It’s no secret that Fox made Ridley Scott shoehorn an Alien storyline into his original idea for Prometheus. And it’s also no secret what happens in the entire movie has been shown to you if you watch the trailer. So what happens when you watch the movie as an Alien fan? You pay $20 for the IMAX 3D extended 2-hour version of the trailer and come away feeling kinda ripped off. At least that’s what happened to us. What about you? The worldwide release is upon us, so let those spoilers fly!
PROMETHEUS REVIEW: Disappointment, Distilled 30 Years
It’s no secret that Fox made Ridley Scott shoehorn an Alien storyline into his original idea for Prometheus. And it’s also no secret what happens in the entire movie has been shown to you if you watch the trailer. So what happens when you watch the movie as an Alien fan? You pay $20 for the IMAX 3D extended 2-hour version of the trailer and come away feeling kinda ripped off. At least that’s what happened to us. What about you? The worldwide release is upon us, so let those spoilers fly!
Enjoyed the movie! It was visually stunning and some great acting from Elba, Theron, and of course Fassbender. Hats off to the actors, really loved Fassbender’s David android. Idris Elba did a great job of a character which began as just a captain of a ship to a man that was the last line of defense for Earth protection. I had two nitpicks on the story. Spoilers!!! If the aliens die around 2,000 years ago, why didn’t the sole survivor leave to destroy Earth anytime before the Prometheus crew got there? Was he unconscious this whole time or can do beings on the outside need to open the stasis pod? Second I wished at the end when David and Shaw are leaving the planet that Ridley gave us the name of the planet they were going to like at the beginning of the movie(crew #, destination, Ship name, etc). Lastly. I enjoyed the ending with the xenomorph but I thought Ridley missed a opportunity to have Theron’s character not die at the spaceship crash. I though he could have had her wake up from being knocked out by falling debris and stumble to the life pod and open the door to the xenomorph. Similar to Burke’s death in Aliens. I would give this movie a B+.
PS Ridley Scott just stated that the DVD release will be a 20 minute longer cut with 30 minutes of deleted scenes extras so maybe this will improve the movie b/c it usually does(Daredevil/Superman 2 director’s cuts)
Extremely disappointed. watched at an invite only event at BAFTA in London…they said at the start Scott couldn’t make the planned Q + A – everyone was obviously let down at this…but it would have been embarrassing if he was.
General consensus from several audience members at the end – a big, loud, overblown, style-over-substance, muddled mess of a movie. Many plot points not explored or expanded on enough to make sense. Character motivations completely lacking…several dramatic beats completely mistimed at ‘reveals’ that no one would care about (…’Father’…erm… So what? and others)
I’m a huuuge fan of Alien, and even see the good signs of it’s canonical sequels…but this. Strangely utterly underwhelmed. So clearly set up for a sequel yet not even sticking properly to this narrative trope – too much linked with Alien but just not quite…hard to see the creative side of Scott’s mind at work – the opportunistic side won out.
Not good enough that these errors may be resolved in some future cut – that again smacks of opportunism over art.
A genuine shame…I wanted so badly to love it. Sorry to end on a Shakespearean quote -but it’s so apt I have to:
“A tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, but signifying nothing.”
I didn’t like it. At all… To me it was anticlimactic, rushed (sort of) and just weird. I didn’t connect with any of the characters and I as Matt don’t remember any of the character’s name (except for David and Shaw). However i do have to disagree with both of you guys on one topic! Prometheus as I recall takes place in the planet LV-223 and Alien takes place in the planet LV-426 (i didn’t know that. I was having the same doubts but a friend of mine clarified it)… sooo… that space jockey in alien is another story haha. Love you guys. Keep on with the work. Greetings from Venezuela
The Proto-Xenomorph at the end is not a precursor to the Xenomorth in the Alien movie.
Check the room where they shine their torches at the murals there is clearly an image of an Alien, meaning that Xenomorphs existed before Prometheus, in fact the Jesus pose leads you to believe that the space jockeys revered Xenomorths in some way, maybe the Xenomorph as we know it is in fact a natural, biological species that the Space jockeys were tampering with to make a biological weapon, when actually as weapons of mass destruction go there is nothing wrong with the original Xenomorphs.
The planets are different LV-223 and LV-426, but like you, I think that makes the Space jockeys particularly bad pilots and whats with cuddles growing so huge with nothing to eat in the medbay.
I thought the movie was visually stunning, but lacked character development and seems like it started life as a direct tie in, with the crashed ship and all, but then they decided “lets make it something else” and screwed with it!
If they were to have made this a direct prequel that tied in with Alien they could have set it on the same planet and had the Space jockey fused to his seat, unable to get out after the crash, Vickers could have returned to the medbay and got the hugged and kissed by cuddles thus impregnating her with the Xenomorph, Alien queen chestburster.
Shaw and David could then leave the planet and the Juvenile queen alien could return to the crashed Juggernaut looking for a place to lay her eggs, finding a spot below the pilot deck and with a the Space jockey just waiting to be facehugged, thus bringing it full circle and linking it directly to Alien.
The only things then that wouldn’t make sense would be how come the crew of the Nostromo didn’t find any of the facilities or any debris left behind from the Earth ship wreckage only 29 years later in the timeline (Prometheus 2093 / Alien 2122), but at least it would have made more sense that way, who knows, maybe that was more what Ridley was originally going for?
I 100% concur with Matt, this was my big movie of 2012, expections were high, trailer looked fantastic, buzz was huge and then total disappointment on seeing the final film. Visually stunning, hints of a better film but muddled narrative, lack of characterisation, huge plot holes and far too many loose ends and questions. Saw it again in 2D and it was better 2nd time around but still unsatisfying. Real shame as had so much potential. Hope the directors cut addresses the acres of criticism levelled on the film and that it takes enough money to warrant the sequels. Poor show Sir Ridley B- must do better.
I absolutely loved the movie! I think that it tied in with the Alien universe just enough to the point where people can start debates and theorizing together and can be talked about for hours on end as to how they think everything ties to Alien. The fact that Ridley Scott brought us into this interesting (and might I say visually stunning) world, and put more depth into it, sortof creating a bigger mythology to work with, is what makes this movie fantastic to me.
And also, they explain in the movie that they are about to land on LV 223, and if youve watched Alien recently, you can remember that that one took place at LV 426. Yes there were some unanswered questions, but is that even a bad thing? Why is it that we can’t have a film that keeps people talking and discussing (sometimes even arguing about)? I love that we don’t know a lot of the answers yet, it keeps fans invested in their own theories and that much more excited for future installments because of that.
And it had everything you could want in a sci fi movie, fantastic film!
Jake I am all for viewers debating and theorizing after watching a movie, in fact it would be a little disappointing if a movie didn’t spark some sort of debate, visually it was stunning without a doubt, I would expect nothing less from a Ridley Scott film, but overall I still find the whole movie a little bit messy and unconvincing.
And as for everything you could want in a sci fi movie, well if everything you wanted was a predictably linear plot, hollow and empty characters, in-explainable inconsistencies and a lot of effects to gloss over a essentially shabby story line, then yeah, you’re right it had it all!!
I know that it sounds like I didn’t like the movie one iota, but that is not true, I just feel that somewhere, somebody sold out and we got robbed, turning what was a potentially phenomenal masterpiece of a movie into a mere fraction of what it could have been.
Sorry Ridley, I had faith in you, but sadly it seems it was misplaced and hearing many other critic and fan reviews it would appear I am not alone in my feeling of dissatisfaction.
Is it just me?.. but I just couldn’t take my eyes off Nat’s boobs in this review.
I wanted to give an honest opinion of the movie before I posted a comment. I had seen it and then needed to see it again after I listened to Matt and Nat’s review. I know what the naysayers mean when they say they found it lacking and I also read Roger Ebert’s review and I found myself liking the movie very much after taking into consideration Ebert’s high points. What were we expecting? I know I sometimes take my preconceived notions into the theater but I didn’t on Prometheus. I get the feeling a lot of peeps were looking for Pre-Alien and wanted their viewing experience to be literal. I think I got enough old references and enough new material to keep me intrigued. Besides, the special effects were stunning and yes I forked over the extra 3 buck for 3D so I could experience the depth. My only criticism is it could have been longer. I didn’t want all my questions answered but I did want to spend more time with David and some more background on Holloway and Idris Elba’s wonderful portrayal of the pilot would have been awesome. I had done my homework and perused the detailed companion websites and found it enhanced my viewing experience. So I like it a lot. And I am looking forward to Prometheus Part Deux.
BTW – There is a YouTube video which slowed the trailer down and allowed you to see all the action. The trailer divulged a lot but they didn’t show the whole movie in the trailer and certain things they did show weren’t in the movie. Remember Shaw at the mirror?
Well, I for one hope Jason is right, Valoris… an extra 20-minutes of Prometheus on home video could give us some characterization for great actors like Elba, and might even fill in some plot holes and explain things like Zombie Geologists. After all, the extended Aliens and extended Alien3 are the superior films for the extra material! I’m hoping the same goes for Prometheus.
~Matt
Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, it stunk.
I had high hopes! Ridley, the Alien franchise.
Storyline was terrible. The father’s character as well as the daughter’s (Theron) could and should have been removed – no point to them being there.
There wasn’t enough made of the love story – seemed silly.
A few good moments.
Too scattered, overall. Why can’t everyone just give JJ Abrams the script before they shoot? (Now there’s a controversial comment, hahaha)
Saddened me.
Three weeks later I can’t even remember the plot….
Adam, just a suggestion, but probably ‘Nat, you are just gorgeous’ would have been better.
I am sure you’ve got some ‘gentleman’ inside there, somewhere! It wants out and the rest of us want it out!