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You're absolutely right. It's no coincidence they've chosen to repeat this trend of naming the film's primary vessel after a greater, underlying message. I've been researching more about the Ark of the Covenant to see what correlations I can make between it and an Alien movie.

As far as I'm concerned, it has to do with the crew, since it's their ship. So the Covenant and whatever it holds is either discovered or being transported by them and not the Engineers, I would assume.

You make a good point it is no coincidence at all. 

The legend of Prometheus ran through many elements of the story. 

The Engineers on LV223. 

Peter Weyland.

Charlie Holloway

All incautiously pushing the boundaries and unleashing terrible retribution on them.

Covenant

Can be a multitude of options but their are some pointers. 

The planet is Paradise Lost through the breaking of a Covenant. The misuse of primordial overwhelming power to create.

Weyland -Yutani begin with their self proclaimed Covenant to build better worlds when they have much more nefarious objectives in mind which they cannot ultimately control.

David may break a Covenant with Shaw and exploit the failed ideals of both the Engineers and Weyland Yutani.  

Yes i think its more than a Namesake.. i would think it would have to fit into the movie somehow in at least one way... maybe more.. most likely actually ;)

I covered the Covenant as far as connection with the Ark, because of the Cherubs on the Alien Covenant Badge in the news post about that imagine...  i did so in more detail but what i could draw from this is

*Symbolism of Protection by some Hierarchy under God, and so in terms of Prometheus/Alien maybe to show that the World is connected to the Engineers as far as the Place they came from or creation came from.   Due to the connections with the Bible and Cherubs are as Guardians of Tree of Life, Garden of Eden, Paradise and Gods Throne.

So it could imply the world protected by the Cherubs is Paradise.... but it could mean some other place or mission of importance...  thats Protected but not by Engineers etc.

*Symbolism of Something the Ship is carrying, or its crews mission that is about some Technology or Knowledge that has great power. That is connected to the Engineers/God.   Based on the Arks Purpose to contain the Commandments of God, and Rod of Aaron.

In context with Alien/Prometheus it could be some Knowledge or Technology of the Engineers.

Then if we look at Covenant in terms of its meaning which is some kind of Pact, Deal, Agreement... usually a deal between God and his Chosen and sometimes in regards to refrain from something.

Noahs Covenant, Mosses Covenant and New Covenant with Jesus Christ.

Which in context to Alien/Prometheus could mean some Agreement, Deal between either Engineers/Hierarchy and themselves...  Engineers/Hierarchy and Mankind.  Engineers/Hierarchy and David and/or Shaw.

By Hierarchy beings above or below the Engineers.

But then it could also be about as Michelle Johnston put.

*Weyland-Yutani..... in regards to maybe what ever deal was made that led to a Merger... so yes this is one thing i admit i overlooked Michelle  and so exceptional point.

*David and Shaw....they would have had to have some agreement, David would have had to agree to Shaws Terms in order for him to be put back together or at least helped in a way that David could manage, as without her Help he would remain a Headless Corpse.

Davids part of this Bargain... take Shaw to where the Engineers came from so she can hopefully get some answers, and David would agree to get her there to face the Engineers or their creators if there are any left.

But the BIG QUESTION.... 

Have any of these Covenants been Broken?

But i would definitely think at least one of the above will somewhat play a role as far as the Covenant meaning.

@Michelle - "David may break a Covenant with Shaw and exploit the failed ideals of both the Engineers and Weyland Yutani."

Precisely. I definitely think David meddles in things isn't supposed to and in doing so, unleashes chaos.  If the early reports BigDave shared were true, then we know David causes a lot of trouble and unleashes the Alien onto Humanity. 

Perhaps the very preservation of the Xenomorph itself is the Covenant the Engineers have tried to safeguard? Perhaps the experiments on LV-223, along with the Black Goo were variations and imitations of the pure Organism, while the pure Organism was kept hidden away never to be released? Perhaps the 'Perfect Organism' was too powerful and needed to be contained forever, but the Engineers, like Weyland-Yutani still wished to learn and advance their own technology based on its physiology?

Yes thats interesting Chris..

There are many ways Covenant could fit...   The company could have made one with the crew... i think the Crew are just Colonists but they would have a variety of crew... like Prometheus, Like Star Treks... i.e bound to be Medical Staff, Engineering etc.

But i feel the Crew or most of them would be unaware of what the actual Mission would be about, like with Alien and Nostramo, i think when Ash came aboard the Nostramo then he knew about the Signal and it was his mission to get as close to that system to be re-routed to LV-426 and Special Order 937

I think Aliens did the same and the Company or some in the company knew what would happen and it was part of their plans to set up Hadleys Hope where the Colonists thought they was Tera-forming a Baron Moon.

So i think Covenant Crew would likewise not be aware of maybe a deeper true and dark Agenda of the Weyland-Yutani Company.

Already Mentioned about a Covenant between David and Shaw.

But we also have to look at the Engineers and many times they have been connected loosely to Fallen Angels and Angels... and so Covenant in that context could explain why the Engineers never came back, and why we dont see them before Prometheus only in Alien as the dead Space Jockey.

So a Covenant would explain things like why LV-223 may have been abandoned or why they never came to check on LV-223.

The only other ways to fill those holes would be only a Faction of Engineers set up LV-223 and maybe created Mankind without the knowledge of the Hierarchy or near enough all the Engineers and their creators are Gone after some event thousand or more years prior to Prometheus.

But a Covenant could be a way to explain those reasons...  God Made a Covenant to Noah that he would save him, provided he also saved every other Land Animal and then after he made his part of that Covenant by saying He (God) would never Flood the Earth Again.  That dont rule out other kinds of Punishment however.

So my theory would be the Engineers or related beings had decided to make a Covenant to refrain from coming back and to just let us to be, and poison our own World and Destroy ourselves.

But turning up on Paradise, and with Engineer Ships and Artificial Life created in our Image would be a Game Changer that would allow the Engineers etc to BREAK the Covenant they made... unless a new one is made during the next few movies.

Chris, Michelle, & BigDave: you have all made superb points and kicked my thinking into some interesting new areas.  I am so very very hopeful that the next movie will build somewhat on Prometheus. So many things implied in that film but not followed up on. Maybe those threads will be woven into Covenant and make a cohesive whole.  I cannot wait to discover what the covenant is about, and with whom it is made...  Thanks again!

@BigDave, fascinating you relate the Engineers and their retraction from interacting with Humanity as a Covenant in itself. Perhaps the Black Goo is like the great Flood? Having promised not to unleash its wrath on Humanity (again?) But like you said, seeing Humanity having transcended far enough to as reach their creators, drastic action was needed to keep them "in line". It's certainly possible!

@Chris. Ridders has continually referred to the Engineers as fallen angels in both the Prom 2 and A:Paradise Lost phase. I think its possible the murals that celebrates the achievements of The Engineers represent pictorial evidence of their fall. Their fall was to break the Covenant with God to use the Life Catalyser benignly.

@Big Dave if you are going to back into A L I E N the theme of Weyland Yutani having a dark agenda hidden from the big company ethos from the get go makes sense otherwise you have to have an overcomplicated narrative about why the company falls. The theme of the first two movies (79,86) are the company are bad. The person who headed up Weyland is nefarious and deceitful, I think it would be right to carry that through into Covenant,. As it is a colony ship there must be many extras. In A L IE N S they were wiped out off screen, it will be fascinating to see how that plays out in Covenant. We may have had some hints from the set.

Tying both together David is amoral and observer, so he will happily lift the lid on the arc metaphorically speaking. Ridders has said getting his head back on is a big idea and he is bringing hell with him that if true clearly means he has broken his Covenant with Shaw. 

Finally I am one who loves Prometheus and see the whole Promethean Myth used as a morality tale. With the exception of the Captain who was a noble "seaman" many of the crew were struck with hubris and arrogance.  The botanist incautious attitude with the hammerpede was built on the sadly deleted scene with the little Alien and makes his actions more plausible for those that need that kind of clarity but his real stupidity was his arrogant assumption was the creature was benign, echoing the hubris of Shaw and the Engineers in their life cycle experiments. They were to use Shaw's words all "so wrong". That layering of the same emotional movement will I am sure work back and forward across the various elements of Covenant.        

Yes Michelle the deleted scenes added a bit but still made that scene odd, as well seeing bigger worms then smaller ones may have seemed odd but who is to say the Worms grow to the larger size on their own... just the Goo made them hammerpedes.

Spaights draft was better, that scene was explained better as Fifield picked the Hammerpede up and toyed with it and it attacked Milburn... Fifield did this because he was under the influence of a substance within his respirator that basically made him throw fear and inhibitions out of the window... like being Totally High or Drunk.

" Ridders has said getting his head back on is a big idea and he is bringing hell with him that if true clearly means he has broken his Covenant with Shaw."

This could have worked in a few ways... that being Davids Agenda came first and he used the Cargo on the Engineers before Shaw got her answers... or that he did so after the Engineers began to be hostile...

We cant be sure what way they are going now... but have they changed it so now when David arrives there are no Engineers Left... or was there a few... but David soon put a stop to that... or did David form a Covenant with those few who remained?

"Their fall was to break the Covenant with God to use the Life Catalyser benignly"

its pretty open as far as that goes... i wondered why the Engineers never came back and then Prometheus Myth as far as steal fire of the Gods.

And so one explanation could be that a Faction of Engineers decided to play God and use the Fire or their creators to create Mankind without the knowledge of their own creators?

This would explain why the Engineers etc never came back... but no soon as David and Shaw turn up to the Homeworld their is no hiding what was done.

Unless the Hierarchy found out but decided to not bother with us.. Especially of the mission to do so proved so costly.

The Engineers may created life on thousands of worlds, and so if Earth was a Bad Crop, maybe they just decided its best to just ignore us.... as the cost before of trying to destroy us was costly.

But no soon as they found out we could Travel the Stars, create life in our own image that could use Engineer Tech and Language that would be a Game Changer.

I felt the Last Engineer only reacted as he did when he realized the above.. The Full Scene and Full Sacrificial and other deleted Engineer Scenes all point to this...

@Chris

Great Flood..?  Maybe but not literal way... lets have a look at what we know about the Franchise..

*Space Jockey befell his Cargo, Deadly as it was, the company have tried and failed everytime to obtain it for their own use.. The Xenomorph was a Cargo that proved too deadly.. for Engineers and Mankind.

The Space Jockey warned his fellow Race of the Dangers and gave maybe a similar warning as Shaw did to Mankind... did the Engineers heed the Space Jockeys Warning?  Would mankind heed Shaws..

We know Mankind did not.. as far as the Space Jockey it depends if this event was after or prior to the LV-223 outbreak.

*Engineers had been working on experiments related to the Xeno Biology, in which order we dont know (which came first) but the ends are the same... the Black Goo like the Xeno Eggs became a Weapon that they could not control a Weapon so deadly it cost them dearly.

And so we got to a point where Engineer disappeared... why? and now in Covenant we are off to the Engineer Homeworld and i think depending there are any Engineers etc left.. or when did their civilization on Paradise End.. would give us our answers.

And depending on these... then a Covenant could be applied to it.

Maybe the Xeno was Fire...

Or maybe the Xeno was created by Fire but in a different way... Fire being Sacrificial Goo

If this is what the Hierarchy use to create, and Engineers are Pawns in creation, maybe Engineers could have rebelled and used this Fire for their own means..

Play with Fire you get Burnt..

Imagine the Sacrificial Goo... what if Mankind used this on a Lizard.. on a World they discovered...

If 10's thousands of years latter Mankind is visited a Race Of Reptiles like in V  and these Reptile Humanoids destroy us would that not serve us right for playing with the Fire of the Gods (Sacrificial Goo) in a way the Gods never intended?

@BigDave

It makes sense that the Xeno represents the Fire.

If we look at the fire in the larger context of the whole series, then the fire aboard the Sulaco can be said to be symbolically AND literally related to the creature.

Mr. Weyland compares himself to Prometheus in the TEDtalk video when mentioning how the androids were forged from clay.  If we look at it that way, then Mr. Weyland himself/the Company is our Prometheus within the story and wishes to steal the fire from the gods.  

When Mr. Weyland extinguishes the match at the end of the TEDtalk vid, it's all highly symbolic. The match is a Lucifer match, and he's the one playing with Fire.

The trick is not minding that it hurts getting burned.  

The David 8 could actually be associated with Prometheus's servant, Dolus, who appears in a story that tells of the goddess Aletheia's creation. Dolus is an embodiment of Trickery/Deception.

The android reflects the company's deceptive nature in his own way, because Weyland taught him "the trick." 

Peter Weyland's mother was an expert in cross-comparative mythology.  And most of our ancient myths/stories are related to earlier myths; some were told long before the written word/syllable was created. Anyway, the Judeo-Christian myths are only part of it. David would be familiar with the story of Aletheia (as told in Aesop's fables) since he studied a number of mankind's myths while breaking down our languages to their roots.  In the story, Prometheus steps away from the workshop and leaves Dolus (Trickery) alone.

Aletheia (or Veritas in Latin) is a goddess of Truth and wisdom that Prometheus created.  She was to dwell with the gods.  The only problem is that Prometheus got called away from the forge by Zeus while the clay used to create Aletheia was still baking.

When Dolus was left alone in Prometheus's workshop, he started messing around with the forge and tried to create his own identical version of Aletheia.  However, Prometheus returned sooner than Dolus expected. Unfortunately, Dolus (Trickery/David) did something to Aletheia (the Truth) while Prometheus was away. Now there are different versions of Aletheia/the Truth.

The workshop ran out of clay, and there wasn't enough time to gather more for the other Aletheia's legs. As a consequence, the false version of Aletheia (the Truth) was half-baked and had no legs to stand on... There was now both a "real" and false copy of her.

When David meets our new protagonist, he may perceive Daniels as a representative of the Truth.  Or at least one version of the truth: the Company's truth.

It might be difficult for David to gain a sense of what our new main character is really like -- what she's thinking & feeling inside. Her personality differs from Miss Shaw's:  he may find her "harder to deal with."  

@big dave "I felt the Last Engineer only reacted as he did when he realized the above. The Full Scene and Full Sacrificial and other deleted Engineer Scenes all point to this…"

To start at the end of the post. I decided to watch it through Ridders commentary and the deleted scenes with the commentary on. I took the scenes in exactly the  same way as you did that the Engineer was outraged by the knowledge that we were now travelling and creating life. 

So that leads us on to one of the core questions for Covenant. How do the Engineers of LV223 fit with the Engineers from the tear drop ship and the Engineers on Paradise. 

I think the acolyte was in a benign gardening phase. LV223 represented the Engineers pursuing the Promethean vanity.Why did they decide to set out to destroy mankind, possibly because the engineers fleeing from the out break, recognised the error of their ways and saw mankind as a failure (The christ rejection) and needed a Noah type moment to re engineer mankind. When we turned up, with David, the decision to complete the mission became in his mind more urgent.

As to where was Paradise at this point we do not know but perhaps in the finally decided backstory David, bringing hell, wiped out the last of the benign strand of engineers, and part of the ten years is to create a paradise lost created by David 8. Yes different from the original idea but whose bad everybody ? 

@caryn I have always "felt" the Promethean myth as it applies to the Engineers is the miss use of the goo and is metaphorically the "playing with fire" which turned round and wiped them out. I am coming round to the idea my previous post they recognised the error of their ways and concluded Mankind represented something which needed to be closed down. Why well hopefully the answer will come in the summer of 2017.

I really was taken with your description of the myth and the creation of Aletheia perhaps this is what Davids relationship with Shaw looks like ?

@big dave David 8 now knows the Engineers represent jeopardy to his existence.He would expect a hostile reception from further Engineers he now has form with them. If he is "bringing hell" to Paradise I could see him proactively turning it on them. Prometheus ended with him in an adversarial relationship with the Engineers and in a "Covenant" with Shaw, their relationship was Co- Dependent. We can be certain he changes that relationship, where the surprise may come is how. 

The journey of the Croissant to Paradise maybe rich with narrative input taking up the first half of the first act and then as Ridders said we are introduced to the Covenant Crew "following Shaw and David" in the middle of the first act.  

I hope the movie is as stimulating as this conversation !      

Yes the potential was always there,  and i hope they have chosen to follow the potential even if they wish to tone down the themes and motifs a bit.

On the other hand i do worry if its all being changed for a Fan Service Xeno Pop Corn Flick... only time would tell.

The last time i heard off a friend who speaks to the source that had apparent information, said they dont know much of the direction now... but that themes from the Original Idea are being used.. just slightly differently.

Like if we take away everything that Spaights Engineers Draft and Lindeloffs Paradise as far as differences... and we look then at what they both share...  So the shared theme was the same, just the other elements differed slightly.

One was more Xeno/Alien connected, other distanced itself from that to explore the Engineers more....  and how we went in style from Spaights to Lindeloffs.... we have Paglen and Greens that was more a follow on to Lindeloffs but now seems we could be having a change back to a more Spaights style Story.

@Michelle Johnston

I look at humanity's handling of the fire as a recurrence of the Engineer's misuse of it.  An example of "history repeating" in a similar, yet not identical, way.  The Company is the one playing with fire now, but in the past it was the Engineers who got burned.

My theory is that the Engineers stole the Fire from their creators originally, and now humanity is playing out a very similar pattern.  The Company has yet to learn their lesson about trying to use the Fire for destructive and selfish purposes, instead of creative ones.  The Engineer depicted in the giant head statue might represent Prometheus as well, because signs/symbols (much like words) can sometimes have two meanings.  The tiny symbols that comprise languages like Cuneiform and Sanskrit can hold dual meanings, which might be why David is only "perhaps" able to read the Engineer's hieroglyphs on LV-223.  The individual symbols can be ambiguous without a larger context or the bigger picture.

I look at Shaw a little differently.  To me, Shaw's character is somewhat like Pandora, but also a little like Persephone (and maybe even shades of Eve from the Garden myth). I'm not sure which character represents her the most. She could certainly offer more to the story down the road, although maybe not in Covenant...  

It's actually Covenant's new protagonist Daniels who I think will represent Aletheia in some ways (as well as some elements of mankind's ex-wife, Lilith, in a biblical sense...). We might be presented with someone who can be a little antagonistic towards androids at times. My guess is that Daniels will almost be the antithesis of Shaw in some ways. For example, she might not be a "true believer."  Also, in my theory, she's a member of Weyland-Yutani private security forces who knows a fair deal about the secret agenda on the planet beforehand.

There's a chance that David 8 thinks he's the protagonist of the story, that it's his "adventure," and he's the "good guy" in the story.  If so, Daniels may be prepared to act like a "bad guy" in David's story. We might see some Bladerunner ideas turning up. David may perceive the company to be antagonistic towards his independent goals on the planet.  When Mr. Weyland died, David imagined he'd be free.  He's a "real boy" now.  Soon he'll free himself from the company forever; he may be busy setting up deathtraps in an ancient Engineer city. 

My prediction is that Daniels (our new protagonist) is actually one of the characters "in the know" and "in bed" with the company when the story begins.  I think this time around, we're presented with the Company's half-version of the truth and let in on a few details. Daniels would let her partner, the other David, play the good cop role and pretend to sympathize/empathize with the David 8 (who is now free).  The David 8 is too smart for the good cop/bad cop routine, so the other David wouldn't pretend to be his friend for very long. 

I feel it's important that Daniels offer a different perspective on the universe than Shaw or Ripley, but unlike Mr. Weyland, she would still have much of her humanity left. Which might become important if she's a character who has knowledge of both the good and evil deeds of the higher-ups within the company.

There might be a twisted sense of logic behind what the company does.  In the TEDtalk, Mr. Weyland mentions his personal philosophy about how morality is only holding humanity back.  He didn't think that morality was "real," so he didn't really believe in good and evil.  Mr. Weyland's spirit still lingers with the company, but Daniels would be the type of character who makes her own informed decisions and judgement calls.

The company COULD just use machines to build each new colony; however, Weyland-Yutani believes that only humans can truly benefit from the emotional and potentially spiritual rewards that come along with taking part in such projects on distant alien worlds.  The breathtaking views of alien landscapes would be wasted on androids, because even at this point in the timeline, they lack true human emotions.  At the end of his life, Mr. Weyland believed that androids don't have souls; therefore, they miss out on any spiritual rewards.

@Caryn

The idea that the Engineers stole the fire is audacious as opposed to misusing the catalytic life generator ?

I probably believe they had a covenant with god to use it benignly on virgin worlds and create life and what we will find in Covenant is they broke that Covenant.

I see like you the Engineers, Mankind and the Company refracting the same error. Believing only morality holds you back. In terms of communicating that for global cinema from a focused and relatable place I think David 8 can bring that altogether in all the myriad of ways you have so eloquently considered taking into account his back ground and creation nd what he is and what he isn't or more to the point lacks - morality.

I was thinking about W-Y and order 937 and two matters occurred to me.

1) The mendacious nature of the company needs to be presented in a fresh and surprising way. Daniels being the female lead and the antagonist with a pet innocent D9 would represent that for me.

Vickers was much more narrow and representative of the dangerous nature of the rule book and compliance some thing that would occasionally get into Star Trek where Kirk was up against authority. Compliance people are not trained to use initiative or think out of the box her death was symptomatic of that.

2) The first 20 minutes maybe the most challenging. Do we need 

a) Contextualising the mission W-Y coming together where they are going etc etc .

b) Waking from hyper sleep. 

This all feels very repetitive and doesn't add anything to the set of films. We need to be introduced to the crew as they move in on Paradise but no more.

For me what would be audacious is to set up and position David 8, so like you say we see him through his eyes, as the protagonist whose world is about to be interfered with.

For them to introduce W-Y and the crew and set off and then arrive and find David and then back story him in feels rather routine. If through David's re-integration we are following him however disapproving then we can see the arrival of the Covenant as interference and only through their actions come to root for some of them. I have a view about where this ends who survives and where it goes next it either comes from a new hero, which I believe is unlikely, or it is a genuine two part story with a cliff hanger or we actually end where it all started. How many more journeys do we need to receive our answers. I am very curious on this point.