|
I've actually never really understood the idea of canon. This isn't a religion, it's a fictional universe written by a ton of different authors (ok same thing but the later isn't treated as seriously). Who cares what fox says is canon, or even what a particular writer says is canon if it conflicts with something else you personally like better. I don't see AvP as "canon" because it's stupid. Half the comics take the universe and overall plot terrible places so gently caress it. I view the Alien franchise as a slightly more unified SCP foundation, just a bunch of spoopy space stories written around a very general theme and setting. Enjoy the ones you like and ignore the ones you don't. If two things you enjoy slightly contradict each other don't worry about it, it's unreliable narrator or something. Also in my head blade runner, alien, and total recall are all in the same cool gritty corporate distopia scify universe.
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2015 18:40
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 14, 2024 03:57 |
|
|
wuffles posted:My personal theory is that there is a being that gives rise to the engineers that compels them to create xenos--for what reason, I'm not sure. It is the source of the black goo, which is like the royal jelly fed to a regular larvae to make it become the new queen in a honey bee colony. But to make the xeno form the engineers revere (note the position of the xeno relief up high in the chamber while the engineer head is on the ground level, watching over the vessels of goo), the jelly/goo has to be applied to humans--not directly to engineers. Think about it, what happens to each organism that contacts it in Prometheus? The idea in the comics predates Prometheus by a good 20 years.  Alhazred posted:Didn't the queen die in that process? Well yeah, but that was because the Newborn outright killed her. Aside from that the process worked!  Lurdiak posted:Speaking of things that aren't canon... I like to think its the Space Jockeys from Alien - it's even thematically appropriate in the sense of creations usurping their creators, and the Engineers trying to make themselves be in the image of their creators.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2015 18:40
|
|
|
Lurdiak posted:Mad Max has been doing that for ages. It's pretty sweet.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2015 18:43
|
|
|
Xenomrph posted:I like to think its the Space Jockeys from Alien - it's even thematically appropriate in the sense of creations usurping their creators, and the Engineers trying to make themselves be in the image of their creators. I hate what they did with the mystery of the space jockey so I've just told my self the engineers are not the space jokeys, they just base their space suits off theirs. I mean it's hard to say because we see the engineers on earth like billions of years ago seeding life, so engineers have existed unchanged for a super long time. At the same time in alien the ship they find and the space jockey have been fossilized, a process which takes a very very long time (although not billions of years). The space jockey was actually melded with its "chair" while the engineer was not, despite the design being almost 100% identical. If they are separate species who came first? Also the engineers don't really match their ships/technology. The space Jockey, the aliens, the ship are all obviously designed by the same person. The engineers are just scaled up humans. I loved the idea that the aliens, the Space Jockeys, and all their related technology and life came from some horrific area of space full of similar bio-mechanical lifeforms. It's probably the one thing I can't "get over" from Prometheus. They took one of the most mysterious and alien aliens in all of scify and made it the most boring humanoid startrek "alien" just wearing a suit. I always found the Space Jockey to be way more interesting than the aliens them selves, it's such a compelling mystery that I would have rather had unsolved vs what Prometheus did with it. Has anything been "officially" said regarding the Space Jockey from alien? Was it just a dead engineer in a suit? I can take everything else in Prometheus, but not that. Baronjutter fucked around with this message at 18:55 on Oct 14, 2015 |
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2015 18:48
|
|
|
Lurdiak posted:Speaking of things that aren't canon... Never claimed it was, in fact I stated the it was a personal theory right up front, so I don't understand your point. Scott has mentioned the Prometheus sequel(s) will tie in with Alien and explain some of its origins and that is simply my best guess as to how it might play out.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2015 18:48
|
|
|
Lurdiak posted:Speaking of things that aren't canon... It's totally canon: Shaw asks "They created us; what created them?" I think humans being created as a "necessary" part of the alien's lifecycle assigns far too much meaning and purpose to our existence, at least for the themes of Prometheus. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jRa_xmJ4zXg They made us because they could.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2015 18:54
|
|
|
Baronjutter posted:I've actually never really understood the idea of canon. This isn't a religion, it's a fictional universe written by a ton of different authors (ok same thing but the later isn't treated as seriously). Who cares what fox says is canon, or even what a particular writer says is canon if it conflicts with something else you personally like better. Canon "matters" from a franchise standpoint because narrative cohesion is useful for world-building or maintaining a continuous series, but strict adherence to it can stifle creativity or cause authors to write themselves into a corner. Fans/nerds generally miss the point and fixate on specific attention to minutiae detail at the expense of recognizing a story's themes and ideas (or just plain old good/fun/interesting storytelling). When the Star Wars canon got thrown out there was a lot of gnashing of teeth, but I didn't care. I have a couple Star Wars books I like to re-read because they're fun and I don't give a poo poo that they're "officially not canon". Baronjutter posted:I hate what they did with the mystery of the space jockey so I've just told my self the engineers are not the space jokeys, they just base their space suits off theirs. I mean it's hard to say because we see the engineers on earth like billions of years ago seeding life, so engineers have existed unchanged for a super long time. At the same time in alien the ship they find and the space jockey have been fossilized, a process which takes a very very long time (although not billions of years). The space jockey was actually melded with its "chair" while the engineer was not, despite the design being almost 100% identical. And no, nothing official has said anything about the a Space Jockeys yet.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2015 18:58
|
|
|
Baronjutter posted:Has anything been "officially" said regarding the Space Jockey from alien? Was it just a dead engineer in a suit? I can take everything else in Prometheus, but not that. Its never been officially stated because its self-explanatory. The Engineer in Prometheus is piloting a ship that looks exactly like the derelict ship from Alien, and he's wearing the same type of suit sitting in a very similar position as the Space Jockey. Its hard for me to come up with any other explanation. The Engineer in Prometheus was in a life-support pod for those two thousand years. The Space Jockey just died in his chair so his body fossilized, much like the corpses the crew of Prometheus find laying around, although they don't seem to have been there as long as the Space Jockey has. But hey if it makes you feel better to think up some other explanation, more power to you.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2015 18:59
|
|
|
Was it a Space Jockey, or was it... ancient aliens? Really though, I doubt any answer to what the Space Jockey is would be satisfying.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2015 19:01
|
|
Party Boat posted:It's totally canon: Shaw asks "They created us; what created them?" Oh, sorry, I was unclear, I was saying I really don't consider Prometheus canon to the Alien universe. It's easier that way.
|
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2015 19:02
|
|
|
Hodgepodge posted:Was it a Space Jockey, or was it... ancient aliens? Basebf555 posted:Its never been officially stated because its self-explanatory. The Engineer in Prometheus is piloting a ship that looks exactly like the derelict ship from Alien, and he's wearing the same type of suit sitting in a very similar position as the Space Jockey. Its hard for me to come up with any other explanation. Also the proportions are really different, and the aesthetics of both the ship and the suit are similar, but demonstrably different. Likewise the Juggernaut (the ship from Prometheus) is subtly but noticeably different from Alien. It's as if the Engineers tried to copy the Space Jockey visual style, and didn't quite get it right. I mean we're talking Ridley Scott here. If he wanted the Engineers and Juggernaut to be absolutely identical to the Space Jockey and Derelict, he could have. But he didn't, and I don't think that was an accident. Sure you can handwave it and still keep the Engineers and Space Jockey the same, but I think there's enough room for interpretation to allow for other ideas. Fun fact: the movie 'Soldier' with Kurt Russell is meant to be in the same "universe" as Blade Runner. No, really.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2015 19:13
|
|
|
Xenomrph posted:I mean we're talking Ridley Scott here. If he wanted the Engineers and Juggernaut to be absolutely identical to the Space Jockey and Derelict, he could have. But he didn't, and I don't think that was an accident. I guess I have to concede that point because I was just having a very similar conversation with my roommate the other day where I was on your side of the argument. He was trying to say that the Xenoish thing that comes out of the Engineer at the end is clearly meant to be the same as the classic Alien, and that doesn't make any sense at all because it took a pretty wacky sequence of events to create it, so its quite a coincidence that the same exact thing happened hundreds of years later in Alien right? I tried to explain to him that no, this is clearly something genetically related to the classic Alien, but you can see differences in the texture of its skin, the mechanics of its mouth, etc. Since my roommate is a very casual movie fan and maybe has only seen each Alien film once, he's like "whatever man, just because the skin is a little different doesn't mean poo poo, that's clearly the thing from Alien!". He just wouldn't take my word for it that no, Ridley Scott didn't just accidentally change all that stuff about the Alien, if it was changed it was for a very specific reason. He just rolled his eyes because to him I'm a movie nerd who reads to much into these things.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2015 19:23
|
|
|
Exactly. And the idea of "similar, but not the same" is a recurring motif in the movie, to boot. David and humans, humans and Engineers, the Deacon and Xenomorphs... why not Engineers and Space Jockeys? -edit Also did you strap your roommate to a chair and force his eyes open Clockwork Orange style and make him re watch Alien? And if not, why not? 
Xenomrph fucked around with this message at 19:55 on Oct 14, 2015 |
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2015 19:27
|
|
|
My useless uninteresting fan theory is that the Space Jockeys are super ancient aliens that come from the same neighbourhood or "family" of lifeforms that the alien comes from, or they made them. If you look at earth animals, yeah we have some weird poo poo but to an alien a bear or a raccoon or a dog or a cat or a horse all look related. Pretty much all earth animals have the same organs and skeletal structure, from a cat to a bat to a whale, even birds and lizards are similar enough. There's some planet or corner of the galaxy where life evolved and/or was engineered over time to look like Geiger's very distinctive designs. I imagine all sorts of creatures, cities, entire landscapes that are 100% Geiger. This isn't "earth but with different plants and animals", this is an absolutely alien family of life and technology. Maybe the Space Jockey is nothing more than a bio-mechanical navigator, purpose created to act as the brains of the ship and nothing more. Perhaps everything in this alien domain are purpose-designed bio-mechanical creatures that blur the line between robot, sentient life, and structure/technology. The alien eggs could just have been a bio-weapon designed to prep a planet for colonization, hell the aliens could just be yet another servant species so this alien "society" if you could even call it that. Much like humans terraforming planets, the Space Jockey may have been on a similar mission. We don't know what the end-game for an alien infestation is, perhaps their hives eventually serve another purpose, or other unseen life forms come from their life-cycle or are supposed to be added later. The aliens might just be step 1 in establishing a whole ecosystem of Geiger creatures. I like that idea that the aliens are just the tip of a massive penis themed bio-mechanical iceberg. I like the idea that this whole "family" of Geiger-life has absolutely no relation or interest in humans. And I think what would keep the franchise fresh is to stop obsessing over the specific alien we see in the movies and instead develop this whole family of life and the society (if it even is one) that created it. I want poo poo so weird and alien we feel the alien is relatable to. I want planetary hives of eldrich geiger life that think and act in ways we cannot comprehend or relate to in any way. I want the aliens and what ever created them to be just a minor part of a massive lovecraftian web of horrible alien intellect and ancient maddening motives. Where do the engineers fit in? I don't know, stupid boring humanoids like us who reverse engineered this society's tech in the hopes of spreading our sort of life around the universe a bit so the galaxy isn't just a soup of geiger poo poo?
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2015 20:04
|
|
|
Xenomrph posted:Also did you strap your roommate to a chair and force his eyes open Clockwork Orange style and make him re watch Alien? He's really not a movie person at all, the only reason he even watched Prometheus is because it was on one Sunday morning when he was hung over. He's not looking to re-watch Alien or any movie ever, he'd rather go out with friends or play guitar or something(he's a much more functional person that I am). From my experience the idea of re-watching movies is a bizarre concept to a lot of people. The topic of Lawrence of Arabia came up at a family dinner the other night and without thinking I said "Oh man I love that movie! I watch it every few months!". This drew worried looks as my extended family all collectively wondered just how much of my free time I spend sitting on my rear end watching movies.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2015 20:24
|
|
|
In a good movie there's more stuff than can be digested or even noticed in a single viewing. I'm certainly not a "movie guy" but I can stand to watch some really good movies multiple times, either after enough years or reading some new take on the movie or watching it socially with other people
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2015 21:07
|
|
|
Basebf555 posted:He's really not a movie person at all  Euthanize him. It's for the best, really.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2015 21:11
|
|
|
Basebf555 posted:I go back and forth about the issue of whether the Engineers created the Xenomorph from the black goo, or if the Xenomorph already existed somewhere and the black goo is a byproduct of the Engineers experiments on them. This is also a theme at the centre of Blade Runner, albeit in a different form.
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2015 01:49
|
|
|
The key to Prometheus is in how the opening scene is interpreted. Shaw, of course, believes that the statue-man's disintegration is the literal story an Ancient Alien landing on a primordial Earth and 'seeding' it with life. This interpretation has become generally accepted as 'canon'. (Although Scott himself has noted that this specific scene doesn't necessarily take place on Earth, it's still considered analogous to what 'actually did' happen here.) The trick is that Shaw has totally misinterpreted the imagery; the alien man did not emerge from the UFO to sacrifice himself. He is sacrificing himself to the UFO. That's to say that the guy in the opening scene has no idea what his own God wants from him, and he himself is acting on faith. We can even assume that this whole scene is taking place on their own homeworld.
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2015 04:37
|
|
|
It's cool to see complaints that Prometheus didn't explain things occasionally come from the same people that complain about Nolan's exposition. But yeah, that opening is beautiful and amazing and enigmatic. When I saw it at the movies, the girl I was with had literally never watched a sci fi film. Talk about getting thrown in at the deep end.
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2015 04:44
|
|
|
Baronjutter posted:Has it actually been determined if queens are the only way the aliens can make more of them selves, or can a single loose drone eventually establish a colony ala Alien Isolation / Alien deleted scenes. Because if a single drone can't reproduce if in isolation that makes them fairly useless in the long run. Pretty sure the player character Alien in one of the AVP games end up turning into a queen.
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2015 05:28
|
|
|
SirDrone posted:Pretty sure the player character Alien in one of the AVP games end up turning into a queen. Yes the 2010 game by Rebellion. At the end of the campaign the player alien is taken to a facility and matures into a queen. Here's the scene on YouTube
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2015 12:42
|
|
|
In my headcanon any unit can turn into a queen because chess.
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2015 12:59
|
|
|
I think it's kind of dumb that "xenomorph" became the de facto name for the Alien species. It was just Gorman's fancy pants way of saying "alien life form".
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2015 19:47
|
|
|
Gargamel Gibson posted:I think it's kind of dumb that "xenomorph" became the de facto name for the Alien species. It was just Gorman's fancy pants way of saying "alien life form". Yet at the same time there's equally awful alien fans that will launch into a massive rant about how calling the alien the xenomorph is incredibly incorrect and anyone who calls it that is not a true fan. I'm just going to call them something less controversial like "legos". It is kinda weird though how they're never given an official name. Not even in alien 4 does the science dude call them something? Wans't some latin name thrown around or was that only in the comics? Baronjutter fucked around with this message at 20:07 on Oct 15, 2015 |
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2015 19:50
|
|
|
Sorry.
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2015 20:05
|
|
Gargamel Gibson posted:I think it's kind of dumb that "xenomorph" became the de facto name for the Alien species. It was just Gorman's fancy pants way of saying "alien life form". It's slightly better than just calling them "Alien".
|
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2015 20:20
|
|
|
Gargamel Gibson posted:I think it's kind of dumb that "xenomorph" became the de facto name for the Alien species. It was just Gorman's fancy pants way of saying "alien life form".
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2015 20:36
|
|
|
Xenomrph posted:It's a unique-sounding word that's convenient and easy to recognize, so you're not saying something clunky like "capital-A Aliens" or "the Aliens from the Alien movies". I'm pretty okay with it. This is exactly why I use the word. Normally I wouldn't use a nonsense term like that if I could just say "alien", but when the franchise is named "Alien", it makes for some confusing sentences.
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2015 20:41
|
|
|
Eighth Passengers.
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2015 20:55
|
|
|
Baronjutter posted:Wans't some latin name thrown around or was that only in the comics? Not very catchy. You would think that in the third and fourth movies Weyland-Yutani/USM would have given them some name, at the very least something boring like Species 4582.
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2015 21:22
|
|
|
Lurdiak posted:It's slightly better than just calling them "Alien". The Aliens, from Aliens.
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2015 21:38
|
|
|
david_a posted:There are two: internecivus raptus ("murderous thief") and linguafoeda acheronsis ("foul tongue from Acheron"). Yeah it's always just "it" or "the creature" or "they".
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2015 21:40
|
|
Baronjutter posted:Yeah it's always just "it" or "the creature" or "they". That big motherfucker.
|
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2015 21:46
|
|
|
Tangentially related, but one of the characters in 'Predators' calls one of the Predators a "space human being".
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2015 22:19
|
|
|
Xenomrph posted:Tangentially related, but one of the characters in 'Predators' calls one of the Predators a "space human being". Problematic
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2015 22:20
|
|
|
It does continue a trend of calling the Predator sexually derogatory things ( "ugly motherfucker", Predator; "pussyface", Predator2), though!
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2015 22:35
|
|
|
Xenomrph posted:Canon, especially in the Alien series, is pretty much whatever you want it to be. Fox has been semi-vague on what is and isn't canon to the point that you're better off making up your own mind. I guess they reneged on the whole Aliens Colonial Marines being canon thing? Bringing Hicks back was the most fan servicey and pointless thing in that whole game.
|
|
#
?
Oct 16, 2015 06:47
|
|
|
Xenomrph posted:It does continue a trend of calling the Predator sexually derogatory things ( "ugly motherfucker", Predator; "pussyface", Predator2), though! That's because it's a vagina who kills muscly men covered in phalluses. Predator is not a subtle movie. gently caress it owns. It really owns that one of the most beloved action movies of all time is really about psycho-sexual emasculation.
|
|
#
?
Oct 16, 2015 07:06
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 14, 2024 03:57 |
|
|
blackguy32 posted:I guess they reneged on the whole Aliens Colonial Marines being canon thing? Bringing Hicks back was the most fan servicey and pointless thing in that whole game.
|
|
#
?
Oct 16, 2015 07:15
|
|