Aliens, why do you look so silly?

[Canadamus Prime]

Bear in mind that the human standards for "aesthetic" and "sense" don't necessarily apply for all sentient life forms.

 

[Risingblade]

It's too much work to create them that way? That's really the only reason unless you're talking about a series which is going to get a ton of money pumped into it they really aren't going to take the time to bother with culture and those things. I'm sure there are exceptions to this but I can't think of any.

 

[kuyo]

The whole point of an alien is to be alien. That's why the bugs from Starship Troopers were good. They contrasted our cyborg evolution and precision tactics with natural evolution and swarm tactics.

 

[Uber Evil]

If you want to test intelligence, you need to create a scenario, and then consider how different races would approach that problem. Then, consider WHY they use this approach. A simple one to start with; someone you don't know turns up in a police officer uniform and says "I'm a police officer." Do you believe him?

You do. You do because social conditioning tells you to. That is part of being human. A species that does not have that level of social conformity, such as a species evolved from lone hunters, are not likely to have that kind of social conformity.

I wouldn't if he just walked up to me and just said "I'm a police officer." I would be very suspicious and require additional proof. If he was in uniform and doing the whole "policing" thing, though, damn straight I would think he was a cop.

 

[Kragg]

It's impossible to create multiple alien societies each as diverse as our own. Our own cultures have thousands of years of history backing it up, that's why a made up alien society will never feel as credible and authentic as ours. Generalized alien societies are simply one of those things where you have to suspend your disbelief.

I disagree. I do not want each planet (or race, if it spans more than one planet) to have thousands of years of history written for it. What I want is to show not all of them are the same. Maybe add the odd comment that "those other guys" follow different beliefs, or maybe show them have slight difficulties in communication thanks to different dialects (we can safely assume that space faring aliens probably learn at least one common language before flying off). You know, things that don't make me ask myself "Why do they seem to be coming from the same town?" In fact, even that is wrong - my home town has more diversity than most alien species in fiction. Take that - take a town or a city and make it as big as a planet, that would satisfy me. Heck, if you're feeling ambitious, take a country. It wouldn't look like the aliens are made in factories according to a list of standards.

Also, I'm not asking to make a diverse culture for each and every species. That is improbable at least at it would take a tremendous amount of time. If the work features just a couple of aliens, they don't need a backstory for their planet if it's not going to come up at all.

I don't think I am being unreasonable - we've seen this work in fantasy. If people can come up with kingdoms, races and even languages for their imaginary characters, why doesn't that work for sci-fi? Even as stereotypical as a bunch of fantasy races are (dwarves, elves) different works still manage to not portray each race as as a unified nation.

one could argue that alien races, having lived on planet x for over 1000 times as long as humans might have wiped out everything else, besides pet or food, even humans would over long enough period of time start to all look alike. skintone, language, any other attribute

 

[LordFisheh]

I don't know, it can go too far the other way. I don't much mind more bestial aliens, but I can't stand the other side of the spectrum. The things with tiny childlike bodies but huge heads (because they're so smart!) that just look outright ridiculous. And people still play this straight, don't they, Green Lantern (the film)?

So Green Lantern might get away with if for being faithful to its source (never read it, but I assume that's what they were doing), but those... whatever-they-were-called-aliens... were impossible to take seriously. They actually looked pretty awesome from a distance, these strips of cloth trailing from something that looked vaguely like a body, atop huge pillars that they'd probably never moved from in centuries. Then we see a close up and they're just dessicated grey children with comically sized heads, but wearing cool robes. Because as we know, clever people and aliens need huge brains.

 

[fix-the-spade]

Slight subversion, but occasionally the 'naked' is actually 'my clothes'.

Case in point being the Alien in Independance day (that suit being the best/scariest things in the movie), or the Skedar in Perfect Dark. Doesn't appear nearly enough, but it's a nice subversion.

 

[llew]

I love sci fi stuff. I'm a fantasy/sci fi gal who loves to watch and play games of those genre's. So why...oh why do we constantly get the most RIDICULOUS aliens?

I don't just meant their apparance but their so-called culture. I get frustrated when we hit an alien species in a movie or game, that is s uppose to be advanced, powerful and smart..and they look like beasts. They're naked, crawling around in steaming, narrow, poorly-lit corridors.

No..jjust...just no.

I refuse to think that a species that can manage trans-galaxy propulsion would look like something out of a tim burton movie. They would have some kind of aesthetic, some kind of sense, some kind of clothing.

I know that you want to make these things the villains...but cna you at LEAST make them look...believable? or am I way off here? Is there some audience for this?

Have you played mass effect?

 

[xPixelatedx]

I don't just meant their apparance but their so-called culture. I get frustrated when we hit an alien species in a movie or game, that is s uppose to be advanced, powerful and smart..and they look like beasts.

You do of course realize that where is a 1 in infinity chance aliens would even remotely look like us? We will be lucky if they are the same size, but the chance of them being a primate or primate-equivalent is so absurd we should feel ashamed for even conceiving it. If they don't look like primates then they are going to look like an animal to us, there is no getting around that. Culture wise would be equally as different. There is a reason why humans live in a human way, because it's a more advanced version of a primate way of life. think it's a pivotal moment when you kiss a girl for the first time in your life? That is not because of love, or how 'advanced' we are, that's a trait directly from our primate ancestors faceted in to our social structure. There is no reason for aliens to be exactly like us in appearance or culture, expect to pander to our ego and make us feel comfortable around them... in fact that is exactly why we do it in fiction, that and the fact that actors need to feasibly wear these costumes.

As far as naked and crawling through dark corridors, why isn't that plausible? Who's to say that all aliens walk like people or have the same sense of modesty? Neither of those things have to do with their ability to make tools, homes, civilizations or warp drive.

I think your post is just a demonstration of how people simply can't cope with things that are truly different. Also, here is a fun fact: the very word alien means 'Extremely different', not 'People with funny noses'.

This is probably the best we can hope for:

 

[Lilani]

Alien's, why do you look so silly?

Humans, why do you use apostrophes to designate plural words? Don't you know those are only for contractions and possessive words?

I jest, I jest. [sub]Sort of.[/sub]

Anyway, I think the idea is the universe is a big place, so whatever else is out there will probably be far removed from the way we look. Aesthetic appeal and attractiveness is relative. What looks ridiculous to us may be normal for some other species far, far away. The world isn't always pretty, so why should aliens always be pretty?

 

[Fieldy409_v1legacy]

Aliens are alien... they will be completely and utterly different to us if they exist.

They could have no concept of fun or aesthetics and go for pure practicality, or what they consider beautiful could be hideous to us. They might think darkly lit rooms and dry ice fog all over the floor is the height of fashion.

 

[The Funslinger]

I am put off by a lot of depictions of aliens as well. I hate the way that most of the time aliens coming from the same planet are the same. I don't mean their image (although sometimes it is), I mean that they all speak the same language, they like the same things, they follow the exact same religion, and so on. As if the entire planet is a single country (or probably a city). You can just look to Earth and see how that model doesn't work. Sure, maybe for some aliens, it could, but when a violent warrior nation somehow manges to cooperate as a single entity, despite being ready to war over anything, it strains the credibility.

That lack of diversity happens too often, if you ask me.

Well, to be fair, in something where an Alien ship lands on earth, of course that ship is going to be crewed by creatures of the same nationality. I mean in some things, they tend to do that, and it's dumb.

Still, aliens have often been a metaphor for whatever country the western world had a problem with at the time. Nazism, Communism etc have frequently been represented by invading alien hordes over the years. So of course an enemy nation is going to be subconsciously represented by a single unified planet in sci-fi flicks.

 

[Zen Toombs]

When I first read the topic, I thought you were talking about Xenomorphs. I actually think they're pretty decent.

Now, I generally like MOST aliens I see - each tends to feel consistent within the feel of the series, which is what I feel is the most important part.

 

[Evil Smurf]

Maybe they're advanced enough socially to know that being naked is the best way forward without pesky archaic rules on having to wear clothes (I'm assuming they also have advanced central heating). As for the other points, meh it's a bit hit and miss, some do a really good job of alien cultures and designs and some don't. I always liked it when they bumped into weird aliens in Stargate. I miss Thor

also, no pants mean no rules

 

[Phlakes]

Spoiler: Getting this out the way first-

And it's for dramatic effect. We don't know what aliens would realistically look like, so we just go with whatever fits what we want to do with them.

 

[xgeua]

I've always thought it would be pretty cool if there was a story about humans discovering a planet with an intelligent race who could be in the middle of a war, living in a post apocolyptic world, have their own team of superheroes, etc.

 

[daveman247]

Need some examples really. Mass effect, star wars and halo have some pretty diverse aliens that look different etc.

 

[Vigormortis]

I am put off by a lot of depictions of aliens as well. I hate the way that most of the time aliens coming from the same planet are the same. I don't mean their image (although sometimes it is), I mean that they all speak the same language, they like the same things, they follow the exact same religion, and so on. As if the entire planet is a single country (or probably a city). You can just look to Earth and see how that model doesn't work. Sure, maybe for some aliens, it could, but when a violent warrior nation somehow manges to cooperate as a single entity, despite being ready to war over anything, it strains the credibility.

That lack of diversity happens too often, if you ask me.

It's impossible to create multiple alien societies each as diverse as our own. Our own cultures have thousands of years of history backing it up, that's why a made up alien society will never feel as credible and authentic as ours. Generalized alien societies are simply one of those things where you have to suspend your disbelief.

Honestly, I'm tired of humanoid aliens period. And if they are humanoid, at least make them like 3 times our size or something.

My God SOOO much this. (I bolded the key part)

Why is it so hard to imagine an advanced (or even non-advanced) alien species that doesn't look human? I understand the principles of anthropomorphism, but a little creativity would be nice.

I know we don't have a diversity of references with which to base alien designs on (what with never finding alien life. yet.) but for goodness sake, we have millions of species on this planet we could be basing alien designs around. Not just ourselves.

Also, you're right about diversity in fictional alien cultures. In fact, the more alien species you toss into your story, the harder it is to come up with varied back stories to your species.

Though, this isn't always the case. There are some science fiction writers who have taken the time and effort to create incredibly diverse cultures for their alien creations within their stories. Granted, this often only happens with stories that contain a relatively small number of alien species, but still; point stands.

Need some examples really. Mass effect, star wars and halo have some pretty diverse aliens that look different etc.

I think what the OP was getting at wasn't just the look of the creatures, but the lack of culture diversity.

 

[Ragsnstitches]

I've always thought it would be pretty cool if there was a story about humans discovering a planet with an intelligent race who could be in the middle of a war, living in a post apocolyptic world, have their own team of superheroes, etc.

I think stuff like that were done at least 2 dozen times in the entirety of Stargate AND Stargate: Atlantis. Yes, even superheroes.

Also, I'm pretty sure each series of Star Trek does something like this. In one of the classics, they end up on a planet which is home to, get this... THE GREEK GODS. No joke, they are immortal and all.