Moon, Stars and Beyond   A Chronicle of Fact, Fiction and Fantasy

I’ve come to notice that one thing many aliens have in common:  they’re angry.

Why?

Now, I’m not talking all sci-fi films or TV series.  In fact, some are really quite friendly and helpful.  Paul, Alf and E.T. made good friends and lifelong connections with their earthling counterparts.  And a quick look at Star Trek/Wars/Gate will tell you that there’s a bounty of otherworldly types just itching to make nice with us inferiors.

But then again, how many baddies have you come to enjoy over the years?

Let’s take, for example, the Borg.  They’re a pretty economical lot.  If you ask me, they become part of a collective, kind of like communism in its most evil form twinned with just plain communes.  They readily adapt to any situation, yet they clearly enjoy being together.  One could argue it’s the system making them relate to each other so well, but they’re so anxious to turn complete strangers into buddies that they readily adapt the most innocent of bystanders, hook them up to machine-like apparatus and get them angry enough to kill anyone the collective doesn’t like.

Now, here’s what I’m talking about:  Mars Attacks!

These guys made no pretensions, minced no Ack! Ack! to their sworn enemies on Earth.  All they knew is that they looked humble and willing for about twenty seconds, let us earthlings make fools of ourselves and then wreaked utter destruction.  Heck, they even brought down Jack Nicholson!  Yet it was a simple yodel that brought them to their knees and made their gooey green brains blow up like bubble gum in a microwave.  Don’t tell me you didn’t get the parallel between that and germs in War of the Worlds.

Yet, for all the seeming variety out there, we keep coming back to this stereotype:

Now, this guy’s pretty cool and the star of his own film, Paul.  But really, he is indicative of the stereotype.  If anyone says they’ve seen someone that didn’t look like they belonged here on Earth, went finger-pointing up a section of the anatomy not commonly known for engaging positive thoughts, and generally dug around in someone’s insides uninvited, it would be similar to the person/thing above.

I’m asking: where did this image come from?  Where did it originate?  Is this the one imprinted in our brains that makes us react when we think we’ve seen something that doesn’t quite belong to our planet?  Is this vision of an alien comforting to us, as in if we see something just like this, we’ll know to run (if we can)?

Will it angry with us?

Will be have the courage to ask why?

Will it accept a box of chocolates and a bouquet of flowers to kiss and make up?

But first, I’d like to know what it is that we did in the first place…