Prometheus
I thought the first half was fantastic and well structured. For instance, i could have watched David and his solitary idiosyncrasies for at least another 30 minutes. But then things just got disheveled super quick. For instance, the sudden, mostly forced yet completely casually delivered revelations, that aren’t really discussed at all and are accepted at face value, like “It’s a weapons base, not their home.”, “They want to kill earth.” The pinnacle of this being that even though there never was a ship-wide briefing or discussion about all the developments and insights, the guys at the end sacrifice themselves without even the least bit of questioning or hesitation. Not only did no one ever categorically prove that the Engineers wanted to destroy earth, i don’t think anyone even cared to explain it to everyone at any point before, especially to the guys that are supposed to kill themseves. Yet their commitment to die is instantaneous and even nonchalant.
Such disarray exists due to poor and contrived characterization, but specifically because of a lacking sense of actual centralized command structure. And not only that, there's an absence of basic co-operation. When things go wrong they never have a meeting to share personal insights, figure out what’s going on and how to proceed further. Most don't even display general lasting concern outside the immediacy of a singular dramatic scene. Instead they just go dilly dallying around the ship, dropping their insights into individual smalltalk in a completely “by the way” manner.
Another thing, which is a continuation of this, is that off-camera characters would at times be completely inert in their absence, popping up to serve a single scene and disappear again, while it would make sense they were trying to act in some way, attempting to resolve the various issues. One glaring instance of this is when they try to put the preggo lady in stasis, she violently escapes and then during a lengthy scene involving only her, nobody finds her or appears to be searching for her, and when she reappears nobody questions where she was and what happened. And too bad, because what happened is an interesting story; she was doing a cesarean on herself to deliver an alien baby. But since no one cares, the alien baby is just left somewhere until it grows into an alien adult.
But outside such cumbersome shortcomings, there was plenty of smaller stuff for the nitpickers. Like the guy who is in charge of mapping the tunnels gets lost in the tunnels. But when they ask him where he is, he gives them exact coordinates. Or the med-pod in Theron’s habitat-room, which is there because she’s super anal about surviving all eventualities, is configured for operating on men only. Sure, it was probably for the old guy, along with the whole survival-habitat-room-thingy, but why would you EVER program a machine like that for men only, especially if you need constant care from other personnel, which needs to be healthy to take care of you.
On a closing note, i didn’t like David’s sass. I know the theme with the robots is that their inner life is richer, and darker than we think, but his quips and comebacks were at times downright alarming and too revelatory about his person, yet everyone just brushes them off. I can’t imagine if that’s the case with all the Davids, or even just this one over a longer period of time, that someone wouldn’t have gotten wise to their/his schtick. And don’t get me started on the whole nonsensical evolution into the first actual xenomorph.
Edit:
In response to: http://cavalorn.livejournal.com/584135.html
That interpretation is terrible. I mean, it's not a terrible interpretation, it's very likely a correct interpretation, but it doesn't change the fact that characters in the movie act like senseless buttheads. It's terrible because at this symbolic level, it is plagued by the same discrepancies and nonsense that the movie, taken at face value, is riddled with.
If the goo really reacts to the morality of it's user, then humans shouldn't have turned out bad, as the selfless sacrifice of the Engineer should have resulted in creation of good life. Though are Engineers really good? Human history is plagued by violence, cruelty and destruction. All of which was obviously tolerated until we kill an Engineer, which pretty much trivializes eons of human suffering and elevates the life of a single Engineer as superior to all of human life, raising the behavior toward a single Engineer as the ultimate litmus test of not just morality, but the right to exist of an entire fucking planet. What pompous dicks! Fuck those narcissist, raisin-balls fucks! But also, how moral it is to hold responsible, and punish an entire planet, with the ultimate punishment, for the behavior of a single, localized culture? So what's the point in the end? Engineers are stupid? Everyone's just stupid? If that's the point, well done, great job! The stupidity was palpable! Finally, it's just offensive all around. It's Christian-centric while at the same time shitting all over Christian mythos and dogma, perverting the sacrifice of Christ. What a fucking ridiculous mess. I feel like throwing up chunks of butter and soda, just materializing in my stomach as the physical embodiment of the revulsion toward this turd.
The first half is still wonderful. <3
Such disarray exists due to poor and contrived characterization, but specifically because of a lacking sense of actual centralized command structure. And not only that, there's an absence of basic co-operation. When things go wrong they never have a meeting to share personal insights, figure out what’s going on and how to proceed further. Most don't even display general lasting concern outside the immediacy of a singular dramatic scene. Instead they just go dilly dallying around the ship, dropping their insights into individual smalltalk in a completely “by the way” manner.
Another thing, which is a continuation of this, is that off-camera characters would at times be completely inert in their absence, popping up to serve a single scene and disappear again, while it would make sense they were trying to act in some way, attempting to resolve the various issues. One glaring instance of this is when they try to put the preggo lady in stasis, she violently escapes and then during a lengthy scene involving only her, nobody finds her or appears to be searching for her, and when she reappears nobody questions where she was and what happened. And too bad, because what happened is an interesting story; she was doing a cesarean on herself to deliver an alien baby. But since no one cares, the alien baby is just left somewhere until it grows into an alien adult.
But outside such cumbersome shortcomings, there was plenty of smaller stuff for the nitpickers. Like the guy who is in charge of mapping the tunnels gets lost in the tunnels. But when they ask him where he is, he gives them exact coordinates. Or the med-pod in Theron’s habitat-room, which is there because she’s super anal about surviving all eventualities, is configured for operating on men only. Sure, it was probably for the old guy, along with the whole survival-habitat-room-thingy, but why would you EVER program a machine like that for men only, especially if you need constant care from other personnel, which needs to be healthy to take care of you.
On a closing note, i didn’t like David’s sass. I know the theme with the robots is that their inner life is richer, and darker than we think, but his quips and comebacks were at times downright alarming and too revelatory about his person, yet everyone just brushes them off. I can’t imagine if that’s the case with all the Davids, or even just this one over a longer period of time, that someone wouldn’t have gotten wise to their/his schtick. And don’t get me started on the whole nonsensical evolution into the first actual xenomorph.
Edit:
In response to: http://cavalorn.livejournal.com/584135.html
That interpretation is terrible. I mean, it's not a terrible interpretation, it's very likely a correct interpretation, but it doesn't change the fact that characters in the movie act like senseless buttheads. It's terrible because at this symbolic level, it is plagued by the same discrepancies and nonsense that the movie, taken at face value, is riddled with.
If the goo really reacts to the morality of it's user, then humans shouldn't have turned out bad, as the selfless sacrifice of the Engineer should have resulted in creation of good life. Though are Engineers really good? Human history is plagued by violence, cruelty and destruction. All of which was obviously tolerated until we kill an Engineer, which pretty much trivializes eons of human suffering and elevates the life of a single Engineer as superior to all of human life, raising the behavior toward a single Engineer as the ultimate litmus test of not just morality, but the right to exist of an entire fucking planet. What pompous dicks! Fuck those narcissist, raisin-balls fucks! But also, how moral it is to hold responsible, and punish an entire planet, with the ultimate punishment, for the behavior of a single, localized culture? So what's the point in the end? Engineers are stupid? Everyone's just stupid? If that's the point, well done, great job! The stupidity was palpable! Finally, it's just offensive all around. It's Christian-centric while at the same time shitting all over Christian mythos and dogma, perverting the sacrifice of Christ. What a fucking ridiculous mess. I feel like throwing up chunks of butter and soda, just materializing in my stomach as the physical embodiment of the revulsion toward this turd.
The first half is still wonderful. <3