Do We Need More Alien Contact Films & Series?

[Ryujin]

1) In 2008, there was the movie Outlander, in which a humanoid alien helps fight another alien in the Viking era.

Seemed to be pretty much Beowulf but yes, that was good.

 

[MarkB]

And who can forget the 2011 film Cowboys & Aliens?

Fewer than would want to.

 

[Mercurius]

I think Invasion (on Apple) is hugely under-appreciated. People complain about its slow pacing, but for me that's a major aspect of what I like about it: the slow-burn really immerses me in the characters and plot. Unlike a lot of such films/shows, it isn't a half hour build up to the reveal of the monster and then an hour of (tedious) CGI action. It is a slow build up with different characters in different places, gradually building up a picture.

I just started season 2, mind you, so don't know if the qualities I like about the first season carry over. But the series does show me, at least, that there are new ways to approach the sub-genre.

 

[Smackpixi]

I like them, but I like them for everything that happens before the alien encounter when all of Snarf’s camps are still possibilities. The first half of the movie tease is the interesting part when you don’t know how this is going to go, once it’s revealed the writer decided this will be one of the aliens kill us all movies, who forking cares anymore?

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Seemed to be pretty much Beowulf but yes, that was good.

It was.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Why do the invading aliens always seem to have pretty much the same goals that we go, but just have bigger whacking sticks?

That would be because HG Wells wrote War of the Worlds as an allegory of British colonialism.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Seemed to be pretty much Beowulf but yes, that was good.

Yes, the woefully underrated Outlander was a Science Fiction version of Beowulf.

I suspect if they had made a bigger thing of that in the marketing, it would have made a bigger impact, at least amongst geeks.

 

[Ryujin]

Yes, the woefully underrated Outlander was a Science Fiction version of Beowulf.

I suspect if they had made a bigger thing of that in the marketing, it would have made a bigger impact, at least amongst geeks.

Just like "Galaxy Quest", which is also an alien contact story, would have been bigger if it had received proper press.

That would be because HG Wells wrote War of the Worlds as an allegory of British colonialism.

Yes, that's one, and it's an allegory that needed to be made. That doesn't explain why something that is also referred to as "speculative fiction" doesn't seem to want to get out of that mold. I suppose it's the easy stereotype, so lazy writers stick to it?

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Yes, that's one, and it's an allegory that needed to be made. That doesn't explain why something that is also referred to as "speculative fiction" doesn't seem to want to get out of that mold. I suppose it's the easy stereotype, so lazy writers stick to it?

More like cautious producers. But, when it comes to creating a commercial movie or TV show, you need to have conflict and human interest. Thus, the aliens are are background. Their motives are not important, any more than the motives of an earthquake are important. Or the aliens are humans with nobs on their heads.

So, you aliens are alien? Why are they interacting with humans at all?

 

[Ryujin]

More like cautious producers. But, when it comes to creating a commercial movie or TV show, you need to have conflict and human interest. Thus, the aliens are are background. Their motives are not important, any more than the motives of an earthquake are important. Or the aliens are humans with nobs on their heads.

So, you aliens are alien? Why are they interacting with humans at all?

Maybe their interaction is incidental? Maybe they don't see carbon based life forms as being alive? Any number of reasons or, perhaps, reasons that we can't comprehend. As zombies are essentially apocalyptic weather in a zombie movie, the same could be said of aliens.