The Deleted Scenes Of Prometheus Actually Explain A Whole Bunch Of Important Stuff


I went along to “Weyland Industries” last night to chat to the creators of Prometheus, and the number one item on my agenda was a few “WTF?!” questions. A lot of the backlash towards the film has been levelled at the confusing plot. We now have the answers as to why Prometheus is such a confusing film: everything they shot to explain why things were happening were taken out and were left for the Blu-ray special features disc.

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It’s worth noting that there are some serious spoilers ahead…

Wondering why the Engineer at the start of the film killed himself for no apparent reason? If you look at the alternate beginning scene on the Blu-ray, you find that this was actually a sacrificial ceremony attended by multiple engineers. Once the Engineer breaks up into tiny pieces and falls into the river, you’re shown a few extra seconds of footage that explains that the sacrifice was meant to boot up the human evolutionary journey.

Wondering why an Engineer indescriminately murdered David the robot at the end of the film? A deleted scene actually reveals that when in conversation with the Engineer, Peter Weyland said that because he had created David, he was equal to the Engineers who also created life. From this statement, the Engineer identifies David as an abomination and then the robot-head ripping goes on.

There are a few more scenes that explain other gaping plot holes in the film, like why a biologist happily approaches a face-f**king worm that proceeds to kill him. If you’re a die-hard Alien-universe fan, you really should grab the Blu-ray and watch.

On the plot holes, though, I think one of the great failings of high-concept films these days is that filmmakers quite often assume that you — the viewer — is either on the same page as them from the get-go, or that you have enough smarts to fill in the gaps yourself. The latter is the most difficult, simply because a lot of people attend the cinema to be entertained, rather than be challenged.

The Prometheus Blu-ray comes out next week.

Should filmmakers “dumb down” their material so that everyone can keep up, or just leave the explanatory stuff on the cutting room floor?