HtownAg92 said:
Late to the party, just watched on HBO. Enjoyed it, seemed to get back to the original horror more.
Something I do not get. So from 10 years after Prometheus (and maybe before?), humans are colonizing and terra-farming distant planets and moons, and running into these xenos. The Nostromo goes to a planet where a jockey has crashed with some xenos. Ripley goes into hypersleep for 50+ years and is finally discovered. In the meantime, a colony goes offline. Obviously, colonies and terra-farming continue during Ripley's float. Marines go to investigate.
Question: How did the company, marines, etc. not know anything about the xenos? Ripley was the source of all information - acid for blood, face-hugging, etc.
The Company did know something of the xenomorphs, although we never get an explanation as to how they knew. In the original movie, it is revealed via the on-board AI Mother that the android Ash was placed aboard the Nostromo to ensure the safe return of an alien specimen, with no consideration given to the crew's safety. Presumably the Company knew because they had detected and translated the same signal that brought the Nostromo's return voyage to Earth to a stop to investigate.
If I recall right, Ripley discovers that Burke had initiated events that led to the colony being decimated and the Marines being sent to investigate, likely all based on Riply's testimony during the corporate investigation into the destruction of the Nostromo.
Prometheus gave us some background on the "space jockeys" - the engineers, and if I read Covenant correctly, the android David seems to be largely responsible for continuing what it believed was their work in genetic engineering to create what we know as the alien.