Thoughts on Prometheus (spoilers)...

 Prometheus will likely end its run at cinemas in the next couple of weeks and have achieved somewhere close to a worldwide box office total near $310 million. Whilst this figure is certainly nothing to get excited about, given the hype surrounding the film, it has been considered enough of a success that a sequel has been recently been given the go-ahead. 

Since release, it has met with a mixed response from audiences, with the majority still giving generally favourable reviews. Now, even as a die-hard fan of the Alien franchise, I don’t intend to use this blog to promote how amazing I found the film and bash those who had reservations. Instead, I am going to focus on the possible factors behind some of the negative press it received, in addition to why it didn’t achieve the financial success  many had expected. 

Despite the excitement over Prometheus, one must remember the last films in the Alien series, Alien vs. Predator (2004) and Alien vs. Predator: Requiem (2007), only made $172million and $128 million respectively, and were almost universally panned with even diehard fans in no rush for a further instalment. Given the state of the franchise, if not for the involvement of Ridley Scott, director of the original Alien (1979), it is debatable whether Prometheus would have been green-lit by 20^th Century Fox with this level of exposure. That being said, whilst Scott’s reputation as one of the world’s leading directors can’t be denied, his films over the last decade have not been met with the acclaim of previous efforts.  Kingdom of Heaven (2004), A Good Year (2006), American Gangster (2007), Body of Lies (2008), Robin Hood (2010) all came and went without lingering in the memory for long. It is back in 2000 with Gladiator where Scott last displayed he still had ‘it’. 

Credit goes to Scott however, as, despite alleged pressure from Fox, the film continued with its R rating in the United States which would automatically have an adverse effects on audience figures, despite the flip-side of this giving more freedom over the film’s content. Whilst this would undoubtedly satisfy fans of the Alien films, it seems a 50/50 decision if the intention was to launch a new franchise. How successful would this be if the next generation of potential Alien fans were too young to watch the film? Perhaps as a result of the R rating and the known content of the previous films in the series, Prometheus was shown at considerably less cinemas in the United States than the other major release that week, Madagascar 3: Europe’s Most Wanted, 3396 cinemas compared to 4258.

Now to the film itself. 

After reading many reviews, the area Prometheus has received most criticism has been the script. One of the more endearing features of Alien and Aliens were the characters and their every-man backgrounds. In Alien, we had a crew of a rusty salvage ship, complaining about not getting paid. The same complaints also come from the marines in Aliens and, ultimately, when the going got tough, many wanted to get the hell out of LV-426 and go home. Concerns over not getting paid and doing a runner in tough times are feelings I’m sure most have felt at some point. Compare this to Prometheus where the bulk of the dialogue between the main characters is concerned with questioning humanity’s origins, who are our creators and what might their true intentions be? These are certainly issues that are not for everyone. Staying within sci-fi, the same problem is seen when comparing the prequel Star Wars films with the original trilogy as the rogue-like ways of Han usually win over the ongoing jedi-wisdom of Qui-Gon.      

It has been mentioned by Ridley Scott that he was not going to be able to fit all ideas into a single film, therefore leaving some unresolved plot threads to a future film that was not guaranteed at the time. Taking this approach, there has been criticism at some of the film’s open-ended aspects, what happens to Elizabeth and David, what were the intentions of the engineers? Whilst there is now news of a sequel in the works, Scott has mentioned it may take two further films to full bridge the gap between the Prometheus films and the original Alien. One can only hope that, by looking at Prometheus’s box-office performance, Fox will realise they will only be able to squeeze out one more film and wrap up the series instead of, should the second film be unsuccessful, leaving it in limbo, for geeks to theorise over for years to come.

In defence of the film, where many have remarked it is not a horror film like Alien, it was never advertised as one. Some have clearly gone in with a drastically incorrect impression of what they were about to see. From interviews, online features, and trailers, Prometheus has always been marketed as a film focused around the origins of humanity and the identity of our creators. This may be a natural consequence where the Alien franchise is seen as sci-fi horror however, if you can get past that, by placing the film within the Alien universe, it builds on so much rich mythology and untapped materials, such as the identity of the space jockey, who has never been mentioned since Alien.

Where my objectivity is severely stretched is when I see people ranting on Facebook and Twitter that the film didn’t answer any questions. Unless I saw a different film, it answers, almost everything except for why the engineers decide to plot a course for Earth to unleash holy hell. Due to the time between the Alien films, there have been many years for people to discuss the role of the Space Jockey and how its ship landed on LV-426. Viewing Prometheus, the audience is essentially told these questions are not overly important as it delves into something much bigger. The ship seen in Alien is one of many and the engineers, our creators, reveal they are imperfect beings as their creations rise up against them, as evident by the corpse found by the crew of the Prometheus. As their flawed nature is revealed, it shouldn’t be a surprise that, on another ship 30 years later, an egg hatches early and the rest is history. 

In conclusion, Prometheus takes considerable risk in building upon the mythology, mainly found in the series’ first two films and, expands its universe without downplaying the significance of Alien and Aliens. Whilst it may suffer from leaving some open-ended plot threads, these are areas, fingers crossed, that will be resolved in the upcoming sequel.