Titus Pompo

cover art by Vincent Di Fate

 In 1987, a first edition of Araminta Station was published (500 copies) and apparently each of them was signed by Jack Vance. Sadly, the cover art for that edition was generic... my guess is that Vincent Di Fate never had a chance to read Vance's novel and then create a depiction of an actual scene from the story. 

In his story, Vance described Araminta Station as a small town on a distant exoplanet (Cadwal), a setting for which Vance gives us accounts of journeys by "flyer", such a the memorable foray to Mad Mountain Lodge by Glawen Clattuc, his love interest Wayness, her brother Milo and also Julian Bohost who is Glawen's rival for the attention of Wayness. As for the tall mountain towering in the image shown to the right, nothing like that appears in Vance's story. The Araminta flyers are small and utilitarian, nothing like the futuristic passenger craft in this image.

cover art by Boris Vallejo

In 1988 there was another edition of Araminta Station with cover art by Boris Vallejo which depicts Glawen and his first girl friend, Sessily Veder. Fairly early in the story, poor Sessily is murdered. One way of looking at the novel is that it is a kind of detective story. Glawen is a policeman in training and by the end of Araminta Station he has discovered who killed Sessily.

That is a dangerous situation for Glawen and Sessily, shown in the image to the left (this scene is on page 71 in the book). However, Glawen tells Sessily, "It's one of the first things my father taught me: never go even three feet into the wilderness without a gun." In this case, they had flown out to a wilderness site of the planet Cadwal where they could collect shed butterfly wings. Sessily used the brightly-colored insect wings to decorate the costume that she wore while performing on stage during Araminta Station's annual Parilia celebration.

Wayness

Later in the story, after both Sessily's murder and the tragic death of Milo at Lake Dimple (near Mad Mountain), Wayness goes off to Earth. Glawen is left behind at Araminta Station where he is lonely and with nothing better to do, he sails out into the ocean and visits Thurben Island, a reef-encircled remnant of a dormant volcano. At Thurben, Glawen is shocked and surprised to discover a party of visitors from Yipton, the much larger island home of the "Yips", a people who through the past several centuries have illegally taken up residence on their island in defiance of the rules that govern human settlement of the planet Cadwal.

Among the party from Yipton are several "Oomps", members of the elite force that guards the ruling strong-man of Yipton, Titus Pompo. 

Wayness and her telepathic daughter

Of more immediate concern to Glawen is a woman named Sibil who is in charge of the group from Yipton. Here is Vance's description of Sibil: "... a tall heavy-boned woman, broad of shoulder, massive of leg and arm..." Glawen has to engage in hand-to-hand combat with Sibil (this comes on page 339 of the novel). That's right: Glawen went out into the wilds of Thurben Island, alone, without bringing along a gun.

Spoilers. I thoroughly enjoy Araminta Station, but there are several plot elements in the story that really make no sense. Perhaps the largest plot hole concerns the ruler of the Yips, Titus Pompo, the Oomphaw. Nobody from Araminta Station is ever allowed to meet Titus Pompo. When speaking, the voice of Titus Pompo is completely disguised by an electronic voice-altering device. Why should the king of the Yips be so secretive?

Perfection of Joy

Finally, near the end of the novel (page 546) readers learn that the real ruler of the Yips is Simonetta Clattuc, a relative of Glawen's who, some 20 years previously, departed from Araminta Station and was never seen again. Vance hardly makes any effort to explain how Simonetta took control of Yipton and her army of Oomphs. Vance needed a way to create drama so he depicted the Yips as a dangerous force (there are 100,000 Yips and only a few hundred residents at Araminta Station) that could threaten sleepy Araminta Station with annihilation and provide a backdrop for Glawen's adventures, but which could also, in the end, be easily defeated.

Old Time Gaming

 Old Time Gaming                                                I mention all of the above as part of my August celebration of Jack Vance's fiction, and nothing that I say above should dissuade anyone from reading Araminta Station. Vance had learned to write at pulp speed, and fans are grateful for the large volume of his writings, so who can quibble if his stories have a few plot holes?

The issue of plot holes is relevant to my own writing. Currently, I'm 3,500 words into writing Part 3 of my new science fiction story, Old Time Gaming. The story has reached the point where Rylla realizes that she has been tricked by another Interventionist agent, Maria Green.

When Rylla was sent on her mission to Australia in 1814, she was warned to expect that her path would cross with that of Maria. In Old Time Gaming, Rylla works as an undercover agent, disguised as a school teacher: Miss Sophie McKnight of Parramatta. 

Max

When adopting that cover identity, Rylla was pleasantly surprised to learn that Sophie had a pleasing sexual relationship with her maid, Elizabeth. 

Rylla was not sent off to Australia in 1814 without support. Soon after her arrival, she meets John Smith. Smith is an experienced Interventionist who has lived on Earth for the past 6,000 years, working to accelerate the pace of technological advancement. Smith is an artificial life-form and essentially immortal. He came to Australia fresh from the North Carolina gold rush, so he is well prepared to help Rylla obtain gold from the Outback. Many Sails (see below) has arranged for there to be a fiery and insuppressible sexual attraction between her two agents in Australia. Many Sails feels obligated to make certain that her operatives are sexually active and sexually satisfied as partial payment for all the hardships that she puts them through.

Rylla also must deal with her "inherited" family, the relatives of Sophie, particularly Sophie's younger brother, Max. Rylla, Smith, Elizabeth and Max journey into the wilderness west of Sydney in search of gold.

Maria Green

In Part 3 of the story, more than 15,000 words into the tale, Rylla finally realizes that one of her acquaintances in Australia is actually Maria Green. Maria is a time traveler from the future, sent to Australia in 1814 in order to make sure that Rylla cannot complete her Interventionist mission on Earth.

In Old Time Gaming, the focus of the story is on Rylla and her adventures in Australia of the 1800s. Behind the scenes there is an ages old conflict involving alien forces who are watching over Earth and the human species. On one side of that ancient conflict are the Huaoshy, aliens from a distant galaxy. The Huaoshy are masters of advanced technologies that rely on sedrons, a type of fundamental particle that remains completely unknown to the primitive people of Earth. Struggling to attain autonomy from the technologically superior Huaoshy are R. Gohrlay and her small cadre of positronic robots.

R. Nyrtia, Viewing the Realities of Earth.

Maria Green was sent back through time to 1814 by R. Nyrtia. Nyrtia is the technology expert among the positronic robots. It was the positronic robots of Earth who first discovered how to travel through time, but the Huaoshy were able to invent their own time travel equipment and even extend their mastery over the phenomenon of time travel by inventing sophisticated Viewing technology that allows them to peer into possible futures: so-called Reality Viewing.

Rylla is in old time Australia as the agent of Many Sails, an artificial life-form known as bumpha. The bumpha are helpers of the Huaoshy and Many Sails has a clear technological advantage over the positronic robots of Earth. 

Rylla being observed (source).

However, it is not the intention of Many Sails to crush and demoralize the positronic robots of Earth. The bumpha and the positronic robots are both working to craft a viable future for Humanity.

Many Sails faces the delicate task of making sure that Rylla accomplishes her mission on Earth while at the same time allowing R. Nyrtia and Maria Green to believe that they defeated Rylla and protected Earth's historical timeline from outside interference.

Thus, I find myself in the same predicament as Vance. I'm trying to devise a formidable adversary for Rylla while at the same time making it clear that Maria really stands no chance of defeating Rylla.

Many Sails on Earth.

 Just a Game. Many Sails has been working for millions of years to craft the human species and guide Humanity into the future. While working through the ages with humans, Many Sails has learned how to mingle among the humans of Earth and have fun living disguised as a human being.  

Many Sails views her relationship with the positronic robots of Earth as a kind of game. Many Sails is not content to simply deploy her agents like Rylla on the playing field of Earth while Many Sails remains in outer space. Readers of Old Time Gaming should not be surprised if Many Sails shows up on Earth and gives Rylla a helping hand with her mission.

Related Reading: Vance's Araminta Station

Next: Part 3 of Old Time Gaming.

Star Trek 50

Zarabeth and Spock

Several years ago I listed ten of my favorite Star Trek episodes. Here, I will expand on that list as a way of celebrating the first 50 years of Star Trek.

a telepathic Sally Kellerman

Trek 11. Last year I blogged about "Where No Man Has Gone Before". In that earlier blog post, I lamented the fact that television shows with a science fiction setting often make no attempt to account for the "superpowers" of characters. However, I like Clarke's Third Law. I believe that there is always an imaginary future science explanation for the god-like powers of characters in a science fiction story.

Stray Thought

In this case, we cannot expect that a writer of television Westerns (Samuel Peeples) would have ever had as much as a single stray thought about a "scientific" explanation for what happened to Dr. Dehner in this episode.

In my case, I like to imagine that in some universes there are  physical principles that would make it possible for a biological creature like we humans to have telepathy. Alternatively, even in our universe it might be possible to use advanced hierion and sedron-based devices to give humans technology-assisted telepathy.

In the Exode saga, all animal life on Earth evolved in the presence of zeptites. The brain of each human has a zeptite endosymbiont that suppresses some functions of the human brain. In the case of Dr. Dehner, we can imagine that she was genetically (or femtobotically)  endowed with the ability to escape from the limiting effects of her zeptite endosymbiont, so she was known to have a "high ESPer rating".

click image to enlarge

Galactic Barrier. Why would leaving the galaxy suddenly allow Dr. Dehner to fully escape from the influence of her zeptite endosymbiont, allowing her to have powerful telekinetic and telepathic abilities? For almost 100 years, a popular idea in stories about space aliens has been the possibility that Earth is a zoo.

extinction curve for hadronic life forms

What if the "human zoo" was actually larger than Earth and, in fact, the "walls" of our zoo are in intergalactic space? As long as we remain in our home galaxy, our brains remain under the restrictions imposed by our zeptite endosymbionts. However, there is a dark matter barrier around our galaxy. When Dr. Dehner crossed that barrier, she could finally use the full capacity of her brain and her "ESPer powers".

Isis and Spock

I like to imagine that the main reason for placing humans in a "zoo" is that our alien Overseers know that young technology-wielding life forms must pass through a survival bottleneck. Young technology-wielding species such as we humans are in danger of destroying themselves, so our Overseers prevent at-risk organisms from using the full potential of their brains to create new technologies.

Trek 12. Yes, along with many other science fiction fans, I have a weakness for stories about time travel. In The Voyage Home, the command rank crew members of the Enterprise travel to 20th century Earth, bringing to the big screen some of the magic that went into the television episode 'Assignment: Earth'.

source

The Slingshot Effect. Back in 2013, Jill Scharr took on the task of listing the Silliest Time Travel Concepts in science fiction. Star Trek's "slingshot effect" made #7 on her list. Is there a way to salvage this silly plot device with a dose of future science?

For the Exode Trilogy, I've introduced the idea that within the Asimov Reality, humans were provided with "intersplit spacedrive" engines. Those engines secretly contained a supply of sedrons, but no human ever had any idea of the existence of sedrons or their special role in making faster-than-light space travel possible.

in an alternate Reality

Imagine a similar plot device in the Star Trek fictional universe: aliens have made sure that starships with "warp engines" can travel though time. When it suits the needs of those aliens, some spaceship crews are allowed to make a risky journey into the past. All the "slingshot" mumbo-jumbo is just a meaningless "cover story" that helps hide the fact that aliens are in complete control of the hidden devices that make time travel possible.

source

Trek 13. 'The Man Trap' was one of the Star Trek episodes that I truly despised in my youth. Even when I was ten years old I had an aversion to biologically-implausible plots and rubber alien masks in my science fiction.

Later on I decided that, had I written the story, then the "salt monster" would only have had to seem biologically plausible to a few people in order to facilitate "hitching a ride" on a star ship. Such a "monster" could have been composed of advanced nanites and had no silly biological needs like an unappeasable craving for salt.

The writer of 'The Man Trap', George  Johnson, died in 2015.

in the Ekcolir Reality

Trek 14. 'The Enemy Within' applies the absurd Sci Fi 'mutation' plot device to teleportation. We are asked to believe that due to a freak teleporter malfunction, Captain Kirk is split into two Kirks, one docile and one aggressive.

This would have been a better episode had the "evil Kirk" quickly started using this new teleportation "feature" to make docile replacements for crew members of the Enterprise.

I have fun imagining that the science fiction genre followed a different course in the Ekcolir Reality. In that alternate Reality, multiple copies of yeoman Rand were made by Captain Kirk.

Grace Whitney died in 2015.

Rigel chorus girls

Trek 15. 'Shore Leave' was one of the Star Trek episodes that raised the question: with a galaxy full of various aliens who are much more technologically advanced than humans, why did we have to be subjected to endless wars against Klingons, Romulans and other aliens stuck at our technological level?

Also, according to some, the costumes of the sex kittens in 'Shore Leave' answered the question of what happened to all those tribbles. Sadly, the tribbles episode came a year after 'Shore Leave'.

'Shore Leave' was written by Theodore Sturgeon. {2018: more Sturgeon}

The crafty T'Pring makes
Kirk fight Spock

Trek 16. Sturgeon also wrote 'Amok Time' which gave fans some backstory for First Officer Spock. I never liked how all the clever telepathic Vulcans in this episode failed to notice that Kirk had not actually been killed by Spock. Had Kirk died, there would have been an opportunity to get a new Captain for the Enterprise.

Arlene Martel died in 2014.

a "strange new world" that looks just like a Hollywood set

Trek 17. 'The Return of the Archons' is the first Star Trek episode in which the crew of the Enterprise must apply the Prime Directive. As usual, they find a way to mess with the alien culture of planet "Beta III in the C-111 system".

I disliked this episode as just one among many in which the "aliens" magically looked just like we Earthlings and also conveniently spoke English.

Madlyn Rhue

One of the most annoying things about Star Trek was the seeming amnesia of the producers. All kinds of technologies were introduced and then forgotten about.

Trek 18. In 'Space Seed' we learn that genetic engineering had been used long ago to make some modified humans. I wish that Star Trek had explored the implications of genetic technology in a sensible way, but in Hollywood, genetic engineering was treated as just another way to make an evil bad guy who could be defeated by Kirk in less than one hour. Sadly, Khan would return to haunt later Star Trek movies and television viewers with endless commercials about "rich Corinthian leather".

Ricardo Montalbán died in 2009. Madlyn Rhue died in 2003.

Leonard Nimoy and Jill Ireland

Trek 19. 'This Side of Paradise' is one of the Star Trek episodes that should be recreated as a story about nanotechnology.

As told in the story, the residents of Omicron Ceti III have been infected by "plant spores" and they now live in perfect health, even to the extent of having previously removed body parts (like a vermiform appendix) regrow.

Of course, the crew of the Enterprise just flies away from Omicron Ceti III and humanity never benefits from any of the discoveries made there.

This was one of the many Star Trek episodes with a stupid fist fight scene.

Jill Ireland died in 1990 after a battle with cancer.

Communicating with a Horta

Trek 20. After complaining (above) about all of the aliens in Star Trek who were indistinguishable from Earthlings, I feel obligated to mention 'The Devil in the Dark' and the silicone Horta.

Miners of Earth (click image to enlarge)

I've never found the biology of the Horta to be plausible, particularly the idea of instant creation of tunnels by infinitely potent acid secretions. We can all be thankful that after a mind meld with Spock, the Horta could communicate using English. The Horta was spared from the angry mob of miners and we got a happy ending.

For the Exode Trilogy, I imagine that the pek long ago infested Earth-like planets with zeptites. 'The Devil in the Dark' is another story that could be better re-told with nanotechnology and without the heavy-handed moralizing of Gene Coon.

time portal

Trek 21. I like time travel stories, but 'The City on the Edge of Forever' always annoyed me for both its utter futility and the silly scene at the start with Dr. McCoy giving himself a shot of cordrazine. The humor in this episode almost made up for all the annoyances. {2018: more about this episode}

Joan Collins

This is the episode of Star Trek that inspired my fan fiction suggestion for a new Star Trek television show in 2017: Star Trek: Galactic Core.

Actors on the edge of forever. Harlan Ellison, William Shatner and Joan Collins are all still with us! (2018 update: Ellison died at age 84)

Hey, with all the human-alien
sexual contacts in Star Trek,
let's call the new show STD!

Looking back at more Star Trek episodes.

Related: new Star Trek episodes.

Ferengi financing: $20 coins for just $40!

Ferengi Rule of Acquisition #117: You should celebrate the Federation as a vision of the future without capitalism by selling special Star Trek merchandise!
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Next: investigating microchanges in the Buld Reality

visit the Gallery of Book and Magazine Covers

Ancient Aliens

1979 - Ripley

This is the fifth in a series of blog posts about my Search for Interesting Hollywood Aliens (SIHA) in science fiction movies this summer. In Part 1 of this series, I gave my pessimistic prediction for what might be put up on the big screen by Hollywood when the idea of ancient alien visitors to Earth is brought into a SciFi flick. This weekend Prometheus is opening in the U.S.A. and I have been reading online accounts of the aliens.
"lots of candy for the eye and just about nothing for the brain"

now, cut that out!

Apparently the creators of Prometheus think it is cool to make ambiguous science fiction stories. The fans will debate the meaning of Prometheus until the sequel comes out. I can understand that approach as a strategy for stringing a television audience along year-after-year-after year. The X-files did it well. Will a movie audience put up with the same kind of treatment? $ure they will, if you market it right.

2012 -  "We must go one better! I want a whole bunch of mysterious black objects!"

"gardener in space"
I've seen many observers who interpret an early scene in Prometheus (see "oil crisis", below) as depicting aliens who come to planets like Earth and "seed their DNA patterns" into the environment, leading to the evolution of creatures like we humans...creatures who are chemically and structurally similar to the aliens. Why do this? Obviously, this ensures that there will be an endless parade of actresses in underwear who can play roles in horror movies about slimy alien snake-like creatures doing nasty things inside their bodies. However, the movie never says that Earth was seeded with alien DNA. The "oil crisis" scene at the start of the movie might be LV-223 about 2,000 years ago.

1968           2001: A Space Odyssey          One mysterious black object

Take my liver, please!

Why do these lithe heroines continually rush off to tinseltown and sign up for this kind of SciFi/horror trouble? Because there is always a lurking corporate magnate who eagerly rushes out to meet the aliens in hope of immortality or, at least, a seven figure Hollywood movie contract.

Any other questions?

mmm...liver!

Aliens left their calling card (a star map) on Earth so that we humans would build spaceships and travel through the stars and make a Summer Blockbuster movie about it. Those aliens really like mammals. We can be easily milked for endless runs of SciFi/horror trilogies, trilogies of prequels, trilogies of re-imaginings, etc etc.  

“What the hell? Is that it?!”
Prometheus 1 can't tell us anything coherent about the aliens because there must be a Prometheus 2 and a Prometheus 3. And then the Prometheus the Next Generation trilogy.

"pseudo sciency mumbo jumbo about DNA"

oil crisis

So, how do aliens "seed their DNA" into the ecosystems of planets? In The X-Files, it was "black oil", a mysterious substance that could infect humans and turn humanity into the slaves of aliens. In Prometheus there is a strange "dark liquid", a plot device that is well-stocked on LV-223 and that when poured out on a Hollywood movie set does anything called for in the story line. In Star Trek, such magical plot devices are given a name such as nanites.

dinner is served

Review (there will be a quiz on this). Did you get that? Here it is in 3D: if you want to send astronauts in underwear to a distant planet for your next horror movie then you use "dark liquid" to put alien DNA into the water. Stir and wait a while: humans  follow their "racial memory" (and cave paintings) upstream to the distant star of the aliens where the horrid decapitations and slimy snake-like things can parade across the big $creen of the $ummer blockbu$ter.

"one of the most disappointing movies I have seen"
I like the idea that human-like creatures might visit Earth and tell Earthlings their story, resulting in cave paintings and other evidence of "ancient astronauts". Why haven't we seen those human-like creatures lately? Maybe those human-like visitors to Earth suffered a technological disaster similar to "gray goo"...nanites-gone-wrong. Hey, these things happen when you let Hollywood script writers get involved.

If "shit happens" does not satisfy you, then blame everything on Jesus.

How do I get out of this movie?

What is the deep "big question" philosophy of Prometheus? " ... science fiction is really just the cautionary tale writ large. The fundamental law of nature is to not know too much about yourself. So God forbid we fly too close to that flame — we are going to get burned." So, if human-like creatures visited Earth thousands of years ago, it is best that we not know too much about that?

Science fiction is a rational exploration of a speculative fiction idea. Prometheus puts a boat-load of scientists into what can be interpreted as an antiscience fiction horror story. In Prometheus some old and dying rich dude (who wants to find the Fountain of Youth) loads up a crew of low-quality scientists and flies off to the stars. Prometheus is lost in a Hollywood fantasy where scientists are as ignorant about science as your average film school graduate and Hollywood script writer. Nothing need be explained or make sense in any horror movie, including Prometheus; just $plash the big $creen with enough blood and play plenty of loud annoying music....the $ummer turnstile$ will whirl. Ka-ching!

Antiscience? Lindelof: "It's definitely not anti-science" ..... "there are certain questions that we as humans should not be asking. ....That was the story that Ridley wanted to tell, and the story that I felt was really cool." Lindelof says that questions like where do we come from? are nonscientific questions, according to Lindelof they are spiritual questions. So, do I have this correct...humans are programmed to use science to explore philosophical questions and that inevitably leads to a horror story? As Lindelof says, "That's Frankenstein 101." I'm sorry Damon, but I don't agree. As far as I can tell, science is the only thing that gives humanity a chance to answering the question: where do we come from? True horror stories of humanity come from ignorance, often ignorance dressed up in the form if indisputable religious and philosophical doctrines.

Prometheus might be an equal opportunity offender. Some observers feel it is antiscience and others feel it is anti-religion (example). Maybe the film must be judged a success if people are discussing it.

2001 lights

Clarke's law says, "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." Stanley Kubrick, in the pre-CGI era, adapted this law for film and came up with, "Any advanced technology can be depicted on the big screen by weird music or a psychedelic light show". Here in the CGI era, in Prometheus this becomes, "Depict for a modern film audience a semi-human space ship passenger (who might have seemed like a god to primitive Earthlings) as performing a magical/religious ritual while using the advanced alien technology (black goo)". Um, why? In a future blog post I'll I attempt to put a positive Exodemic spin on this flick and "explain away" the antiscience overtones of the horror story elements of Prometheus.

X marks the disposable sperm donor?

A sense of wonder

"a staggering disappointment"

As a fictional scientist trying to achieve First Contact, I'll take Carl Sagan's Contact and Ellie Arroway over horror sperm donor Charlie Holloway. But then, I hate horror stories.

"Scott seduces audiences with thought-provoking possibilities, then pulls a bait-and-switch, subbing in a familiar monster thriller and fiery explosion-fest"

Caesarean section, anyone?

I was tempted to see this movie before I learned that it is just a tease that tells us nothing interesting about the aliens who visited Earth long ago. It is a tease with the next movie in the $erie$ already being di$cu$$ed. Rather than go to the theater, I find it more fun to imagine how Prometheus could be turned into an interesting SciFi flick (see this blog post).

Rated R for "Relentless Hollywood money machine".

Wait! Remember, this is a horror movie, where is the axe?

source

God vs. Aliens 

Creationism for Geeks
echo

If there is no God and we, as a species, found evidence that we had been created by Hollywood aliens then would nihilism rule the box office? One solution to the Fermi Paradox is that humanoids inevitably destroy themselves: some technology (death stars, nuclear power, genetic engineering or nanorobotics, take your pick) will spin out of control and exterminate any technological species. Is that the inevitable Hollywood vision of a godless future?

Imagine that Ridley Scott is able to make a sequel (or two, or three or whatever the market will allow) to Prometheus: what are the chances that such a movie would say something interesting about aliens? Four puzzle pieces need to be fit in:

David, I am your father.

1) When I look into my crystal ball, I feel like my answer to this question should include artificial intelligence and humanoid robots. Do the "aliens" of Prometheus, "aliens" who have traveled between the stars for thousands of years, "aliens" who are so much like humans, also have artificial intelligence and robots?

2) Why is it that when humans finally make first contact, after 4,000,000,000 years of evolution, the aliens are very close to our level of technological development? Just so that humans can always defeat the Evil Aliens and allow for next year's $equel?

3) Are all humanoids blundering fools who will eventually unleashed a destructive "dark liquid" upon the universe, causing all biological lifeforms to be exterminated, leaving only their machines to continue into the future?

2020 - They want to put what inside of me?

4) What do the marketing expert$ in Hollywood judge to be the be$t mo$t profitable path forward for $ciFi movie$?

In the spirit of Prometheus, where the Big Answers are purposefully withheld, I'll leave this puzzle as an exercise for the reader. Answers are due before Noomi wakes up for the sequel.

"the weaknesses of Prometheus might be said to illustrate ... the negative impact of the large, greedy corporations that now govern the production of science fiction films"

Related news.... 

Apparently there was a decade-long effort to bring At the Mountains of Madness to the big screen. Since the plot of Prometheus is so similar to that in the 1931 H. P. Lovecraft horror story, that effort might need to wait until audience memories fade. I wonder how they planned to depict ancient alien ruins in a remote corner of Earth. Given the James Cameron connection, maybe the plan was to discover evidence for past visitors to Earth under water. Just think of the horrors that Cameron might dredge up from Lake Vostok.

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My fantasy about of how Hollywood is likely to complete the story told in Prometheus....

2015: Prometheus 2, or, Take Me to My Maker

I just wanted to get a head

Timewarp! So, it is now 2015. Elizabeth the Faithful still expects to have a nice chat with an "engineer". David's robot head is riding an alien hover-unicycle around the "engineer" ship during the trip to the "engineer" home world. We wonder....has the entire "engineer"  civilization been knocked out of the space age 2,000 years previously? David Headroom and Elizabeth the Faithful are the only two sentient beings who managed to escape from moon LV-223. Why is that? The rest of the crew was unworthy; a bunch of dope-smoking buggers who deserved to die in a horror movie. Elizabeth and David have the right stuff. It might be the gold...David has gold leads on his positronic brain circuits and Elizabeth has a gold cross.

At the alien home world David Headroom and the Alien Birther will learn the truth of humanity's past. Lucky for corporate, there will be many "engineers" in suspended animation on the "engineer" home world who can be awakened and infected with black slime in order to satisfy every Hollywood horror fetish. Then it will be time for Elizabeth and David to return triumphantly to Earth.

2020: Prometheus 3: The Voyage Home
But on the flight to Earth poor David will have his doubts. Logic will demand empirical evidence that worthy humans such as Elizabeth the Faithful are able to survive direct contact with the black slime. So, during their return flight to Earth, David will infect Noomi with black goo and something will grow inside her. Will it be the next stage human Star Child from 2001? In a horror movie? Get real. Well, maybe a Star Child with a giant prehensile snake-like organ (with teeth) that will emerge from Queen Elizabeth whenever an unworthy Earthling needs to be eliminated. Earth will be full of unworthy redshirts, more than enough to satisfy the casting call for yet another Hollywood horror movie.

Coming in 2025: a Prometheus the Next Generation trilogy.

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See the exciting conclusion to the 2012 Search for Interesting Hollywood Aliens

Click here to see how I would convert Prometheus from a horror movie into an intellectually-stimulating SciFi adventure flick.

2013 SIHA Award.

2014 SIHA.

Related reading: how ancient? 2,000,000,000 years; the alien Huaoshy.