Alien: Earth and Alien: Romulus sequel news

Ultimate Plot holes/questions and answers debate thread

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Engineering

MemberOvomorphJune 14, 2012
********THIS THREAD IS A WORK IN PROGRESS******** These are truncated interpretations of forum members "plot holes" or unaswered questions along with answers and explainations from various members... 1)[u]Is sacrificing one of their kind really the best way they have to create life on earth in the beginning of the film?[/u] 2)[u]Why would Weyland spend so much money to fund a mission with no hard evidence that Shaw and Holloway's theories are correct?[/u] [b]He's a multi-quadrillionaire or mega-rich for that matter. Money is no object and immortality is his only desire.[/b] 3)[u]Why is Shaw portrayed as a Christian believer yet she forms a hypothesis that contradicts Christian beliefs?[/u] [b]In the film someone says that her beliefs are incorrect because the Engineers created humans. She answers with "Yes, but who made them?" She has her own beliefs that are obviously based in Christianity but every Christian does not believe or worship in the same way.[/b] 4)[u]Why was Weyland playing like he was dead and hiding in cryo besides plot reasons?[/u] [b]He was in cryo to preserve the short time he had to live. As far as why he hid it from the crew perhaps he's an eccentric multi-quadrillionaire who likes to mess with people's heads. Or, if the comany and share holders believe he's dead he could be doing it for some business reasons.[/b] 5)[u]Why is Vickers being Weyland's daughter kept a secret?[/u] [b]Vickers being Weyland's daughter is kept secret from the audience. Never in the film does it suggest that this fact is kept from the crew. She has a different last name but that doesn't mean that the last name was made up. Maybe a married name or she kept her mother's last name.[/b] 6)[u]Why does Vickers even go on the mission when it's against her best intrest in regards to taking over Weyland Industries? It's not in her best intrest if other "sharks" are on earth plotting to take over the company while she's on the mission.[/u] [b]For one Weyland is not dead so the company is still his. Also, Vickers obviously has daddy issues. Her father prefers a replicant to her. Her father is dying. She expresses that in her opinion the mission is a joke and will not be successful therefore she believes her father is going to die on the mission. She looks at the mission as her last chance to redeem herself or win her father's love away from David.[/b] 7)[u]Why does Weyland take the voyage instead of sending a probe and funding further medical research?[/u] [b]What medical research is going to uncover immortality?[/b] 8)[u]Why does Weyland think he can appreciate or understand immortality or the Engineers reasoning and capabilities when he himself states that his creatioin, David, cannot appreciate the immortality he has been given because he has no soul?[/u] [b]Again, he's an eccentric, multi-quadrillionaire. He created another lifeform. He also obviously thinks he is on equal footing with the gods or Engineers. He is incredibly self rightious. And, unlike David, he has a soul.[/b] 9)[u]Why does the crew rush into the temple instead of waiting for the pups to finish mapping?[/u] [b]They never go into any area of the pyramid that has not been mapped.[/b] 10)[u]Why would the crew remove their helmets when they admit that, though breathable, it could still be dangerous?[/u] [b]Once they find out it's breathable they never say anything about a chance of it still being dangerous. In fact, someone states that the air is, in fact, cleaner than earth's air.[/b] 11)[u]Why does David shine a flashlight at a hologram?[/u] [b]He's in a very dark place and has a flashlight in his hand. When most people are in the dark and hear or see something moving they usually will shine said flashlight in that direction.[/b] 12)[u]How does Fifield and Milburn get lost when Fifield is in charge of the pups?[/u] [b]The pup readout was loading to the display on the ship, Fifield had a piece of the equipment that showed them the readout however when he and Millburn decided to leave rather near their point of entry he had to leave the equipment with the crew who were staying so they could continue to find their way. Fifield and Millburn being men both think they can find their own way and don't bother contacting Janek for directions. Then the storm hits knocking out contact.[/b] 13)[u]Why are geologist Fifield and biologist Millburn not interested in the uber-important descoveries that the team make in the pyramid?[/u] [b]It's possible that they are too frightened to care about their careers at that point. Or better yet they are interested but are smart enough to hang back until the pyramid is found to be safe and without threat.[/b] 14)[u]Why is Millburn stupid enough to try to pet the hammerpeede?[/u] [b]Perhaps his inquisitive, biologist nature that was talked about being absent in question #36 has finally got the better of him. Also, Fifield had just showed him that he had marajuana in his resperator. This could explain why Fifield is super paranoid as well as why Millburn wants to pet the hammerpeede. Fifield is paranoid because he's stoned and Millburn is trying to show off in order to impress Fifield so he'll share the marajuana.[/b] 15)[u]How is human dna and engineer dna a match yet there are differences between them?[/u] 16)[u]Why doesn't the crew ask David to translate Engineer writing when they find out there's a contagion loose?[/u] [b]When they find out Holloway's infected is the first sign of a contagion. At this point they are in the pyramid and find Millburn's body and see that Fifield is missing. They also see the hammerpeede scuttle off which scares them as well. The sh*t has hit the fan at this point.They don't think about or have time to ask David to translate anything as they are trying to hurry and get to the Prometheus to help Holloway. Besides, David is off on his own mission at the orrey in the Juggernaut.[/b] 17)[u]Why does Janek go to have sex with Vickers?[/u] [b]Seriously??? All joking aside, Janek is the captain of the ship. He's not responsible for anything scientific which is what the mapping of the pyramid is. Also, at this point he has told Fifield and Millburn to hunker down and not bugger each other and all is quiet. Finally, at this point, there has been no threat. Just what he believes to be glitches with the pups.[/b] 18)[u]Why does nobody get angry at Janek for dereliction of duty?[/u] [b]See above answer.[/b] 19)[u]Why does David infect Holloway for no reason?[/u] [b]Before David infects Holloway he has a conversation with Weyland who is in cryo. When David leaves he comes upon Vickers lurking in the corridors. She askes David what Weyland said. "He said to try harder" he tells her. Weyland wants to find out what the "black goo" is capable of without being the guinea pig. Could it make him immortal? Could it make him morph into an alien? Could it give him the runs? He tells David to infect someone. David picks the person he likes the least of the crew. [/b] 20)[u]Why does infected Holloway act ok and return to the temple putting his girlfriend and crew in danger?[/u] [b]Holloway has no idea he's infected. He dosn't know what David did. All that happened before they left for the pyramid was what he saw in his eye in the mirror. He could have been thinking he was seeing things due to cryo or space travel or whatever. He didn't display any pain until they were in the ampule room and at that point he asked Shaw if what was going on was bad.[/b] 21)[u]How does David know what 3 months pregnant looks like in terms of an alien?[/u] [b]David tells Shaw she's 3 months pregnant BEFORE he tells her it's not human. He's telling her she's 3 months pregnant in terms of the size of a human fetus at 3 months. He knows they haven't been there for 3 months and that the alien fetus couldn't be that old as they hadn't been there 3 months.[/b] 22)[u]Why does David put Shaw to sleep when she asks him to take the alien fetus out?[/u] [b]First, putting Shaw to sleep and in cryo is the most rational actions he could take as the med-pod only works on males and they don't have the personel to do the procedure.[/b] 23)[u]Why does Shaw not mention David's behavior to anyone after the c-section?[/u] [b]Because his behavior was totally rational.[/b] 24)[u]Why is nobody, especially David,curious about what happened to Shaw and her baby after the c-section?[/u] [b]David trumped Shaw's pregnancy with the surviving Engineer. After he was found, anything else was secondary - which includes Shaw's baby. And David was the only one who SAW the fetus. I doubt he said much, of if he did, he was deliberately vague. Weyland's only concern was meeting his "maker", and since Shaw was obviously alive and coherent, why would Weyland even care? He was on borrowed time, only days to live - if that. He's not going to give a crap about what Shaw was up to.[/b] 25)[u]Why does Janek assume that LV-233 is an "experimental weapons depot" located far away from the Engineer's home world?[/u] [b]Janek explains this himself to Shaw in the film.[/b] 26)[u]If LV-233 is in fact an "experimental weapons depot" why would the Engineers give humans a map to it?[/u] 27)[u]Why is the ships control system started by a flute and controlled with buttons instead of being contolled by a flute OR buttons exclusively?[/u] [b]Do cars start up when you push the gas pedal or stereo buttons? No. They start with keys. The flute is the key the Engineers chose.[/b] 28)[u]Why does the awakened Engineer attack instead of finding out what's going on?[/u] [b]He has just been awakened early from a long sleep by inferior beings who he and his kind created and now want to destroy. These inferior beings have somehow found them and the rest of his beings on the ship are dead. He sees them somewhat of a threat. He has no idea what they know or what they're capable of. Not physically, he knows he can handle them physically. He's worried about what they know about the Juggernauts on the planet and their plan to destroy mankind.[/b] 29)[u]Why do Janek's co-pilots offer up their lives so readily?[/u] [b]First ands foremost the fact that the lifeboat can only sustain life for 2 years means they are going to die before anyone can rescue them anyway. Also, Janek seems to be a boss that they definitely look up to and they obviously respect him to the utmost. Plus, how often do you get a chance to save the entire planet instead of running like a coward?[/b] 30)[u]Why doesn't Vickers run sideways to avoid crash?[/u] 31)[u]Why does the Juggernaut fall straight down during the crash instead of at an angle?[/u] 32)[u]How does a rock hold the crashing Juggernaut up, saving Shaw's life?[/u] [b]If you look you can see that the part of the Juggernaut that lands where Shaw is is sloped inward which means the part of the ship that hit the rock was also lower to the ground when the ship hits. If the ship is sitting flat on flat ground that part of the ship would not be touching the ground.[/b] 33)[u]Why does the Engineer go after Shaw with bare hands when there are more Juggernauts?[/u] [b]See question #28.[/b] 34)[u]How does Shaw's baby grow so big in a confined area with no food source?[/u] [b]The trilobite fetus grew at an alarming rate while inside with what would seem to be little nutrition from Shaw as from the time she had intercourse and was impregnated to the time of the c-section she had not eaten anything. The trilobite just continues this trend after the c-section. Or perhaps the trilobite ate some of the crew members we didn't see much of.[/b] 35)[u]Why does Shaw head for the Engineer's home when she knows they want to destroy humans?[/u] [b]To get answers. She states this at the end of the film. She doesn't care the cost. In her mind she will get answers from the Engineers or die and meet her maker and get answers that way.[/b] 36)[u]How did Shaw manage to acomplish all the feats of strength and daring after a very painful c-section?[/u] [b]Shaw gives herself painkilling shots during the c-section as well as after. The combination of future surgical tools and techniques, the ability of future drugs to kill pain as well as good ol' adrenaline could have easily helped her along.[/b] 37)[u]How did the Trilobite survive the sterilization process?[/u] [b]The Trilobite does have some human DNA and perhaps the Pauling Med-pod's sterilization process is not calibrated for human/alien hybrid parasite trilobite.[/b] 38)[u]Why is the Prometheus no equipped with weapons to blow the Juggernaut up instead of having to fly into it?[/u] [b]Scientific expedition. Not an attack ship.[/b]
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Lopan
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I think the post needs to be a little more open minded then just plot holes. It needs to be about the general feeling of the film also and if you think in a way it is just a little silly or not very well made. These are not really plot holes as such. More so things that leave a viewer a little unconvinced. To me the people that ask these questions are the ones who are thinking and not fooled. To ignore these points without answer just seems like bad writing. In any case i still stand by the fact if any other movie had this many things to question it would be slated. I think we all know that. Why did Skyline get slated ? Poor writing ? Poor story? 1: The crew (17 i think) awake and the first thing they say is. "Hi what is your name" to each other. How did they all get on the ship then ? Get on in silence hide from each other? 2: No weapons other then flame throwers. Why? To me this is unrealistic. I am not saying it should have been an Aliens film at all. I am talking in common sense. A company spends a trillion on a whim that there are gods right? They take no sort of protection to a planet and the ship has no guns on it? Sorry not believable. Surely if this is so deep and something to think about those things should have been in the script. 3: The Engineer ship contains organic life of some sort which means there is oxygen on the ship. I assume the Engineer needs oxygen to breath like humans. Towards the end of the movie the alien ship is destroyed and the engineer does not seem to need any oxygen why? If he does not need any why did his ship have it? Does not make no sense at all. 4: This has been said many times but i do not buy it. The captain asks a number of times. "Where is this character" "I don't know how we will find this person" etc. There is a giant hologram on the ship which clearly shows where everyone is at all times. 5: The 2 guys that go missing. The whole crew go looking for them, including the captain. Why would he go leaving the ship empty? Again before leaving he says "Where are they". The previous night he went to Vickers room i presume. Yet there are cameras on every crew member that leaves the ship. Why not just check the footage on this hugely expensive craft ? They would have seen what happened and know exactly where they are. 6: Before leaving the ship a crew member displays a flamethrower to Shaw. She says something along the lines of "No weapons bla bla bla". No human being would do that. Also the company would not do it. They have spent "Trillions" as pointed out and would protect there investment. Simple 7: The giving birth scene. How comes 10 mins after this happens Shaw is running around like nothing happened? Why did nobody say anything to her when she was covered in blood ? 8: Old man turning up. Unless i am mistaken at the start there is the hologram video in which it is explained he is dead etc. Why is it when he turns up nobody questions it? Human nature would be at least one person saying "WTF is going on". 9: Birth of the Alien from the Engineer. Perhaps it was a time scale thing. I just don't buy the fact in any other movie the birth of any alien happens over time. Even with Shaw it was like 24 hours or perhaps less. The engineer is attacked by a squid type creature an in no less then 2 min screen time an alien has grown and burst's out. Rushed i don't buy it. 10: How they got to the planet. Again perhaps a time restriction but it put me off the movie straight away. "look there is a picture" cut scene "Here we are 2 or 3 years later." No reason nothing just here we are. That is like starting the Iron Movie the very first time and introducing Tony Stark saying "I want to make a suit that is powerful" Cut Scene. He is flying around fighting a monster with no reason behind it. Just poor directing to me. 11: The Biologist. He had 100s of dead engineers to examine but done a runner back to the ship which is when they got lost right? So if he was afraid and did not want any specimen why did he approach the cobra type alien? It does not compute with the character 20 mins previous. 12: The DNA of the alien Engineers is apparently a perfect match for human DNA, despite the fact that they’re like 8-feet tall with grey skin, no body hair, and completely black eyes.
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Krell
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How long will it take for the rest of the people on this site to realize that the movie was pure crapola. You have to be very simple and easy to please to like something of this sort when it turned out so cheap and unintellectual.
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jrh
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Bang-o. Good topic. Very few full-on plot holes in the movie though (at this stage)- more like questions waiting to be answered. Faith in the sequel(s). We'll see. Here's a big one: -IF the creators were a prometheus-like faction of their own race who broke away to come create life on earth... -AND there was a militaristic installation on a planet cultivating a bio-parasite weapon of mass destruction that could wipe us out -THEN why would the creators lead us back (leave a map/invitation) to [i]that[/i] horrific outpost? -In short, why would a map proposing contact lead to a terrible weapons installation where someone's trying to kill us? -Why tf would our creators lead us THERE of all places??? Right into the shit!? Speculations: Not an invitation. A WARNING. A map to what we should go blow up... OR The creators were not a prometheus-like splinter from the rest of their species, they all just decided to create and then destroy us, BUT THEN why leave us the map INTHEFIRSTF*KING PLACE... AND STILL- why the f*k would the map (left before they changed their minds) lead to some barren deadly outpost instead of a place where contact can happen? Did the outpost used to be something different and nice? Was it then changed when the engineers decided to wipe us out? AND It seems way out of character for a race who'd evolved that far to not even try to dialogue with us upon seeing that we'd solved their map and reached the destination planet. ...Maybe the maps weren't meant for us? WTF IS GOING ON???? WHY DECIDE TO CREATE AND DESTROY US (the film asks) and I add to that- if they wanted to destroy us, WHY LEAVE US A F*KING MAP PROPOSING CONTACT, to THAT F*KING DEATH TRAP of ALL PLACES. -Was it meant to be a trap? -Or was the installation formerly all lovely-dovey? -Or was it a warning from "rebellious creators" that their authorities were mounting our doom? Whole premise for the movie needs justification, and is possibly implausible or too weakly thought through, depending on answers in sequel. The truth had better not be "so we could get our heroes off-planet and make a movie." Right now I love it, but if the sequel(s) skip these answers, I will change my opinion to "retards."
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Engineering
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spacyfreak
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Sorry engineer, dont want to destress you at all. Looking forward to some explanations. But as i did read explanations here for days, i can already say that it SUCKs that a hollywood sci-fi plot is SO FILLED UP WITH HINTS that you need days and forums and extra-information to get the picture completed - NEVER KNOWING IF YOU ARE ON THE RIGHT PATH! Where i come from, they call this "TO MUCK AROUND WITH SOMEONE." But as WE are the CUSTOMERS, why they dont give the customers what they want? Some customers want brain-off movies with exploding titts (Battleship). 1-dimensional flick with good vs. bad and some nice CGI Effekts. Other customers want intelligent sci-fi movies with fresh look and inspiring story. Something you can think about. But with some believable answers. What these types of customers DONT want is a 80% miracle-mystery-question-show with hints here, some hint there, and those hints COULD lead you to some "answer", but maybe that hint was put there to lead you to a even WRONGER conclusion? HELL- we talk here about a hollywood sci-fi plot and not about some ARTHOUSE-SHIT for nerdz or rich people who even never understand whats going on, but they THINK they understand...
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Engineering
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C'mon, spacyfreak. I'd really like this thread to work and I'm sure you understand those post spaces are reseved for the information in this thread to be organized. Not sarcastic jokes.
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Custodian
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"groundless substantiation" that's a Lindelof plot-hole, right there; surely. ;)
2013 sci-fi horror novels 'Custodian' and 'Tandem' available from Amazon, B&N, iTunes etc...
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Engineering
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Please be more specific.
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Drakeequation
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Plot Hole Level: Damon Lindelof [img]http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lqwoc4wRwI1qzzta5o1_500.jpg[/img]
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Engineering
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Also, this is tipical of most bad talk about the film on forums. It's usually "It sucks" and "It's crap" with nothing to back it up.
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Engineering
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Wow, screw it. Haters obviously can't talk about the "plot holes" intelligently. Maybe you guys are scared or maybe there are none???
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Drakeequation
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Fine, I'll be a little more specific, these are a few from Julian Sanchez's blog. The movie opens with an alien “Engineer” preparing to seed a primordial planet—presumably Earth—with life. He accomplishes this by drinking a black goop which causes him to die in agony, disintegrating at the cellular level. It looks cool, but forces you to wonder: Is this really the best means available for this incredibly advanced species to introduce genetic material to a planet? It’s a little like finding out that Prometheus brought fire to humanity by setting himself on fire despite the ready availability of kindling. As with many, many other bizarre moments in this movie, this makes sense at a thematic and allegorical level, but fails at the level of elementary plot logic. This is why doing allegory well is hard: Your story actually has to work at a second level without shattering the viewer’s suspension of disbelief on the first level. Throughout the movie, you get the sense that the authors have decided that if it works symbolically, it doesn’t need to make sense narratively. The movie proper begins with the discovery of a glyph that appears in the art of many human civilizations separated by vast distances in time and space. Apparently the configuration of five stars, depicted at the resolution of cave paintings, is sufficient to uniquely identify one area of space 35 light years away. Noomi Rapace concludes that this is an invitation from the aforementioned aliens, who not only visited earth in ancient times, but actually created the human species. Not one shred of evidence for this hypothesis is ever provided, but it’s what Noomi “chooses to believe,” even though this is in fairly obvious tension with Christian doctrine, which she also “chooses to believe.”(She later suggests that maybe God made the aliens, without any acknowledgement that this would rescue deism, not Christianity.) Nevertheless, this is all it takes to persuade the Weyland Corporation to spend a trillion dollars sending not an unmanned probe but a ship full of human scientists on a two-year voyage in cryostasis to see if Erich von Daniken was right after all. A big chunk of this tedious exposition is delivered by a hologram of CEO Peter Weyland, who is inexplicably played by Guy Pearce in bad latex makeup rather than an actual old person, even though no younger version of the character is ever seen. Weyland claims he will have died by the time they see this recording, but this turns out to be a deception: He’s actually also in cryostasis on the ship. Since Weyland’s plan involves him being revived once they’ve made contact with the aliens, he must know that this will be exposed as a deception within a day or two, making the whole elaborate ruse completely pointless, except as a setup for a lame third-act reveal. Ditto the fact that Charlize Theron is Weyland’s daughter: This is kept secret for no reason beyond setting up a meh-inducing late reveal. Her motives are even more opaque. She believes the entire mission is just a hazardous wild goose chase, and only wants to inherit her father’s empire. She joins them on this 4-year-plus mission because she doesn’t want to hang around squabbling over who runs the company… even though her best-case scenario would appear to involve doing this when she gets back from the perilous mission, having given her rivals 5 years to scheme in her absence. Weyland’s primary motive, we eventually learn, is the hope of learning from the aliens some means of further prolonging his life, as he has hit the limits of artificial extension and is near death. Except he can apparently remain alive in cryostasis indefinitely. So instead of funding a probe and further medical research while he waits on ice for the next breakthrough, he has packed himself on this unprecedented and incredibly hazardous voyage. Weyland also takes off on a forced and clunky tangent about how his Android “son” David can’t appreciate his own immortality because he lacks a soul. There’s no hint that scientific supergenius Weyland detects any tension between this quaint notion and his apparent conviction that humans, too, have been “engineered” by an advanced biological race. Upon arriving at their destination, we see that the team has incredibly sophisticated mapping probes, but charge into an alien facility themselves without waiting for the probes to finish scanning the structure. Immediately upon discovering that there’s a breathable atmosphere within the facility, one Dr. Holloway brazenly pulls off his helmet—chiding his colleague and lover to not “be a skeptic,” because apparently skepticism is anathema to good scientists. Though it’s later confirmed they have no way of being sure the air isn’t full of strange pathogens, and everyone else points out that this is insane, the rest of the team nevertheless immediately follows suit when it doesn’t result in his instant death. A hologram recording showing the apparent deaths of many of the aliens millennia earlier is triggered. The supposedly superintelligent android shines a flashlight on the holograms in an effort to see them better. The Shaggy and Scooby of the film—a biologist and a geologist—freak out at the sight of dead alien bodies, despite having been willing to truck 35 light years on a perilous exploratory mission, and hasten to head back to the ship in a panic. They get lost, despite the fact that the geologist is the one with mapping expertise. This fear then evaporates as quickly as it appeared, as the biologist decides he should recklessly cozy up to a terrifying alien serpent creature. To nobody’s surprise, it quickly kills the biologist, while his geologist colleague is dissolved in black goop, only to later reappear as a zombie in a completely pointless fight scene. This is a pattern. In almost every scene, members of this handpicked group of top scientists for a trillion-dollar mission routinely make the kind of wildly irrational blunders that we strain to accept when it’s half-drunk teenagers in slasher pics. Nobody, at any time, acts remotely like a scientist The DNA of the alien Engineers is apparently a perfect match for human DNA, despite the fact that they’re like 8-feet tall with grey skin, no body hair, and completely black eyes. Just how this could actually be true so many millions of years later remains a puzzle for the viewer. Android David indicates that he thinks he can read the alien language. Nobody follows up with him on this or suggests that deciphering their records might be urgent, especially when it’s clear they’ve got a lethal contagion on the loose. With half the team out exploring the hazardous alien facility, Space Captain Stringer Bell decides to abandon his post at the comms station to bang Charlize Theron. Which, at some level, fair enough… but nobody ever suggests this is a gross dereliction of duty. Android David infects one of the scientists with the black alien slime for no apparent reason, despite the obvious danger this poses. (Oddly, David’s actions do make sense if you assume he has the same goal as the treacherous android Ash in Alien—to preserve the xenomorph as a biological weapon—though there’s no indication of this, and it would seem to require knowledge none of the characters could possibly have.) The aforementioned infected scientist can see there’s something obviously wrong with him, but instead of immediately seeking medical attention, decides to risk himself and the entire crew—including the love of his life—by pretending he’s just hunky dory until he literally collapses. Android David tells Noomi she seems to be about “three months pregnant” (about ten minutes after we awkwardly introduce the idea that she’s infertile for the first time)—then immediately reveals that the “fetus” is an alien squid thing. Maybe he read something about the normal gestational cycle of alien squid things in the hieroglyphs? Because… how the hell does he know what “three months” looks like? When she pleads with him to cut it out, he attempt to knock her out and put her in stasis, again for reasons unclear. She then neglects to mention this unsporting behavior to anyone, and nobody seems at all curious when she shows up bloodied and bedraggled after performing an emergency auto-caesarian. David, who was previously so keen to retrieve squid-fetus for whatever reason, exhibits no interest in what might have happened to it. At one point, Space Captain Stringer Bell abruptly intuits that they’ve landed at a WMD manufacturing plant wisely situated far from the Engineers’ home world, though it’s not remotely clear that his explanation is anything more than a wild guess. Maybe it’s just what he “chooses to believe”? This raises the additional question: Why did the aliens leave us with an invitation to their weapons depot? The sophisticated alien computer has a sort of flute-like control mechanism, apparently used exclusively to turn the system on, at which point it’s operated by buttons. Which is like having a remote control for your TV, except for the power button, which takes the form of a flute. Why don’t they just have an on button? Or an entirely flute-based control system? Because space, shut up. A member of this incredibly advanced species that created humanity is found in stasis and awakened. Confronted by a group of humans, including an android that speaks its language, and obviously lacking any knowledge of how many others there might be, or what weaponry they might have, this advanced being makes no effort to gather any information. It roars and begins acting like a space monster, attacking the party with its bare hands. When Space Captain Stringer Bell decides he must sacrifice himself to stop the Engineer from returning to earth and destroying humanity, his crew almost gleefully volunteer to join him, on the grounds that he is a bad pilot and will need their help… to ram a spaceship the size of a city block. (As a commenter suggests, it’s possible that this is said sarcastically, and they’re actually just needlessly throwing their lives away in a gesture of solidarity. Hey, what are buddies for?) Charlize Theron is crushed to death when said ship topples because she runs along its falling length instead of, you know, going sideways. (In an apparent repudiation of Newton along with Darwin, the fast-moving ship basically drops out of the sky in a straight line rather than falling in an arc to crash miles away.) Noomi survives because the gazillion ton space ship that has just fallen out of the sky in flames hits… a rock or something. So the ship halts a few inches above her head. The Engineer survives this crash and almost instantly locates Noomi Rapace in order to continue the effort to kill her, again with his bare hands. The rationale for this is, again, totally opaque, especially given that we then learn there are dozens of other ships—possibly including other Engineers in stasis, though nobody exhibits any curiosity about this possibility either. Noomi’s squid-fetus, meanwhile, has grown to monstrous proportions despite being locked in a small room with no sources of food or other places for the additional mass to have come from. We end with Noomi heading for the homeworld of the creatures who we’ve just learned are determined to immediately kill any human they see.
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spacyfreak
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Plotholes.. Plotholes. I would rather say, according to my "expactations", some (or many?) of the reactions of the actors were not "believable". Some call it "lazy writing". Is that a plothole? Plotholes: - whats this guy in the beginning? on earth? when? why? what? All this has been said in maybe hundreds of posts here.. [b]Brief summary of not authentic scenes / acting:[/b] - engineer head scene where it explodes was complete childish crap - the scene with that big squid working on engineer was crap - the alien coming out of engineer was crap ("letz put ONE alien inside, so that nobody can say that there was no alien...") - did not like vickers character at all. Its "her" ship, but noone cares or does what she says, and that does not have any consequences - what did FORD do? complete wasted role. Shaw beats here, and 5 minutes later ford is there with weyland and the engineer... - geologist and biologist dont are there finding the most interesting thing of all times - and they dont want to stay? ..hm... - why geologist (!) with superb tech. instruments can be LOST in that cave? - biologist finds alien snake and wants to pet.. alllll right... hm - shaw has hard operation, and then she walks and jumps around..hm - shaw comes to the weyland room after operation, nobody is interested why she is bleeding and where is this blood coming form? hmmm - squid baby was sterilized after operation, some hours later there is a 3 meter squid and feels very alife... hm - weyland and david go to the engineer who did sleep for 2000 years, and after he opens his eyes, they ask immidiately for "eternal life".. hm - no security on the ship. Dont they have some rockets to shoot the derelict, NO they have to do kamikaze. Aha. Just to fit this "mystery sacrifize theme" i think.. but thats very unreal - vickers is unfriendly without a reason, no leader would be that way. no authority by nature, wrong actress for that role if you ask me ......
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Drakeequation
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I will play Devil's Advocate here and defend the film against spacyfreak's plothole allegations: - engineer head scene where it explodes was complete childish crap This is not a description of a plot hole, you simply did not like this scene it seems. - the scene with that big squid working on engineer was crap Once again, this is not a description of a plot hole. - the alien coming out of engineer was crap ("letz put ONE alien inside, so that nobody can say that there was no alien...") Yet another example of something you did not like but that was not a plot hole. - did not like vickers character at all. Its "her" ship, but noone cares or does what she says, and that does not have any consequences Not a plot hole. - what did FORD do? complete wasted role. Shaw beats here, and 5 minutes later ford is there with weyland and the engineer... Not a plot hole. - geologist and biologist dont are there finding the most interesting thing of all times - and they dont want to stay? ..hm... It could be possible that they were simply too frightened to care about their careers at that point. - why geologist (!) with superb tech. instruments can be LOST in that cave? The map readout was loading to the display on the ship, the geologist did not have the map and lost contact with the ship due to the storm. - biologist finds alien snake and wants to pet.. alllll right... hm He may have simply calmed down enough to finally let his inquisitive nature get the better of him. - shaw has hard operation, and then she walks and jumps around..hm Well they did show her injecting herself with painkillers after the operation and in the future painkillers maybe much stronger than they are now. - shaw comes to the weyland room after operation, nobody is interested why she is bleeding and where is this blood coming form? hmmm Perhaps Weyland assumed that his team had extracted the fetus from Shaw and stored it as a sample and now she was here. This is just speculation of course, this is a legitimate plot hole as nothing shown in the film can actually account for the casual reaction they show. - squid baby was sterilized after operation, some hours later there is a 3 meter squid and feels very alife... hm The sterilization measures programmed into the med pod probably are not calibrated for human/alien hybrid parasite squid. - weyland and david go to the engineer who did sleep for 2000 years, and after he opens his eyes, they ask immidiately for "eternal life".. hm Not sure how this is a plot hole, maybe silly on their part but Weyland is old and has one thing on his mind. - no security on the ship. Dont they have some rockets to shoot the derelict, NO they have to do kamikaze. Aha. Just to fit this "mystery sacrifize theme" i think.. but thats very unreal Well outfitting a scientific exploratory vessel with missiles probably seemed like overkill as most people probably did not think they would find alien life or, if they did, that they would engage in aerial combat. - vickers is unfriendly without a reason, no leader would be that way. no authority by nature, wrong actress for that role if you ask me Many authority figures are unfriendly, and throughout history there have been some truly evil and sadistic individuals who rose to positions of power. This is not a plot hole.
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spacyfreak
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AHH that was really HELPFULL. As said, you can talk everything and anything in which way it SHOULD (or could?) be seen so that it sounds like "it makes sense", but my feeling (FEELING) and the feeling of many others is - there are lots of scenes (mentioned above) that dont give you the idea "this is real, i am THERE". I was not there the most time, i was wondering what the shit all these "scientists" are doing. In comparison, when i see ALIEN, that crew acts different. Believable! They talk the funny "bonus-situation". i had a good laugh on these two mechanics doing their jokes. But the captain (and ash) tell them about the bonus situation. When ripley comes to the two mechanics and there is some "gas" coming out of the wall, and they can not talk as its so loud. When she leaves, the put it OFF. Funny, BELIEVABLE guys. Maybe most things mentioned are just QUESTION OF TASTE. So as discussed a dozend times, i am ready with it. Enjoy the movie - i did. Though it did not deliver in the way i hoped for. Hopefully sequel will deliver the rest puzzles i miss desperatlly. ***************************************************************************** END OF TRANSMISSION ABOUT PLOTHOLES LINDELOST AND BAD ACTORS.
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Maiafay
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[quote]Android David infects one of the scientists with the black alien slime for no apparent reason, despite the obvious danger this poses. (Oddly, David’s actions do make sense if you assume he has the same goal as the treacherous android Ash in Alien—to preserve the xenomorph as a biological weapon—though there’s no indication of this, and it would seem to require knowledge none of the characters could possibly have.) [/quote] I'm really surprised this keeps being labeled as a plot hole. The scene prior, David is talking with someone (Weyland) in cryostasis. It's obvious Weyland is ordering David to "try harder", aka, "find out everything you can about these Engineers". David looks uncertain when he's bringing the bottle of wine for Holloway, as if he's unsure whether or not to go through with it. Holloway of course makes it easier by being a dick, and David asks "How far would you go to get your answers? What would you be willing to do?" To me, this is David rationalizing what he's about to do, and even asking permission in a backwards way. Again, Weyland ordered David to study the goo. David chose the human he disliked the most to infect. The pieces are there for you to connect. Must everything be spelled out? Not a plot hole.
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spacyfreak
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Come on - so just to find out what the goo does to a human, the robot (you remember the 3 robot laws??) just "asks" him what he would do for truth, and as holloway says "everything & anything", thats enough reason for David to use him as a genua pig? KIDDING? I would expect some animals for testing, or simply do some chemical testing, i did not see ANYBODY do a chemical scientific test, WHAT is inside of this GOO ! PLOTHOLE! NOT BELIEVABLE!

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