Prometheus

I watched Prometheus today. I went to the movie with high expectations, considering that it's Ridley Scott again, doing the Aliens thing...again. How could it possibly go wrong? Well, despite its best attempts to do things right, the story just didn't hold together. I would presume that Prometheus started off as an attempt at explaining the origins of the xenomorphs and humanity, and perhaps telling us about the Jockey while we're at it. Unfortunately, the movie came across more like a shoddy attempt at tying up the story, winding up with more loose ends than it began with. So basically the Weyland guys fly over to a distant earthlike planet to discover what it's all about, and then discover that the planet's mostly deserted. This time, it doesn't exactly seem to be the xenomorphs that are responsible. Unfortunately, it seems that this potential to evolve the narrative has been squandered, and instead of trying to establish a coherent origin story, the narrative feels more like a mishmash of strange infections and outcomes that have no apparent relation to one another. Granted, this movie may be intended to be a two part experience and perhaps all would be explained in the second film, the current form is quite simply unable to stand by itself. I find this greatly disappointing. Overall I'd say the movie gets a 5.5/10 from me. I would've graded it lower for squandering the potential it has, but I guess it's points for effort at depicting a different form of the xenomorphs and just what the Jockey had in relation to the monsters. Unfortunately, the woeful lack of proper character development prevents any appreciation of just what's going on, and just makes the film feel like a rather nicely detailed action flick that is short of most of the action. I'd write a comparison between Alien and Prometheus next, to highlight just what's off about the whole shebang, but be warned that spoilers will be included.