I don't know whether this is the right place to post this, but I've been thinking a bit about this recently and wanted to know your opinions on this:

The attitude of sci-fi movies towards alien beings has always been a split one. Actually, you can define three basic settings:

1. The movies where people live together with alien beings of some kind. Most of the time, alien cultures are clearly set to represent an ethnical group of our time, show absolutely no ethnical or cultural diversity and all act alike except to serve as a plot device (or being hybrids). Humans seem to show no cultural diversity either in those times (pick for yourself if you want it to be the 23rd century of a long time ago...)

2. Benevolent, wise aliens who come to Earth to enlighten the people and/or found culture as we know it (Close Encounters, 2001). Very rare (probably because it doesn't make for an interesting story, even though some of the best scifi stories are based on it).

3. (The largest group) Evil Invaders. Usually have some sort of social system that best reminds of anthives. They vary from the Giger versions to humanoid specimens (Borg, those Signs beings) and usually exploit their hosts/home planets until the resources are gone and then travel to the next place.
Now, the question is, why are these beings represented as they are?
Sometimes I have the fear that, if human beings should ever colonize other planets, they would fall into this category. We are a parasitic species to our home planet (as Agent Smith so nicely put it in The Matrix), and might be seen that way by other cultures. Might that be the reason?
Or is it the notion of this hive-system that is still in the minds of people from the demonisation of communism during the cold war?

Another strange observation: Personally, I never found those insect-like aliens particularly scary. Sure, they are ugly, but not scary. What is/was scary were the humanoid aliens. Even though my mind was screaming "Stupid! Stupid!" at the end of Signs those aliens still freaked me out. Even worse were humans that turned out to be aliens/alien androids in disguise.
Now where might that irrational fear(s) come from? What do YOU find particularly scary and why?

__________________
[Foot mouth in put]
Si tacuisses, philosophus mansisses.

Pauly Shore, so that fits.

That's why I read more than watch movies .

Larryt Nivens aliens are a little more multi-cultural than those of many movies I've seen.

But looking at Earth, now we are moving to "continental" cultures with the advent of mass communication. Befor I get flamed, I do understand that that is a massive oversimplification, but give it time as old cultures blend into new ones. In a few centuries (or longer) the Earth may well be one culture that is completely alien to us now...

__________________
"Light thinks it travels faster than anything but it is wrong. No matter how fast light travels it finds the darkness has always got there first, and is waiting for it." — Terry Pratchett, Reaper Man

441!!!! :)

We fear what we don't understand. Star Trek takes all of its Aline cultures from earth. We tried to find out what each is in a thread sometime ago (can't remmeber which).

Insect aliens scare me because they are ugly. I think they are so common because the hive mentality is so unhuman. They are always posed as a million insect army coming at you with no disreguard to their own lives. They sacrifice millions just to get at a main character. It is unhuman and it scares us. I don't think it parallels communism. That is more Star Wars and Star Trek.

Type number one comes from the nature of the SF genre. Quite often, SF is used as a mirror for our own society. Aliens are used as substitutes for human groups, which allows social commentary to be made while at the same time bypassing innate prejudices.

Types two and three are mythical archetypes. They are the modern versions of the gods, angels, faries, demons and other magical beings found throughout human history. As such, they either become our teachers and benefactors, or supernatural enemies to overcome. They symbolize either the best or worst in humanity in an exaggerated way.

__________________
...And that, my liege, is how we know the Earth to be banana-shaped. --Sir Bedevere

Each human is unique. All of us are different from one another, there are no two alike. We are individuals, sentient beings who can think and reason independantly of a larger group. The hive mentality is the complete opposite. Each unit of the hive is not sentient nor really self-aware. They just work. They use the mass force of numbers to overcome problems which we normally conquer using intelligence.

The Russians were less advanced than the Germans in WWII. They used large numbers of untrained and poorly equiped soldiers to combat the highly-trained and technologically equipped Germans. It is my opinion though that they would not have overcome the Germans unless the allies were fighting the Germans on the Western Front as well.

We see this type of story played out in Starship Troopers (the best example I can think of at the moment) by the humans equipped with advanced technology against brainless drones who hold no value for their own lives. In the hive sense you can not really say that each is an individual. They are all units of a larger organism which resembles a living being. There is a brain, worker, food gatherer, reproduction capabilities, and soldiers. -Colt

__________________
Be not afraid of any man no matter what his size; when danger threatens, call on me, and I will equalize.

I still say it all comes down to how creative the writers, producers, designers, et al can be . It also comes down to what actually makes a (well, they try anyway) good story.

__________________
"As I lay beneath the Southern Cross, the stars tell more than I could" . . . David Meece

I think perhaps the insect/hive type aliens are mainly used because it's not necessary to feel much guilt when the heroes obliterate them. They don't think, feel, etc., so why feel bad about wiping them out?
The humanoid types are, I agree, much scarier because to me they represent some deformity of ourselves.
The problem is that all these types are just variations on lifeforms with which we are familiar, and it's a pretty rare science fiction writer (book or screen) who can think outside those lines. Maybe the Guild navigators in Dune, or the plant-based creatures in Brunner's Crucible of Time. At least those were original.

The Puppeteers were pretty original too, and the Kzinti. At least physically. I am pretty sure there have been other feline-like alien species but the Kzinti have culture, morals (if you believe that), and have a huge backstory. I am about to go and buy the rest of the Man-Kzin Wars books new because no one seems to be taking them to the used book store. :x -Colt

__________________
Be not afraid of any man no matter what his size; when danger threatens, call on me, and I will equalize.

Yes, Larry Niven is one writer who has original ideas. I think the Puppeteers are probably the most original of his aliens that I've come across.

First post.

I think it is important to realize that humans are not individuals.
Each one of us is a "hive" of non-sentient life-forms that work
together for the overall good of the body. These individuals do not
care for their own lives.

Just pondering. :wink:

__________________
Having is not so pleasing a thing as wanting; it is not logical, but it is often true. --Spock

Welcome
I dunno. My red blood cells are on strike for a better health package.

What about the Bandersnachi?

The Kzinti had morals and honor--just not something that a lot of "civilizded" folks of today would understand. Thier honor was their life, and without it they might as well of curled up and died. That why the Puppetters instigated the Man-Kzin wars, to get all the hot-headed ones to die gloriously and battle so that the ones left would think just a little before jumping to attack. (To me that made them more dangrous--instead of attack when they got mad, adn to soon, they'd cool of, plan, and really whup you...)

__________________
"Light thinks it travels faster than anything but it is wrong. No matter how fast light travels it finds the darkness has always got there first, and is waiting for it." — Terry Pratchett, Reaper Man

441!!!! :)