Prometheus Movie Review

Prometheus (2012)

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Written by: Jon Spaihts and Damon Lindelof, Dan O'Bannon and Ronald Shusett (based on elements created by)
Directed by: Ridley Scott
Starring: Noomi Rapace, Logan Marshall-Green, Michael Fassbender, Charlize Theron, Idris Elba, Guy Pearce, Sean Harris, Rafe Spall, Benedict Wong
Rated: R
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Plot
Following clues to the origin of mankind, a team finds a structure on a distant moon but soon realize they are not alone.

Verdict
This was a neat idea with the question of humanity's origins, but I don't think this ever intended to provide a satisfying answer. The last half is all over the place due to several ideas which makes a conclusion more difficult. This keeps introducing new plot points. So much of the plot is written to solve other problems that it seems like the movie started with an ending and worked backwards, choosing complexity when simplicity would deliver a better movie. There's too many characters, species, and bad decisions.
Skip it.

Review
In mythology, Prometheus defied the Greek gods by taking fire from them and giving it to humanity in the form of technology and knowledge, providing a basis for civilization. There's certainly something to that with the large bipedals in this movie, Titans, and the inference that they are the origin of humankind.

This is the fifth movie in the franchise. While I've seen it before, that wasn't long after it released. It's not as good as Alien or Aliens, few things are. It had a lot of potential but tries to do too much and leaves those ideas unresolved.

An introductory scene with what we learn are the fore bearers of civilization starts the movie before we're introduced to Shaw (Noomi Rapace) and Holloway (Logan Marshall-Green). They find several cave drawings, reliefs, and painting of a star map. The planets are too far away for past civilizations to have seen it, and these groups never interacted to share such a map. Weyland funds their four year journey to the star system where Shaw and Holloway hope to find the origins of humankind. That's a big ask.

Logan Marshall-Green, Noomi Rapace play Holloway, Shaw

The crew consists of hired engineers and a Weyland representative. They land on this planet and immediately find something unnatural. It's too easy. On top of that, they take so few precautions. You'd think being scientists they'd be more wary, studying this structure.  It's a writing choice to keep the pacing quick. It could easily be written off as using computer scanners instead of scientists being dangerous. They find the body of a creature similar to what we saw in the prologue. The question immediately becomes whether these giants populated Earth. If so, did they populate other planets?

This has too many characters, several with vague agendas. Among them are two red shirt characters, whose names don't really matter, that get lost in this structure. They are comic relief which is not what I want in this movie. They're plot devices, not characters, and then they discover some new species that attacks them, and there are many different creatures in this. It just leads to more questions of whether they are the origins of face huggers or derived from them. Also, they are multiple holograms that play at just the right moments and impart the exact information characters need. It's silly. Why would the Titans even record these moments that are clearly plot explanation?

Charlize Theron, Idris Elba play Meredith Vickers, Janek

One thing I liked about the original movies is how dingy everything was. These were mining ships that were used and broken in. Everything in this movie is so polished. You can write it off as funded by the super rich Weyland, but because of that the ship and equipment lack character.

This franchise has shown us aliens and gestation before, and this wants to introduce something new. There are snakes and squids, and that's just the start. At one point we get a mutated crew member. What we discover, and at least in part explains the various creatures, is that the Titans were developing bio-weapons that led to face huggers. Instead of well thought out ideas, we get forced drama and action. That leads to a second half that's more of a random mash up of different threads. The best answer we get as to why humans were created is because the Titans could. How that connects to the development of biological weapons remains unanswered. It's a symptom of too many ideas. Simplifying this to face huggers or an early iteration of them would be a better tie in. At one point we get a giant squid only because we need it to fight a giant Titan. By writing to solve a problem at a time, you lose all logic. A ship crash isn't a big enough ending, we need another fight, but how can a human defeat an Titan? You need a giant squid. The writing seems like stream of consciousness, and the movie continues long past when you think it would end.