No Xenomorphs in Prometheus 2

[happyninja42]

Jesus, let it die. Just let it go, already, and put it out its misery.



Scott, I don't think you have the slightest idea how horror works.

I'm not sure if Prometheus was ever intended to be an outright horror film.

But as mentioned by others, the biggest problem was the god awful script. Not a single memorable character in that whole movie. In the original Alien film I remember all the characters well because they were all nicely fleshed out as real humans. Prometheus just created entities which had no depth. It was clear from very early on who was meant to die first. They practically had 'I WILL DIE' written on their heads. Poor character development indeed.

I dunno, given the way the trailers for Prometheus were built up, it was definitely working that "creepy horror in space" vibe.

And yeah, the story itself, and the structure they used to tell it were terrible. No amount of xenomorphs can save a terrible script and terrible directing.

 

[jFr[e]ak93]

This is good news, I feel.

While not the pinnacle of Hollywood achievement, I liked the first one. But the Deacon at the end made little to no sense. Removing that element from the sequel might help.

It is a spin off series after all. These aren't alien movies.

 

[Neurotic Void Melody]

I have never watched prometheus due to not having the right opportuntity...but seeing all this hate, i shall now download and see with thine own ears and eyes! (Perhaps tongue too, if i get any hungrier)
To be honest, the xenomorphs have been milked dry (now theres a thought), i would welcome something fresh and unknown. Also i could only count the first, alien as a horror. Though still not scary. Maybe tense? Wouldnt that be a thriller? I dont know. Anyway, film time!

 

[oooooooooooooooooooooooooo]

I dunno, given the way the trailers for Prometheus were built up, it was definitely working that "creepy horror in space" vibe.

And yeah, the story itself, and the structure they used to tell it were terrible. No amount of xenomorphs can save a terrible script and terrible directing.

Well I thought even in the trailers the film didn't really have a horror movie aesthetic (though the aesthetic was creepy) and looked as it was going to be too action oriented with it's set pieces (exploding/falling engineer ship and the like) to be a horror film. To be fair though, I followed production a bit before the trailers and knew before I saw them that it wasn't going a horror film, so my viewing of the trailers was probably a bit biased.

As for the film itself, I liked it, there are very few attempts at hard alien based sci-fi in film, I liked the ideas that it played with and I liked that it didn't really reach any conclusions on any of them. I also wasn't really expecting any Xenomorphs to appear in the second film to begin with, so I'm not bothered by this.

 

[Callate]

...So, instead, you're moving forward on the strength of the "Prometheus" brand...? Good luck with that.

To be fair, there were bits and pieces of Prometheus that had promise. And if you got a cast of humans that didn't immediately start acting like horror movie victims when faced with a crisis, that continued acting like competent scientists instead, it would be a good start.

But most of what we saw of the Engineers was as sub-par (and definitely sub-Xenomorph) movie monsters. Frankenstein monsters, to be more specific. The most interesting thing one of them did was to black goo himself at the beginning. Give them some motivation- preferably without spelling it out in bald exposition- and maybe they'll be on to something.

 

[Jung Frankenstein]

What Prometheus 2 needs is not "No Xenomorphs", it's "No Damon Lindelof". Also, no Roberto Orci, Alex Kurtzman, J.J. Abrams, Michael Bay or any of those losers.

This. Damon Lindelof's fan service to JJ and JJ's awful "mystery box" (a mystery wrapped in a box clearly labelled "mystery" wrapped in another box that clearly says "mystery" - the point is the boxes, not actually solving the mystery- see Lost) is what killed Prometheus. Lindelof has done this repeatedly throughout his career, and I recommend checking out Kevin Smith's interview with DL on Comic Book Men to find out how he writes. It's very sloppy and self-indulgent. For example, Prometheus starts with what is essentially a scene setting up the Engineers as deity-like figures, sacrificing themselves so Earth can prosper. Then later, when humans wake one up, it tries to kill them because... black goo, or something. I shouldn't need a wiki to figure out what's going on in a supposedly self-contained story. And "the Engineers are a good step?" You mean those things that have no personality or really any distinguishing characteristics? Good golly, Ridley Scott has truly gone the way of classic rock bands. It's just sad at this point.

Who knows, maybe I'm just mad because I watched this thing TWICE to try and figure out what's going on before I realized there isn't really anything there.

And what is Scott talking about when he says there was no xeno in Prometheus? What exactly was that thing at the end? Sure looked like a phallic alien to me, and I'm pretty sure that's what makes Giger so distinctive, yes? It's already been established (and I checked the link up there to the Deacon - another religious reference, wth) that xenomorphs have different characteristics based on what species they come out of. I'm thinking of the Predator-Xeno here. The Deacon is an Engineer-Xeno. So actually, yeah, it is a xenoMORPH. And if it's not gonna be in the next movie, WHY WAS IT IN THE FIRST MOVIE IN THE FIRST PLACE?

I guess we're admitting it was shoe-horned in for fans of the original Alien. Cool. I hope it was worth it, because I'm refusing to see Prometheus 2 because of that. I give sci-fi movies a lot of latitude; Prometheus was poorly done, as has been stated here, so I rather had hope for a sequel. Kinda seems to me Scott still doesn't get it.

 

[Zydrate]

Honestly I didn't have too much of a problem with Prometheus except for the fact it felt like not much happened with it.

 

[Trishbot]

So, to compare and contrast...

Is it better for Ridley Scott to not understand the reason the original worked, and the latest didn't, and to just keep making new films?

Or is it better for George Lucas to not understand the reason the original worked, and the latest didn't, and to permanently alter the originals?

Ridley Scott is still the lesser of two evils, but my love affair with the Alien series begins and ends with the first two and no more.

 

[soul_rune1984]

Yes H.Rs design is one of the most beautiful creature designs ever and the thing that popped out of the Engineer is a CG mess of blandness but, it's still a Xenomorph.

 

[Lightspeaker]

Chalk me up as another one who doesn't quite get the hating on Prometheus. No, it wasn't exactly a great film; it was extremely average. But it wasn't the crime against humanity that some people seem to paint it as. It was ok, I wouldn't really recommend it to anyone but I wouldn't tell anyone interested not to see it.

Personally I think the film was just very dry. The script was relatively dull and most of the actors seemed to just phone it in. About the only people who actually seemed to try to put in some effort to their roles were Idris Elba and Michael Fassbender. With the former not having that much major screen time and the latter, as someone above put it, basically carrying the film.

 

[gamegod25]

While they are at it why not just scrap the engineers and everything else and just start all over from scratch. Not only was it a halfhearted link to the Alien series but it was just plain terrible standing just on it's own. These were the worst scientists ever in fiction, there are so many plot holes and idiotic moments, and the whole faith aspect was nonsense. Really it didn't do anything right...well maybe look pretty if that's really all you care about.

 

[Soulrender95]

I think a lot of people just read the title and not the article with so many people calling the "Deacon" a xenomorph, it isn't, it never was, similar birth method but totally different species.

Semantics I know, but it could mean that while there's no xeno's, there could be more of these "Deacons".

 

[mtarzaim02]

...And if you got a cast of humans that didn't immediately start acting like horror movie victims when faced with a crisis, that continued acting like competent scientists instead, it would be a good start.
...

That's what I disliked the most about the movie: supposed top scientists acting like the dumbest thing in the known universe.
And why the heroine decided, after all that crap, to go after the Engineers to get her answer?
Couldn't she just... I don't know... go back to earth with a super high-tech space ship, full of starmaps and crypted knowledge? Instead of... let me remember... looking after a specie she knows nothing about, which has probably gone extinct or evolved to an extreme degree for the last billion years at best?

And for what answer?
The robot already gave it at the beginning. They created us because they could. What's the point to look further than that.
No wonder the engineer goes on a rampage after meeting those "finest" humans. Their sheer stupidity must have forced him to kill them all in an act of infinite kindness. Or incredible shame.

If this second movie follows the end of the first, I cannot see why and how they hope to make something better. Shit makes shit, not gold. All we're asking is a good starship troopers with inventive xenomorphs and some lessons about darwinism. Get cameron out of his sub, and put him to work!

 

[K12]

The lack of Xenomorphs had nothing to do with the reasons behind "Prometheus" not being very good.

Stupid and inconsistent character decisions as well as no apparent enemy motivation. It was alright to have the Xenomorphs being killers because "they're natural superpredators" makes sense but the Engineers tried to kill everyone for no apparent reason... I mean didn't they create us? Anyway... all this stuff has been said many times before.

And really that thing at the end of Prometheus WAS a Xenomorph, if you make it look the same and act the same (from what we've seen anyway) then you can't insist that it's different. Insisting that something is a Toad and not a Frog makes sense since those things actually exist but in a fictional setting you have to actually show some distinction otherwise you're just being pedantic.

 

[ObserverStatus]

I don't understand, if the audience is tired of xenomorphs, what's the point of even continuing this franchise? It's certainly not for the story, the story in Prometheus was ridiculous. Can't the movie studio just stop using the Alien brand to trick people into watching this pretentious nonsense and make something original?

 

[Canadamus Prime]

I more surprised to learn that there's going to be a Prometheus 2.

 

[Neurotic Void Melody]

Just watched the film...and really ...i dont understand the hate. It was enjoyable and mysterious as an experience. It kept me interested...the characters werent 'bad' as people like to keep saying, but how can you flesh out that many characters with everything else in the film anyway? I only remember one interesting character from alien...what were people expecting? I mean really?
Bring on the next one, i say! I am willing to be surprised! (positivity!)

 

[Grumman]

Just watched the film...and really ...i dont understand the hate. It was enjoyable and mysterious as an experience. It kept me interested...the characters werent 'bad' as people like to keep saying, but how can you flesh out that many characters with everything else in the film anyway?

The characters /were/ bad. Even if you don't have enough screen time to show a character in depth, what you /do/ show - that glimpse into the life of the character - should not be offensively stupid. For example, /anyone/ thinking it's a good idea to pet the dickcobra - let alone biologists who should recognise its body language as being hostile - is offensively stupid.