They're aliens. Get over it.

The BBQ Pit
1

Re: The movie "Signs"

They’re aliens. There are no good reasons at all to suspect otherwise, and plenty of reasons to suspect that they are aliens. Get over it.

“Oooooh! But you’re just assuming they’re aliens! We’re never actually told that!”

We’re never actually told that Vito Corleone, from “The Godfather”, is a member of the mafia. Sure, that’s what characters in the movie seem to assume, but it’s just an assumption. The director never appears on camera and says, “Oh, hey, FYI, he’s a mobster.” We are left only with our assumptions.

We’re never actually told that Sauron is evil in “The Lord of the Rings”. Sure, most of the characters believe him to be evil. But we only have their perspective - and why should we believe them? We’re never actually told he’s evil; other charaters just assume he is. We are left only with our assumptions.

We’re never actually told that Darth Vader is Luke Skywalker’s father. Sure, Vader says that, but why should we believe him? That would just be an assumption. We have no clear evidence. Certainly we aren’t shown him concieving Luke, followed by 9 months of pregnancy, followed by childbirth. We have only Vader’s word to go on. We are left only with our assumptions.

Oh. And mountains of evidence.

Just like “Signs”. The creatures look like aliens from another planet, as such are traditionally depicted in a variety of media. They make crop circles, just like popular culture associates with aliens from another planet. They have hovering ships created from advanced technology. They are biologically very different from any known creature that lives or has ever lived on planet Earth. At least some of the characters in the movie clearly believe the creatures to be aliens.

But oh no - we’re not actually told that. Well, not on camera by the director with his hand on a Bible swearing on the souls of his children.

I understand the desire to pretend they aren’t supposed to be aliens. If they weren’t, the movie would suck less in one or more ways. But it would suck more in other ways, because if they weren’t supposed to be aliens then why the fuck were they depicted to be aliens?

In one manner or another the director, who is indeed a very talented director, failed.

Sorry. This has been brewing for a while.

2

Actually, my reaction to the “they’re not necessarily aliens” argument is usually, “Then what the hell ARE they?!”

3

I never once heard anybody claim they were not aliens.

4

Of course they’re aliens. They’re extraordinarily stupid aliens, seeing how their weakness is water and they chose to invade a planet whose surface area is 3/4 covered with the stuff.

Almost as dumb as the ID4 aliens running Appletalk on their mothership computers. Silly aliens.

5

Well, atleast they did not run any Microsoft products.

6

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=5124591&postcount=67

There have been other posts on the subject, but this one is the most recent that I know of. There were several posts of this nature when the movie “Signs” was in theatres.

7

Actually, a couple years back, Reality Chuck proposed that this was a McGuffin.

8

I have no intention of ever seeing Signs, but is there any chance the aliens are related to the ones from V?

“We will now invade the Earth and take all her precious water for ourselves!”
“Supreme Commander, wouldn’t it be easier to just go to Saturn and mine all the ice there?”
BWAZZAAAPPPP!

9

Apparently, the humidity, and the rain, and the dew didn’t affect them. Just water thrown by people. Also evidently they couldn’t figure out how to get out of a closet.

10

So how the hell does this director get such praise? (Or should I be blaming the screenwriter?)

11

Sometimes it’s a good idea to ask yourself, “do I get it?” If only people asked themselves that more often.

12

Seems quite possible to me that aliens could be effected by liquid water and not humidity. It takes a certain concentration to harm them, which is above the concentration of the water vapour in the air, but less than that of water.

And regarding them being able to travel across space but not hack through doors and stuff, if I were the writer I’d make it so that the aliens that built and possibly piloted the ships where a different class or even species that the ones that hunt down food. It’d be analogous to letting your hunting dog kill birds and bring them back to the car. Just because you drove your dog to the woods doesn’t mean he has to be able to build the car or even drive it.

There’s just as implausible things in reality, if you analyze them with the right eye.

13

Yes, but if you or I for example were in an atmosphere where hydrocloric acid was in a mist, we would find the place unpalatable and uncomfortable. I doubt we’d try to invade it.

14

I’ve always thought that the “aliens” are not real, that they are manifestations sent by God to show Gibson why bad things happen to good people, and how everything (even his kids asthma) has a purpose. The only information about them that we receive is (are?) from the TV set, and the only other on-screen person to claim to have seen them is Shyamalan’s character, who himself is integral to the main plot.

Looking at it this way, the movie makes a lot more sense. Try it and you’ll see. :smiley:

15

If there was tasty food there, and we could stand the mist long enough to round it up (or if we had an underclass or subspecies to brave the uncomfortable mist for us), we might. Especially if we were short on food.

People dive for lobster and other sea foods, and they can’t stay underwater forever without dying. But it’s fun, so people do it. Or they have to do it to survive. Maybe it’s sport for the aliens to go to inhospitable atmospheres to round up exotic species to eat, just like it is for us.

16

Well, yes. But does that mean they’re not Aliens? I agree the plot would have worked just as well if they’d been hydophobic demons, or hydophobic rabid dogs (ba-boom tsch) ie. McGuffin. But as presented, they are aliens. (Apparently. I’ve never SEEN the thing.)

17

What, Yoda’s word isn’t good enough for ya, :wally
:smiley:

18

Shyamalan seems to think that they’re aliens. Irrelevantly so, but aliens nonetheless. From an interview with Shyamalan at SciFi.com:

19

Eh, what the hell does he know? :wink:

20

In his case, they are one and the same. That’s the central dilemma when evaluating Shyamalan’s filmmaking: He is a remarkably talented director who unfortunately chooses to work from his own increasingly bad scripts.