Prometheus – By Chris Bischoff
I think its important for someone who wants to tell stories to constantly be ‘rewriting’, be it of their own works, or of someone elses.
Like the many swathes of people around the world, I went to watch Prometheus. I went in having only watched 2 Trailers, and generally avoiding all spoilers, viral ads, interviews, and reviews. And you know what? I enjoyed it.
Sure, it wasnt ALIEN, or ALIENS-but it certainly wasnt the worst movie I’ve ever seen (as some of the more scathing reviewers would have you know).
But then time passed…and I really started to think about the movie. What annoys me about Prometheus ISNT the plot holes, or the really strange character development. No, its that with just a few more drafts at the OUTLINE stage, they could have had an ABSOLUTE CLASSIC on their hands.
See, there are many many forums of debate going around about Prometheus, but honestly I think these debates arent in the ‘Did the top stop spinning’, or ‘How many Deloreans existed at one time?’ vein, but rather in the ‘Why did Batman have nipples?’ way.
Im not really going to go into an actual review of Promtheus here, because there are THOUSANDS of those online. What I am going to do is a ‘this is how I would have done it’ thing.
PROMETHEUS, By Chris Bischoff
In 2089, archaeologists Elizabeth Shaw and Charlie Holloway discover a star map among several unconnected ancient cultures. They interpret this proof of previous contact from an alien species. After a robotic probe is sent to the moon, images of massive temples and other structures are sent back to earth. Peter Weyland, the elderly CEO of Weyland Corporation, funds the creation of the scientific vessel Prometheus to follow the map to the distant moon LV-223. A team of scientists and engineers are assembled, and sent on what could be the greatest scientific breakthrough in the history of mankind.
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The Prometheus lands near a large artificial structure (previously identified by satelite and probe scans) which a ‘first contact’ team explores.
Using tried and trusted excavation techniques, they find numerous stone cylinders, a monolithic statue of a humanoid head (“It looks….human….”), and the corpse of a large alien. They find other petrified bodies and presume that something, thousands of years ago, went terribly wrong.
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A rapidly approaching electrical storm forces the crew to return to Prometheus. The geologist, and biologist (Millburn and Fifield) opt to stay behind in the structure to continue their excavations, and exploration. These are scientists, and this is the find of a lifetime!
Samples are taken, including one of the ‘urns’.
Once the storm hits, communication between Millburn, Fifield, and Prometheus is sporadic at best.
Onboard Prometheus, the aliens DNA is found to match that of humans. Meanwhile, David and Holloway investigates the urn and discovers a dark liquid. A power surge onboard the ship causes the contamination field in the lab to fail, with some of the liquid (unbeknonwst to them) splashing onto Holloway.
Shortly after Shaw and Holloway have sex (cos…you know…sex scenes in SciFi movies are apparently essential. Plus they make for good trailers).
Captain Janek, and pilot Ravel are conducting repairs outside of the ship to try and stop the surges, and get the ship back on track.
Back on Prometheus power drains flash through the ship, the electrical storm having effected most systems on board. Vickers watches through broken communication and video feeds as ‘something’ attacks and kills Millburn and Fifield. The crew watches and hears the agonizing deaths of these two scientists.
The crew later returns to the structure and finds Millburn’s corpse, with the white worms feeding off of him. David and Holloway separately discover a control room containing a surviving humanoid alien in stasis, and a star map highlighting Earth. They learn that the cave paintings were a control of sorts. That humanity was an experiment..and that when the humans grew technologically advanced enough to find this planet, phase 2 of the experiment could commence. At that moment, Holloway collapses…his skin crawling and changing. and he is rushed back to Prometheus.
Inside Prometheus, Holloway is sealed off in a medical bay, with only David being able to enter and care for him. The black liquid is causing massive changes at a genetic level. Tearing him up from the inside, and changing him. He begs for David to kill him. Shaw collapses, and is rushed to the medical quarters. Upon scanning her, its revealed that she has ‘something’ growing inside of her.
Outside, while still conducting repairs, something attacks and violently kills Ravel, and throws Janek into the exposed electrics of the ship, causing his electrocution, and the shut down of the entire ship.
Inside the ship, Holloway, David, and Shaw are inside the medical deck, when everything goes black. In the darkness, Holloway begins to undergo the final transformation into ‘something’. He begs either David or Shaw to kill him. Shaw watches as David, despite Shaws begging, kills Holloway.
Knowing that Shaw is in imminent danger, he takes her to Vickers shuttle which has its own life support, emergency power, and medical pod. When there, David and Vickers argue about letting an infected Shaw into the shuttle. During the argument, the thing that killed Janek and Ravel enters the shuttle. Revealed to be a mutated Fifield, he bites Vickers and attacks David.
During the scuffle, Shaw locks herself in the medical pod, and uses the automated surgery table to cut the infected embryo out.
Vickers fends of Fifield, using a discarded vodka bottle, ending in Fifield being badly hurt, and running screeching off into the ship. Vickers collapses in Davids arms, and dies.
David, and Shaw are the two remaining members of the Prometheus expedition. They need to ready the lifeboat, and get off the ship. To do that, they need to transfere all remaining power to the lifeboat to break orbit, as well as release the docking clamps. Shaw, shooting up with drugs to get over the pain of her surgery opts to transfer the power, while David will manually release the clamps (the automated systems failing during the storm).
Walking through the ship, sensitive from surgery, and armed with an axe, Shaw makes it to the bridge, and begins the process of transferring the remaining power to the lifeboat (aided by David over the radio system). The mutated Fifield attacks her, and just as he is about to kill her, David arrives and kills him.
The lifeboat shuttle breaks off from the main ship, and slowly climbs into the sky.
A voice over of David punctuates the scenes of a shut down Prometheus…the camera moves through the alien structure, into the control room, where we see the Engineer’s eyes open.
FADE TO BLACK.