NOT using the
panel discussions of the most recent World Science Fiction Convention in Dublin,
Ireland in August 2019 (to which I be unable to go (until I retire from education)),
I would jump off, jump on, rail against, and shamelessly agree with the BRIEF
DESCRIPTION given in the pdf copy of the Program Guide. But not today. This explanation
is reserved for when I dash “off topic”, sometimes reviewing movies, sometimes
reviewing books, and other times taking up the spirit of a blog an old friend of
mine used to keep called THE RANTING ROOM…
Part 1 -- https://faithandsciencefiction.blogspot.com/2020/01/slice-of-pie-creating-alien-aliens.html
Part
2 -- https://faithandsciencefiction.blogspot.com/2020/02/slice-of-pie-creating-alien-aliens-part.html
I’m going to
dissect, so to speak, an alien that is less…um…alien than it is exaggerated.
From the universe
created by Dan O'Bannon, Ronald Shusett, how the aliens look (as envisioned by
H.R. Giger), are less important to me than how they act.
In the original
three movies (which spawned (ironically), an entire franchise (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alien_(franchise)),
the aliens appear to be simple monsters; a giant-sized version of rats.
While the aliens
here weren’t new, nor was the tone of the movie: “…the Doctor Who serial ‘The
Ark in Space’ (1975), in which an insectoid queen alien lays larvae inside
humans which later eat their way out, a life cycle inspired by that of the
ichneumon wasp. He has also noted similarities between the first half of the
film, particularly in early versions of the script, to H.P. Lovecraft's At the
Mountains of Madness, ‘not in storyline, but in dread-building mystery…’”
Being a biologist,
I’m most interested in the connection between the Aliens and the wasps. They’re
part of a very small family of the order of Hymenoptera (ants, bees, wasps,
sawflies) of which there are some 150,000 species. Within their suborder, they
are a secondary branch described as parasites. Though this group is only
unofficial, within the rest of the Hymenoptera, we have the insect superfamily
that inspired the Alien franchise.
The Ichneumonidae, of which there are some 100,000 species,
mostly unidentified, are distinguished by the quintessential characteristic of
the Alien species – they lay eggs inside of living caterpillars. The young
hatch, and eat the insides of their host on their way out. Then they go on with
their lives.
So, the problem
with creating aliens and THE Aliens, is that the writers had tow ways they
could have gone. They could have left the aliens as animals or they could have
made them intelligent; with a society, morality, and thoughts to think.
Instead, they chose
to make them MOSTLY animals with just enough brains to appear to threaten the
Humans. They don’t speak, just hiss and drool a lot. They aren’t particularly
intelligent. The implication is that they are mostly an “infestation”. When the
NOSTROMO crew first discover them, their hosts were immense humanoids who apparently
piloted the ship. They find a hold full of eggs, which is where the horror
begins to grow.
I’m not the only
person who’s noticed this: “In Alien Vault, the
excellent account of the first film’s creation by Ian Nathan, the nature of the
creature is briefly discussed by its creators. ‘It’s never been subject to its
own culture,’ said screenwriter Dan O’Bannon. ‘The alien is not only savage, it
is also ignorant.’”
“Savage and
ignorant the alien may be…in Alien, the creature uses the ship’s
darkness and hiding spaces to its own advantage, turning a tatty old mining
vessel into a hunting ground – abilities you’d expect from a natural,
highly-evolved predator. But later on in the film, the alien begins to do
things you wouldn’t expect of a mere animal.”
Hmmm…I expect
dogs, cats, and monkeys to hide. I expect these animals to seek out the warmest,
safest place to hide their young. Ryan Lamble uses this instinct to imply
intelligence: “In Aliens… Ripley points out that the creatures' lair is
located right beneath a reactor, meaning any stray gunfire could destroy them
as well as the aliens…Did the aliens choose this spot for their nest as a
tactical advantage, or was it merely the coziest spot in the base?” Another
question is that using other life forms as hosts, do they also need exposure to
outside sources of energy to complete their metamorphosis into adults? Or do
they get that energy from eating both the host and anyone else around the host?
They bring up
another point, “Ripley…threatens to torch the alien Queen’s eggs if the latter
doesn’t restrain her soldiers – a moment of bargaining that probably wouldn't
work with mere animals.” Consider though that even wolves and other animals
might back off when a Human threatens their litter. “…and echoing the events at
the conclusion of Alien, Ripley later discovers that the Queen has snuck aboard
the Sulaco, avoiding destruction on LV-426 in an almost identical fashion to
her predecessor on the Nostromo decades earlier. To do this, the Queen had to
work out how to operate a lift, and then, we're guessing, hide itself away in
the landing gear of the dropship...”
But as the kid’s
movie “Homeward Bound” shows, even Earthly animals are capable of amazing
feats. Higher animals like the elephants and dolphins are capable of
self-sacrifice. I understand that people always argue that animals are people,
too, but I think part of that is a ploy to get their puppy a seat on the jet
and a table at a five star New York restaurant, rather than to preserve the
elephants and dolphins…
At the end,
animals are animals no matter how much caviar you feed them.
Speaking of eating
tasty delicacies, “…[a] proposed final scene would have revealed that [after
eating Ripley’s brain, a] xenomorph is capable of rational thought - or, more
chillingly still, it's somehow capable of imbibing the intellects of its
victims [implying that xenomorph is much like we humans in certain respects:
it's a creature of its environment as well as its breeding…[they also have an] uncanny
ability to anticipate their prey’s movements, and even manipulate machinery…unclouded
by conscience, remorse, or delusions of morality…”
Given all of that
speculation, the Aliens in the franchise are severely short-changed and left to
stew in their own highly corrosive juices. We’re never given a chance to find
out what they might have become. Rationality implies at least a possibility of
rational thought. Even the leftist of the left and the rightest of the right
can’t imply that their far distant counterpart isn’t Human and capable of all
of the other assumptions we make about Humanity. In the Alien franchise, the
Xenomorphs aren’t given a chance to show their “Human” side (to be specist!)
Would hive
intelligences be inherently our enemies? How SHOULD they react – besides skulking
about in dark starships and murdering Humans right and left and lashing their pointy
tails (have you ever noticed how they are more-or-less an “alienized” version
of our image of Satan?)? Do the writers ever give them a CHANCE to do anything
but be…monstrous?
What about their
dreams? Bizarre, no doubt; but would they be any more bizarre than an elephant
dream? David Brin took time to develop the personality of dolphins in his
UPLIFT books. What if the purveyors of the Alien franchise took the same amount
of time with the Xenomorphs? (They may have as I’ve never read an Alien
original novel…of which there are a dozen or more…) has anyone ever tried to imagine
what it would be like to be an intelligent colony of Ichneumonidae?
Maybe I should
read one of the books!
Reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alien_(film)#Sequels_and_franchise,
https://www.denofgeek.com/us/movies/alien/261999/alien-just-how-intelligent-is-the-title-monster
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