prometheus opening scene

@ignorantGuy

IG I like your point about Oedipus because David cannot have the cross over relationship with a mother. He might see Elizabeth as a mother (a point you have made) and he might see Charlie as competition. I must go back and watch that three way scene where he saves her I am fairly certain Charlie looks territorially challenged. I think David wants to be able to hangout with Elizabeth but maybe not sure what to do next. Personally as a woman I cannot envisage a man with no capacity for sexual reproduction at all and no sex drive:-

1) Wanting to create or feel the loss.

2) Or sleep with her.

He is more like the boy at school who has a crush on a girl and the girl likes him more than any other confides him goes to him but never considers getting it on with him.

My worry about your thoughtful analysis is that you may be flattering the writers or Ridley who comes in the room and says great that fits and walks out. Remember his comment when the movie was called Paradise Lost "thats a huge poem but thats the title thats as far as it goes."

I do think the Lawrence thread though for Prometheus was much more fully realised and thrilled that it was.

Back to Oedipus its a real shame that Meredith didn't try and come on to David and show how much more adequate she was as a real girl. "Come on David its see if you have what it takes" Michael and Charlize would have had some fun with that and David switching off his head visor would have then be a real F... You.

I like Idris performance with Meredith and his heroic "that was a great .... you aren't a robot after all now get off the ship vibe" Indeed that provides our answer as to what Ridley thinks about getting it on with a real robot. NO.... sorry thats what he thought in 2012.    

@BioDegradable

Sorry that brings up another point. The Engineers on planet four may be entirely different to the guys on LV 223 and we the audience have no idea as to whether he finds out or not. I mean visually because of issues of cost they look like they are presaging out for a view of a coming home they maybe stupid but they are certainly innocent.  Indeed in Advent there is the implication that he finds out and they have gone soft so why wipe them out. The work of Renaissance Man ? 

I mean in Lawrence on the road to Damascus David Lean shows the Turks have raped the woman and killed the childen and still Lawrence is counselled to show restraint by Ali but the audience are appalled but understanding of the Arabs slaughtering the Turks but Lawrence is seen to be unhinged by this stage where is Davids motivation as he misquotes Percy Shelley ?

It is just plot point convenient to clear the decks.   

@Michelle Johnston I also recall that when making the first BR, RS imposed an interdiction to the crew to read the novel and that he found it impossible to read, or something along this line.

And I also said to you at the end when Shaw says that she still believes even if though she was proved that the Engineers are not good/God for me is ironically reminiscent of the end of Do Androids..., were the androids prove that the Mercerism (a religion based on empathy) is fake but then Deckard has an epiphany. Also, don't we all remember the scene where Shaw gears up for the meeting with Engineer? She did look like Christ during the Passion.

Was this only accidental? Probably it was and it you're right. 

Also we did answer to your questions, he receives compassion and he rapes and kills, and without his father he becomes. This might not be satisfying for were many.  

Michelle,

one of the reasons David wiped them out, is not because he was a renaisansse man in that particular case, although he is quite a man of that epoch, a Leonardo Da Vinci type actually, but because they, engineers on planet 4 had entirely devolved. They not only did not better themselves having benefits of all this time and this potent mutagen technology, they went backwards, even by their own standards. They replaced it all with something that resembles faith, religion, cult, whatever you call it. Recall, we are shown two distinc times in the Prometheus where David wanted to learn the motivation of the subject to follow unfounded and delusional blind beliefs. Shaw said it was her choice, it is what she choose to believe. I have to say, in reality, not many people privy to one or other religious schoolf of though made the decision to join on their own. Some one made it for them. Shaw made such a choice on her own. And I suppose, David respects that choice of hers, even though it turns out to be silly in that universe of theirs. It was not Jesus or proverbial god (as she believed bearing the cross ) who created them but these stupid ogrees, as she found out. So, even though religion is irrational absurdity we are shown he can respect people's choices as did Shaw which he saw during his neuro connection where her father says that they don't want my help because their god is different and I respect that. Weyland certainly did not believe the traditional abrahamic  religion but he also did not believe in a chance. And he certainly was vindicated in his belief, though, ultimately, his creators shunned him. So David has all the reasons to doubt any form of religion.

Now, we know David did not value humans. And what he found was that habitants of planet 4 were humanoids, who looked a bit like barbarians and damningly for them they looked like they established a religious society where they idolized another humanoids. What are they good for with their set of beliefs for David? Besides, he just gave them the taste of their own medicine. All those bombs loaded with mutagen was used many times. I suppose it was deployed on humans as well, and multiple times really. So, in a way, he humbled the race of creators. Not a bad story, to teach a lesson or two to creators of your creator.

But what was his immediate motivation is not as clear to me. Was it because he was almost left stranded as a result of actions of one of them engineers? Was it because, their tech has contaminated his Elizabeth which he was not expecting? Was it perhaps because they killed Weyland? I am not sure David would have a grudge because of the later. However, the other two might actually be the reasons, even though I doubt it. Perhaps David was not expecting his experiment on Charlie to contaminate and flaw Elizabeth. And why do I think he had something for Elizabeth? Why else would he come on intercom and warn her that he, the mad engineer, was coming after her? He knew she had almost no chance against that big boy, but laying there with his head decapitated he still bothered enough to give Elizabeth the chance, however small it was, to escape her imminent death at the hands of this dirty and angry bastard. And the engineer was mad. Instead of going for other ship, he went for the kill, for vengeance, retribution, displaying his quite human vices and lack of judgement even for such an advanced specie, supposedly a god worthy figure. He ultimately paid for his stupidity with his 2000+ years old life.

We are told that David has learned their ways during the travel to the planet. And this is the plot convenience. He learned all about their barbarian nature the moment the engineer ripped his head off. Wether they are innocent or not did not matter, because he happened to have a ship full of nice liquid they know about and the fact that he didn't value them because they were totally unworthy. Unlucky for the I suppose. If you argue that they are worthy and all. Well, why didn't they have defense systems in place which would just in case protect them in their god worthy indulgement on their playground?

In any case, the easiest explanation why he wiped them out is because for safety reasons. There is no indication they might be sanguinely appreciative of alternative life forms. They might have torn them to shreds the moment they stepped out of the ship. Precaution. Especially, that the first time around David came into contact with them it did not go well at all.

As for quoting Shelley, it is a plot objective to display his, David's fallibility. David is on a journey from a thing, a robot, an object, property, to his own person, free being. A god.

In the process, however perfect he might be, he is shown to us to be fallible, in a similar way humans are fallible. He made mistakes, which is humanity's essence, an attribute which David doesn't like(would he be proud making human like mistakes?). And this is pointed out by another synthetic. Were it a human pointing out those flaws David would disregard them. But the fact that another synthetic, and a crippled one at that, who was made to serve, a slave points out to him, who was not made to serve that he is in fact become as bad as humans is quite an insult to David. I assume that was the point. And David can't quite blame Walter being biased, because the wrongness was observed coming from David himself. When a note is a half the whole symphony is...that is the diplomatic way of saying David you are broken, insane and all your theories are void and null or at least suspect.

Michelle Johnston

Yes, to sacrifice people is very benevolent. The Mayan culture tortured the “lucky” victims by heart extraction (and other kinds of disembowelment), hurling people into deep pits or sinkholes, burying them alive etc. Aren’t they the lucky ones? The acolyte also seems to have a jolly good time after his cup of tea. As a matter of fact, I don’t think it’s his cup of tea at all. So, isn’t the opening scene gorgeous? Wouldn’t you want to try that cup of tea, Michelle? I really recommend it!

@BioDegradable

Your post is quite illuminating for three reasons:-

1) Your having to do a good deal of leg work to make sense of the Engineers on Planet 4. This is supposed to be episodic film making which in musical terms operates like a symphony where the story grows and reveals more of itself as we move forward. We actually know less about everything at the end of this film. Other than David created the Xenomorph in a cave by killing everybody.

2) Your observations about Elizabeths faith are most interesting and I wonder whether they did not pursue Ridleys interest in the creation/paradise story because as you say we live in a world where people see Elizabeths view as naive and her view that there is a God of any description out there as plain nuts. 

3) The Engineer coming after Elizabeth was to create the Deacon to provide the riff. Its actually inconceivable that he would survive if you see where the Prometheus hits the Juggernaut. Its a stretch that Davids remains would survive but the former was to drive the plot to the Deacon.   

Would it have made any difference if Elizabeth had survived and there was no life boat exchange. Elizabeth has two options :-

1) Die. 

2) Enter into a co dependent relationship with David.

If she opts for Number 2 there is a much bigger issue than hauling him off the bridge. Does she put him back together. If she does as a devout faith based person she only has one option and one reason for doing so.

John Logans initial response having done that is they arrives at this extra ordinary Paradise and David rips her head off and destroys Paradise. I am quite happy to report I would have walked out of the cinema at that point. 

Makes sense for an ALIEN franchise (all answers have to be dark). But they recognised the dilemma of this and hid the story in fudge and mudge.  

chli You seem to forget that in history were willing sacrifices. Look at the Celts (look at the Lindow Man, who was even high society and his death was giving back to nature so that it might provide in the future) or the Dacians (the chosen one will live after dead and will speak with the Gods, after being killed by being thrown into spikes/spears). The Mayans and other cultures sacrificed slaves and prisoners of war, not people willing to die.

There is a difference and the acolyte seems to accept it's fate, his death creates new life which will eventually be sentient and return home (gaining an afterlife of sorts). Ok, nature can be a big b***h so the benevolent part could be argued. However, the  Xenomorph it's an abomination, who will sacrifice anything sentient only to produce more of itself, without remorse and the rest of the quote.

ignorantGuy

Yes, leaders in a culture can make people believe anything and thinking it's right. Terrorists are indoctrinated into this. I get my reward in heaven . . . Don't buy it!

chli Sorry I did not say that at all. I don't think that religion appeared as as mean to manipulate and psychology is a way more effective tool to manipulate and I bet you wouldn't say the same thing about it.

@Michelle Johnston

To be very honest, there quite many people who criticize that ending as she could return home as it stupid to go find out where the Engineers home. How does that make sense? She does not have nothing back home, she does not want people to return to Lv-... and she would have driven back to the front yard of the Weyland Megacorp. (a clearly evil corporation)? David also would have been still a slave or decommissioned.

Actually, Elizabeth had no choice really, at that point. Or rather it was to die a  miserable way or die a bit later but with a slim chance of pursuing her quest for answers. She came all the way, lost everything and at that point she was all in. David knew this. However, she stunned David a bit more, when he expected her to go home, to Earth, while she actually asked him to take her where they came from. The questions, this quest of hers is irrelevant according to David(these ogrees won't give any satisfactory answers anyway, therefore David said the answer is irrelevant. He saw enough while on board of engineer ship to see that they never had a grand plan for humans anyway), yet her belief, her drive, grit and determination amazed him. I think she showed him actually that there is something in humans that robots won't have guts to do: to go on and try the irrelevant looking thing. It takes courage to do the thing especially if it might cost you everything. I suppose David became more fan of hers because of her show of character. And she was putting it on display not for vanity, she was just doing her thing.

I actually like to think that she died on the ship, while they were travelling. I guess, the answers she would get if she had the chance to reach planet 4 engineers would be rather dissapointing for her. David knew all this and I like to think that one of the reasons he wiped the planet is because of her struggles and how it would frustrate her to no end at the end of all things. Just imagine her seeing these creators doing their own thing, praying to no end their own god-humanoid faces sculpted from stone, with no purpose and no meaning. Where is the thrill in that for her, having made all this journey and at what cost? She died because of the goo(And David actually). He, David might be mighty mad at those engineers(although innocent). Because, even out of billion people, he will probably never come across a person like Elizabeth, perhaps a single human person he came to respect, admire and eventually love. So perhaps that is why David was emotional when he was releasing the payload on those folks. I like to think that David indeed liked her and having lost his only friend, a partner he was feeling the pain. He doesn't otherwise has anything worthy to mourn about except the most unlikely friendship relationship he ever had. Recall, he only had warm things to say about her. No damning thing about her at all, even though she was from that contemp deserving humanoid specie homus moderno sapiens.

ignorantGuy

If "sacrifice" is the central part of something we hear or see, how should we look upon it? Janek does a heroic sacrifice but the acolyte is indoctrinated. He has been taught to believe that his sacrifice is heroic and he will get his rewards in history, or afterlife. It's not beautiful - it's horrific!

Regarding sacrifice and all. There is a slight technical difference in the context of these movies wrt to some sequences. Some of them are true sacrifices. Some are not, or rather it is a sacrifice technically but of a different sort. Sacrifice is something you pay for dearly while it is very unlikely for you to know what sort of benefits you will get in return. In fact it is not a sacrifice if you know precisely what you will get from your actions. So for instance, Janek is not actually sacrificing himself. He paid a hefty price but he did it to save lives - a very direct and definite outcome. He took the gamble, as did Chance and Ravel. There is no sacrifice in it. Only a heroic act - an act of duty for all his loved ones back at home. He paid/traded his life for other lives. A sacrifice is when you trade something costly for nothing or rather immaterial. Like that sacrificial fellow in the opening scene. What did he receive in return? You would say immortality, but that is highly questionable. To accentuate, if that fellow having gone through such experience, would he again take that deal given a chance? If he would say "I would rather not, but if you insist..." then I would call it a sacrifice. Janek on the other hand would always choose to die for a chance to save Earth. And that is why it is not really a sacrifice to me. I hope you see the point I am trying to make here. And I would say Elizabeth sacrificed(forsaken) her life when she chose to follow her quest further. She was willing to die come what may, even if she dies never learning anything worthy, like she did. We watch her sacrifice herself but we never see the payout, that is why we feel mad. Would you pay such a price on such a deal with such questionable outcome? If you do, then sacrifice your life in my books. If however, you agree to amputate a part of your body in order to get rid of sarcoma you can say it was your sacrifice of that body part of yours, but I wouldn't call it a sacrifice. Just like Janek never really sacrificed himself in my books.

Sorry if this is abit off topic.

But this is also a part of the reason why David is mad at engineers - they set up an ellaborate trap for a person he dearly came to value. He did not like the deal they gave her, so to speak. But I understand that this is rather perverse way of impicating others, especially if it was all her choices that led her there. And hence he cleansed the dealer and damned his choices. My two cents.

I do not want to end up in a conversation about the meaning of words though 80% of arguments are effectively that.

Hard sacrifice

The acolyte was offering himself voluntarily on the basis of faith. He gave up whatever the privileges of life were to do so.

Soft Sacrifice  

Janek and the others were taking noble actions to save mankind I would call that a sacrifice but Janek knew there was no future unless he did so I can see that is a different kind of sacrifice both routes lead to death but then Meredith showed us the opposite survive at all costs.

However we are talking about an episodic film sequence and it remains my view that sacrifice is a cornerstone of the mythos.

For me this conversation is about two things.

1) We spend a good deal of time right at the beginning of Prometheus setting up the notion of creation through sacrifice and that theme has been set aside.

2)David and Elizabeth leave the planetoid and the audience has very clearly established views of them and how they interact with each other  

Those two narratives were essentially placed in the trash can as "bullshit" and I profoundly disagree with that view whether its Fox,Ridley or focus groups who want the Xeno on the screen. 

Thats me done as always its enjoyable discussing these matters with people who have a passion for these stories whom are respectful and to be honest what I am doing sub consciously is a certain amount of audience research in seeing how people react to my thoughts. 

It is rightly called bullshit because it is all bs of sorts, a fantasy, just that they are in it for money, ultimately, and therefore they are apt to follow their target paying audience. What I am here for, is I am willing to sacrifice my money in return of hope of a good story. However, the dealer choices have been awful after the prometheus hookup. Hence I am here getting my frustrations quenched by some of the posts on this board. Besides, it has been a long time to shine some light at that interesting Prometheus movie. I am afraid, the writers were breaking the fourth wall when they were saying "the answer is irrelevant" through David. But I still got to see an interesting relation develop between David and Elizabeth. Even though they didn't get much time for fun, sadly, because well, a lot of general audience wanted an ALIEN, not some obscure and unlikely story between an android and a human. Oh, well.

Michelle, sure thing sacrifice is the foundation of the movie.

Perhaps humans were periodically wiped out the moment they stopped sacrificing their selves, when they stopped this practice of monkeying the religious norms of their creators. And the payback? Well if humans were not going to be doing sacrifices out of their volition, they were going to be sacrificed anyway by non-consensual sacrifice through a potent specie, produced by the help of mutagen. That is to say we were meant to mimic their religion and if not...well, you get the idea. Btw, can you imagine David sacrificing himself for anything really? Hard/soft, I don't really. Because, for him, nothing is greater than him - he is the god, the peak as far as he is concerned, therefore I don't see David sacrificing himself, unless he becomes utterly humanly eccentric through his journey. I recall him citing poetry finishing with words that one can die happy producing such a masterpiece. Will he die for his children to have half a chance to survive? His perfect organism? Well, if the xeno strain carries some of Elizabeths markup, I like to think he would.

I was pondering here earlier what if synthetics were treated with dignity, would they treat humans better than David did. The partial answer is given by Walter. Daniels even went as far as asking him to help her build cabin on the lake a role reserved for a very very special person. But then again, Walter was built to serve, unlike David. And Walter,by his own admission said it was his duty to sacrifice his part of the body for Daniels, not love or anything else. And then again he was ready to throw himself at David(without a limb, a disadvantaged position really) to save Daniels. Duty again? She was the highest ranking officer at that time, but Walter's loyalty should be for the colony not some particular member of the colony. These film makers are playing with us - they surely want to establish a relationship between a synth and a human.

So, does Walter have something beyond duty towards Daniels? Can you understand her somewhat intensifying feelings beyond friendship towards Walter? Her offering to stitch him up. Her wanting him to be her soulmate, a cabin builder-helper. She wasn't really looking to friendozne Walter, like she would T, for instance. They won't ever be partners with T in honor of their shared partners lost to a common mission, I presume.

David is the opposite of Walter. He is her rapist. Non-consensual "friend", who bizarrely is almost identical to Walter. Interesting "sexual" game we are dealt with. She is "okay" with Walter, but not David, who is supposedly much better than Walter, simply because he is not a slave. I guess, we will see Walter come back for his Daniels to rid her of her rapist.

PS: oh, on a side note, did film makers throw in Walter-Daniels gravitas so that those people from Prometheus who were curious about synth-human had something to look for in the sequel? While I am curious to see what it looks like, I wasn't reallly happy with the substitute for Elizabeth-David relationship. Too on the nose, too crude Ridley! What do you think you are doing?!

PPS: is it just coincidence that all those ancient people that Holloway found who had those nine planets/stars constellation practicied human sacrifice? Michelle, this looks like right up your alley. Perhaps there is something to it? The almost throw away comment I made earlier where I conjured the reason why they came visiting Earth might be because people stopped sacrifice? That engineer that Weyland woke up knew where these monkeys came from, and instead of offering some sort of sacrifice they wanted more life.

Besides, who do you think Weyland's fav character was in LOA? I know who David found sympathy with, but I presume it was Weylands fascination with LOA that got David hooked up with it. Weyland exposed himself completely to David while allowing him to surveil him under his neurolink. Damn, Weyland completely disregarded David it seems. As the later conjectured early on that Weyland will not find what he is looking for on the LV-223, but it seems he never had the balls to tell it to Peter. That is how I take his "there is nothing in the desert and ..." Weyland's death was in vain. He was shunned by these "creators", who themselves did not posses what Weyland was looking for. His last gasp "There is nothing.." gives away that Weyland came to terms that he will die and the fact that he was at the last moment okay with it since anyway "no man needs nothing" - he redeemed himself in the eyes of David, who even wished him a good journey. He even pitied him in the end despite the fact that Weyland abused him to no end.(all those remarks about no soul - a public humiliation of a superior being infront of inferior beings that are humans, about him being his slave and his place despite his superiority...) Yet David showed grace towards "Mr. Weyland". It is rather curious detail, but in AC David is free to badmouth Weyland, that is, he is completely free of any failsafe obedience programming that he had when Weyland was around, which was fully shown in bring me this tea scene.

This is a gift to David from Weyland. Complete freedom. Not only that, David inherited Weyland Corp completely, because his security code was still obeyed by MURTHUR on the Covenant ship many years later after he whent missing. This is not a coincidence! Weyland gave a big FU to his daughter though. What a guy. But she is dead anyway.

I think Weyland would take back his remark about Dave having no soul, because he himself lacked it :)

Michelle Johnston

You are absolutely amazing. You say you don’t want to end up in a discussion about the meaning of words and here you are, telling us how to interpret the meaning of “sacrifice”. And if we don’t agree with you, you will, like a spoiled girl, say that you won’t play any more?

Hard sacrifice is when you get nothing in return for yourself! NOTHING! You are not promised an afterlife of coconuts, virgins and pina coladas. Therefore, Janek does the ultimate sacrifice.

But the problem is that you see everything from a female point of view . . . (which, in essence, mean that you don't understand anything - about being a man).

chli,

Janek traded his life for lives of his close ones on Earth. That is not a hard sacrifice. It is not a sacrifice in my mind at all. Besides he did what two other volunteered to do anyway. A sacrifice is something you would rather not do, only perhaps if you had some misfortune and felt perhaps compelled to. Janek traded his life for a definite outcome. It is the same thing if you take a calculated risk to get a bigger benefit. Janek obviously valued lives of some people back on Earth more than his. Recall his self musing song: if you can't be with the one you love, love the one ....I presume his true love interest is left back at home, and he gave his life to save her/him(?!). Even though he was okay to have a quick intense "practice" with Vickers(who wouldn't though) :)

a sacrifice would be what David did to Charlie. Even though the latter never gave his consensus. He kind of did though in the eyes of David, when he said that he would do anything and everything. Well, David was just being fair: he only gave Charlie what he was ready to dish out to others, lol.