PROMETHEUS (2012)

Every criticism under the sun was thrown at this film/story and none of it sticks. It may be within fairness to say that it was made for an audience that hasn't yet reached adulthood. I suppose, most of the 'criticism' that informed the general audience attitude is rooted in the laziness and impotence engendered by popular fashion. 

 

 The storytellers of Prometheus created a masterful work in providing the audience with fascinating pieces to form a greater whole. Instead of putting in the work to form that whole (read: plot), to link the connections, there was much complaining about thin characters, their poor logic and their motivations not being explicitly drawn out. Ambiguity allows the viewer to bring their own intelligence, their own soul, their own wisdom, their own experience to the story. This creates an exchange of ideas between the creators and the audience member which is crucial to fulfilling the 'genetic imperatives' of the medium . It seems individual thought is the antithesis of whatever it is that the American audience, largely informed by social media, cultivates in their use of the internet. 

Take the review in Forbes. It punishes Prometheus for lacking in original ideas, suggesting a purposeful characterization of the storytellers as plagiaristic. To what critical end? Certainly not for finding value in cinema. He refers to himself as a 'self-respecting fan of the genre' and perhaps therein lies the problem. The word 'fan' is thrown around so loosely today that its meaning has been lost. Unfortunately, that word only serves to discredit the user when applied to their self being that fanaticism is marked by an obsessive, blinding devotion which obscures critical-thought. 
This fan in his review, seems to hold Alien in high regard as he makes a damning comparison to its 2012 counterpart in his opening paragraph. Alien came under the very same criticism in its time of release. The author of Alien, Dan O'Bannon, responded by saying that he borrowed not from a single work of science fiction or even a handful of titles, but from many titles.  For the Forbes reviewer, this illustrates a blind spot in his understanding of storytelling and film history.

                   

The Forbes critic continues by claiming Prometheus has no characters worth our (or his) investment and furthermore has nothing to say about humans and humanity that is worth hearing. Therefore, no answer is forthcoming to this kind of criticism which the Forbes reviewer puts forth as such. It seems to me that he is not talking about Prometheus at all, but instead his inability to understand what he has been presented with by the storytellers. One cannot answer a fan and expect any further reasonable exchange, especially one posing as a critic. 

From the review: "what's responsible for the vacant barbarism of the aliens is merely the limited imaginations of their authors." Yet, science fiction is about today, who we are today and inviting the audience to ask that question of themselves. If we are to buy into the reviewers comment about vacant barbarism and limited imaginations, then it begs examining as a further example of the material being misunderstood and the misunderstanding stemming from the inability to employ critical thought as impaired by his self-proclaimed fanaticism.

It seems that the 'reason' for finding the message of Prometheus as unworthy for our hearing it is that it contradicts and threatens even, the comfortable lifestyle in which he and many other naysayers of this story blindly indulge. As it is we who are the Engineers. We are the ones who actuate vacant barbarism, and as the story illustrates, behind religious beliefs of all things. The story of Prometheus deals with something that most people are devoted to in a very personal way, their religious beliefs. Prometheus tackles religion as the source, if not the flashpoint, for intergalactic conflict. Then certainly it has created an alternate view through which one can relate to our own world, recontextualizing it to allow a Lucian perspective. Furthermore, the film's story points it's questions at an area of our lives, our existence, our psychology which makes so many people uncomfortable to question or even address, that being our morality.

The goal here is not to single out this particular reviewer in Forbes or even the review itself, but to cite as an example of the grave misunderstandings and misgivings which dominate popular taste and criticism toward science fiction. The point being not that Prometheus got bad reviews, but that the reviews themselves were bad. Bad criticism, and that is a far greater crime. Doubly so that it came from people who claim that their love of science fiction is so intense that it has become an obsession.