8 Early Drafts That Almost Ruined Great Movies

It's no Alien, but Prometheus wasn't deserving of the disparaging response it got upon release. That's not important to this entry, I just feel I need to preface any talk about the Alien "prequel" with that given how resounding a disappointment it's regarded as.

Anyway, to the film, and specifically the Engineers, the Space Jockey-suit wearing creators of humanity. In the movie, a bunch of scientists travel to a far-off planet in search of the aliens, only to instead discover that they were actually plotting to go attack Earth 2000 years ago until the ambiguous effects of the black goo got in the way.

The key detail there is 2000 years, a conspicuous round number that is incredibly coincidental unless the Engineers work by the Gregorian calendar. And, in an earlier draft, they weren't just using it, they instigated it. That's right - Jesus was an Engineer.

As revealed by Ridley Scott, the original plan was that the creators sent an emissary down to Earth to check up on their little life experiment, only for us to baulk at his brilliance and crucify him, motivating that waylaid attack. It's an interesting idea, tying the ancient astronaut hypothesis into our modern society, but when you write it down - I repeat, Jesus was an Engineer - it feels incredibly dumb. Prometheus was trying to be this major exploration of key existential issues, and to tie them into religion so flippantly would have really waylaid that.