YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH said:
I was looking at a Dawn on War page on TV tropes (great website; don't go there unless you hate being productive) and I realized how remarkably similar the Zerg/Protoss and the Tyranids/Eldar are. It's not just them though: you've also got the Aliens/Predator or the Flood/Elites for example.
Do you think that these common tropes in media are simply because they are so readily understood by the audience (bugs=bad etc.), or is there something deeper at work? Collective unconscious anybody?
What other all-consuming bugs or superior but oval-faced aliens can you think of?
To be honest i think the warhammer 40k universe does well... it all best.
As it says the tyranids are absolutely horrifying and so utterly... alien because they have No reasoning motive. None. Orks want to fight for blood. Choas wants souls. Evil wants goals and ends. The great devourer is just hungry. So hungry. All the time. You cannot communicate. It doesnt want anything complicated, or that needs planning, or that gives you anything to bargain with. It just wants to eat. It is the eternal hunger. It will never ever ever ever stop. It doesnt reason, its literally an animal, a space animal, one that doesnt know anything but being hungry. You cant beat it back or scare it off, you can inflict massive injury and it wont give up. Because its eat or die. Every single time. Nothing is more unsettling than this. Its the LAST thing we expect to find in space. Man reaches a tentative hand out into the void, expecting life, something to talk to, even if that thing is aggressive. A wild animal that snaps and desperately claws at him was the last thing anyone expected. Its the most alien something can be. Thus why it is the classical "alien".
This archetype is pretty freaking scary which is why we see it so often. The all consuming devourer, faceless, huge, legion. Absolutely 100% fanatical about eating you. Freaking scary.
The idea of the elites/eldar is to underpin this archetype. The old race has stood before these creatures and even THEY failed. They are dying because they were arrogant, they can do nothing before the hunger and it makes them bitter. The idea of this ancient dying race is meant to come across gloomy. It sets the world to be in its decline. The best is behind everyone. It cannot get better. The golden age of the ancient omniscient races is gone. Long gone. And its never coming back. Its meant to make the universe seem dark. These two archetypes work so well together its no wonder they are seen all over.
