Skip to main content

alien franchise - How long is the alternate ending of Prometheus, and is it canon?


I just bought my copy of Prometheus on Blu-Ray yesterday and I'm going to watch it tonight. The copy I bought says it has an "alternate ending and beginning". I have two questions about this:




  1. How long is the alternate ending and beginning? I'm likely going to watch the original version first; if I wanted to then watch the alternate version, how much additional time is that? (I probably won't want to watch the entire film again, just the parts that are different)




  2. What is the provenance of the alternate ending and beginning? I do not want spoilers (which is why I am asking here instead of Googling). If you want to include a spoiler block, that's fine, but I am not looking for what the specific plot differences are. What I want to know are things like:



    • Is the alternate version Ridley Scott's vision and the studio made him cut it?


    • Or, vise-versa? Is the alternate beginning and ending something the studio made him include to sell more discs?

    • Is it officially canon?




(In case you can't tell, I'm looking for the most offical Alien experience :-)



Answer



Unlike how some discs are mastered where the alternate beginning/ending is an alternative choice when watching the entire feature, the Prometheus Blu-ray includes the alternate beginning and the alternate ending in the Extras sub-menu as individual clips. So I didn't have to worry about which way to watch the movie: the theatrical way or the alternate way. The only way to watch the entire film is the theatrical release.


The alternate beginning is about 2 minutes in length, and the alternate ending is about 5 minutes long, so they're not very long at all.


The alternate beginning and ending scenes were sanctioned by Ridley Scott. The alternate beginning was a slightly expanded version of the scene with the engineer in the beginning. The alternate ending was an expanded version of Shaw and David's conversation prior to Shaw leaving. It was based on Ridley Scott's original title for the film.



Therefore, these scenes are canon. Furthermore, having watched them, they don't change anything about the plot. They just have different visuals and different dialoge.


For more information about the beginning, see the following spoiler:



The menu before the alternate beginning reveals that the Engineers are seeding Earth with life, something which was questioned by many viewers. The actual text of the menu is:

Scene 7: Arrival of the Engineers

The Engineers touch down on prehistoric Earth for a sacred ritual devoted to the seeding of Intelligent life. Whereas the Theatrical version of the scene is devoted to the Lone Sacrifice Engineer, this early cut features several of his comrades, including the Elder Engineer. The ceremony was filmed with dialogue but unsatisfied with the result, Ridley Scott removed the dialogue entirely.

This sounded to me like the scene would contain dialogue. However, apparently Ridley Scott was so unhappy with how the dialogue turned out that he removed it altogether. All the beginning shows is a few more Engineers on Earth along with the Lone Engineer, and different shots of the Lone Engineer's sacrifice.



And for more information about the ending, see the following spoiler:



The description of the alternate ending from the Blu-Ray's menu reads:

Scenes 141-150: Paradise

This extended scene reveals new information about the Engineer Homeworld as well as some alternate dialogue between Shaw and David. Note that one of Ridley Scott's original titles for the film was Paradise and it was even maintained as a cover title for secrecy during production.

In the scenes, we see an extended version of Shaw uprighting the vehicle she uses to drive to rescue David with more dialogue where Shaw demands to know what the Engineer said before he ripped David's head off. (This exchange was shown in another deleted scene) Then, upon arriving at the ship, Shaw asks David if he can use the Engineers' maps to navigate to where they came from and he says he believes he can (just like before) and goes on to ask why she wants go to. He reveals that there is no word in Human language to describe where the Engineers come from, but the closest would be the word "Paradise"

So it's the same plot (Shaw and David leave for the Engineer Homeworld) just new information about what they might find there.



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Why didn't The Doctor or Clara recognize Missy right away?

So after it was established that Missy is actually both the Master, and the "woman in the shop" who gave Clara the TARDIS number... ...why didn't The Doctor or Clara recognize her right away? I remember the Tenth Doctor in The Sound of Drums stating that Timelords had a way of recognizing other Timelords no matter if they had regenerated. And Clara should have recognized her as well... I'm hoping for a better explanation than "Moffat screwed up", and that I actually missed something after two watchthroughs of the episode. Answer There seems to be a lot of in-canon uncertainty as to the extent to which Time Lords can recognise one another which far pre-dates Moffat's tenure. From the Time Lords page on Wikipedia : Whether or not Time Lords can recognise each other across regenerations is not made entirely clear: In The War Games, the War Chief recognises the Second Doctor despite his regeneration and it is implied that the Doctor knows him when they fir
Post a Comment
Read more

the lord of the rings - Why is Gimli allowed to travel to Valinor?

Gimli was allowed to go to Valinor despite not being a ring bearer. Is this explained in detail or just with the one line "for his love for Galadriel"? Answer There's not much detail about this aside from what's said in Appendix A to Return of the King: We have heard tell that Legolas took Gimli Glóin's son with him because of their great friendship, greater than any that has been between Elf and Dwarf. If this is true, then it is strange indeed: that a Dwarf should be willing to leave Middle-earth for any love, or that the Eldar should receive him, or that the Lords of the West should permit it. But it is said that Gimli went also out of desire to see again the beauty of Galadriel; and it may be that she, being mighty among the Eldar, obtained this grace for him. More cannot be said of this matter. And Appendix B: Then Legolas built a grey ship in Ithilien, and sailed down Anduin and so over Sea; and with him, it is said, went Gimli the Dwarf . And when that sh
Post a Comment
Read more

Did the gatekeeper and the keymaster get intimate in Ghostbusters?

According to TVTropes ( usual warning, don't follow the link or you'll waste half your life in a twisty maze of content ): In Ghostbusters, it's strongly implied that Dana Barret, while possessed by Zuul the Gatekeeper, had sex with Louis Tully, who was possessed by Vinz Clortho the Keymaster (key, gate, get it?), in order to free Big Bad Gozer. In fact, a deleted scene from the movie has Venkman explicitly asking Dana if she and Louis "did it". I turned the quote into a spoiler since it contains really poor-taste joke, but the gist of it is that it's implied that as part of freeing Gozer , the two characters possessed by the Keymaster and the Gatekeeper had sex. Is there any canon confirmation or denial of this theory (canon meaning something from creators' interviews, DVD commentary, script, delete scenes etc...)? Answer The Richard Mueller novelisation and both versions of the script strongly suggest that they didn't have sex (or at the very l
1 comment
Read more

What is the etymology of Doctor Who?

I recently decided to watch Doctor Who, and started viewing the 2005 version. I have the first two episodes from the first season, and I can't help but wonder what is the etymology of the name "Doctor Who"? And why does the protagonist call himself "the Doctor" (or is it "the doctor")? Answer In the very first episode of Doctor Who (way back in 1963), the Doctor has a granddaughter going by the name "Susan Foreman", and the junkyard where the TARDIS is has the sign "I.M. Foreman". Barbara, who becomes one of the Doctor's companions, calls him "Doctor Foreman" (probably assuming that is his name given his relationship to Susan), and Ian (another early companion) does the same in the second episode, to which the Doctor says: Eh? Doctor who? What's he talking about? "Foreman" is most likely selected as a convenient surname for Susan to use because it happened to be on display near where the TARDIS landed.
Post a Comment
Read more