****SPOILER*** David Walter update

Probably the same reason he can have his hand chopped off, staple his face, walk around barefoot over unfriendly terrain, etc. He's not human he's a machine even if he doesn't think so. The eggs aren't going to choke him.

 splatterpunk, sry my wording choice wasn't very clear. I meant, at what point in time did the embryos get swallowed? After some sleep, I think I understand now; I've updated my post. 

Umm. You are all barking down the wrong tree.

Walter was programmed to get the Alien embryos. All the synthetics are. That's all that is. No weird alien mind sex, that part was weird enough already. 

That Walter had a hidden agenda is all possible he had intel on the Prometheus mission.

As for David's being on board at the end. Murthur was offline because of the EMP storm, she couldn't have noticed David's mascarade, tampering with cryoeggs, reprograming her codes. Besides no hole in Walter's neck but scars I don't buy it. Think Fox wants us to go and see the films two, three times each so they can make billions ;) and will decide which one survives based on the majority's preferences. I think David wins here he is a cameleon actor... he's more complex than his brother. Fassbender confirms Walter is more boring and the film isn't very subtle to have us believe in something not shown on screens before like AI-USB transfers...

Ridley confirms David incapacitated Walter then cut off his own hand and impersonated Walter in this Podcast. As for how David was able to communicate with Mother and have control over the ship, I assume because no one thought to rescind David's permissions with the ships A.I after the Prometheus disappeared he simply still had full access. 

Alien: Covenant Spoiler Special With Sir Ridley Scott

Hi, I don't think David needed a voice changer or whatever...At the beginning of Prometheous was seen imitating the voice of the actor in the movie he was watching... 

Walter is dead or alive. I would like to think he will be back as a hero. After all the crashed engineer ship still had power in that console...

OT but Elizabeth Shaw is super dead.  David was our protagonist all along... I just love that he's so messed up and unpredictable. 

I believe it's possible that David processed the entire chain of events up to him gaining access to the covenant and placing the alien embryos in the drawer. He built in some kinda of worm or virus that allowed him a backdoor into all of Weylands products to override and use anything to his advantage to help him complete his mission. It also could have been very similar parameters to the first alien movie where some kind of unknown corporate entity is looking for their next super weapon and without Weylands knowledge, reprogrammed or gave David a secret mission to bring back any viable weapon like materials or technology. When contact with David was lost this hidden corporate entity put Davids override codes into MUTHUR in case he was still alive. David being a machine interpreted his objectives differently and was simply trying to ensure the success of his mission by any means necessary.

Keep in mind that the company doesn't know that David has gone rogue, so his access keys may still be valid.

Or, maybe they programmed him that way... and his access keys are all still valid....

David grabbed the knife in the last fight, while Walter punched his face.

He likely deactivated him again and used that knife as well to cut off his own hand.

Not sure how long Walter stays deactivated after a critical hit but if it's longer than 30 minutes then time is plenty enough so David can swap the roles.

Other than that. I wonder when David ingested that two facehugger-embryos? Looks weird that scene, like a cliche-antagonist revenge-surprise-scenario.

I feel that somewhat supports my theory of a hidden mission from either Weyland Enterprise or some other hidden corporation that wanted and possibly even knew about the bio-weapon making this an actual search and recovery mission disguised as a colony mission. MUTHER could have detected David was still alive or just sent out a wide broadcast, and notified him other humans had arrived, allowing him time to plan ahead and then swallow the alien embryos just before he made contact.

It takes right around 1 minute of screen time from when we last see Walter fighting David to David-as-Walter on the plaza. The way the action plays, that seems like it was all in real time too, not condensed movie time, so not even enough time to change clothes, let alone make matching face cuts and chop your hand off.

According to RS, it was condensed time. He states in the Empire interview that it took a total of 20 minutes for the fight, incapacitating of Walter, taking his clothes, cutting off his own hand, and running after Daniels and Lope. Plenty of time to take Walter's place. Which is what RS also says happened. David did not implant himself in Walter.

What if synths can/could be uploaded and downloaded.....?

Would everyone be okay if David uploaded his core into Ash and became Ash(David finally getting defeated by the crew of Nostromo....head knocked off and burned alive)?    

Uploading yourself into a weak older synth is probably not wise...but maybe he needed to escape again and had little choice?

"David's body was badly damaged, he could not move. Ash propped him against the wall.

Ash "I fear this is the end old friend..."

David "No. ..This is just the beginning..."

"

I'm not sure it would be feasible... If they could upload and download their consciousness so easily, AI would be rife for tampering by anyone and everyone. Pretty sure WY would never allow that.

It was Walter not David at the end. Walter had already decided David was beneath him and it had already shown Walter's reflexes are vastly superior to David's. David gave Walter a choice between two. Only two. But Walter saw that David's mindset was right but that David, himself, was inferior. You can see him thinking about Davids philosophies when David let's Walter in on of his intentions. It can also be seen that the injuries on the android in question matches the one's of Walter but they do not match the one's of David. There is no hole in the neck where Walter stabbed him. It may not be definitive but it's a cool thought.

From reading the novel I am convinced that there was no consciousness-download at play and that Walter is still alive on Planet 4.

In the novel, when David (pretending to be Walter), reaches the rendezvous sight for the cargo lift, he warns Shaw that David is still alive and at large.

From this we can see that David must have deactivated Walter again and was not confident in how long Walter's incapacitation would last. He likely swapped clothes with Walter. David was hoping that if Walter did come running out to warn them, they'd mistake him for himself.

@MonsterZero

re: David downloading himself into Ash

OMG I LOVE IT SO MUCH I'VE JUST HEAD-CANONIZED IT!!! YESSS!

I can picture that scene the way you wrote it and it is AWESOME!!!

It works on so many levels. For one thing, in the novel, during Weyland and David's discussion of Wagner's "Entry of the Gods into Valhalla" David mentioned that the aforementioned Gods were doomed to die in a fire that would beset Valhalla.

So, David's efforts at Godhood being thwarted and him being burnt to a crisp fits very nicely.

Plus, Ash throws Ripley across the room almost exactly the same way David threw Daniels.

And who knows why Ash tried to Kill her by stuffing a rolled up magazine down he throat...? But...it fits pretty well for David because as I've said before, he's a pretty weird dude.

Also, the whole "...you have my sympathies." *Malevolent smile* is very David.

Oh man MonsterZero, I just love your idea so much and I really hope it happens in the next movie.

Walter would have to had to either downloaded David. Why would david make the exact same cut on his face as walter? There would have been no need for it as no one was there during the fight when walter got cut

 Check the directors commentary. R. Scott tells you that you should have been figured out it was David. That Daniels figured it out once he "Walter" was clueless about the cabin and didn't respond to her but had that discombobulated look. 

One definite point we should know it's not Walter is that part of the upgrades is a sort of self healing. We see it at the beginning when the alien bit his hand off (I thought it was the right one and had to act out the scene on my couch lol) and again at the end when he sealed up the puncture in his neck. David instead had to staple his wounds. When is the last film coming out and I hope it has more scenes with the aliens in it.