Skip to main content

alien franchise - Why did the Engineers leave the clues to their military installation (as opposed to somewhere else)?


Dr. Shaw (and her boy friend) told the crew of Prometheus in their presentation that Engineers left - as far back as 35,000 years - clues as to the location of their planet in the form of a star pattern in images found all over the globe.



"They want us to find them" - Dr. Elizabeth Shaw




Enter image description here


When they researched the pattern, they found LV-223.


Except that:




  • LV-223 was NOT their home planet, it was their secret military base dedicated to project "Kill 'em all!"




  • The base on LV-223 looked to be a temporary installation from 2000 years ago, NOT a permanent colony from 35,000+ years ago (I don't have canon proof, just the impression I got from the movie).





It seems like the wrong place to leave directions to on both accounts.


Is there some canon explanation (movie detail I missed, interviews/deleted scenes) that explain this seeming contradiction?



Answer



The only thing we know from the movie is that about 2000 years before the crew arrive at the planet some Engineers were planning on using the black liquid to destroy life on Earth.


The military base was certainly not a "secret" as primitive cultures dating back 35000 years were told about its location by the Engineers.


It is safe to assume that the Engineers did not always intend to "kill 'em all" but that at some point prior to 2000 years before the crew arrive they changed their viewpoint on humanity. Shaw and David say as much at the end of the movie



Shaw: "They created us. Then they tried to kill us. They changed their minds. I deserve to know why."


David:...Does it matter why they changed their minds?




As far as why they told them the location of one of their outposts, rather than their home planet we can only speculate, though it seems likely that it was just a precaution.


Note: I reviewed the scene that had the "invitations" from the primitive cultures and all but one* of the drawings were dated BCE (from before when we know that the Engineer's at the outpost were attempting to kill all humans). This seems to corroborate the theory that these drawings really were invitations to meet, and that the Engineer's just hadn't changed their minds about us yet.


The last is Hawaiian, and is dated 680 CE which does not make much sense in any interpretation of the movie.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

harry potter - Do the Kwikspell courses work?

In Harry Potter we are introduced to Kwikspell course in The Chamber of Secrets (and never hear about it again). We see Filch taking courses, presumably by mail. The descriptions of Kwikspell make me think it is for people who are weak in magic (kind of like how Neville was supposed to be when he was younger), but had magic in them nonetheless. However, Ron's comments later in the chapter make it sound like it is mainly for Squibs to learn magic. However, it is strongly implied through out all the books that Squibs are essentially Muggles, and will never be able to do magic. How then is a Kwikspell course supposed to work? Do we have any information to know if it works at all? Is it a scam? An answer from any level of canon is welcome. Answer Kwikspell courses are (probably) useful to some wizards, but not to squibs. The Kwikspell course literature comes with two testimonials. Madam Z. Nettles of Topsham writes: ‘I had no memory for incantations and my potions were a family joke...
Post a Comment
Read more

futurama - How much time is lost in 'Time Keeps on Slippin''

In time Keeps on Slippin' , Farnsworth creates a basketball team which he matures by abusing Chronitons. This leads to time skipping forward by random, but ever increasing amounts. How much time was skipped in this way? Answer Unfortunately, I don't think a good estimate can be made for this, for two reasons: Many of the time skips move forward by an indeterminate amount of time. At one point, the Professor mentions localized regions of space skipping forward much more than others. We then see two young boys on the street below complaining about having to pay social security, only to suddenly become senior citizens and start complaining about wanting their money. Thus, each individual could have experienced a different amount of time skippage.
Post a Comment
Read more

star wars - What "exactly" happens when someone turns to the Dark Side?

When I saw the original Star Wars saga as a kid, the concept of the Dark Side imprinted in me was quite simple. You did a bad thing, so you're a bad person so you go to the Dark Side and keep doing bad things. Now, obviously this doesn't hold true in reality. In my mind it is perfectly reasonable for Luke to kill the Emperor and Vader and then just flee the Death Star and rejoin the Alliance. After all they are at war, those are enemy officers that have captured him and are taunting him by threatening with death of all loved ones and the whole operation was intended to kill the Emperor anyway. The same would hold true for Anakin. He could have killed Mace Windu to save the Chancellor and Padme but that doesn't mean he's going to then go mad and kill all Jedis including children. It doesn't add up from a merely psychological point of view. He had a set of objectives and that made him want to keep the Chancellor alive (quite valid by the way, Mace Windu is quite clums...
Post a Comment
Read more

star trek - Warning regarding forward saucer section in Nemesis?

In Star Trek: Nemesis , just before the Enterprise rams into the Scimitar, Picard sends a text message from his captain's chair arm pad to Troi — who is manning the helm in lieu of the crewman who was just blown out through what was once the view screen — indicating that she should put full impulse on standby. (Literally, if you watch the scene closely, Troi's console prefaces the order with "TXT MSG" !) My question is: Did Picard also somehow warn crew members in the forward saucer section about what was about to happen? The ramming of the Scimitar was a heat of the moment decision. Considering that he also resorted to calling the auto-destruct sequence shortly after (which ended up being offline), he probably was of the mindset that any losses would be acceptable in order to hault Shinzon's march to Earth. Still, I'm curious. Answer The original script indicates that he called for the crew to " brace for impact ". Whether that call (or the comma...
Post a Comment
Read more