Prometheus: Connecting the Dots (Part 1)

After a personally mandatory re-watching of the first two Alien movies a few days back, I finally got around to seeing Prometheus with high expectations. The film delivered in exactly the way that I hoped. We get a glimpse into the events before the previous movies, finally revealing several missing pieces of the franchise, especially the original Alien. Each revelation kept me on the edge of my seat, and I left quite satisfied.

Of course, all the information present gave me the urge to figure out how all the movies connect together. A few flowcharts later, and I think I've connected most of it. A lot of these will be kind of obvious to Alien fans, but I figure I should leave a detailed list for the sake of completeness.

Of couse, there are many spoilers below. Continue at your own peril.

You're still here? Awesome! Let's get down to business. For the record, this article will go over the contents of Prometheus. An article next Monday will cover the chronological connection between it and Alien.

First up, the only part that really has me stumped is the opening scene of the film. I just have no idea what to make of it. What is the jockey doing there? What is the nature of his core directive? Is his sacrifice in the name of science or religion? Is it even Earth? Why choose such a horrific way to die? Was it a personal choice or an order? Was it an act of martyrdom or suicide? So many questions!

Regardless, let's look at the interior of the launch site, where the explorers first discover the severed head, the shrine, and the first alien canisters. First off, if the previous movies are to be believed, we already have a pretty good idea of what those creepy canisters have in store. We can tell they're not xenomorph eggs, but they are decidedly hostile using similar methods of attack (the oviduct proboscis, burning acid, etc). This connection is immediately enforced by the engraving behind the head, very clearly displaying the oblong carapace of a xenomorph.

The thing is, seeing the engraving behind the altar (pictured left) challenges what we knew about the aliens. If the first known xenomorph is born in Prometheus, then we don't really know what the xenomorphs are. Previous theories have suggested the popular idea that xenomorphs were a prototype bioweapon, but what purpose does the "shrine" serve? The mural could be mostly a fancy label or safety warning for the space jockeys, but that doesn't quite fit with its aesthetic. If they were the only place they were found, we could say it was a storage chamber, but we find the magazine of canisters a few rooms off. Is this smaller room an incubation chamber? Are the jockeys really trying to create a weapon, or is it something else? Given the violently hostile reactions of the jockey the astronauts awoke from stasis, it seems like they were meant to be weapons for use against humans, but the pieces still don't quite add up for me. Perhaps one of you reading has a theory to share?

The severed head persents its own questions, albeit largely symbolic ones. I believe the connection is between the helmet on the ground and the likeness of the statue, sort of implying that these heads were one and the same. Maybe there's something different, like thoughts on the mortality of life and the endurance of the nonliving? I don't know. I'm just stabbing in the dark. Guess I'll wait for the DVD commentary.

There's a it of a toss-up on the last scene of the film as the new alien emerges from its engineer host. While it doesn't look like the aliens from the previous films, its morphology is unmistakably reminiscent of the xenomorphs. Most theories floating around suggest that the alien is a primitive ancestor of the xenomorphs in Alien(s) while others suggest that this is some sort of xenomorph prototype being developed as a bioweapon by the space jockeys. However, neither of these have really satisfied my curiosity in context of the franchise.  If they are prototypes, why are there thousands of them stockpiled in the arsenal, and why were they also in the statue room? With such burning questions, I've been compelled to formulate my own theory.

I posit that the xenomorph at the end of Prometheus is the queen alien that Ripley destroys at the end of Aliens. It could aptly explain all the discrepancies in morphology, reproduction, development, and spawning. If you watch Aliens, you can tell that the queen is decidedly different from the others (aside from the obvious difference in size). Since the queen is so unique among other xenomorphs, one could suggest that the young xenomorph queen is spawned differently -- namely from one of those mega-facehuggers. If this is the case, the alien queen would be spawning smaller, stunted xenomorphs through heterochronic mutation. This would make the spawn something like a nymph or a drone of the queen's species rather than the classic alien being the adult specimen.

What really seals the deal for me is the similarity in the mandibles of the juvenile alien and the adult queen. Take a look at the picture. You see how that fleshy second moth sticks out? The morphology differs just a little too from the form of the 'morphs for me. However, if we compare it to the mouth of the queen in Aliens, we can see the second mouth extends itself in a similar fashion. The theory isn't perfect by any means, but it leaves me just a little more resolved than the other theories floating about.

However, this still leaves us with some empty spaces to fill to get from the Prometheus to Alien. How do they connect? This is already a pretty long rant, but check out next week. Same bat-time, same bat-channel.