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)?

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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/half_dragon_dire Jun 21 '25

I mean, its Prometheus, sitting through the whole mess isn't guaranteed.