# District 9: Rave Reviews So Far... **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 12, 2009, 7:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152 "2009-08-12T07:49:04Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 12
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2009, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152/221 "2009-08-21T14:58:12Z")
What would be really interesting to me is if Christopher went back to his home planet and found out that they were abandoned by their leadership caste due to the infection, that their caste was considered entirely expendable. That would be a very interesting twist. ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2009, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152/222 "2009-08-21T18:45:47Z")
> [@cmyk](#): > > > [@MsWhatzit](#): > > > > I have a plot question. > > > > The aliens have these unbelievably awesome guns that can blast humans into a fine spray of bloody mist in about a nanosecond. The humans are en fuego to figure out how to replicate these weapons. And yet the aliens are trading these mega-awesome weapons for cat food and tires. Why don’t they just..y’know…USE the weapons? Even if they can’t get back home, they could at least negotiate for some better digs, or something. If I had a mega-awesome-human-puree-o-matic, I definitely wouldn’t put up with living in a shack and getting kicked around by the ugly bags of mostly water on a regular basis. > > [spoiler]Yeh, I think what happened is the first arrivals were so malnourished and ill when they first arrived (because of failed life support), they were in no condition to to fight for anything. They were immediately sequestered into District 9. And over the 20 years, they bred and their numbers drastically increased into the tens of thousands. I can’t remember if they said how many Prawns were on the mothership when it first came though, but I imagine the numbers were much smaller. > > Once they got back on their feet, despite their advanced weaponry, any uprising for food and shelter (let alone all out war) would have meant the extermination of them. It would be them and their limited number of weapons against the population of the world. Also, as time goes on in conditions like that, becoming organized is an uphill battle. Their weapons were verboten by the MNU (but also coveted), and so they were kept under the black market to trade for their cat food, which was basically a drug for them. Something like that.[/spoiler] Yeah, I had the same problem with the weapons, **Ms. Whatzit** : [spoiler]They have all these weapons and it never occurs to them to just take the cat food from the Nigerians? It’s not like anyone would mourn the Nigerians if they were gone. At the very least off one or two Nigerians for show, so as to get a little more respectful treatment. Also: How did they manage to bring all these weapons with them from the mother ship to the ground? All the caches of weapons we saw wouldn’t have fit into the little escape pod. Presumably the Earthlings ferried the prawns from the mother ship to the ground in helicopters. Did they let them bring their terrible weapons down, too? Makes no sense. And the tractor beam, and the mech suit, and our protagonist’s ease with alien technology all bothered me too. All that plus I never really _liked_ the sniveling weasel protagonist, even after he “saw the light.” Also, if this is a commentary on Apartheid, well, it’s not exactly _timely_, is it?[/spoiler] I think I agree with [Ebert](http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090812/REVIEWS/908129987). Pretty good science fiction film, but not great by any stretch. He gave it three stars. That sounds about right to me. Worth seeing, but don’t set your expectations too high. ---
**Author:** ![Red\_Barchetta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/da6949/32.png) [@Red\_Barchetta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Red_Barchetta)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2009, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152/223 "2009-08-21T19:34:00Z")
> [@spoke-](#): > > [spoiler]They have all these weapons and it never occurs to them to just take the cat food from the Nigerians? It’s not like anyone would mourn the Nigerians if they were gone. At the very least off one or two Nigerians for show, so as to get a little more respectful treatment. > > Also: How did they manage to bring all these weapons with them from the mother ship to the ground? All the caches of weapons we saw wouldn’t have fit into the little escape pod. Presumably the Earthlings ferried the prawns from the mother ship to the ground in helicopters. Did they let them bring their terrible weapons down, too? Makes no sense. > > And the tractor beam, and the mech suit, and our protagonist’s ease with alien technology all bothered me too. > > All that plus I never really _liked_ the sniveling weasel protagonist, even after he “saw the light.” > > Also, if this is a commentary on Apartheid, well, it’s not exactly _timely_, is it?[/spoiler] Insert _half-assed fanwank that justifies the greatness of the entire movie_ here. ---
**Author:** ![wierdaaron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/eada6e/32.png) [@wierdaaron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wierdaaron)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2009, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152/224 "2009-08-21T19:55:02Z")
> [@Red\_Barchetta](#): > > Insert _half-assed fanwank that justifies the greatness of the entire movie_ here. All of those issues have been covered at great length in this very thread. Unlike plot holes in Star Wars which are explained away via some made-up crap about a race of invisible monsters that lives on planet Carelesswritink, the explanations for first-glance problems with D9 can all be resolved by elements within the film itself and needn’t be prefaced with, “Scoff! Well, if you’d _ **ACTUALLY READ** _ the companion novel and all of the viral marketing material…” ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2009, 8:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152/225 "2009-08-21T20:11:53Z")
> [@Red\_Barchetta](#): > > Insert _half-assed fanwank that justifies the greatness of the entire movie_ here. You know, this is a telling comment, because I think it highlights two different approaches to science fiction movies. You seem to be taking the position that a good sf movie needs to explain all its parts and show how they work together. I tend to feel that a good sf movie shows the audience the parts, but leaves it up to them to put them together on their own. Obviously, there’s a limit to how much that can work, and past a certain point, the audience has to start actively working against a movie in order to make sense of it, and everyone’s going to draw that line in a different place, but none of **spoke-**'s objections are particularly strong. I mean, take Wikus using the mech. The movie makes a huge point of the fact that the alien’s tech is tied to their DNA. Wikus has alien DNA. It’s not a particularly huge stretch to assume that the technology of the suit ties into the DNA somehow to make operating it easy, either through some sort of neural interface, or genetic memory, or whatever. The movie never comes out and states this, but I don’t think it has to. It gives you two or three pieces of information, and leaves it up to the audience to assemble an answer. I think this makes for a much more interesting film than one that pauses every fifteen minutes for an exposition dump to make sure the audience is keeping up. ---
**Author:** ![Red\_Barchetta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/da6949/32.png) [@Red\_Barchetta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Red_Barchetta)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2009, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152/226 "2009-08-21T20:28:55Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > It gives you two or three pieces of information, and leaves it up to the audience to assemble an answer. I think this makes for a much more interesting film than one that pauses every fifteen minutes for an exposition dump to make sure the audience is keeping up. A good story-teller doesn’t need to stop every fifteen minutes for an exposition dump, without succumbing to a narrative riddled with plot holes. ---
**Author:** ![Red\_Barchetta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/da6949/32.png) [@Red\_Barchetta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Red_Barchetta)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2009, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152/227 "2009-08-21T20:33:00Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > It gives you two or three pieces of information, and leaves it up to the audience to assemble an answer. I think this makes for a much more interesting film than one that pauses every fifteen minutes for an exposition dump to make sure the audience is keeping up. A good story-teller doesn’t need to stop every fifteen minutes for an exposition dump, without succumbing to a narrative riddled with plot holes. It’s cool though that it doesn’t bother you, but it bothers me. I’m a fan of several sci-fi movies, but few raised as few questions as this (again, for me). Part of it is the fault of the narrative itself–to the film’s credit, they tried (and largely succeeded, on a technical level) making the film look raw, real, as if it were actually happening. Unfortunately, this has the side-effect of making the unrealistic, poorly justified, or ill-defined elements \*really \* stand out. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2009, 8:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152/228 "2009-08-21T20:48:54Z")
> [@Red\_Barchetta](#): > > A good story-teller doesn’t need to stop every fifteen minutes for an exposition dump, without succumbing to a narrative riddled with plot holes. That’s what I’m saying. _District 9_ didn’t have any plot holes, it just doesn’t hold your hand a lead you from A to B to C. It expects the audience to keep up with it on their own. Nothing that happens in the film requires reference to material outside the film to be understood - figuring out how the parts fit together is part of the appeal of a movie like this. Just because you don’t like to engage in a movie at this level doesn’t justify dismissing those that do as engaging in “fanwanks.” ---
**Author:** ![Red\_Barchetta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/da6949/32.png) [@Red\_Barchetta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Red_Barchetta)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2009, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152/229 "2009-08-21T20:52:56Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Nothing that happens in the film requires reference to material outside the film to be understood - figuring out how the parts fit together is part of the appeal of a movie like this. Just because you don’t like to engage in a movie at this level doesn’t justify dismissing those that do as engaging in “fanwanks.” That would be the case if what you said is true–this thread is full of antidotes, opinions, theories, and content otherwise not included in the film. If you disagree with that, then we hold fundamentally different views on what actually included in the movie. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2009, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152/230 "2009-08-22T01:29:12Z")
Can I just say that it upsets me a little to see how casually the people in this thread are using the word “prawn” to describe the aliens? My impression from watching the movie was that it was being used as a racial slur on par with nigger, and seeing it used matter-of-factly to describe a group of beings we’re supposed to be sympathetic towards just doesn’t seem right. ---
**Author:** ![Red\_Barchetta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/da6949/32.png) [@Red\_Barchetta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Red_Barchetta)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2009, 1:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152/231 "2009-08-22T01:35:45Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > Can I just say that it upsets me a little to see how casually the people in this thread are using the word “prawn” to describe the aliens? My impression from watching the movie was that it was being used as a racial slur on par with nigger, and seeing it used matter-of-factly to describe a group of beings we’re supposed to be sympathetic towards just doesn’t seem right. Dude, it’s fiction. As in, it isn’t real. ---
**Author:** ![Tanbarkie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a698b9/32.png) [@Tanbarkie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tanbarkie)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2009, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152/232 "2009-08-22T02:30:26Z")
> [@Red\_Barchetta](#): > > Dude, it’s fiction. As in, it isn’t real. Dude, good fiction impacts the audience. As in, the mere fact that “District 9” evoked that reaction from **Smapti** (and he or she isn’t the only one) is a testament to its success. ---
**Author:** ![Declan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecae2f/32.png) [@Declan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Declan)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2009, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152/233 "2009-08-22T02:35:21Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > Can I just say that it upsets me a little to see how casually the people in this thread are using the word “prawn” to describe the aliens? My impression from watching the movie was that it was being used as a racial slur on par with nigger, and seeing it used matter-of-factly to describe a group of beings we’re supposed to be sympathetic towards just doesn’t seem right. And who’s to say that isn’t what the director had in mind when he made this apartied inspired flick. If something does not have a name, we label it for our convience, even if they have a perfectly good name they call themselves, we either make a new one for them or add a derogatory one, witness somalis being called skinnys or Iraqis called hajis. Declan ---
**Author:** ![AlsoNamedBort](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alsonamedbort/32/3213_2.png) [@AlsoNamedBort](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AlsoNamedBort)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2009, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152/234 "2009-08-22T02:36:52Z")
Well, prawn is really the only name we got for them. I think idea is that 20 years ago it started as a slur, but eventually became the common name. ---
**Author:** ![Red\_Barchetta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/da6949/32.png) [@Red\_Barchetta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Red_Barchetta)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2009, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152/235 "2009-08-22T02:37:00Z")
> [@Tanbarkie](#): > > Dude, good fiction impacts the audience. As in, the mere fact that “District 9” evoked that reaction from **Smapti** (and he or she isn’t the only one) is a testament to its success. It offends my sensibilities that anyone would take issue with the use of a fictitious term and place it on par with actual racists slurs. I’m fine that Smapt was touched by the movie, however, the tone of his posts seems to purport that we should feel bad for casually throwing a made-up term around, and that is beyond ridiculous. ---
**Author:** ![wierdaaron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/eada6e/32.png) [@wierdaaron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wierdaaron)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2009, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152/236 "2009-08-22T02:39:52Z")
> [@AlsoNamedBort](#): > > Well, prawn is really the only name we got for them. I think idea is that 20 years ago it started as a slur, but eventually became the common name. Bingo. It’s the only name we’ve got, short of “the aliens,” which seems even more condescending. ---
**Author:** ![wmfellows](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c2a13f/32.png) [@wmfellows](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wmfellows)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2009, 3:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152/237 "2009-08-22T03:40:23Z")
> [@Tanbarkie](#): > > Dude, good fiction impacts the audience. As in, the mere fact that “District 9” evoked that reaction from **Smapti** (and he or she isn’t the only one) is a testament to its success. That hardly means it is a reasonable or more bluntly, non ridiculous, item to post. Prawns, prawns, prawns… ---
**Author:** ![wierdaaron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/eada6e/32.png) [@wierdaaron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wierdaaron)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2009, 3:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152/238 "2009-08-22T03:42:02Z")
_Prawn please!_ ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2009, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152/239 "2009-08-22T04:33:27Z")
> [@wierdaaron](#): > > All of those issues have been covered at great length in this very thread. > [@Miller](#): > > …none of **spoke-**'s objections are particularly strong. Maybe I missed it, but has anyone explained how all the caches of weapons made it from the mother ship to District 9? That is really my strongest objection. I presume the prawns were ferried to earth in helicopters. So, what…did they just carry their weapons with them with no objections from the humans? It’s already been said (and used in defense of other plot holes) that they were disorganized. So then, too disorganized to smuggle the weapons off the ship, I presume? (The weapons were pretty bulky anyway. Not really suitable for smuggling onto helicopters.) We saw the inside of the command module. Way too small to accommodate all the weapons we saw. So how did all the alien weapons get to District 9? And can you explain that without creating MORE plot holes? ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2009, 4:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152/240 "2009-08-22T04:57:49Z")
> [@spoke-](#): > > So how did all the alien weapons get to District 9? And can you explain that without creating MORE plot holes? It’s not really necessary to provide a detailed explanation. They’re there. But if you want a general explanation, bear one thing in mind; they’ve been on Earth for 28 years. It seems unlikely the initial evacuation off the ship was the last time anyone thought to fly up there; indeed, it seems almost certain there’d be mass looting. It’s equally likely that the prawns might have initially had some degree of organization for 28 years of hopelessness, dependency and crushing deprivation have more or less wrecked them. They might even have once been treated better than they were during the movie; it would seem logical that it would take a few years to work things out. You can come up with 200 plausible reasons why stuff got taken off the mothership. You don’t _need_ any specific one; the movie assumes any one of those reasons took place when Wikus was in about grade five, and so isn’t hugely important to explain in detail during the movie. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152.md?page=11) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/district-9-rave-reviews-so-far/506152.md?page=13)