"Alien Covenant: The plot of "Paradise Lost"

leading from

Heading towards Prometheus: Paradise Lost

and

Carlos Huante

and

Nephilim  

 

 
 

a) Paradise Lost
 

 

a.i) More creatures. 

Carlos Huante found that there were two versions of Alien Covenant. The first one, called Paradise Lost, had more creatures.

It had a pitbull like alien dog named 'Bug' that David had running around loose on the Engineer planet, and then he created these Meerkats as his super violent army.

They would open their mouths to reveal all their teeth that were individually attached to a finger so they had this sort of hand of teeth inside of their mouth, and it was a precursor of things to come, showing the projecting mouth like form already happening in David's creations.

 

a.ii) David as the devil creates the Nephilim

Going by the script that he read, it looked to Carlos as if David was going to become the devil who had taken over Paradise and was now creating the Nephilim, his hybrids and he was even starting to do experiments on some of the engineers.

Carlos also understood that in Prometheus, there was still no evidence that the Engineers had anything to do with Earth through the whole film but for some reason, everyone was stupid enough to say 'They created us" because it had similar DNA.

He found the ideas there stupid.

 

a.iii) Like the Nephilim from the bible

 

As a man who had discovered God after a personal experience, he took an interest in the bible and

assumed the film was about the fallen angels and the Nephilim from the bible.

 

As an audience member, he thought about David's story in terms of the Genesis story of the Nephillim which was about fallen angels rather than demons.

 

These fallen angels removed their state to be able to mate with humans using technology.

 

Even from the time that they were working on Prometheus, these giants were like the Nephilim from the bible, and the created beings by these other aliens that had created these giants to infect humanity by mixing with them was like the old biblical story.

 

However it was as if David was more of a Nephillim hmself, as if he creating life in his own image in an abominable way because he cannot reproduce like humans can.

 

David was a damaged being fostered and programmed by a damaged creator, Peter Weyland, 

 

It appeared that he produces things that mirror his interests and shortcomings that would be a reflection of his creator's

 

So if a human is born from faulty parents, he or she can still overcome those challenges and do something great, but what if you are a programmed being .

 

 But Carlos wanted this android to die

Meanwhile, he would have liked the Ultramorph to show up and there to be the revenge of the Engineers on David.

 

a.iv) Elizabeth Shaw turns up alive
In the story, Elizabeth Shaw was still alive.

They find her and she's been hiding from David the whole time and helps the explorers on the planet escape.

 

In the script there would have been experiments done on the engineers and some would have been found still alive

Carlos wasn't happy about the fact that in the final film, she seemed to have been killed off, as she was one of the best things about Prometheus

 

a.v) Elizabeth Shaw reassembled David

On her trip to the homeworld, she became lonely and she had David's parts floating outside the ship, she didn't want anything to do with him, but she still had to talk to him. 

 

Eventually she ended up bring his body in and reattaching him as they became friends.

He would have affection for her in a friendship way.

 

a.vi) Why David kills the Engineers

On the planet, they journey to the city and David looks at her and tells her "Do you trust me, do you trust that I love you and everything I’m going to do from this point on is because of you and that’s all to protect you."

She looks at him and says,"Okay, yes I do" so he then then kills all the Engineers on the planet with the black goo..

As far as Carlos could say, Shaw's character seems to tell him "Hey, I wanted to talk to these people" but of course it is too late

1.  Carlo Huante: “So it goes away. But in that version we had this pitbull kind of alien dog named ‘Bug’ that David had running around loose on the Engineer planet and then he had created these Meerkats and that’s why I called the little white things [Covenant’s version of the Neomorphs] Meerkats because that’s what they reminded me of from the old story.. David, in the old script, had an army of Meerkats that were super violent. They were not normal. They would open their mouths to reveal that all their teeth were individually attached to a finger so they had this sort of hand of teeth inside of their mouth. A precursor of things to come. showing the projecting mouth thing already starting to happen in David’s creation there.”
    I didn’t know if it’s what Ridley was going for, that David was going to become the Devil but that’s what it was sounding like that he was the Devil that got ahold of Paradise and he’s now creating his Nephilim, his hybrids, and he even started to do experiments on some of the Engineers. It’s wrong in many ways, right, that the creation of the creation has come in to dominate you…story-wise back to Prometheus there was still no evidence that Engineers had anything to do with Earth through the whole film but for some reason, everyone was stupid enough to say ‘They created us’ because it has similar DNA..There was a lot of stupid talk in those movies.”(https://hnentertainment.co/exclusive-alien-covenant-creature-designer-carlos-huante-talks-details-of-elizabeth-shaws-original-role-davids-army-of-meerkats-and-a-fight-between-xenomorph-neomorphs/)
   
2. HN: Fans were really upset that Elizabeth Shaw’s character was sort of killed off in between films was she ever part of the story more?
   Carlo Huante: “In the first version of what was called Paradise/Prometheus 2, Shaw was alive. They find her and she’s been hiding from David the whole time and she helps them escape. I told Ridley my wife and mother-in-law, who are strong characters themselves, they loved the Shaw character and the actress (Noomi Rapace) more than any other characters in the film and they’re not science fiction people, but they liked the film because of Noomi. I think it was a studio call as to why she didn’t return. What a shame”
   
   “So in the first version of Covenant called Paradise, she was hiding in the catacombs from David under the city and the story was that on her trip to the homeworld she got lonely and she had David hanging outside the ship, she didn’t want anything to do with him. But she still had to talk to him. Eventually, she ends up bringing his body in and reattaching him as they become friends during this trip. He ends up having affection for her in a friendship way.”
   
   “So they end up going to the city and that’s when David looks at her and tells that story ‘Do you trust me, do you trust that I love you and everything I’m going to do from this point on is because of you and that’s all to protect you’…she looks at him and says ‘Okay, yes I do’ so then he turns around and kills all the Engineers on the planet. It’s his own twisted way of vengeance for her, he kills the planet. She is like ‘Hey, I wanted to talk to these people’ but too late the whole planet is polluted now and everyone on the planet dies.”(https://hnentertainment.co/exclusive-alien-covenant-creature-designer-carlos-huante-talks-details-of-elizabeth-shaws-original-role-davids-army-of-meerkats-and-a-fight-between-xenomorph-neomorphs/)
3.  Studio Yutani: If you could decide how you would like a third alien prequel to go, how would you progress the story and what creature or creatures would you have featured in the film?

   Carlos Huante: Well just as a member of the audience  i want David dead.. heheh.. he’s a menace and the mirror of his creators shortcomings. The story of David to me is the Genesis story of The Nephillim. About how fallen angels / not demons .. the fallen angels removed the their state to be able to mate with humans.. using technology? Not unlike David.. Although David is more of a Nephillim himself.. he’s a creation creating life in his own image in an abominable way because he cannot reproduce like humans can.. so he produces things that mirror his interests and shortcomings.. if a human is born from faulty parents a he or she can still overcome those challenges and do something great.. but if you are a programmed being?.That being said i would like the Ultramorph to show up and there to be the revenge of the Engineers on David. (https://yutani.studio/carlos-huante-alien-day-2020-interview/)

4. Studio Yutani:How do you feel about the treatment of Elizabeth Shaw in the prequel films? And how if you had the choice would you have liked her story to have occurred and progressed?

   Carlos Huante: I wasn’t happy that she got killed off.. she was one of the best things about Prometheus. I liked Idris and The David character..the scientists were severely dumb and had super weak conclusions in Prometheus. They were super hero’s of stupid .. But they were right about there being something there on the planetoid. I’ll give them that.. In the script I read for Covenant..She lived and had escaped the clutches of David.. She helped the crew escape David …in that script there were experiments done on Engineers and some were still alive.(https://yutani.studio/carlos-huante-alien-day-2020-interview/)

    

 

b) The xenomorph

 

b.i)
The crew of the ship are running to another ship, they're being chased by the Neomorphs and then the beast based on the first Alien film's creature, known as the Xenomorph shows up, and starts to fight and kill these other creatures because it's supposed to hates everything

The first version of the alien beast now known at the Xenomorph does show up at the end and so has a fight with the Neomorphs.

b.ii)The xenomorph as a creature designed to destroy life

 

The idea behind the Xenomorph from the original Alien movie at the time was that it was a creation of the engineers, made to wipe off a planet of life and then to wipe itself off because it had such hostility to anything living including itself (despite the fact that the original Alien appeared in Ridley's story to be trying to reproduce and continue its life cycle) leaving nothing there and this all changed with Alien Covenant

Since the time he saw Prometheus, Carlos was able to tell Ridley that his wife and mother in law who he found were strong characters themselves but had little or no science fiction interest, actually loved the Elizabeth Shaw character and the actress Noomi Rapace herself more than any other of the characters in the film. He assumed that it was a studio call that led to her not returning


Having read the Paradise Lost script,

Carlos thought "Man, this could be the coolest thing ever. No one would ever go into this area of the bible’"

1. Carlos Huante: “The first version of the xenomorph did show up at the end and the Neomorphs and the Xenomorph have a fight. There was supposed to be a monster fight at the end of the film as they are chasing the crew to get to the ship. So as they’re running to another ship they’re being chased by the Neomorphs and then this Xenomorph shows up and it’s fighting and killing these other creatures because it hates them, it hates everything.”(https://hnentertainment.co/exclusive-alien-covenant-creature-designer-carlos-huante-talks-details-of-elizabeth-shaws-original-role-davids-army-of-meerkats-and-a-fight-between-xenomorph-neomorphs/)
2. Carlos Huante “The idea for the Xenomorph from the Prometheus era of the film series was that it was a creation of the Engineers, the original idea, made to wipe off a planet of life and then to wipe itself off because it [xeno/neomorph] has such hostility towards anything living even itself and that it would wipe off a planet and wipe itself off and leaving nothing there. Of course, all seems to have changed with Covenant.”(https://hnentertainment.co/exclusive-alien-covenant-creature-designer-carlos-huante-talks-details-of-elizabeth-shaws-original-role-davids-army-of-meerkats-and-a-fight-between-xenomorph-neomorphs/
3. HN: That was more of a hypothesis since it was never confirmed [in Prometheus].
   
   Carlo Huante: “There’s no reason to think that and then Charlie’s idea that ‘Anyone can create life. All you need is DNA’… well, that’s not ‘all you need’ that’s a huge one. You’re supposed to be a scientist.”
   
   “I was gathering from what I was reading that obviously, they called it Paradise Lost. So It was going to be a science fiction version of Paradise Lost and that’s what I was kind of gathering even from the time we were working on Prometheus is that these are giants like the Nephilim, the created beings by these other aliens that had created these giants to infect humanity by mixing with them that’s kind of the old biblical story. The fallen angels and the Nephilim, and that’s what I thought he was trying to tell. And I thought ‘Man, this could be the coolest thing ever. No one would ever go into this area of the bible’…and then as in Paradise Lost David would essentially become the devil.”
   
   “But I still don’t know where that movie was going because I don’t know if a third one is going to get made. But there were other creatures in there, there were supposed to be a bunch of experimental creatures…Neomorphs, the giant engineer creature, the many failed experiments of David, and the Primitive Xenomorph .”(https://hnentertainment.co/exclusive-alien-covenant-creature-designer-carlos-huante-talks-details-of-elizabeth-shaws-original-role-davids-army-of-meerkats-and-a-fight-between-xenomorph-neomorphs/)
   

 

 

 

 

c) Arthur Max brings news of the delay

The production was picking up steam but Arthur Max suddenly phoned Carlos up
Arthur Max said to him "'Carlos are you sitting down?"

"Um, why" responded Carlos. He was just out to lunch with a friend of his

Arthur went into the answer with a question "How long have you been working in this industry?" that was just a setup for another statement

Carlos simply said "Okay, tell me, what"

Arthur Max continued "Well, Fassbender is going off to do another movie and so they're not going to have hum any more and so they've decided to put the movie on hold"

Naturally Carlos was dismayed "Come on man, you're gonna tell me I have to go look for another job now? I'm totally into this one don't do that"

Arthur Max replied "Don't worry, we'll call you back, it may take a year"

Carlos had nothing more to say than "Okay, fine"

1. HN: Moving on to Alien: Covenant, could talk about what the early discussions on that film were? I know there was artwork where there were other animals and another sort of hybrid experiments that David was doing.
   
   Carlo Huante: “Yes, well there are two versions of Covenant..the first one had more creatures in it…that was all edited out in the second version…So we had started Paradise which is the first version of Covenant and we were going, all-in already and It stopped right as we were just picking up steam. I got a call from [production designer] Arthur Max.. ‘Carlos are you sitting down?’….’Um, why? I say. I was just out to lunch with a friend of mine, what?’ Don’t tell me ……’How long have you’ve been working in this industry?…’ I say ok tell me, what?’…he says Well, Fassbender was going off to do another movie and so they weren’t going to have him anymore and so they decided to put the movie on hold. I’m telling him ‘Come on man, you’re gonna tell me I have to go look for another job now? I’m totally into this one, don’t do that’…’Don’t worry, he says we’ll call you back it may take a year’….’Okay, fine’.”
   (https://hnentertainment.co/exclusive-alien-covenant-creature-designer-carlos-huante-talks-details-of-elizabeth-shaws-original-role-davids-army-of-meerkats-and-a-fight-between-xenomorph-neomorphs/)

d) Alien Covenant

Carlos appreciated how in the final Alien Covenant movie, they bypassed the reassembly of David the android, and it made the whole thing a little more horrific, because it shows how much a screwed up sociopath the character is right from the get-go.

In that way, it would be seen how David would have intelligence, understand the rules but have absolutely no feeling at all.

The character Walter would then seem more human than David would, which was strange to Carlos as David asserted that he was more human himself because he thought about himself, created and then Walter was more of a robot and less human, but his human qualities were his restraint, while David had no restraint at all and didn't care for anything living at all.


He felt that the film was watered down, that the studios didn't want it to become a monster movie and he hoped that it would be a little more fantastic.

The environment looked more terrestrials and he thought that it looked too conventional in terms of the design of the environment. if it were up to him, he'd want to see acid burnt stone formation that they could reference in Tundra Valley on planet Earth, where some of the large stones are blown-out into hollowed out spheres looking very alien.

1. HN: It looked like there was a bigger role planned for the Engineers originally was that ever discussed?
   
   Carlo Huante: “Prior to the black goo genocide, I know that in the script I had, the early script, there was the story between Shaw and David, and how and why David got reassembled. That story happens at the beginning of the film but they kind of bypassed all of that which makes it a little more horrific in a way. Because it shows how screwed up of a sociopath the character [of David] is, I mean the character is a sociopath from the get-go. He has intelligence and he knows the rules but he has absolutely no feeling at all.”
   “The new version of David in Covenant, Walter, seemed more human than David did, there’s a weird sort of description going on there wherein the film David asserts that he is more human because he thinks of himself and creates and Walter is more of a robot and less human. Well, Walter seemed more human because he had restraint and David had absolutely no restraint and didn’t care for anything living at all. That’s a strange character description but of course, David is a Damaged being fostered and programmed by a damaged creator… I just wanted David dead already [in Alien: Covenant].” (https://hnentertainment.co/exclusive-alien-covenant-creature-designer-carlos-huante-talks-details-of-elizabeth-shaws-original-role-davids-army-of-meerkats-and-a-fight-between-xenomorph-neomorphs/)
2. Carlo Huante: They kind of watered down that film…they didn’t want it to become a monster movie and I thought it was going to be a little more fantastic and they brought it down to a more terrestrial environment which I thought looked too conventional in the design of the environment. If it were me I’d want to see more of the acid burned stone formation which we can reference here on Earth in the Tundra valley. Some of the big stones in the valleys are blown-out into hollowed out spheres looking very Alien. Why did we have to go so conventional on a planet like this?(https://hnentertainment.co/exclusive-alien-covenant-creature-designer-carlos-huante-talks-details-of-elizabeth-shaws-original-role-davids-army-of-meerkats-and-a-fight-between-xenomorph-neomorphs/)