SIHA Watch 2018

Ringworld (image source)

Now 25% of the way through 2018, it is time to scan the horizon for possible SIHA nominations (see the Search for Interesting Hollywood Aliens, 2017). For me, one of the big questions surrounding The X-Files Season 11 was if Chris Carter would have anything interesting to say about aliens. I'm not really surprised that Carter seemed to forget about aliens at the end of Season 11. I'm disappointed, but not surprised.

"Good space movies understand that both art and aliens should prompt an experience of wonder" (source)

Ringworld

Ringworld
Here in 2018, rumors continue to circulate about Larry Niven's Ringworld being turned into a movie (why not a TV series?). My only reservation: Niven, as a physicist, did not invent biologically plausible aliens.

I'm thinking that there could be real advantages for me in watching science fiction films that are made in languages other than English. I would not have to cognitively process the absurd blather in the script and I could imagine that I am watching an interesting story. In that spirit.... to Japan...

Before We Vanish

Before We Vanish (source)

This movie came out in 2017, but I did not notice it last year. It was reviewed in the New York Times this year.

In general, I don't like alien invasion movies because they are usually portrayals of human history warped into some imaginary futures where aliens travel across vast interstellar distance to make a stupid war movie in Hollywood. Before We Vanish seems a slightly more cerebral than your average American film (based on some reviews that I've read) and might have some interesting aliens.

Foreboding (image source)

Foreboding
I'm confused, but apparently Foreboding is another version of the same story (originally a play) that inspired Before We Vanish. Hopefully I'll be able to watch one of these two films. Apparently this story was originally seen in Japan as a 5 part television show, then it was spliced into a film, shown this year in Europe.

SIHA 2018

Side Show Shills
I've read all of the webpages proclaiming lists of "must see" science fiction for 2018. These films are what the folks in Hollywood imagine as science fiction, but they are low on science and big on horror and fantasy. As usual, there is nothing there that interests me.

I have a sense of foreboding: maybe aliens invaded Earth and zapped the brains of movie makers, turning them into zombies who keep re-working the same tired plots, again and again. Is there anything that can be done before the science fiction genre completely vanishes from our screens?

UPDATE: I saw Before We Vanish
Related Reading: SIHA 2018 Award
Next: Azynov the replicoid

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