockey was..... but the next shot as the Crew Climb up to take a closer look we clearly see the Space Jockey Magically Shrinks.. and we can see it is about 15ft mark on a  16-17ft Pilot Chair which was the Props size.

So its a case of ok we messed that up, and are left with a 15ft Space Jockey so lets make a sequel to explore the Space Jockey and his Race... which Spaights draft did, it was hinting at maybe the Chest Buster Scene at the end could have been the same crashed ship as in Alien. But then it may had been another.

They re-wrote the draft to take it away from the Xenos and the event on LV 426 but to explore the Space Jockey Engineer Race who were to be 15ft tall Bald White as Snow Humanoids who wear Bio-Mechanical Space Suits that is what the Space Jockeys wore.

But on Screen we got to see a supposed toned down 10ft brothers of the Space Jockey Race, who ended up only looking 8ft tops.... if they had used the same Camera Trickery and Effects as The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit they could have pulled off this Illusion.

So while they are not telling The Actual Space Jockeys Story they are trying to explore and evolve the Story Behind which Race of beings does this Space Jockey come from, where does he come from.. what was his Ship and Cargo....  The movie draft by Spaights basically covered that subject by showing us they was Bald 15 foot Humanoid Engineers who played a part in our creation and also experiemented on a whole manner of Organisms related to the Xeno to create 8 different kinds on LV 426

Lindeloff changed Location to LV 223 as a Outpost tonned down Xeno like Organisms running around but still gave us clues to the connection between the Juggernaught and Derelict being similar and having the same purpose and that LV 223 these Engineers carried out Experiments related to the Xeno on LV 426 Genetically but they just never exactly told us HOW and WHEN as far as the Xeno on LV 426 as far as creation and connection with the Engineers and its Origins.

I dont think we would ever ever see the Space Jockey Story... but we would get clues i would imagine to pretty much allow us to get the Answer without having to see a flash back of his event.

FOR THE RECORD...

Ridley did cover his Story in interviews and that is that he is related to our Engineers, the event of LV 426 and LV 223 are related in some connection, the Space Jockey had left from a undisclosed Location with his Cargo and became infected with his said Cargo and knowing he and his ship was Comprimised he set down a course to the nearest baron place where he could Quarantine his Ship and Cargo and set off a Warning Beacon to Warn his Fellow Space Jockey (Engineer) Race... he was attempting to Land his Ship when in the final stages he then became Chest Busted.

This event happened within a few hundred years of the Outbreak on LV 223 that caused most of the Engineers to die out..... so thats 1800-2200 years ago give or take a bit.

Ridley had in other comments although vague seem to after Prometheus give some clues and suggest the Space Jockeys Cargo had Evolved and got to the Space Jockey  and then hinted about LV 223 connection... so he was either leaving LV 223 or heading towards it...

This last peice of information has made things a little more confusing... and well kind of impossible which i will explain in a Ultimate Space Jockey Story Thread....  But i have a explantation that i think could very well fit in with what happened....  But its one that could place the Two Ghost Engineer Scenes as being at different times but then they looked relaxed...... Lindeloffs draft has more detail on the 2nd Ghost Engineer Scene that adds some Panic However... but i guess we can only take what we see on Screen as Canon.

They (Fox) wanted to step away from a Xeno fest movie, and try something else... that would link Xeno DNA but concentrate on our Space Jockey (Engineers) but as far as their Race in general and their Agenda and Purpose and connection to Bio-Weapon Organisms and Experiments with their Bio-Weapon Cargo Ships the Juggernaught/Derelict rather than cover the story of the Space Jockey and his Cargo which happened thousands of years ago well so we was first told and how it also looked, but do they make a movie thats set thousands of years ago... and how would Humans play a part..

Well they in Spaights draft tried to link the Space Jockey event within the timeframe of just before Alien i.e late 22nd century i,e 2100 or abouts. But then thats not to say that the crashed Juggernaught in Spaights draft was the one in Alien as another could have crashed thousands of years before.. but as Ridley hinted the Sacrifical Scene did not have to be Earth.... the movie was set up to show us it was.. and likewise Spaights draft was set up to show us the Derelict event was a result of the end of his Alien Engineers movie...