Battle: Los Angeles trailer

[Serafina]

I am somehow troubled by the thought of an aquatic race being even capable to discover space travel in some way. Oceans aren't really a habitat that supports the sort of scientific advancements I'd presume to be vital for the eventual discovery of space travel, most importantly electricity. So I'd presume more of an amphibian race if Lebensraum's the way they wish to go.
Nah, I'll stick to them needing to fight off the Nudist Aliens from Signs. Next they'll be after our wooden doors too.

I know that, but for their immediate motivation, it makes way more sense.
Your's the most logical explanation, of course

[Commander 598]

They came for our water like we went for Iraq's oil, and by that I mean they're probably using cheap justifications to go to war with Earth just because. Picture an alien leader trying to convince his people that they'll never get anything from Sol but dead bodies unless they strike Earth first because that's all those damned warmongering apes will let them have.

[Serafina]

They came for our water like we went for Iraq's oil, and by that I mean they're probably using cheap justifications to go to war with Earth just because. Picture an alien leader trying to convince his people that they'll never get anything from Sol but dead bodies unless they strike Earth first because that's all those damned warmongering apes will let them have.

Unlike oil, water is readily available. You can find it in abundance in our solar system (on ice moons and in meteors) and likel many others as well. Furthermore, it's very easy to produce - and unlike oil, it's mostly re-usable, so you don't even have to do it constantly in large quantities.

That's in a nutshell why the "aliens want our water"-plot makes no sense at all.

[Losonti Tokash]

It's just supposed to be a big dumb movie. No one cares that the motivations are dumb. Just like no one particularly cares that the movie doesn't open with the aliens dropping a rock on every major city or glassing the planet or whatever crap you guys come up with that would be an interesting effect but would make a terrible film. If actual real wars can start for incredibly stupid reasons with no logical grounding then I can damn well excuse the reasons for a fake one.

[loomer]

Maybe they caught a telly signal of Hitler, and have really come to save us all (turns out they really shouldn't have turned off the telly afterwards). That'd be an incredibly stupid but vaguely hilarious one.

[Commander 598]

They came for our water like we went for Iraq's oil, and by that I mean they're probably using cheap justifications to go to war with Earth just because. Picture an alien leader trying to convince his people that they'll never get anything from Sol but dead bodies unless they strike Earth first because that's all those damned warmongering apes will let them have.

Unlike oil, water is readily available. You can find it in abundance in our solar system (on ice moons and in meteors) and likel many others as well. Furthermore, it's very easy to produce - and unlike oil, it's mostly re-usable, so you don't even have to do it constantly in large quantities.

I'm pretty sure i covered that. Oh wait, I did:

Picture an alien leader trying to convince his people that they'll never get anything from Sol but dead bodies unless they strike Earth first because that's all those damned warmongering apes will let them have.

That's in a nutshell why the "aliens want our water"-plot makes no sense at all.

And invading Iraq because they're obviously building nucular weapons for Osama Bin Laden to bomb 'MERCA with makes sense?
Spoiler

In case you're still not getting this, I'm insinuating that they aren't actually here for our water, it's just a thinly veiled justification for a war.

[Gil Hamilton]

It's just supposed to be a big dumb movie. No one cares that the motivations are dumb. Just like no one particularly cares that the movie doesn't open with the aliens dropping a rock on every major city or glassing the planet or whatever crap you guys come up with that would be an interesting effect but would make a terrible film. If actual real wars can start for incredibly stupid reasons with no logical grounding then I can damn well excuse the reasons for a fake one.

Mmm... I love anti-intellectualism. "It's a popcorn flick! If you use your brain at any time while watching or even looking at a poster of this movie, you are somehow doing it wrong, so shut up and clap at the explosions!"

[Losonti Tokash]

Yes, jumping to absurd conclusions based on a two minute teaser and IMDB (a known bastion of logic and reason) is "intellectual" behavior.

You know literally nothing about this film other than aliens attack Los Angeles. A perfect launching point from which to declare the film total garbage because it (may have) ignored/overlooked the ubiquity of water in the universe to give the aliens a reason to attack. Hell, for all you know, in the film's universe, water is actually a rare thing. Or the movie may never tell us why they invade in the first place, like Cloverfield.

Edit: Oh, hey

It's pretty funny to watch nerds try to divine an entire plot from a trailer - the peak of lols is when they are outraged when the actual movie doesn't follow their chinese whispers version.

[Gil Hamilton]

Yes, jumping to absurd conclusions based on a two minute teaser and IMDB (a known bastion of logic and reason) is "intellectual" behavior.

You know literally nothing about this film other than aliens attack Los Angeles. A perfect launching point from which to declare the film total garbage because it (may have) ignored/overlooked the ubiquity of water in the universe to give the aliens a reason to attack. Hell, for all you know, in the film's universe, water is actually a rare thing. Or the movie may never tell us why they invade in the first place, like Cloverfield

That wasn't what you said. You made the popcorn film argument that it doesn't have to make sense because it's a "big dumb movie". Of course, this happens with anything, that some jackass comes strolling in and says that thinking about a movie's content and judging it is bad because you just aren't supposed to do it.

You'll notice I didn't say anything about their potential motives and I haven't made ANY speculation in this entire thread expanding on the plot from the trailer. If you can point to the post where, I do, let me know and we can argue over it. However, as far as I can tell, my posts in this thread have been responding to Red on the cost/benefits about making your invaders arbitrarily invince, saying that I liked the trailer and I thought meteors were a sensible thing to do to kick off an invasion, responding to Stark's response to my post about War of the Worlds, saying a map probably shouldn't be taken literally, and responding to you.

Of course, the fact you probably are just raving here and are an imbecile who didn't check the thread before you started talking shit is likely. Oh, wait, not just likely: "Hell, for all you know, in the film's universe, water is actually a rare thing." Really? Why do people say moronic things like this?

[Losonti Tokash]

I don't know. Why do people quote themselves in their signatures? Water being rare is less moronic than having ships that travel faster than light. It was just some half-assed throwaway line that would explain why they want Earth's water or whatever.

But yes, you were completely right to criticize my criticism of people criticizing a film for reasons they may or may not have made up in their own minds. You'll notice I didn't say anything about thinking about or judging a movie's content (which comes from outside the film or associated materials anyway, thus violating the whole "author's intent is irrelevant" thing that's popular here) is bad because you just aren't supposed to do it. I might have said that judging a movie based on some amazingly minor detail that no one actually cares about is, you know, stupid, but hey.

[Metahive]

No one cares that the motivations are dumb.

As this very thread proves, you're wrong. Also, why is there this meme that spectacular action movies also absolutely need to insult their audience' intelligence? Plot and characterization taking a backseat to spectacle and action doesn't need the former to be retarded and nonsensical, just the writers to give at least half a shit.

[lance]

Man That Fell to Earth had a fairly plausible alien comes for water plot. With it being a one man operation, and the aliens only having the tech for a one way trip. There was a slight implication that the that the alien was abandoning his family.

[Metahive]

As was established, why would aliens need to take it from Earth of all places, when its readily available from other places not also housing a bunch of violent and xenophobic primates?

[Shroom Man 777]

If the aliens want Earth's water, I am sure dropping asteroids on all human population concentrations would kill everyone on Earth, and without nuking the planet from orbit and the associated difficulties of radiation, they can still get clean water while killing all of the humans.

If their spaceship engine can propel them to the speed of .c, or assuming if they have relativistic drives, they could just point their engines at Earth and vaporize a whole hemisphere from orbit.

[Oni Koneko Damien]

No one cares that the motivations are dumb.

As this very thread proves, you're wrong.

This made me giggle, because this board is representative of what the average person expects from a movie... oh wait. And to pre-emptively cut off any reply: Los is obviously engaging in hyperbole when he said 'no one'. Of course he can't literally mean 'no one' because a thread full of angry nerds proves that statement wrong, but it certainly doesn't prove what he was implying: "No one that matters cares."

Also, why is there this meme that spectacular action movies also absolutely need to insult their audience' intelligence? Plot and characterization taking a backseat to spectacle and action doesn't need the former to be retarded and nonsensical, just the writers to give at least half a shit.

A few things wrong with this:

1) No one has claimed that action movies have to insult peoples' intelligence, merely that if the movie is good enough, we can overlook stupid quibbles such as a somewhat nonsensical motivation which is really secondary to the main thrust of aliens coming and killfucking us.

2) Non-sequitar. Rigorous scientific accuracy and realistic portrayal of military capabilities and tactics =/= plot and characterization. Take a look at Star Wars, for instance. Science-breaking faster than light? Massively variable weapons yields and characters that seem to often forget they're allegedly toting around the capabilities of heavy artillery and/or nukes? Any number of other scientific, economic, military and whatever nitpicks you could make about it? Check, check, and check. Yet, amazingly enough, the old trilogy manages to have a fantastic plot and wonderful characterization.

As far as wanting the water goes? Maybe they don't so much want Earth's water as they want the sort of environment the water's located in. Maybe the aliens are semi-aquatic and want to turn one of the few known temperate planets with massive oceans into a luxury resort for their kind. Maybe those giant alien refinery things were actually giant water-filters. This makes enough sense because it requires finding both a lot of water and a suitable environment, which Earth just happened to have both of for them.

[Gil Hamilton]

I don't know. Why do people quote themselves in their signatures? Water being rare is less moronic than having ships that travel faster than light. It was just some half-assed throwaway line that would explain why they want Earth's water or whatever.

I believe the saying is that in fiction, the impossible is alright, but the improbable is unforgivable. We forgive FTL motors because there is no alien movie without aliens and having them get her is a convenience. Of course, you could easily make an alien invasion movie where the aliens don't have an FTL at all, which in fact makes the invasion happen because the aliens simply can't just pack up and leave. Some good fiction has been generated on that premise, "Footfall" for one, where the aliens in question didn't have much of a choice but attack, because their psychology didn't allow them compromise when they found their destination full of intelligent natives. A sufficiently talented writer can not only think of a good reason for the alien invasion but have it drive the story.

But no, water being rare in the universe is more moronic than ships travelling faster than light, because the FTL motor is clearly a handwave, while water being rare in the universe directly violates what we see on screen. Somehow you managed to miss the fact that, you know? The solar system is part of the universe and not a unusual part of it. If water is incredibly rare in the universe, the Earth and many of the rocky bodies in the solar system wouldn't be soaking in it. In the trailer we see a normal modern Earth, not a bone dry desert hellhole (wait, check that, the movie about LA so we DO see a bone dry desert hellhole, but at least its next to an ocean). The sort of cosmology that would make water unlikely the form would also radically change the Earth in ways that certainly wouldn't allow a completely identical Earth to arise. Moreover, if water was so rare, chances are the aliens wouldn't need it, they be dependent on something that wasn't so rare (after all, all the things life is dependent on actually tend to be really, really common water, oxygen, etc). So let's go back to where we say that your suggestion was completely moronic and move on.

That's the thing, people here aren't suggesting that the movie is bad because the premise is retarded. They are saying that not only is the premise retarded, it's been done to death. The evil alien invaders coming to steal our water is a dead horse that for some reason movie writers love to beat out of sheer lack of imagination, just above the aliens wanting to steal our women and just believe the aliens want to eat us.

[Metahive]

This made me giggle, because this board is representative of what the average person expects from a movie... oh wait. And to pre-emptively cut off any reply: Los is obviously engaging in hyperbole when he said 'no one'. Of course he can't literally mean 'no one' because a thread full of angry nerds proves that statement wrong, but it certainly doesn't prove what he was implying: "No one that matters cares."

Hyperbole is the last refuge of the scoundrel. Especially one with no hard numbers behind it, relying solely on "common perception".

1) No one has claimed that action movies have to insult peoples' intelligence, merely that if the movie is good enough, we can overlook stupid quibbles such as a somewhat nonsensical motivation which is really secondary to the main thrust of aliens coming and killfucking us.

Every time the "It's a popcorn movie, STFU nerd" meme is used, this is the underlying assumption, otherwise it wouldn't make sense to even use it.

2) Non-sequitar. Rigorous scientific accuracy and realistic portrayal of military capabilities and tactics =/= plot and characterization. Take a look at Star Wars, for instance. Science-breaking faster than light? Massively variable weapons yields and characters that seem to often forget they're allegedly toting around the capabilities of heavy artillery and/or nukes? Any number of other scientific, economic, military and whatever nitpicks you could make about it? Check, check, and check. Yet, amazingly enough, the old trilogy manages to have a fantastic plot and wonderful characterization.

Burn that strawman and burn it hard! I am not clamoring for super accurate scientific/military accuracy and Tolstoy levels of characterization in action movies, I'm clamoring for plots and characterization not being retarded and nonsensical! Yet people like you then come and tell me that as long as the movie is entertaining, the plot can be crap and characters drooling retards, it doesn't matter.
Hey, maybe I'm just not all that entertained when the latter two occur? But hey, I am irrelevant because I am a "nerd".

As far as wanting the water goes? Maybe they don't so much want Earth's water as they want the sort of environment the water's located in. Maybe the aliens are semi-aquatic and want to turn one of the few known temperate planets with massive oceans into a luxury resort for their kind. Maybe those giant alien refinery things were actually giant water-filters. This makes enough sense because it requires finding both a lot of water and a suitable environment, which Earth just happened to have both of for them.

Already discussed this. It pays off to read threads in total before replying.

[Serafina]

As was established, why would aliens need to take it from Earth of all places, when its readily available from other places not also housing a bunch of violent and xenophobic primates?

Well, it made sense back when those aliens used to come from Mars - their space travel was simply so limited that earth actually WAS the best target.
Of course, that doesn't work if the aliens have FTL.

Oh, and on a side-note: i once read some crappy fiction where the aliens who wanted our water came from Titan.
Yes, that's right - they came from a moon whose bulk (not surface, actual bulk) is about 50% water - in order to steal water. I suppose they were REALLY thirsty
Actually, i suppose that the author realised that the "steal our water"-plot made no sense, and that it only makes sense if the aliens come from within our solar system. But because Mars was done to death, he choose Titan instead (after all, it might have life).

[Metahive]

Well, it made sense back when those aliens used to come from Mars - their space travel was simply so limited that earth actually WAS the best target.
Of course, that doesn't work if the aliens have FTL.

If it's War of the Worlds you're thinking of, there was also the point that their own world was rapidly dying, so they had not much time to prepare for their invasion, explaining why they fell for the aggressive microorganisms in Earth's atmosphere. The George Pal adaption had that point too and then Spielberg fucked up badly by unwisely depicting them as having already visited Earth earlier, making them outright retards for not preparing for eventual biohazards (and being nudists too). Bah, I hate that version, although not just for that point.

[Marcus Aurelius]

No one cares that the motivations are dumb.

As this very thread proves, you're wrong.

This made me giggle, because this board is representative of what the average person expects from a movie... oh wait. And to pre-emptively cut off any reply: Los is obviously engaging in hyperbole when he said 'no one'. Of course he can't literally mean 'no one' because a thread full of angry nerds proves that statement wrong, but it certainly doesn't prove what he was implying: "No one that matters cares."

The real question here is: why should you care if anyone else, let alone the majority, cares? If people just want to let off steam by impotently complaining about nonsensical motivations, then why the hell not? The only problem I see with that is that if you start to think that your venting could actually lead to some changes in the way Hollywood operates, because that would be just delusional. Hollywood is a business that caters to the average 12-22 year old audience. Sometimes they manage to make pretty good movies regardless, but only because the individual writers and directors manage to combine popular elements, good plot, visuals and characters with something that actually does make sense, at least a little... Like District 9 or Inception, hell even Avatar to a very limited degree.

Of course it is also true that interesting plot and characters are much more important than any kind of realism or believability. Sometimes you can have both, but oftentimes not. I am not a huge fan of the "it's just a bog dumb movie" argument either, but mostly because many of the popcorn movies actually have shitty plots and cardboard characters, and rely on pyrotechnics and CGI it keep the audience interested for the duration. Such movies are single use, and in my opinion movies are too fucking expensive to spend money on if everything you get is two hours of superficial eye candy.

[Bakustra]

To me, it's annoying when movies use aliens demanding water, but I can understand why they do it. Much of the alien invasion genre is still dependent on War of the Worlds, a metaphor for imperialism and colonialism. US-style Cold War imperialism would be probably unacceptable for a blockbuster and harder to set up or take seriously, so resource colonialism has to do. Water provides an immediate threat to our very survival, and so is much more powerful than oil or gold would be, and is also subtler and avoids overt criticism of the dominant power structure. Essentially, though dumb, getting writers to stop it would require convincing them to be subversive and convincing marketers that the viewing public can handle movies with nuance. These are probably Sisyphean tasks.

[hongi]

Hang on, maybe they just want to live in the water. Lets be fair, Earth is a pretty sexy piece of real estate.

[Oni Koneko Damien]

Hang on, maybe they just want to live in the water. Lets be fair, Earth is a pretty sexy piece of real estate.

Damn, it's almost as if this wasn't mentioned several times already!

[Metahive]

To me, it's annoying when movies use aliens demanding water, but I can understand why they do it. Much of the alien invasion genre is still dependent on War of the Worlds, a metaphor for imperialism and colonialism. US-style Cold War imperialism would be probably unacceptable for a blockbuster and harder to set up or take seriously, so resource colonialism has to do.

Well, Babylon5 came close to emulating the Cold War era with the Vorlon-Shadow conflict which was primarily about ideology and fought mostly via proxies. It also had the relatively novel solution to the conflict by dismantling their arguments rationally in their faces instead of either brute forcing them away somehow or using a gimmicky, easily exploitable yet lethal weakness.
Props to JM Straczinsky for that, even though not everyone was happy about it.
It would however be indeed a bit much to have all that in just one single movie.

[weemadando]

New Trailer

It's the international trailer. A few bits of new imagery.