November 18, 2013I choose to believe that the Engineers were undergoing the same sort of head first mutation that Fifield was suffering from somehow, or a similar strain. However, their genetics were safeguarded so that if the mutation cycle started up from the spores within the green goo, they would not mutate all the way like Fifield would. So, that left some of them knowing they would head burst before a creature could come out and in a way their genetics were missing a key ingredient that allows both the transformation to complete and the egg laying traits to go forward.
Their x chromosomes are altered, and they have increased testosterone and lower levels of estrogen, creating a man who is genetically coded to be stronger and taller than us, based on levels of hormones and things going on under the surface. David has certain sets of programming, but the Engineers have themselves been engineered genetically by a higher species and follow genetic codes where the junk DNA triggers subroutines in them and not in us, hormones etc regulate the behaviour of most Engineers.
The Weyland corp may have had a manipulative agenda for their crew, and programmed David to do certain things, yet he may gain his own free will. The Engineers could be almost like a runaway faction that was once completely obedient to the Elders.
The idea of the head might not be as important as the idea of the mind. The morphing side of the genetics might usually attack the mind directly. The brain might be more important than the head themes, because it's what's in the head and below the surface that matters.
For some reason I think the Engineers were coded so that certain aspects of the Xenomorph's lifecycle couldn't move all the way through them and caused their heads to explode, or caused the chests to burst prematurely and kept chestbursters down to a minimum... and it needed the addition of Shaw's x chromosome and Holloway's sperm. Making the sex themes/psycho-sexual nature of things in the alien series very important.
Fifield and Millburn ask if the Hammerpede is a boy or girl, but it looks like both. Worms are hermaphroditic so it is both... the Alien species also shares this trait...but has many other traits, and can take traits from its host... The Alien may even be able to evolve faster than any other species, because if it did survive for long enough it would carry its traits to the next generation and be the perfect harvesting tool to carry the genetics forward from one species to the next, if you can use the fire the right way and not get burned.
In my theories the Engineers were coded to not let the mutation cycle start bringing about more octopoid/facehugger creatures and then chestbursters, so the cycle wouldn't keep going forever, but David accidentally got their evolution started again, and it quickly and rapidly moved through the mutation cycle to try to find the traits it needed to get to Original Xeno form... However, it became a Deacon because Shaw was infertile -- she gave it an x chromosome so it is almost there, but the trait it needs to be able to lay eggs is dormant in Shaw's genetics. The Deacon cannot become a Queen... The Ultramorphs become Kings.... but they die even faster than the Hermaphroditic ones if they don't develop a hive. The Hammerpede lacks the ability to transform, the sperm side...But has amazing regen capabilities like worms do.. Worms can split their genetics...it can heal itself in a way similar to the original facehugger, but can't deposit spores. The Hammerpede used genetic memory to try to attack the head and enter the brain or chest...
The brain is as important as the head themes/symbols. In Frankenstein it is the bad brain the monster has that causes him to be a monster... This is similar to some things we see in Prometheus, The modern Frankenstein. David is a monster. He is different than all other androids because his artificial brain has artificial feelings.. Ash said the Alien is the perfect organism, unclouded by conscience and delusions of morality...
However, just because the Alien is instinctive and not burdened by logic all the time, does not mean it is not intelligent. It doesn't mean it doesn't exploit the intelligence of others and control the minds of its drones and warriors... The Alien Queen may control minds in her hive, and Cameron was wrong to say they're in any way like Ants... The characters were wrong, they were so wrong, too many horrible traits from all across the universe in the species.It's more like the wasp/bee idea, the ones that paralyze their ant victims and turn them into Zombies, take full control over their minds, over Fiefield's head/mind, before even changing him all the way... The Alien is building its hive mind before a queen arises because the male side is rising to dominance. The green goo side/green crystal side contains the nanospores already, and David found this out and pieced it together. The green goo is from an alien Queen that reached near maturity, and almost the very last stage of the alien cycle where they become fully intelligent... The green goo is sort of the idea of a Queen's royal jelly, whereas the blackgoo actually is a product of the extremely rare Alien king that some of the factions fight over to try to make the perfect strain(s). In one of spaight's scripts they were almost farming them in beehives, and had 8 different types of alien egg. This particular Engineer faction only has one strain...and big things have very small beginnings. The goo can contain different ratios of spores and nano spores, and the black goo is secreted from an Alien king or male aliens..-- the Engineers worship them and have to kill/sacrifice a King to get this rare highly weaponized form of it. The alien drones and warriors can usually only secrete the black goo and resin to transform the environment in minor ways, to get royal goo you need a king or queen. But a king has his reign and then he dies, its inevitable. The Queens are usually dominant in their species, and males Kings are extremely rare because they start hermaphroditic until the female genetics rises to dominance... the reverse of what happened in Engineers and humans, favoring kings over queens... Weyland wanting a son so bad he created one.
It'd be about worship and obedience to the head of the hive, the colonies, the Empire etc. Mind control, tricks that don't really hurt pyhsically, but emotionally and psychologically... hive minds... possibly collective consciousness and the idea of the singularity.
I think the heads exploded because they were programmed to if infected with one strain of the alien, it was trying to get to the chestburster stage and some of it managed to within their genetics, because they do have x chromosomes, and are a match for us, but the x ad y chromosomes have been altered to produce more and less testosterone.
The series becomes about a parallel path, a parallel evolutionary track that can split away from the creature that normally prefers to take the she approach... and can combine back with it later on in the series... We've never seen a King before because the normally hermaphroditic alien represses its male side as the Queen comes to dominance and controls their minds...
David and Weyland were tricking people/controlling their minds in this movie, and David cut off the feed to Weyland. The head of a company can regenerate like the head of the Hammerpede...because the brains behind the operation is too important, and much work was done to make it so David's head will be able to be revived..
In the early posters there was a green light coming out of a hole in the head statue. There are reasons the characters behave the way they do, and that some people might do the same in similar situations if they were uninformed beforehand... many were picked for their "skills" and ability to be manipulated, as well as their egotism.
Like the happy birthday video for David, the crew interviews in the special features are clues. Weyland corp analyzed each of their psychological profiles, and David might have edited Shaw's dreams/memory to almost program her to respond in certain ways... He didn't plant a fake memory like Blade runner, they used her memories and beliefs, her genetics and her father's image, to their advantage...
Shaw will feel like her mind is about to explode when she finds out all of what Weyland and David did. The Engineers were coded to almost make the organism self destruct within them. The Last Engineer was actually trying to destroy this other factions outpost, cause them to have the outbreak, but stop the outbreak dead in its tracks, kill them all, then stop them from leaving for Earth.... The last Engineer then stepped into his hero chamber and thought all would be well, that the Elders would come pick him up. But a bigger war was brewing back on Paradise. The Hero Engineer had already stopped the supply of this strain, but we kick started the organism again, because the other faction tried to leave a trap for anyone who would come for the goo. The Elders decided not to approach the planet at that time,a s they were engaged in war elsewhere and forgot about the hero engineer/knew the area would be full of deacons and chestburster, but no full xenos who could plant eggs.., they did want to try to take some of the royal goo, but knew the area could be compromised and had no way of knowing if the hero died completing his mission or not.
The Hero engineer actually thinks David is an idiot for screwing it all up, they were planning to go to earth but that Engineer stopped them. the others who were part of his crew of sabateurs only succumbed to the chestburster stage, and it did influence his mind because the infection got into his head, but he was only killing us so he could get off the planet and not leave people alive. He needs the pulse to die out before they become infected. His head was David only worked out the broad strokes and made Janek kill himself. There could be gaps in David's logic because of emotion... Humans are emotional creatures, David almost gets emotional while watching Lawrence of Arabia. The reason logic flew right out the window for Millburn is because his mind was blown... He had never seen anything like it, and he was hypnotized by it. It was not successfully mesmerized by him, and he was being completely illogical because of emotion, and his own inner character, i.e. trying to impress Fifield, and thinking he could handle the situation by spouting something about snake charming (which he may know nothing about, although yes he was a biologist, but may not have any experience handling snakes of any sort, and wanted to appear in control to Fifield who was panicking)... A sort of fight or flight response, Millburn chose to fight back his fright at that point, but the panic and lack of real world experience causes him to act irrationally like Vickers when she keeps running straight and develops tunnel vision... There are problems with the characters characters, i.e. their psychologies, not so much an intelligence thing. They were all found to be easily manipulated by others.