Comments on: Aliens I have known and loved

By: Rachel

Rachel — Tue, 03 Oct 2006 12:44:15 +0000

The new season of Battlestar starts this week! It’s so frackin’ exciting I can hardly stand it.

By: Jeremy Zitter

Jeremy Zitter — Tue, 03 Oct 2006 05:41:58 +0000

Great post, Bryan. I still haven’t gotten around to Roswell, but I’m glad you reminded me (somehow, it got pushed down my netflix queue). I did mention the 4400 back in my addicted-to-TVDs post because I was planning to become addicted, but I never got into it. Perhaps you’ll have better luck. I can’t recommend Battlestar Gallactica enough, though (thanks to Missy’s comment)…

By: Bryan Waterman

Bryan Waterman — Tue, 03 Oct 2006 00:33:15 +0000

Hey PB — I certainly thought of you while I was writing this last night. Also — you reminded me that the thing that prompted me to write this post in the first place, which I totally left out of the post altogether, is that we started renting the 4400 after Anna’s REPEATED requests. And it’s kind of fun. Have you seen it? Wasn’t it one of Jeremy’s guilty pleasures way back on his trash TV post?

Max and Liz, TLA and forever. I believe!

By: PB

PB — Tue, 03 Oct 2006 00:00:36 +0000

OK, coolest and most relevant post EVER!!! I love every image you mention, the ones I know and the ones you introduce. I too have been obsessed by this alien thing, from the religious allusions to the hotties human and not on Roswell (and Smallville). The pique is the difference but difference that is “special,” unique and gifted among the common natives. Aliens almost always have powers of some kind, even if it is just a change in gravity or peculiar eating habits or superior technology. I stare at the Nazca (sp?) lines in Peru, certainly something bigger and grander than us (venutians?) made these symbols? Just like our ancestors tried to explain why it rained or why the elephant has a trunk, we try and explain our own sense of separation or “alienation” from other people by creating a mythology of difference that is glamorous and even logical (they call it SCIENCE fiction after all). Even if it seems silly to think we are personally aliens, can it be comforting to know that possibility exists?
The other interesting thought is that the tag line for aliens is “we are not alone,” another “gosling trying to find their real tribe of swans” type of image. We have company, and they might be like you the ironist, they might be better than you and they might eat guinea pigs. We don’t know.
Great picture of JS btw.

By: Bryan Waterman

Bryan Waterman — Mon, 02 Oct 2006 23:42:14 +0000

ruben — i’m pretty sure my top photo is of diana. i don’t remember the guinea pig — i just remember the whole thing freaked me out and fascinated me all at once. i want to netflix that baby though. also, i wanted to include some youtube clips of bowie in his ziggy stardust getup but i couldn’t figure out how to get them into my post. must learn new tricks. there’s some pretty amazing stuff floating out there.

missy — i don’t remember phil doing talking heads. it’s funny you mention him and pop music, though, because i almost made an REM/”losing my religion” reference to Portrait of the Artist — and *that’s* one I got from Phil, without a doubt. we must have been riding the same wave.

dave — yes, we are brothers in rorty. and no, i’m not particularly hopeful about solidarity. i came across as optimistic in this post? i was afraid i sounded a bit down. i was trying to be funny but then i had one of those existential moments. boo hoo.

scott — i like your scenario. also, of course i liked my shorts superfriends style. haven’t you noticed how every superhero has a nice pair of spandex briefs riding over his or her outfit? hell, in many cases, the spandex brief *is* the outfit.

like ruben’s, mine came from the sears catalog, i’m sure. i didn’t shop anywhere else until the 8th or 9th grade.