Corrected entry: Spoiler; Ajak and 'the true villain' are the only ones who know the true nature of the mission and the fact that the Earth will cease to exist in 7 days. None of her fellow Eternals would know where to find her or suspect that she's dead or that anything is wrong, but the villain makes them find her body on purpose to provide a distraction to keep them busy investigating her death. Provide a 'distraction' to someone who is completely unsuspecting (and actively lead them) is pure nonsense.
Corrected entry: Cell phone service in the middle of the Amazon jungle? This scene is shown as "present day." Cell phone service in the jungle is not very probable. (01:11:20)
Correction: I do fundamentally agree, but feels more like a minor 'stupidity' of the movie; the movie itself does address the point with Kingo asking Sersi who's their phone carrier since his is dead, and the convo does break in the end. There is a close-up of the phone during their talk, I believe the logo of the brand is not visible but I could be wrong - it would surely have been a great opportunity for product placement, with that kind of quality.
Corrected entry: During the ending credits, Chloe Zhao's name is accidentally written twice - when it gets to the "Written by" credit, it reads "Chloe Zhao and Chloe Zhao and Patrick Burleigh and Kaz and Ryan Firpo." This is not referring to a "story by" credit, as Zhao is not credited for that - as this is part of the flashy CGI credits sequence and not the scrolling regular credits, it's very unclear as to why it's there. [Confirmed in the theatrical release, not certain for the home media release].
Correction: What the credits actually say is "Screenplay by Chloé Zhao and Chloé Zhao & Patrick Burleigh and Ryan Firpo and Kaz Firpo." Per Writers Guild rules, "and" and "&" have different meanings. In this case, it means Chloé Zhao wrote a draft with Patrick Burleigh and a separate draft by herself.
Correction: It's not a mistake. It has to do with rules as to how people are credited for different drafts. It's happened in other films too. Zhao wrote a draft on her own, so she gets a credit for that draft. She also wrote a separate draft with Patrick Burleigh, so she was required to get a separate credit for that draft since it was part of a collaboration. What makes it clear is that he second credit uses an & symbol and not the word "and." An & symbol in a writing credit dictates a collaborative draft, while the word "and" dictates separate drafts. This is why the credits read "Written by Chloe Zhao and Chloe Zhao & Patrick Burleigh."
Corrected entry: Thena and some Eternals go to the Amazon. The opening scene shows the Amazon River lowlands. In the Amazon they speak Portuguese. But the Eternals speak Spanish to the natives. A part of the Amazon is in Peru where Spanish is spoken, but this is not the area where llamas (shown) typically live. Llamas are highland animals and are in southern Peru, not northern. (01:06:10)
Correction: That's not true that in Amazon forest they speak Portuguese, because actually the Amazon is a forest, not a state with an official language, which one contemplates a few of Latin American countries, including Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador, and most of them speak in Spanish. I found an article who studied languages in Amazon forest, there are around 240 languages around all the extension of the Amazon forest. Https://www.comciencia.br/dossies-1-72/reportagens/amazonia/amaz6.htm.
The explanation for the language spoken is that they are the descendants of the Spanish conquistadores that Druig controlled mentally in Tenochtitlan. I have no idea about the llamas part though.
Well, it's just a movie. A few slips here and there are inconsequential. Thanks.
OK. Noted. Thanks.
Correction: He explains this plainly. He knows that when the earth is being destroyed they would go to Ajak for help, Since she is dead however they will know something is wrong and will investigate the emergence. But if it was a Deviant, they will be distracted killing them to not know about the emergence before it is too late. At least, that is what he had hoped.
lionhead
"When the others realise something is happening to the Earth, they'll come to you. When they find your body, they'll know the Deviants are back. It'll keep them busy during the Emergence." It makes absolutely no sense. During the movie, none of them cares about what is happening to the planet. There's no such sense of urgency. He does all that to "keep busy" people who never met in centuries and never interfered to any world-threatening phenomenon.None of them knows about the Emergence.If they didn't find her at home, they wouldn't even know she was dead and that would have only delayed them further. He needs to stall them just for a couple days, not years.
Sammo ★
He also said he suspected that Ajak would change her mind and betray Arishem. If he hasn't killed her, she would have tried to recruit the others to stop the Emergence. The Deviants had already escaped the ice, he just lured them together to kill Ajak. His plan kind of went sideways since the group was to find her dead and seek out the Deviants, but the Deviants already attacked them. Plus, had Sersi not learned their true mission, they would be too busy to stop the Emergence.
Bishop73
Killing Ajak is the logical part. Hauling her body across the continent so the others will find it is the absurd part. Why having killed the only person who was a threat to his plan would he build a murder mystery about it? He had already won. If they didn't find Ajak at home, assuming they'd bother to go there to begin with, they would have waited for her, at most looked for her presumably in vain, and wasted time. Why stir anything?
Sammo ★
He stirs to keep them distracted, hoping they would not investigate the earthquakes for one thing, and then the sudden giant volcano for another. He knows they are attached to the Earth and it's people, would try to safe them. He tried to convince them it were the Deviants, not something else. Unfortunately for him, Sersi became their leader, whilst he expected it to be him.
lionhead
Even if they would figure out on their own that 'something was happening' (and they didn't), they didn't have the faintest idea about the dormant Celestial business. Deviants are literally the only thing that would bring them together and back to action (not even that, Gil just butchers one and does not give a damn). Ikaris states matter-of-factly that he needed to do things and certain stuff would happen only because he needs to make the movie happen. They were all 'busy' already, leading their boring lives, and they had completely insufficient data to react, especially if he didn't spoon-feed them that it was something connected to them to begin with.
Sammo ★
The Deviants did come back, after dormant in the ice. That's what brings them together, that's why Ikarus killed Ajak, that's why he needed to distract them from her death. It's not that difficult to understand. You're just not seeing the connection.
lionhead
I am simply not seeing connections that don't exist. The Deviants are not "why" he killed Ajak at all; he kills her because she wants to stop the Emergence. The Deviants are just a distraction (which is a misleading term, for the reasons I underlined in the original post, but let's go with that). They are a weak colony stranded in Alaska and unable to do any substantial damage that got free a week before; It will be Ajak's power that causes them to be able to be on the radar again and changes their target from humans to Eternals (which is something they never did before and he couldn't have anticipated).
Sammo ★
I didn't say he killed Ajak because of the deviants. He killed Ajak because the deviants would cause the Eternals to come together again, they will come to Ajak (or she to them) and she will tell them about the emergence. So, he kills Ajak but once they encounter the Deviants again and Ajak is missing, they will start to investigate and perhaps find out about the emergence. So, he puts her body to be found, so they will focus on the deviants. Alright?
lionhead
No, the others wouldn't come to Ajak (or vice versa, she didn't even know about them) because of the Deviants. The Deviants aren't back, there's just half a dozen harmless leftovers that got thawed out and that he 'feeds' (it's never said or implied that he knew that they'd become stronger and Eternal-murders, too). The others may go ask Ajak for an opinion because of the strange earthquake - and you never see a sense of urgency in this movie. This guy goes out of his way to ring a giant alarm bell, so he can tell a fake story to people who haven't been in touch in ages and may have some mild curiosity about something that does not involve them as far as they know, since they don't know about Emergence or any of that stuff.
Sammo ★