I think the movie just enforced my opinion that characters>>>>>>>story when it comes to films. I mean this had a good story, unnanswered questions/plot holes be damned I liked the story, but none of the characters were than compelling to me.
ANd I think I felt bad for his death because of how it was done. [BLACKOUT]Him walking toward Theron saying "Just do it" was pretty sad[/BLACKOUT]
I felt this movie had two good characters. David and Shaw. David is a fascinating character because he's a robot/android. Except he doesn't seem interested in "becoming human" or having the human experience like they usually do in sci-fi. Like HAL-9000, he's intrigued by it and observes it, but you don't get the sense he wants it for himself. And instead of learning emotions, we're kept on our toes as unsure whether he has them or not (did Weyland tell him to test the goo on Holloway or did he do it out of a sense of revenge for being picked on? Did he expect the engineer to go ape ****, but wanted it to "kill his parent"?). Any robot that models itself after Peter O'Toole in
Lawrence of Arabia is a pretty amazing character to me.
Shaw is intriguing because she's a strong Ridley Scott female protagonist. While not as iconic as Ripley (yet), she is interesting because she doesn't start off strong. She's a naive believer and a walking contradiction. She has lost her parents, Christian missionaries, to horrible things like ebola and has become a scientist trying to learn how we were created and seemingly trying to disprove God. But she is still a very devout Christian reconciling everything she sees with her faith. And her curiosity drives her into some extreme situations that when push comes to shove she discovers she is a survivor and, as David says, has remarkable survivor instinct after she cuts the aline out of her stomach. Never mind the pro-choice parallels, it's just an amazing scene of strength.
The other characters are interesting but underdeveloped. Janek is the only one who feels like a throwback to the crew of the Nostromo. You could see Janek being in that movie. And his casual, blue collar, "I don't give a ****" attitude contrasts Shaw/Holloway/Weyland/David nicely. He's funny and pragmatic, but he doesn't have enough screentime. Vickers works better on second viewing because once you know her relationship with Weyland, you understand her motivations much better and she's much more interesting. I wouldn't say likable though. Holloway's OK, but he's killed off far too early before we can really see the horror of what's happening to him and his depression over finding a dead engineer seems too sudden.
So, I'd say there are two strong characters and three more who are decent and could've been strong if the film developed them more. Then there are literally a dozen side characters just there to die. That is disappointing, but then again
Aliens had plenty of "red shirt" characters and
Alien 3 and
Alien: Resurrection/i] had nothing but meat characters supporting Ripley. Still, Prometheus could've been stronger if they got rid of most of the meat and developed at least Holloway and Janek a little more.
Just my opinion.
If I'm ignoring a certain aspect of the film, then so are you. Your theory still doesn't explain anything (not even remotely close) involving the purpose of the origins of humanity and the relationship between The Engineers and Humans. If the conversation between David and Charlie been accurate, then the Space Jockeys would have never 'raised' us and left us clues.
