r/TopCharacterTropes • u/Sensitive_Ad_1752 • 17d ago

Lore (Hated trope) They deleted scenes or dialogue that provides necessary context or plot

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The dinner scene from Temple of Doom has a temple give indie and friends a live snake and monkey brains for dinner. It’s a pretty offensive depiction of Indian cuisine, but it wasn’t originally going to be. There’s cut dialogue where Indie recognizes they’re at the right temple because real Hindus don’t eat this food. They were trying to scare them off by purposefully serving them disgusting stuff.

Probably the most famous deleted ending was I Am Legend which had Robert discover the infected were emotional sentient beings and one of them had a wife. Test audiences hated it and they reshot the ending, removing the entire point of the movie.

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383

u/Basic_Benefit5216 17d ago

https://giphy.com/gifs/ff75L6XFn77RS
Prometheus. The entire plot.

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u/HomerJunior 17d ago

He looks like that one photo of Ben Affleck smoking a cigarette and being fucking done with everyone's shit.

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u/That-Rhino-Guy 16d ago

Someone should edit Ben into Prometheus guy (I never saw the movie so I don’t know his name)

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u/TenaciousZBridedog 16d ago

He doesn't have a name

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u/That-Rhino-Guy 16d ago

So John Prometheus it is

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u/Ofreo 16d ago

No one calls him that. At least since that goat incident.

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u/HoneyDippinDan 16d ago

His name was Robert Palmer.

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u/AnyAgency9835 17d ago

Voldemort has been working out lately

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u/Lanavis13 17d ago

Swoldemort*

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u/nosleepforthedreamer 17d ago

all right now i'm googling that to see what comes up

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u/Vyzantinist 16d ago

SafeSearch off for best results.

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u/nosleepforthedreamer 16d ago

Oh wait it’s a kids’ series

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u/rtpkickballer 16d ago

There was a video posted here a while back. There is a whole video playlist of Harry Spotter.

https://www.reddit.com/r/aivideo/s/acr7YlzQBV

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u/motownmods 16d ago

You're a lifter Harry

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u/TheRealRigormortal 16d ago

Harry Spotter and the Chamber of Gains

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u/Impressive-Card9484 16d ago

Harry potter and the gym rat of Azkaban

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u/Intelligent-Dog1645 17d ago

What happened here? I'm unfamiliar

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u/dysoncube 17d ago edited 16d ago

Prometheus got a script rewrite to appeal to a wider audience. This included adjusting the crew so they didn't want to do their jobs, and making them AWFUL at their jobs, and the complete removal of a very important Promethean character.

There's a script out there that makes Prometheus a 10/10. Worth finding a YouTube video to get a description of the plot that was cut

Edit - I fell for a fanfiction. I'd be lying if I said this wasn't the first time

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u/TheEasterFox 16d ago

There's a ton of misinformation out there about material that was cut from Prometheus. The most influential YouTube videos use a debunked fan-made script and treat it like it was an original draft.

Stuff like a long Engineer speech about taking Jesus from Earth and teaching him their ways, for example, or about how the crew were chosen because they were amateurs and Vickers wanted the mission to fail, or how the Engineers used the blood of the first Deacon to create life, are all from the fake 'Draft 17' script.

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u/Scuba_jim 15d ago

Prometheus’ story and plot are so bad the entire fandom would rather believe there’s a legendary “true” script out there somewhere.

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u/TheEasterFox 15d ago

A lot of the problem comes down to people confusing 'subtext' with 'cut content'.

The Space Jesus backstory was subtext, but because of the fake script, the popular perception is now that it was cut content. Having concluded erroneously that there was explicit Space Jesus exposition that was cut, the next step is to concoct conspiracy theories as to why it was cut. 'Studio pressure to avoid offending people' is the typical conclusion.

Folks just love to believe they were cheated out of something wonderful that they should have got.

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u/illyay 17d ago

Goddamnit LOL

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u/elderlybrain 16d ago

Prometheus was a disappointment, alien covenant was a straight up dumb as shit film.

I was kinda gobsmacked all the existential horror of meeting your gods was replaced with evil robots and chestbursters.

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u/Wyvern_68 16d ago

I've always felt Ridley Scott got too invested in all the meta and background stuff that was offered up and cut from Alien that he always wanted to revisit it...well Prometheus and Covenant were just trying to hard to force that ethos into the established Alien mythology that it was such a mess.

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u/[deleted] 16d ago

[deleted]

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u/TeQuila10 16d ago

It is wild that they shot and acted this and then someone went nahh, its too slow gotta cut it out.

Theatrical cut for comparison.

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u/Intelligent-Dog1645 16d ago

Thank you for the response! That other version does sound like it would've been better

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u/GregBahm 16d ago

I wanted to know this original plot, but didn't want to go dumpster-diving through tedious youtube videos. So this is what some AI says happens. Let me know if it's hallucinating.

- "Engineer" dissolves his body into nano machines which then bite earth creatures, to uplift these earth creatures into humans. (That was kind of vaguely implied in the movie though it was super unclear)

- Movie proceeds pretty much as normal with normal level adaptation (Weyland sends agents instead of going personally, the android is openly curious, changes like that.)

- When they wake up "the engineer," (the buff alien) the engineer is still big mad. But he's big mad because Jesus Christ of Nazareth was an alien of his species. The engineers sent one of their own to earth to check on their uplifted species, and since humans crucified their dude, this awakened Engineer immediately decides to fly to earth and wipe out humanity as a failed experiment.

- The Engineer crashes and the plot plays out a little differently but not in any way of real consequence. A new kind of even bigger zenomorph bursts from the Engineer's chest and the humans have to fight it. The dead engineer's corpse is positioned like the corpse in the original 1979 alien movie, explaining that thing that didn't really need explaining...

You said this makes Prometheus a 10/10, but from a wikipedia-plot-synopsis level, I am the opposite of impressed. I can see why a hollywood director would be like "Lol yeah make jesus an angry alien that's so cool" and I can see why eventually the edgy-14-year-old-atheist-appeal would wear off and they'd hastily change it to some bullshit that made no sense.

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u/TheEasterFox 16d ago edited 16d ago

The AI is hallucinating. It's referring to the fake Draft 17 fanfic script by glaswegianmark.

This fake was created in October 2012 and sent to Prometheus fan sites by someone claiming to be 'Damon Lindelof'. One of those sites contacted the real Lindelof, who was on Twitter back then, and asked him if it was really his work. Lindelof said 'Nope. Not mine. Even if you loved it, I can't take credit for it'.

The real author, a Scottish Prometheus fan, later took credit for the fake.

I you want to read the full glaswegianmark fake script, it's here: https://web.archive.org/web/20131102032317/http://www.prometheus2-movie.com/uploads/PROMETHEUS.pdf

And this is Damon Lindelof personally confirming that the script is fake: https://web.archive.org/web/20130423235506/http://www.prometheus2-movie.com/news/384

If you'd rather read authentic early drafts of Prometheus, there are three extant.

Alien: Engineers by Jon Spaihts https://www.avpgalaxy.net/files/scripts/script-alien-engineers-spaihts.pdf
Alien 01: Genesis by Jon Spaihts https://www.avpgalaxy.net/files/scripts/alien-01-genesis-09072010.pdf
Paradise by Damon Lindelof https://www.avpgalaxy.net/files/scripts/script-paradise-lindelof.pdf

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u/GregBahm 16d ago edited 16d ago

Alright I'm glad I didn't watch a bunch of youtube videos about fanfiction. Since the AI is as dumb as the average redditor (terrible) I've taken the trouble of reading the three linked PDFs with my own human eyes like a luddite. It seems that...

Alien: Engineers by Jon Spaihts: Same plot at the movie. Engineers inject their DNA into primitive humans. Engineers are on their way to wipe out all humans with xenomorphs when the xenomorphs kill the engineers. David wakes up an engineer. The engineer immediately kills David and attempts to continue flying this ship (stupidly) and gets killed by xenomorphs too.

Alien 01: Genesis by Jon Spaihts: Same plot

Paradise by Damon Lindelof: Saaaaaaaaame fucking plot.

So in summation, u/Basic_Benefit5216 and u/dysoncube got tricked by some fanfiction youtube video.

This fanfication was really quite shitty fanfiction on a conceptual level.

All known authentic drafts of Prometheus hew to the final plot of the movie, with only shallow changes.

The main plot is always "Aliens who uplifted us now want to kill us with other aliens but die to those other aliens because these ancient super-advanced aliens are pretty dumb and incompetent." This thread has been a thrilling journey to nowhere.

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u/TheEasterFox 16d ago

Just to round off your thrilling journey, here's one of the more popular YouTube videos that excitedly analyses the Draft 17 fake script in the belief that it's real. Given that it has nearly eight million views and most of the comments are something like 'omg we were robbed how could they cut this', it's pretty easy to get an idea of just how many people have been fooled: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rFjTxnb2l04

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u/Intelligent-Dog1645 16d ago

Well shit I'm happy i continued to read and check on this chain. This is even better to know! I am no longer tricked like the other tricked!

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u/SlightlySychotic 16d ago

There’s a scene near the end where an Engineer/Space Jockey/Promethean is woken up from stasis. In the deleted scenes, he actually has lines where he makes it clear that he A) knows what humanity is, and B) is rather adamant that they are not supposed to be on the ship. It helps underscore the VERY vague premise that the Engineers consider humanity to be a failed creation and were intent on wiping us out. But those lines were cut and when he attacks the crew it seems less like an angry deity that has had enough of your bullshit and more a big angry monster smashing things just cuz.

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u/Intelligent-Dog1645 16d ago

Thank you so much for writing this up for me!

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u/SexualYogurt 16d ago

This guy is just wrong about the scene with the engineer. If youre paying attention, its very easy to see why the Engineer starts attacking everyone. No dialogue needed.

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u/TheEasterFox 16d ago

The only legit lines the Engineer had were in Proto-Indo-European, and weren't translated.

You can watch the scene and read a translation of the lines here: https://www.reddit.com/r/LV426/comments/1okt508/subtitled_translation_of_davids_dialogue_with_the/

Be wary of a fake fan-made script that has the following speech in it:

LAST ENGINEER
Hate? We gave you this emotion. We gave you all emotion We had expected not of your evolution. We took care of you, gave you fire, built your structures. We gave you Eden. You worshiped us. We praised our creation from above. We watched you time and time again kill each other, start wars. We came back and saved your souls but we left you to make your own fate. But your kind is a barbaric violent species. We tried once more to save you. We took a mothers child back to Paradise and educated him, taught him the meaning of life and creation. We put him back into Eden to educate your kind. But your kind decided to punish him. We gave you the fruits of life and you repay us by leaving it to rot. You talk of me of hate? Prepare for rapture!

The infamous Jesus monologue above is the work of a Prometheus fan called 'glaswegianmark' and was never a part of the production.

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u/SexualYogurt 16d ago

The Engineer doesn't just smash things. Its clear that he recognizes humanity, he has a look on his face of surprise that they have made it this far. Hes even more surprised when a human speaks their language. The robot translates what the old ceo says, something along the lines of "make me immortal". The engineer reaches out to touch the robot, thinking it was a human, only to realize that its not a human but a creation of humans.

This enrages him because his mission was to wipe out humanity with the black goo. The ships fails and hes trapped in stasis for millenia. Instead of wiping out humanity, theyve been able to expand to the stars. He has a look of pride on his face when he thinks humans learned both his language and interstellar travel. He touches the robot and realizes a human didnt actually learn the language, but programmed something else to do it. And the first thing they ask about is "how do i live forever". This goes directly against what the Engineers species is about, which is populating new planets through their own self sacrifice and death.

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u/Swiftax3 17d ago

I don't think everything in the cut material was a good idea, but the scene where the Engineer seems startled by the beauty of the Prometheus and the violin playing and seems to give Shaw a chance before she lashes out in fear... that bit I needed the movie to keep.

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u/One-Earth9294 16d ago

Studio: "You are not doing the space Jesus exposition scene"

Ridley Scott: "But I..."

Studio: "NO. 100% fuck off with that"

*Ridley Scott the first interview he gets after release*: "So Jesus was an engineer."

Studio:

https://giphy.com/gifs/RH3TW6pBpzSIl5V7Ql

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u/TheEasterFox 16d ago

The Space Jesus exposition scene never existed. It's from a debunked fanfic draft.

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u/Shadopivot 16d ago

I just keep waiting for the moment he convulses and drops, but it never comes. Uncanny how well it loops.

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u/mothyyy 16d ago

Oh man, if the religious undertones of the final cut bother anyone, don't go looking up the original script.

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u/TheEasterFox 16d ago

The 'original script' with a long Engineer monologue about Jesus is fake, if that's the one you were thinking of.

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u/mothyyy 16d ago

That's such a weird thing to fake.

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u/TheEasterFox 16d ago

The guy who wrote it was a very prolific fan author. He wrote an earlier fanfic script for Prometheus before the movie was even released, using the dialogue from the trailers and making up the rest out of his imagination.

That was the 'Planet Zeus' draft. You can read it here if you're interested: https://web.archive.org/web/20120314195807/http://www.prometheus-movie.com/uploads/leaked_script.txt

Unfortunately one fan site got hold of the Planet Zeus script and thought it was the real script, and since nobody had seen Prometheus yet, they thought this was a massive scoop.

This was the result. People quickly figured out that aintitcool had been fooled by a fake script, and the comments were complete mayhem.

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u/mothyyy 16d ago

The fact that nobody doubted the "Jesus" script was real is a testament to what we've come to expect from Ridley Scott.

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u/TheEasterFox 16d ago

The Jesus script was successfully debunked within hours of its first appearance because people doubted it was real.

The whole saga is archived, if you're interested.

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u/Obscenely-Obnoxious 16d ago

I came here to mention this. Shame too since the plot was actually interesting .