Q: Why do we find movies about aliens compelling? (Even bad ones.)
- Because reality, which for most people means sitting at a desk all day, can be pretty boring. (In space, no one can hear you type.)
- Because alien movies are an exercise in imagination, and in an age where everything is shrunken to fit a prevailing science of materialism, we long to spend time in the vast space of imagination.
- Because these movies give us the cathartic release of seeing our social structures destroyed or transcended, when so much of our time day to day is consumed by the careful maintenance of our existing structures.