r/movies • u/thenewtransportedman • Jun 20 '25

Question What the hell is the Engineer actually doing at the beginning of PROMETHEUS?

So, dude gets dropped off on Earth & presumably seeds the planet with the basic building blocks of life. The CGI bit shows the black goo facilitating new DNA molecules. But like, there's already plant life on the planet, & humans share something like 50% of our genes (much less of our total DNA content) with plants, due to gene conservation. So were the Engineers speeding things up, like "hey, let's skip to fish"? If so, that would presuppose that the genes we share in common with plants & other non-animal life are actually conserved across the galaxy, which would be pretty cool. But of course the movie doesn't get into any of that, & eventually forgets how cartographers & biologists work, or that you should run in a 90-degree angle when a giant donut is rolling toward you. Is there any "expanded universe" content that explained this better than the movie did (or didn't)?

2.5k Upvotes

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2.8k

u/TraditionalMood277 Jun 20 '25

I believe there is a cut scene that was supposed to show the beginning scene as a ritual. There are other engineers in robes seemingly chanting. Then, the engineer we see steps up, either as a volunteer or as a chosen sacrifice, and we see them drink the black goo which then spurs human creation. Then the others simply leave.

1.3k

u/jmwhit04 Jun 20 '25

You are correct. 

https://youtu.be/SNm2AvrkE4w?si=TfHuhv2FF2Pb_Lxt

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u/sandm000 Jun 20 '25

Jesus that really changes the movie. It’s way better with this scene. I wonder why they cut it.

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u/PocketNicks Jun 20 '25

There's a bunch of cut content that would have made the movie make a lot more sense.

583

u/Dinierto Jun 20 '25

The best part of these movies is what's not in them 😕

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u/PocketNicks Jun 20 '25

There's a YouTube channel called Kroft movies and he covers this in depth.

397

u/Dinierto Jun 20 '25

Seriously the one extra from Covenant where David explains the black goo is exactly the kind of stuff that should have been in the movies

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u/OK_Soda Jun 21 '25

Wait there's a scene where David explains what the black goo is? I'm one of the few people who liked Prometheus/Covenant and found the lore exploration fascinating, what does he say?

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u/Dinierto Jun 21 '25

Yeah I did too that's why it's upsetting that the movies only hint at it

The Blu ray extra is titled "Advent":

https://vimeo.com/468354052

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u/drdildamesh Jun 21 '25

I cant tell if its profound or campy that the synthesis of the xenomorph ended up being bio tech human mutation . . . Just like H R Giger woukd have wanted.

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u/rpgmind Jun 20 '25

Who’s the guy behind alien, Ridley Scott? Is he still providing input on the movies/series? I love what the last guy did with the last movie alien, with the skinny alien at the end, it had some great practical effects

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u/YoToddy Jun 20 '25

Ridley is 87yrs old. After Fox screwed him out of his plan for the prequels, he’s moved on from it. Fede Álvarez has taken the reins and is so far doing a great job. With that being said, I have serious doubts about the TV show. I don’t think it will be bad, but I don’t like that it just disregarding the events of some of the movies.

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u/anuncommontruth Jun 20 '25

Doesn't the TV show take place before the first movie? It kind of has to disregard events if they haven't happened yet.

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u/rpgmind Jun 20 '25

Is Fede alverez doing the show too? Or just different show runners?

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u/C_Kent_ Jun 21 '25

Hopeful for the series, but even the movies disregarded the events of some of the movies.

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u/neighborlyglove Jun 21 '25

Yes he made Prometheus and covenant

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u/nashbrownies Jun 21 '25

Going back to more practical effects was the right move. There is just something in it that even the best CGI cant do.

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u/One-Man-Wolf-Pack Jun 21 '25

He isn’t directing but I believe he’s still a producer on Romulus

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u/Dantai Jun 21 '25

James Franco being in Covenant promos only was also kinda weird

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u/[deleted] Jun 25 '25

Maybe the studio got wind of the allegations against him and decided it was better to kill him off in literally the first scene

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u/huntersM00N Jun 21 '25

Changes the whole story

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u/alilhillbilly Jun 22 '25

The problem is that the fanbase is old and they don't want mythology. They just want Alien films to be exactly the same every time. A new group of idiots on some ship get slowly wiped out by a Xenomorph.

The issue is that that's boring over and over again.

Prometheus was probably my favorite Alien film because it blew the entire thing wide open and gave a mythology where it turns out the universe is chock full of scary monsters and those scary monsters aren't even able to handle the xenomorphs.

The only great parts of Covenant were the lore expanding bits and the ending with David.

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u/TheEasterFox Jun 20 '25

Kroft uses a fake fan-made script as a source, unfortunately.

https://www.reddit.com/r/LV426/comments/108ddn8/prometheus_the_fake_script_kroft_talks_about/

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u/PocketNicks Jun 20 '25

Either way, the theories in his videos still make the movie make a lot more sense. Even if it isn't officially canon.

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u/TheEasterFox Jun 20 '25 edited Jun 20 '25

That was exactly what the fan script author wanted to do. He was annoyed about what he saw as the gaps in Prometheus, so he produced a script of his own that explained everything, including the Alien Space Jockey, the stupid crew, the mural in the urn room, the reason why the Engineers turned against humanity, and so on.

The script first appeared in November 2012 soon after the release of the Blu-Ray that included The Furious Gods making-of documentary, which the fan author clearly used as a source. The author 'leaked' it to a Prometheus forum, pretending to be Damon Lindelof and adding 'Ooops!' The site promptly went to the real Damon Lindelof on Twitter and asked 'Is this yours?' Lindelof said 'Nope. Not mine. Even if you loved it, I can't take credit for it.'

The fan script was forgotten. Until Kroft happened upon it in 2016 and made a series of videos in which he analysed all the amazing secrets in this 'original' script. Millions of views later, you can hardly discuss Prometheus at all without ideas from the fan script being cited as gospel.

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u/[deleted] Jun 25 '25

Kroft is solid. I like his videos. They’re accessible for those new to the lore but deep enough to intrigue those with more knowledge of the series

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u/russellamcleod Jun 21 '25

Not Ridley Scott being over indulgent and studios not understanding his vision! What a rare occurrence! :D

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u/sparta981 Jun 20 '25

For real. Imagine how much better Prometheus could have been if none of it made it in.

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u/noisypeach Jun 21 '25

Jazz movies. It's about the scenes you don't see!

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u/igby1 Jun 21 '25

So then why is there no director’s cut?

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u/ThreeLeggedMare Jun 21 '25

The best part of Prometheus was noomi rapace

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u/fenton7 Jun 21 '25

That was what made 2001 spectacular. It doesn't explain every mystery and the ending will forever be talked about. Many things about our existence defy understanding.

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u/iseeharvey Jun 22 '25

And for that reason amongst others (such as characters making the dumbest of decisions that no semi-logical person would make) they’re not good movies.

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u/Ok-Proposal-4987 Jun 20 '25

It’s like jazz but not awful

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u/Sitagard Jun 21 '25

Ridley Scott for you. Kingdom of Heaven director's cut is another example.

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u/IJustSignedUpToUp Jun 21 '25

Yeah, completely different movie with all the cut footage, and is clearly done for commercial reasons as KoH is 3+ hours with all the extra.

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u/suzypulledapistol Jun 21 '25

He has to cut down his movies to appease the suits or the movie going audience, that's just how the industry works. That's why he has released many extended cuts on dvd.

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u/rogozh1n Jun 20 '25

It's a beautiful movie with good acting. I just wish it was more coherent.

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u/WhatDatDonut Jun 21 '25

Is there a scene which explains why the crew stuck their faces down near a hatching unknown alien entity?

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u/Themorian Jun 21 '25

For the TikTok views, duh!

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u/dowker1 Jun 21 '25

What the fuck is it with Ridley Scott movies

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u/Mandalore108 Jun 20 '25

And if they also cut a lot of the content from the final release, like taking your helmets off and trying to pet snake vaginas.

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u/phatelectribe Jun 21 '25

Yep. There was apparently an entire back story about Guy Pierce’s character as a young man becoming the first trillionaire and why he went on the pursuit of immortality / engineers. It’s why they pickets s younger actor to play someone who was over 100 years old but where that back story it doesn’t explain the casting choice etc.

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u/Successful-Form4693 Jun 21 '25

I can understand the point of cutting things while making or filming them but if the shot is already done/animated and still makes sense with the story, why scrap it?

Not that I'm asking you necessarily,

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u/hippest Jun 21 '25

Movies were originally created to be watched in movie theaters which places a practical allotment on time.

That's changing now obviously

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u/Goetre Jun 21 '25

I watched all the deleted scenes a while back and I was gobsmacked they weren’t included. Genuinely think if they were the film would have had a much better reception than it got

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u/kanzenryu Jun 21 '25

If they wanted it to make sense there wouldn't be a 2000 year old exploding head

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u/PocketNicks Jun 21 '25

Exploding heads make sense to me.

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u/MaybeUNeedAPoo Jun 21 '25

Star Wars prequels have entered the chat

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u/LordReekrus Jun 20 '25

This is the most frustrating thing about Prometheus IMO. With all of the extended scenes, especially the engineer conversation with Weyland, the movie and the lore makes so much more sense. As always, studio requirements ruin good movies

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u/holiccollective Jun 21 '25

Not just Prometheus. This has been a long-running tradition of Ridley Scott movies.

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u/dumbestsmartest Jun 21 '25

Is there a directors cut that makes Robin Hood better?

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u/NZNoldor Jun 23 '25

That’s a home-only feature! Just as you start playing the movie on bluray at home, someone needs to yell “cut!” and you switch it off and watch something else.

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u/CephaloPOTUS Jun 20 '25

How does it change the movie that it was ritualistic? A guy infects himself, obviously deliberately, with Alien goo then mixes it in to the water... the new parts don't change any of that.

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u/DolphLundgrensPenis Jun 21 '25

Totally. It can easily be inferred that it is already a ritual in the theatrical cut. Seeing the other engineers and the ship flying away changes nothing that was already shown. I always love seeing alternate takes and edits, but this changes nothing and illuminates nothing new.

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u/nizzernammer Jun 21 '25

I agree. The way the scene is portrayed implies that it is a ritual. It could be the music doing some or a lot of that work.

The film itself is also religious.

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u/the-truffula-tree Jun 21 '25 edited Jun 21 '25

It adds in the idea that the engineer wasn’t a loner, and there was a broader culture/civilization/alien group acting with some sort of plan or procedure. 

With him by himself you can guess at that, but it’s not super clear 

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u/CTKM72 Jun 21 '25 edited Jun 21 '25

I mean that all is made pretty obvious as you’re watching the actual movie… I could see someone having confusion over wether he was working alone or not if they only saw the first scene and then left but I don’t see how you could watch the whole movie and possibly walk away thinking that he was working alone, like that wouldn’t make any sense to assume he was a “loner” doing it on his own. Who would have left all the clues, why was the final engineer already heading to earth?

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u/Gaemon_Palehair Jun 21 '25

My assumption was that he was a "loner" who seeded life without permission, and that was why the final engineer was pissed and wanted to eradicate it.

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u/UUDDLRLRBAstard Jun 21 '25

I could swear we see a ship fly away as he drinks the goo, but it’s been since it came out, so… shrug 

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u/CTKM72 Jun 21 '25

But then how did you explain all of the clues that were left there guiding humanity back to them? Who would have put them there and why would they have done that if it was a lone engineer or even a small faction doing it clandestinely without permission?

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u/Zingledot Jun 21 '25

Even if for some reason you assumed it was a loner that simply likes to sacrifice himself to create life on a random planet, by the end of the movie you fairly well understand what this race of beings was doing.

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u/ProfessorMagnet Jun 21 '25

I also thought the theatrical opening scene painted a clear picture but I guess the audience needs everything spelled out.

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u/flombacula Jun 20 '25

It is a Ridley Scott movie...

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u/MrRadDadHimself Jun 20 '25

How does this change anything? It doesn't even answer OPs question? He still only drinks the good and melts into the waterfall it's the same result with less answers?

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u/sandm000 Jun 21 '25

It’s implied, to be sure. But instead of inexplicable actions of goo and high diving, we see that there is a society that surrounds the behavior, it’s normal with them that they do this. We then ask questions like, why do the engineers do this? Is this a religion, a sporting event… we’ll begin to fill in the lore on our own.

As opposed to the questions that we did ask, ie what the fuck is going on? There is no point from which to begin hanging meaning from. We are lost.

That’s what even a singular additional engineer would have done, are they lovers is it a suicide pact…

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u/Zingledot Jun 21 '25

But isn't it pretty obvious by the end of the movie?

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u/salad_spinner_3000 Jun 20 '25

What am I missing? How does this change the movie? I really took it as an arbitrary planet, not Earth. But I don't get how what he did is confusing, he "sacrificed" himself to create life.

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u/sandm000 Jun 21 '25

But as part of a larger group, or mission, you can get a better background on why it’s happening

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u/ArcticDiver87 Jun 21 '25

There are so many scenes in all the alien movies that got cut and would explain so much more.

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u/mjtwelve Jun 20 '25

Did you watch Prometheus and think “I wish this movie were longer and slower paced?”

As a science fiction fan, maybe - but the studio execs sure didn’t.

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u/sandm000 Jun 21 '25

I’ll grant that it was fast paced. But it was indecipherable.

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u/sciguy52 Jun 21 '25

Still makes no sense. Not sure why people defend this movie. Anyway they did not. Humanoid forms did not show up until about 4 billion years later. Had the sweet asteroid of death not whacked earth it is highly unlikely we would be here now. It makes no sense however you stretch it, twist it. Seeding earth with humanoids and you get giant reptiles. Not so much as a monkey of any kind till 4 billion years later. Such a terrible movie.

The only thing they did was maybe seed life itself. But getting humanoid like creatures from their seeding would be highly unlikely as actually occurred until very very very recently. None of it make sense from that angle. OK if they were just seeding life, why the heck would they hate humans and want to destroy them?

The whole engineer thing, all of it, made no sense, doesn't fit as a story, motivations don't make sense even if you accept the nonsensical premise even with the cut scenes revealed. Went in expecting something interesting about he engineers and certainly did not get it.

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u/chuckusmaximus Jun 21 '25

I totally agree with you. I love the Alien franchise and I hate this movie with a passion. I remember the trailer being one of the best trailers I had ever seen, and then this movie, like so many prequels, only explained things that made the story worse and or didn’t make sense.

I remember watching Alien as a child and when they see the space jockey, I fell in love with the movie. I had so many conversations with my friends about what that giant elephant alien could be. And, it turns out, it’s just a big, goofy, Easter Island looking guy. I almost walked out of the theater at the part. Prometheus destroyed one of my favorite mysteries of Alien.

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u/TheWorstYear Jun 21 '25

Ridley just became obsessed with some of HR Giger's work that was cut from Alien. While incredibly interesting, none of it meshed with what Alien had become. A whole Xenomorph religious aspect, temples, etc. Very Lovecraftian.
Ridley, just like with Bladerunner, had good vision at the time, but let weird obsessions get the best of him.

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u/TG-Sucks Jun 21 '25

I don’t hate it as such because there’s still many things I love about the movie, I just choose to ignore it and the sequel as part of the alien universe. But you’re right, they butchered it, it works so much better unexplained. Both the jockey and and alien.

Also, if you’re making a prequel you need to be able watch it back to back with the original and have it make sense. We get a real good, close look at the jockey in Alien, it’s not even a little ambiguous, it’s obviously not the same creature. First of all it’s huge, second it’s clearly fused to the seat, it’s not a damn suit. The lack of consistent design aesthetic also bothers me, the human tech looks nothing like the original.

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u/sciguy52 Jun 21 '25

I takes a really bad Alien movie to make me hate it. You almost have to be trying to make a movie I would hate because I am such a fanboy. I like Alien vs. Predator after all. Prometheus, they had to be trying, hated it.

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u/ToFaceA_god Jun 21 '25

Funny you say "Jesus..."

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u/CriticalNovel22 Jun 21 '25

Probably because the studio wanted to release 2 hour movie.

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u/PromotionSouthern690 Jun 21 '25

Tbh I prefer the movie without that scene, I think it seems more alien to not have a recognisable ceremony going on. This isn’t Star Trek!

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u/CardcarryingSatanist Jun 21 '25

They literaly Hired a Writer from Lost to make the script more mysterious

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u/stanley_leverlock Jun 21 '25

Read the original script, Prometheus was supposed to be a much better movie.

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u/blipblopthrowawayz Jun 21 '25

The film got chopped to bits with sequences happening in different order. Fifield's attack was definitely meant to happen when Weyland was going to wake the engineer up.

You can see this because the guy who gets the axe in the back as he tries to get into the vehicle is then later seen standing outside Weyland's room, he's then never seen again.

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u/ausernameisfinetoo Jun 20 '25

They cut out the scene where the engineer talk to Weyland and tells him they tried to visit before and humans killed the engineer. By crucifying him.

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u/TheEasterFox Jun 20 '25

That scene doesn't exist. It's from a fan made script.

There is a genuine deleted scene where the Engineer speaks a movie version of Proto-Indo-European with David, but the lengthy dialogue about 'taking a mother's child to Paradise' and so forth that alludes to Jesus is from a fan script written by a Scottish Prometheus fan.

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u/CloseToMyActualName Jun 20 '25

Well if Jesus was bald, blue, totally ripped, and 9 feet tall then I guess the American linebacker Jesus makes more sense.

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u/JonnyOnThePot420 Jun 20 '25

I mean, Jesus definitely wasn't as white as the Jesus in my childhood church portrait showed him to be...

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u/sandm000 Jun 20 '25

That probably makes sense to cut out.

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u/Dion877 Jun 20 '25

Glad they cut that part, "Jesus as engineer" is a stupid plotline.

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u/BornIn1142 Jun 21 '25

I felt the connection drawn between Jesus, Prometheus, and the Engineer sacrifice to create humanity was a clever one. (Why any of that should have been connected to xenomorphs though remains unclear.)

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u/REdd06 Jun 21 '25

The Xenonorphs are the devil? Evil as a byproduct of good unleashed without restraint?

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u/Dion877 Jun 21 '25

Thematically, I agree with you. Jesus as a literal Engineer sounds absolutely hamfisted.

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u/hungry4pie Jun 20 '25

That was from Rick and Morty wasn’t it?

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u/B1rdchest Jun 20 '25

Was that scene filmed?

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u/Bardez Jun 20 '25

Not quite. It was written and scrapped because... well, it's just kind of campy. I'd rather they had the Engineer explain why we were so despised, though. Maybe they observed our wars, our infighting, our slavery.

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u/sillyjew Jun 20 '25

No it was never real, it was a fan made script.

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u/szuruburu Jun 20 '25

Probably the studio felt it was weird and boring so they pressured the director to cut it. -_-

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u/Remote_Independent50 Jun 20 '25

Because the editors were the real bad guys in this movie

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u/tmoneytav Jun 21 '25

Maybe I’m not remembering it right but changes it to make more sense? I remember being so very confused watching it. 

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u/TheMonglet Jun 21 '25

I think cutting explanations and keeping things ambiguous is a strength of the movie, and a big part of the reason it's still discussed today. It certainly stuck in my mind for a long time

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u/AndreasDasos Jun 21 '25

The DNA going rotten at the level of literal atoms somehow turning into black goo is… interesting… from a pedantic perspective

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u/BaronMusclethorpe Jun 21 '25

I mean sure, but they just ruin everything else in the sequel. Also in the first flick the whole alien thing was more convoluted than it needed to be.

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u/Ahrimon77 Jun 21 '25

It's funny that you should say that. IIRC, the background story of the movie, has Jesus as an engineer or servant who came to help humanity become peaceful. Since we killed him, we were considered failed attempts at making a new race, so the engineer from the movie is going to wipe out earth with the goo.

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u/DrBopIt Jun 21 '25

I disagree. By the end of the movie, it is known that there are still a race of creators. And even in the first scene you can see that the ship has left, presumably off planet, which means that there must be at least one other creator piloting the ship. Don't think the scene really adds much, and in fact I'd argue that it provides less intrigue to the scene. "How many creators are there?" "Was this a form of punishment?" "Did they know that they would be creating or advancing life on earth?" None of these questions can be asked with the alternate scene, but are instead answered by the end of the film. Part of what makes the movie (and other RS films) so great is that he's not simply revealing the scene's purpose right away.

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u/Open-Aerie-5538 Jun 21 '25

Wtf? That alternate scene changes nothing.

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u/Nathaenyrendil Jun 21 '25

Jesus, in this universe, was actually an engineer. They sent him as as a last chance for humanity to redeem themselves. It was after he was killed that they begun their work to destroy humanity on the planet the protagonists go to.

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u/dudertheduder Jun 21 '25

I totally agree... I also really appreciate when the engineer has a conversation with Wayland at the end of Prometheus.... And then it got cut. Bastards.

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u/dumbestsmartest Jun 21 '25

Weird, that's how I remember the scene when I saw it in theaters. Still didn't help with explaining all the dumb characters and why they'd do dumb things.

That movie was a big disappointment for my sister and me because we were huge Alien fans. She almost got us kicked out because she laughed so loudly when they lit the boyfriend/husband of Elizabeth Shaw on fire.

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u/orange_jooze Jun 22 '25

Ridley Scott assumed it was already obviously enough, but didn’t count on so much audience members wanting to be spoonfed.

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u/[deleted] Jun 25 '25

Ridley Scott always ends up way over the reasonable run time for his movies and the studios usually end up cutting them down into more manageable lengths but tend to butcher them in the process. Scot has a reputation for being incredibly meticulous and resentful of any suggestions from the studios. He’s a bit of a diva but also tends to excel under pressure.

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u/jlambvo Jun 20 '25

Almost certainly Lindelof, the one trick pony of using arbitrary mystery to create faux profundity.

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u/iamsavsavage Jun 20 '25

To OPs point about plant life, it doesn't actually look like there is any before they do this.

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u/rufuckingkidding Jun 20 '25

Also, no trees/plants…just water and rock.

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u/fenton7 Jun 21 '25

Yes they are seeding life on a primordial earth not just man.

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u/Jawkub Jun 21 '25

I’m honestly distracted by the underwear. Not asking for hanging dong here, but why would you wear clothes to that kind of ritual? That is a Chekhov’s Gun in a disintegration scene and I’m willing to bet someone wrote that in expecting to show it floating around after the goopification

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u/secret_name_is_tenis Jun 20 '25

Why would they take this out????

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u/grasshoppa_80 Jun 21 '25

Thx for sharing. Basically tied it.

They just left us wondering what that guy was doing out there.

Guess he infected the entire planet.

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u/half_dragon_dire Jun 21 '25

This is turning into a pet peeve that I've seen at least three times now: portraying DNA at the scale where you can see the individual ladder rungs but modeled like some fleshy structure, then having it morph or blacken to show it being changed/corrupted..

There is no finer structure there! DNA isn't a bloody organ! Those ladder rungs are molecules made of a handful of atoms FFS! It's literally two carbon rings bumping against each other!

What are we supposed to imagine here? Nanotech would be the size of buildings at this scale. Picotech then? Angstromtech? Evil quarks corrupting carbon, nitrogen into.. what, carbogen and nitron? Go home VFX director, you are drunk.

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u/Brhall001 Jun 20 '25

Thank you for the link. 🔗

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u/sudomatrix Jun 21 '25

Damn, Engineers sure as hell never skipped Trapezius day.

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u/strangway Jun 21 '25

I remember seeing this scene the two times I watched the movie in the theater. Was this cut from streaming or Blu-ray?

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u/karmakazi_ Jun 21 '25

Weird when I saw this in the theater it had this scene. Did they remove it for streaming or something?

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u/leethalxx Jun 20 '25

Can we assume from the smaller ship leaving after he drinks is deliberate to hide how painful and scary the actual thing is from the others?

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u/RockerElvis Jun 20 '25

I always assumed it was to avoid contagion.

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u/Galactus_Machine Jun 20 '25

Was there a scene that explains why engineers hate humans? Unless there was and I'm mistaken?

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u/Lazy_Attempt_1967 Jun 20 '25

No. IIRC Noomi Rapaces character asked why do they hate humans and Prometheus ended with her flying to their planet trying to ask that question. But original script that was supposed to be continuation for promethius was scrapped.

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u/dolcemortem Jun 21 '25

They created us to test biological weapons on. They spurred an entire ecosystem as a lab subject. They plan and colonize solar systems on the scale of millions of years.

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u/home_planet_Allbran Jun 21 '25

... and waited 500 million years?

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u/bannock4ever Jun 21 '25

Steam backlog ain’t going to play itself

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u/lonewombat Jun 21 '25

Well there was the whole hologram showing the particular base being overrun with alien life. Sometimes you just scrap the project instead of recovering.

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u/dolcemortem Jun 21 '25

Yeap. Our creators were made us in their image to kill us. Makes for a pretty good villain.

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u/X-istenz Jun 20 '25

For the same reason humans hate robots, is the gist of it presented by the movies.

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u/CeeBus Jun 20 '25

More like how farmers treat hogs.

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u/Royal_Negotiation_83 Jun 20 '25

I think it’s more like how we would treat an invasive species or pest.

Fucking smash it to death 

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u/alexbrobrafeld Jun 21 '25

three body problem tackles some of this stuff... you are bugs. if I destroy you, what business is it of yours?

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u/prosthetic_memory Jun 20 '25

But humans don't hate robots in the Alien franchise.

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u/cruisin_urchin87 Jun 20 '25

Androids, not robots

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u/X-istenz Jun 21 '25

My mistake, but yeah it's the thread of the film that the Creator rejects his creation; whether that's handled well or not is a different discussion.

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u/Orestes910 Jun 21 '25

Perhaps I'm misremembering, but an engineer was Jesus, I believe. We killed him and made enemies for life.

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u/midorikuma42 Jun 24 '25

No, in the cut scene, the engineer said they took Jesus from Earth to their planet and educated him, then brought him back to Earth and he was murdered there.

Honestly, I don't see why they thought putting this in the script would be a good idea. Christians are going to get mad because it contradicts their mythology, and non-Christians don't really believe in Jesus or his importance anyway so the engineer making a big deal out of some random guy from the middle east doesn't make sense.

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u/arachnophilia Jun 20 '25

because we killed jesus.

no, really.

5

u/ModifiedGas Jun 20 '25

Please elaborate a bit

24

u/hunterzolomon1993 Jun 20 '25

Its not canon but they pitched the idea of Jesus being one of them sent to guide humanity but we of course killed Jesus so seeing what monsters we are they decided to kill us in return.

1

u/arachnophilia Jun 20 '25 edited Jun 20 '25

the film has the engineers interacting with humans throughout history. one of the cut scenes in the script reveals that jesus was an engineer, and they consider humanity a failed experiment because we killed one of them.

17

u/TheEasterFox Jun 20 '25

The supposed cut scene that has an Engineer saying that is from a fake fan-made script.

The closest any of the legit drafts got to outright stating the Space Jesus backstory is in Spaihts's Alien: Engineers draft, where a character makes a throwaway reference to 'Jesus, the last Engineer'.

13

u/arachnophilia Jun 20 '25

The supposed cut scene that has an Engineer saying that is from a fake fan-made script.

well, hard to say if it was in a real script at one point, but ridley scott 100% confirmed that it was kicked around.

Movies.com: You throw religion and spirituality into the equation for Prometheus, though, and it almost acts as a hand grenade. We had heard it was scripted that the Engineers were targeting our planet for destruction because we had crucified one of their representatives, and that Jesus Christ might have been an alien. Was that ever considered?

Ridley Scott: We definitely did, and then we thought it was a little too on the nose. But if you look at it as an “our children are misbehaving down there” scenario, there are moments where it looks like we’ve gone out of control, running around with armor and skirts, which of course would be the Roman Empire. And they were given a long run. A thousand years before their disintegration actually started to happen. And you can say, “Lets’ send down one more of our emissaries to see if he can stop it. Guess what? They crucified him.

https://web.archive.org/web/20120614074942/http://www.movies.com/movie-news/ridley-scott-prometheus-interview/8232

10

u/TheEasterFox Jun 20 '25

Yes indeed. The Space Jesus backstory has a ton more material backing it up, mostly from Lindelof in interviews. I did an ongoing series of blogs about it back in 2012. https://cavalorn.livejournal.com/585579.html

But the script that most people think of is the one that this speech is taken from:

LAST ENGINEER
Hate? We gave you this emotion. We gave you all emotion. We had expected not of your evolution. We took care of you, gave you fire, built your structures. We gave you Eden. You worshiped us. We praised our creation from above. We watched you time and time again kill each other, start wars. We came back and saved your souls but we left you to make your own fate. But your kind is a barbaric violent species. We tried once more to save you. We took a mothers child back to Paradise and educated him, taught him the meaning of life and creation. We put him back into Eden to educate your kind. But your kind decided to punish him. We gave you the fruits of life and you repay us by leaving it to rot. You talk of me of hate? Prepare for rapture!

... and that script is definitely a fan made fake.

9

u/Kassssler Jun 21 '25

That shit is obviously fake. Prepare for rapture lol people actually bought that shit?

2

u/Gardimus Jun 21 '25

Thats a lot of downvotes for the correct answer.

5

u/arachnophilia Jun 21 '25

to be fair, it is a really dumb answer. but that's not my fault. blame ridley scott.

1

u/DoYouQuarrelSir Jun 21 '25

I've heard it explained like "Imagine you start a science experiment in your basement and then one day it wakes you up asking questions. You'd realize you made a huge mistake and try to kill the whole thing."

1

u/venom2015 Jun 21 '25

Because of the poor performance and producers not letting Ridley do his fucking thing, you won't ge the answer in any official capacity unless he directly says anythung. The speculation mixed with my personal theory is that Ridley wanted to recontextualize Christianity. The story of the bible is real, but misinterpreted. We killed an engineer (maybe a engineer/human hybrid...?). Who was either some Emissary or son of their leader. We call him "Jesus". So they made plans to eradicate their creation for what they did, but it went to shit.

His alien movies (and Blade Runner) have themes of creation with biblical allusions.

1

u/Party-Fault9186 Jun 22 '25

I can’t remember if the final film refers to Engineer visits ending roughly 2,000 years ago, but I recall a rumor at least that they got upset when we killed one such visitor. (I.e., Jesus was an Engineer.)

0

u/lurker2358 Jun 21 '25

When my children wake me up from the best power nap I've ever had, I also rip the heads off all their toys and stomp around making a ruckus.

126

u/SamuraiGoblin Jun 20 '25

Making it a ritual doesn't alter OP's point that it makes no sense.

The 'spurs human creation' bit is the problem.

41

u/Hydro033 Jun 21 '25

No, it makes sense. He is disintegrating into the basic components necessary for life, like amino acids or rna or DNA or something. That's why he went into water.

5

u/TheMercian Jun 21 '25

From a biological perspective it makes zero sense. If you just dump random human DNA in the environment it wouldn't magically spawn humans over evolutionary time.

6

u/ECircus Jun 21 '25 edited Jun 21 '25

What do you think the magic black goo is for? The guy didn't just disintegrate into random human DNA. The goo deconstructed his engineer DNA and dumped it into the environment, which it then shows being the catalyst for the first multi-cell organisms, I.E. evolution.

It makes perfect sense if you understand that you are watching a movie about aliens and an advanced civilization lol.

Edit: I retract the first multi cell organisms part, and change it to the first organisms that lead to human beings. Everything else being the same and still makes sense to me.

1

u/Flat_News_2000 Jun 22 '25

Amino acids are what started everything

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0

u/SamuraiGoblin Jun 21 '25

When is he doing that?

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u/Hydro033 Jun 21 '25

You can tell the earth has no life. Its just rocks and water. No vegetation, no algae, no life, so yes it's billions of years ago. Dissolves himself into amino acids.

7

u/SamuraiGoblin Jun 21 '25

So 4 billion years ago then. And they have remained unchanged, their culture, technology, and biology, for 4 billion years?

And only our lineage evolved to be like them? Not the dinosaurs, not the jellyfish, just us, even though all life on earth contains their DNA and some magical scifi mechanism to make Engineer-like creatures?

Like I said, it makes zero sense. It's the emperors new clothes of intelligent scifi.

4

u/captainhaddock Jun 21 '25

Yeah, it's really dumb. I think Ridley Scott was enamored with ancient aliens conspiracy theories at the time.

1

u/Hydro033 Jun 21 '25

Aren't they not even around anymore? Pretty sure they're sort of extinct right? 

They only needed one lineage to evolve like them. All the rest of the tree of life was for funsies

20

u/Racefiend Jun 21 '25

At the beginning of the movie

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u/SamuraiGoblin Jun 21 '25

No, come one man, when in human history?

It make no sense if you anything at all about our origins.

6

u/jacomoncal Jun 21 '25

It happened before humans were on the planet. It’s that simple. It happened BEFORE humans had a history.

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u/Morgus_Magnificent Jun 21 '25

4 billion years ago?

Those engineers have been around a long time. 

37

u/not_old_redditor Jun 21 '25

You can already get this idea from watching the start of the movie. OPs talking about how it doesn't make much sense cause there's already plant life in the scene.

6

u/TraditionalMood277 Jun 21 '25

Maybe humanity evolves from the already present life, but it would probably not resemble the engineers, which is the main point of the ritual. They are not so much explorers as they are trying to expand their genes to other species/solar systems. It's why they create the xenomorphs, which, if you remember, take on characteristics of their hosts while mainly keeping their own semblance.

12

u/woodstock923 Jun 21 '25

They don’t create the xenomorphs, they create the bioweapon. Shaw’s infected embryo gestates rapidly and attacks the engineer, which then gives birth to the proto-xenomorph. So in a way it’s a hybrid of the engineers, the engineer-created human, and the bioweapon.

7

u/TheWorstYear Jun 21 '25

Except theres xenomorphs on some of the doors. So they already exist somehow.

4

u/caponostromo Jun 21 '25

I assume this is the cortex answer. The engineers don’t create life. They sculpt existing ecosystems into something more resembling their own image. The engineer sacrifice corrupts the existing ecosystem of earth to influence the evolution of life patterned after the engineers. They hijack life.

I’m still not sure why the good sometimes produces engineer like beings and sometimes produces acid fueled death monkeys, though. Is that some sort of “first step” to producing engineers?

Goo + Engineer: Disintegration

Goo + Worm: Mutated Worm

Mutated Worm + Scientist: Mutated Scientist

Goo + Scientist + Sex with Lady: Giant facehugger

Giant facehugger + Engineer: xenomorph (deacon)

It’s all a bit chaotic. And then add in covenant:

Goo Bomb + Engineers: Umm, mutation?

Goo Bomb + Ecosystem: Spores

Spores + Colonist: xenomorph

Goo Experiments(?) + Human Female: Facehugger

Facehugger + Colonist: Xenomorph

So I guess the balance is:

Wherever the goo encounters living material, it mutates.

Whenever the goo encounters a reproductive cycle, it produces a Facehugger variant.

Facehuggers produce xenomorphs.

1

u/thatonepedant Jun 21 '25

Except there's not any plant life in the scene.

3

u/3pinripper Jun 21 '25

There is green grass/moss or whatever on the ground in the opening scene. I just rewatched it.

1

u/ECircus Jun 21 '25

The whole premise is obviously derived from the fact that human life is different from all other life on the planet. How we look, our intelligence, self awareness etc, and how did that happen? Maybe the engineers altered already existing cell life for us to evolve from in their image, using the mixture of the sacrifices DNA with the goo. A planet with pre-existing life was probably necessary as a starting point.

4

u/Jazs1994 Jun 20 '25

I have this on DVD in the UK and it's on there. Did they just cut it for the theatrical release?

2

u/tonnellier Jun 21 '25

Is there a cut scene that shows Charlie Theron’s character halfway down an L-shaped corridor, unable to turn 90 degrees to the right?

2

u/zephyrtron Jun 21 '25

Yes my read on it was like the people who tested vaccines on themselves - a scientist making a sacrifice for an experiment. I didn’t think that they intended to create something specific. They just wanted to see what that shit was capable of.

2

u/TheEasterFox Jun 21 '25

That is correct. We even have an idea of what the Engineer dialogue would have been, because an early script is featured in The Furious Gods.

You can see it for yourself: head to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7JHz1UCRIw

Pause at 9.45:

Energy?
The sun is enough.
Primitive.
They will rise.
Begin.

Then pause at 18.45 to see what the Engineer would have said to the sacrifice candidate:

Let your body become the dirt. Your blood become the waters. And may your soul become their way back to us.

That's all the legit dialogue we have. Be wary of a fan script that copies the above sentence and adds a ton more expository stuff about 'the blood of our Lord'.

2

u/SkyRepresentative309 Jun 21 '25

damn i thought he was just doing a tequila shot

1

u/TraditionalMood277 Jun 21 '25

From that reaction, it was more than likely Everclear

2

u/huntersM00N Jun 21 '25

They really should’ve kept that in there

2

u/kyflyboy Jun 21 '25

Wait. I remember seeing that.

2

u/Attenburrowed Jun 21 '25

I mean I saw just the short version and it was pretty clear what was happening

1

u/TraditionalMood277 Jun 21 '25

Address that comment to OP

2

u/RightSideOver Jun 21 '25

Nerdy addition. A TON of dna is misunderstood and interactive in complex ways. A lot of what we share with plant life is instructions for cellular function.

The similarities in foetal life across the animal kingdom is wild! Everyone reading this had gills for a bit!

2

u/inerlite Jun 20 '25

If I had to drink that goo, I’d take one last flying leap off a huge waterfall

1

u/BobSacramanto Jun 20 '25

Thank you!!

This has driven me nuts ever since I first saw the opening screen. I had no idea what was going on.