Prometheus

[Ironwood]

I'm fairly sure that wasn't me.

I suspect the chap in question was Jewish.

[Teleku]

I saw this 2 weeks ago, but went to Ireland and forgot to comment.

Agree with general gist of what everybody is saying.  Movie is ok to meh'ish.  Has some plot holes, and the plot isn't much to begin with.  Visuals were great, but movie certainly could be better.  Still, was ok for a Sci-fi night out, and the sequel could be good.

Having said that, a few complaints about silliness in the movie:

[OandA]

Just watched it and got the feeling that more than half of the story died on the floor of the editing room. What a convoluted mess of a story.

[Ratman_tf]

I watched the deleted scenes, and I think they underestimated how explicit they should have been. This movie comes across as timid and afraid to tell it's story, and just wants to rely on everything being grand and mysterious.

[DraconianOne]

I watched this last night and yeah, Del Toro was spot on - this isn't an Alien prequel, it's an adaptation of Lovecraft's "At the Mountains of Madness" except, instead of a science expedition going to the Antarctic, they go to a planet where the first thing someone says is as close as dammit to "You can’t imagine anything like this. Highest peaks must go over thirty-five thousand feet. Everest out of the running." Then they find an abandoned alien structure.

The Engineers are Elder Things, the snake/octo-baby/alien thing are Shoggoths and the " freshly glistening and reflectively iridescent black slime" is glistening black slime. The scientists learn about the fate of the Elder things by murals/holograms and it seems that the Shoggoths turned on them. But they find a surviving Elder Thing which attacks the scientists and is then killed by a Shoggoth.

Simple really. 

[Samwise]

...I feel stupid now for not noticing that.

[Mattemeo]

Christ, it's true. The only fundamental difference between the two is the lack of fucking man-sized penguins in Prometheus. 

[angry.bob]

Christ, it's true. The only fundamental difference between the two is the lack of fucking man-sized penguins in Prometheus. 

Well, there's a pseudo alien, a bunch of rapidly evolving worm things, and enough black oil to fill a lake. Given enough time I'm sure there will be man sized somethings there.

The more I watch this movie, the more pissed I am at it. A Del Torro MoM movie would have been a much better use of this plot. He's able to make stuff creepy and suspenseful without even trying. There's just so much crap Scott put in here that's stupid and demands you be stupid too. My latest bitch is that went whatsherfuck goes back to the alien ship that crashed to get David, she has to pass though that one big chamber that had thousands of those black oil canisters stacked neatly in it. Since just opening that one door made the canisters leak in that other room, guess what I bet will make them leak real good. Being in a spaceship that's just been rammed, crashed, rolled along the ground, and then fell the fuck over. But no, its apparently cool. And if they've got those cannisters stacked like chordwood in that room, what the fuck is the deal with the giant head room and the cannisters sitting up and neatly arranged. What's with that stupid green crystal in there. And if the Engineers were infected with the stuff, why were they all running to get into a room full of the stuff? Also, the CG scene of the geologist attacking the ship was a hundred times better than the shitty muppet makeup version they used. Shit, almost every scene has dozens of things wrong with it that make no sense.

David was good though. What a wasted opportunity on so many levels.

[taolurker]

DVD/BLURAY PROMO AD

Questions... will... be answered?  

 

THE. FUCK?!?

I actually yelled at the TV at a friend's watching football "What?" when seeing this ad.

Whole movie made me say WTF, and was a masturbatory Scott attempt to create additional sequels to an already overdone series.  

[calapine]

David was good though. What a wasted opportunity on so many levels.

Yups. I think my favorite part of Prometheus was the viral trailers featuring David.

Yups again about the stupid shit. The film has so many unrealistic and contrived scenes and, even worse, characters that constantly act however the plot requires them too, rather than being sensible or at least relate-able. It's a long prepared-for science mission with an crack team of experts from every field, but their behavior is only consistent if you assume they are a bunch of 18 year olds from a generic teenage-slasher film.

Edit: And what was up with taking a 40 year old actor to play Weyland and dress him up like 95? I understand the use of CGI in something like Jurassic Park because, duh, but old people aren't extinct yet...

[Lakov_Sanite]

I can only suspect that Scott used a younger actor I case he ever want to revisit Weyland as a younger man.

[Tannhauser]

IIRC, they had to do that because old Weyland wasn't originally in the movie, but after many changes to the script he was added.  Yes, the main point of the movie was added at the last minute.   

Also, don't try to figure out this movie.  It was a terrible script, terrible directing and terrible editing.  That's it.

[Venkman]

I watched this last night and yeah, Del Toro was spot on - this isn't an Alien prequel, it's an adaptation of Lovecraft's "At the Mountains of Madness"

I haven't seen the movie, but vaguely recall these short stories. So I went to the wiki for a refresher, and whoever edited that part of the page links ATMOM to Prometheus:

According to Salon.com, "Universal wants to hold onto the project in the event that it changes its mind and decides to make it later, either as an R or PG-13 movie. But del Toro is already trying to set up Mountains at another studio (possibly 20th Century Fox).[27] However, on April 30, 2012, del Toro posted that, due to the resemblance in premise with director Ridley Scott's film, Prometheus, the project would probably face a "long pause -if not demise"

They cite this post by DelToro at DelToroFilms.com.

All of which actually makes me now want to see Prometheus. And reread ATMOM  

[Ratman_tf]

DVD/BLURAY PROMO AD

Questions... will... be answered?  

 

THE. FUCK?!?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=avXZVgzLP68

[angry.bob]

Edit: And what was up with taking a 40 year old actor to play Weyland and dress him up like 95? I understand the use of CGI in something like Jurassic Park because, duh, but old people aren't extinct yet...

They addressed this specifically in the three hour wankfest "making of" on bluray. It was because Scott wanted Weyland to have "youthful" eyes.

[Soln]

euhhhhhhgg

I would've preferred a 2hr movie of just Michael Fassbender as David alone on that ship doing neat, existential things than what I just saw.  Honestly.  I fear for any Blade Runner prequel. 

Lindlehof the obfuscator + Scott phoning in the direction is a terrible formula.  Disappointing.


But nice to see Sean Harris (Micheletto on Borgias) getting work.  Great stuff. 

[Lantyssa]

Christ, it's true. The only fundamental difference between the two is the lack of fucking man-sized penguins in Prometheus. 

Obviously you missed the alien at the end.

[DraconianOne]

I would've preferred a 2hr movie of just Michael Fassbender as David alone on that ship doing neat, existential things than what I just saw.  Honestly. 

The world does not need another remake of Solaris.

[lamaros]

I thought the movie was pretty good. The final line was lame, but otherwise I thought it was really enjoyable.

I think you're all being nitpicking nerds and alien fanboys.

[Riggswolfe]

David was good though. What a wasted opportunity on so many levels.

Yups. I think my favorite part of Prometheus was the viral trailers featuring David.

Yups again about the stupid shit. The film has so many unrealistic and contrived scenes and, even worse, characters that constantly act however the plot requires them too, rather than being sensible or at least relate-able. It's a long prepared-for science mission with an crack team of experts from every field, but their behavior is only consistent if you assume they are a bunch of 18 year olds from a generic teenage-slasher film.

Edit: And what was up with taking a 40 year old actor to play Weyland and dress him up like 95? I understand the use of CGI in something like Jurassic Park because, duh, but old people aren't extinct yet...

I'd add the Welyand Ted speech to my list of favorite parts of Prometheus. If they'd had that version of Weyland in the movie and had a competent screenwriter rip the stupid out of the script it would have been a lot better. As it was it loses out only to Alien 3 as my least favorite Alien movie. Much like Alien 3 I simply pretend it never happened lest my enjoyment of the other movies is ruined.

[Furiously]

I'm sure there will be a great directors recut in a few years. Actually I'm not sure you can fix some of the stupid/plot.

It's unfortunate.

Also worlds strongest stomach staples. And the black goo turns everyone into a homicidal maniac, but shaw just gets knocked up?

[Lantyssa]

The goo only works on the Y chromosome.  That's why she had squid-sperm baby instead of being affected like the others.

[01101010]

Also worlds strongest stomach staples. And the black goo turns everyone into a homicidal maniac, but shaw just gets knocked up?

Thought that was due to the sexy time with the infected worm-eye.

[Kitsune]

The black goo didn't turn anyone homicidal.  It made the idiot 'durr, let's take off our helmets!' boyfriend into a walking tumor who looked about to explode, and made him knock her up with the squid, but that's it.  The two even more idiotic scientists who got all homicidal weren't exposed to the goo, they got facehugged by the worm-snake-penis things that they shouldn't've been trying to poke but did anyways.

[01101010]

The black goo didn't turn anyone homicidal.  It made the idiot 'durr, let's take off our helmets!' boyfriend into a walking tumor who looked about to explode, and made him knock her up with the squid, but that's it.  The two even more idiotic scientists who got all homicidal weren't exposed to the goo, they got facehugged by the worm-snake-penis things that they shouldn't've been trying to poke but did anyways.

At least it was a legitimate squid. 

[Furiously]

David's actions made so little sense as well. I'm sad this movie wasn't better than it was.

[Tannhauser]

Me too.  I am still really jonesing for a fairly hard sci-fi movie. 

[MediumHigh]

I don't know how anyone expecting much after seeing that trailer...

[Ratman_tf]

I don't know how anyone expecting much after seeing that trailer...

Shut your mouth. The trailer was boss.

[lamaros]

I don't know what you people were expecting. I thought the movie was very enjoyable. Most of the complaints seem to be nitpicking or "why isn't everything clear and explicit?!"

I liked all the "you're just a stupid robot" comments the characters made to David. (Oh no - alien life form is a little bit inscrutable! I call that good writing, not bad.) Edit: Let me clarify that all the other characterisation was pretty awful. Or maybe Fassbender is just good at being an andriod and Marshall-Green is fuckawful at being an insufferable idealist and just does 'goober' instead.

[Cadaverine]

For those that were bitching about Lindelof earlier on in the thread, I leave you this.

http://io9.com/5960275/what-did-damon-lindelof-add-to-prometheus-the-biggest-differences-with-the-original-draft?tag=prometheus

[tazelbain]

Just saw this. It was a mess.  I wanted everyone to die. Micheal Fassbender did well with the only mildly interesting or competent character. Charlize Theron was completely wasted which is crime by itself.  If I had payed more then $1.20, I'd be upset.

[palmer_eldritch]

For those that were bitching about Lindelof earlier on in the thread, I leave you this.

http://io9.com/5960275/what-did-damon-lindelof-add-to-prometheus-the-biggest-differences-with-the-original-draft?tag=prometheus

Interesting article. One thing I might have liked about the original script is that it explained why David was a psycho (to precis the article; while everyone else is in hypersleep on the way to the planet, he is busy decoding the alien language - and when he succeeds, it messes up his programming).

One of the problems I had with the movie as it stands is that it doesn't explain why David behaves the way he does. It's one thing to have some mystery in a film (like Alien not explaining what the visitor is or where it comes from - it's mysterious and inexplicable to us just like it is to the characters, which is cool because it helps us identify with them) but you have to understand the motivation of the main characters in a movie for it to work, it seems to me.

[Samwise]

I was cool with the idea that David was just a little nuts and doing his own thing.  I've never bought into the idea of the Three Laws of Robotics as something that would be easy or failsafe.  Any human-level AI would necessarily be as complicated (and potentially unpredictable) as a human, and might not do the stuff you want.  Especially if it's a one-of-a-kind prototype or whatever.

That said, I like the idea of David being corrupted by alien thought patterns or whatever.  It's a cool touch.

[DraconianOne]

One of the problems I had with the movie as it stands is that it doesn't explain why David behaves the way he does.

Because in the same way that the alien organism in Prometheus hints at/harks back to what will/did happen in Alien, so David's instability foreshadows/recalls Ash's own human-esque failings and illogicalities.

EDIT: Christ I'm thick - only just picked up on Ash, Bishop, Call, David.