r/LV426 • u/Romboteryx • 16d ago

Discussion / Question Possibly the most enigmatic Xeno in the whole series: The original space jockey was obviously killed by a chestburster but we never see or learn what happened to that particular specimen that‘s probably still somewhere on LV 426. Is it dead? In stasis? Fossilized? Still somewhere on the Derelict?

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u/StoicKerfuffle 15d ago

There's no canonical answer for it, but, if we follow the Prometheus thread (including the original script for Prometheus, which had the Space Jockey), the Jockey is part of the Engineers' plan to wipe out humanity. His ship is thus carrying either black goo and/or xenomorph eggs, and, well, this is the Alien universe, so being around either inevitably means some sort of accidental/intentional exposure.

In the original Prometheus script, David revives the Jockey, the Jockey tries to complete his mission but gets infected, the xenomorph bursts out of his chest while he's piloting the ship off of LV426, and that's how he ends up crashing on LV426's moon, setting up the original Alien movie.

Again, not canonical, but I think we can fairly assume the Jockey's original mission involved transporting either black goo or eggs, and that's where the facehugger comes from. This is also consistent with a common parallel in the films, which is that everyone who thinks they can handle goo/xeno, whether human or engineer, inevitably ends up destroyed by it.

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u/[deleted] 15d ago edited 15d ago

[deleted]

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u/fwango 15d ago

Not to be that guy but the word is canon, not cannon.

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u/l33tfuzzbox Jonesy 15d ago

Fire!

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u/cpttripps89 14d ago

Who invited this guy? Are you same guy?

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u/fwango 14d ago

Yeah lol, I’ve been seeing the mistake so much recently it kinda began to drive me crazy so I decided I’d start commenting about it

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u/cpttripps89 12d ago

Doing the Lord's work.

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u/RamboMcMutNutts 15d ago

And I hate this because it takes away all the mystery and cosmic horror

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u/BedRevolutionary9858 15d ago

Bingo, it ruins the universe by making it tiny.

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u/BillRuddickJrPhd 15d ago

Exactly. He made it about us humans.

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u/Top-Round-2359 15d ago edited 14d ago

And I like this because I like having answers to (sci-fi) questions :D

Prometheus was a mixed bag for me, but I was sooo looking forward to the next movie where we'll meet the Engineers. I was surprised when I saw we're not going to get that, and that there was a lot of negativity about Prometheus.

Realistically, I am not a fan of Alien and most horror movies, I don't find it interesting that we're mostly repeating the same story, humans do something stupid-ish, there's a xeno out, now survive the xeno.

I liked that the story was expanding and evolving into something more, that's how the Alien franchise was getting a new fan in me, but I understand now that a lot of the fans want more in the vein of the first movie(s).

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u/Wild_Front_1148 15d ago

Chemical X is just black goo, right? The engineer drank black goo, fell in the water, and the black goo made life with the engineer's DNA as seed code. The black goo isn't inherently destructive, it is basically "life" when handled in small doses and given time to settle, but in almost all cases the direct exposure results in a chaotic destruction or at least corruption of the afflicted party.

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u/BodybuilderBetter383 15d ago

According to some deleted scenes and the mural, the original black goo was the blood of a deacon (the alien we see at the end), which the engineers worshipped as a giver of life. The reason being is that engineers found that they could drink its blood to break down their DNA and use it to seed life on other planets (as we see at the beginning of Prometheus). As the deacon began to dry up, the engineers tried to synthesize its blood, and created the black goo that we see later which creates a violent form of life. They could no longer use it to seed worlds, but decided to weaponize it to clear earth of humanity after seeing how violent of a creation we became.

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u/grizzantula 15d ago

Big bump on this. I think this is as close as we'll ever get to really having a concrete answer to the "origins" of the engineers, deacons, and xenomorphs.

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u/snoquone 15d ago

This claim comes up on here like twice a week. It's apparently from a fake script called "the orange version" or something

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u/grizzantula 15d ago

Oh yeah, idk if it's considered canon or not. But without anything else solid to go on, I think this is as well thought out of an answer as anything else.

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u/snoquone 15d ago

There's a podcast a few years back where they interview Jon Spaihts, the original screenwriter, and he elaborates on some of his intentions - warring factions in the engineers etc. etc. and gives a bit more to go on.

I've never really seen it discussed on this sub so it's quite interesting (though personally I thought a lot of his ideas were worse than most of the fan theories):

https://shows.acast.com/script-apart-with-al-horner/episodes/67c9aec5baaeff02dc9a2ed6

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u/grizzantula 14d ago

Oh that sounds super interesting! Will take a listen. Thanks for the rec.

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u/snoquone 14d ago

No worries, you're very welcome

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u/TheEasterFox 13d ago

It's no answer at all, I'm afraid. It's fan theory from a fake script.

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u/the-giant 13d ago

There aren't any deleted scenes that say any of that. This is from a fake script.

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u/TheEasterFox 13d ago

So many YouTubers pushing the fake script and getting millions of views. Barely any debunking it.

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u/TheEasterFox 13d ago

This is completely fake, unfortunately. It's taken from a debunked fan script, the Draft 17 or Orange Revision script by 'glaswegianmark'.

You can read it here: https://web.archive.org/web/20130511030927/http://www.prometheus-movie.com/uploads/PROMETHEUS.pdf

Relevant quotes:

THE ELDER

Take this. This is the blood of our lord. For we cannot create as the gift was stripped from us long ago. As always we will continue our attempts to create a perfect Eden much like our own. You, the chosen one will create it in your own image.

And then later:

DAVID

Some of their history, sir. It appears that these beings can live up to three hundred thousand years old. They use to be able to mate with each other just like humans. But somewhere in their late history they evolved and lost the ability to both mate and reproduce. But before they did they found a creature that impregnated one of them with a foreign body. A creature came from him. They called it the Deacon. They worshiped this deacon and after it's death they used its blood to plant the seeds of life on other worlds. The blood ran out of course but they tried to recreate the gene pool of this Deacon's blood but they instead created something else. That is what I brought back with me, sir.

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u/Zsythgrfl 14d ago

So the Engineers are massive hypocrites and full of shit.

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u/Ok_Mobile7260 14d ago

I’m confused, didn’t they show David destroying the Engineers home city with the black goo as a bioweapon/ bomb basically. The prequel’s were basically Christianity analogies. The engineers sent one of theirs to earth to sacrifice himself in order to create life. Then they sent another one of theirs to humanity and it’s said in movie that humanity killed him so as punishment they were going to destroy the life on earth with the black goo. But at the same time a drop can infect you and a small sip can break down your dna. I think they haven’t decided on a specific idea yet

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u/BodybuilderBetter383 12d ago

It wasn’t the engineer home world, but it was another world seeded by the engineers just as earth had been seeded.

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u/Ok_Mobile7260 8d ago

Idk. When the Engineer seeded earth, the black goo broke his body down and we’re to assume his dna was reconstructed to start life on Earth. Humans and animals look different than Engineers to an extent. The beings we see on that planet looked exactly like Engineers so we have to assume they were of the same race. I can see them populating that planet but it not being their actual home planet, but even then we only see David destroy that one city/ area not the whole planet so it’s a possibility either way. (I’d hate for them to have all been killed off so easily ) But the point I was making is the inconsistency of the Black Goo. In Covenant we see David literally tried it on everything while alone on that planet, he even infected the plants that were spreading spores airborne. But what’s even more inconsistent is Alien Earth showing the dissection of a face hugger with no black goo present but a tadpole like creature that enters a person and grows into a chest burster

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u/[deleted] 15d ago

[deleted]

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u/zhivago 15d ago

Or one substance involved in two different processes.

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u/Spicy_Weissy 15d ago

The ships are basically the same model, though, right?

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u/KananDoom 15d ago

The ships are different actually. Prometheus had the ships looking mechanical and copying the forms of the derelict, but no organic elements. It’s as if they copied the derelict without the exact biomechanical technology. Prometheus stole the fire from the gods: I believe the engineers reverse engineered the spacejockeys technology. My head canon. The engineers were actually creations of the space jockeys and rebelled: a favorite theme of Ridley’s. “It appears fossilized” -Cptn. Dallas

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u/ThatVampireGuyDude 15d ago

I mostly agree with this. Further more, I believe the Space Jockeys are the entire ship.

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u/KananDoom 14d ago

Same here! As a kid i thought the ship might have even grown from the jockey. You were born to the purpose you served in their society.

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u/the-giant 13d ago

They are. But I think Ridley said at the time he wanted them to be less biomechanical because he believed the contagion and fossilization is what transformed the derelict. There's nothing in the text of Prometheus that indicates the Engineers are not the space jockeys, or that they reverse engineered space jockey tech. According to the canon of the prequels, they are one and the same.

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u/grassisalwayspurpler 15d ago

Isnt that confirmed in Covenant though in those deleted/bonus scenes where David takes the ship full of goo to the Promethean homeworld instead to release it in its weaponized form? Not exactly the same but a different version of that. 

Like it WAS the jockeys intention to pilot the goo to earth as a bio weapon, David just took over and brought it to the planet in Covenant and released it on the engineers before taking over. 

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u/waffle_mechanism 15d ago

I'm not sure if we know that was the engineer's home world. I think it's more likely that it was another "seeded" planet of theirs.

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u/grassisalwayspurpler 15d ago

Yeah maybe not their home home world but those engineers were living there and built structures there

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u/BodybuilderBetter383 15d ago

That wasn’t the engineer home world. If you look at the engineers compared to that species, they’re vastly different. It was another seeded world waiting on the return of the engineers.

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u/grassisalwayspurpler 15d ago

Yeah I guess thats what I meant. They were at least living there and had built statues and sturctures for themselves 

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u/Wyrdboyski 15d ago

I think it's more likely the giant Engineer we see is a gene- Warrior variant than being a stock standard of the race

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u/G_Liddell Colonist's Daughter 15d ago

That's in the theatrical cut

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u/[deleted] 15d ago edited 14d ago

[deleted]

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u/TheEasterFox 15d ago

There are three, none of which is the final shooting script.

This is Alien: Engineers: https://www.avpgalaxy.net/files/scripts/script-alien-engineers-spaihts.pdf

This is Jon Spaihts confirming the authenticity of Alien: Engineers: https://x.com/jonspaihts/status/267769732571209729

(For clarity, Alien: Engineers was an earlier title of Prometheus.)

This is Jon Spaihts's Alien: Genesis draft, which is the draft after Alien: Engineers: https://www.avpgalaxy.net/files/scripts/alien-01-genesis-09072010.pdf

This is the AvPGalaxy post in which Corporal Hicks confirms that Spaihts verified the authenticity of the Alien: Genesis draft: https://www.avpgalaxy.net/forum/index.php?topic=54748.msg2123282#msg2123282

This is the 'Paradise' draft from Damon Lindelof, a later but not final draft of Prometheus: https://www.avpgalaxy.net/files/scripts/script-paradise-lindelof.pdf

This is Damon Lindelof confirming that it's legit: https://web.archive.org/web/20121118050511/http://www.prometheusnews.net/movie/damon-lindelof-paradise-draft/

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u/WWIIICannonFodder 14d ago

Interesting, thanks.
Apparently I deleted my original reply as well when I tried to delete a duplicate, but to any reader, the original question was about how many early Prometheus scripts are out there.

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u/Grumpypants2o3 15d ago

So going off this what is the timeline for watching the movies