District 9

[Korietsu]

Ya, we know nothing about DNA and could never determine what genome sequence activated the weaponry and how, or even take the weapon apart and determine exactly what made physics of the system happen...

Who says that their DNA is even structured like ours? Considering how long it took us to sequence the human genome, working with a completely foreign and alien one similar to nothing on the planet, you'd be hard pressed to do it in 20 years. Our few weapons like theirs, being the Directed-Energy Weapons that we currently have. They're terrible, inefficient and no where near a hand-held level that's lethal.

[Kwijiboe]

Ok, but if the humans have cut into the ship and moved all of the aliens off, why are there not like 500 humans currently on the ship doing research..

Like really, we are going to leave this big floating space ship up there by itself and not disect every last inch of it.

And the movie vastly underated our ability to backwards engineer technology. "oh, only aliens can use it, guess we will never be able to use these weapons".

20 years after the aliens landed and I didnt see one piece of human tech that had been obviously upgraded/stolen from alien tech.

We can't be for sure that there are not currently humans on the ship conducting research. Granted, the movie never suggests one way or the other, but we can't assume that since there is no mention of humans conducting research on the ship that there has or presently have been no humans on the ship conducting some forms of research.

As for dissecting the ship, we don't know any specifics about that as well, all we know is that there is a ship there. It's possible the mothership left with some human stowaways (researchers, perhaps), not definite, but possible. (Would make an interesting premise for a new sequel)

I don't think the movie goes as far to underrate human capabilities to learn how to operate alien weaponry/technology. All we know is that it is it has been 20 years since humans have had access to this technology, this does not suggest humans will never be capable of operating technology, just that, at the given time, human researchers are actively seeking the answer--and Wiccus(sp.) is an invaluable asset (according to the film) to the understanding and progression of said technologies.

Lastly, just because you didn't see upgraded tech/weaponry, you can't assume human researchers haven't made any
progress.

As a film, I left feeling that there were many unanswered questions-- But I think there are very few examples of contradictory evidence, making it, at least a little, more plausible.

[Neosutra]

Who says that their DNA is even structured like ours? Considering how long it took us to sequence the human genome, working with a completely foreign and alien one similar to nothing on the planet, you'd be hard pressed to do it in 20 years. Our few weapons like theirs, being the Directed-Energy Weapons that we currently have. They're terrible, inefficient and no where near a hand-held level that's lethal.

Living organisms have similar DNA structures.. Unless they are made of different base elements than the one in our universe, then such things wouldnt be "some amazing mystery" to us.

And it was clear in the movie they were really just figuring out what the shit even did, let alone had made any progress in that 20 years beyond torturing the aliens.

Seriously, the cavemen with a raygun analogy is silly and really took the realism out of the movie for me.

[Seraph]

Living organisms have similar DNA structures.. Unless they are made of different base elements than the one in our universe, then such things wouldn't be "some amazing mystery" to us.

And it was clear in the movie they were really just figuring out what the shit even did, let alone had made any progress in that 20 years beyond torturing the aliens.

Seriously, the cavemen with a raygun analogy is silly and really took the realism out of the movie for me.

It was all being done privately by MNU undercover though, and that might have hampered their efforts, especially since they had no immediate progress. Until the events of the movie, maybe it was just a small R&D division, since I'm sure the company was making a mint just being the alien police force.

I'm also not sure what 'claims' to everything South Africa had, since the ship was hovering in their airspace. Maybe those with the realistic ability to make everything function just didn't have access. Maybe most of the weapons discovered were destroyed, they never really say.

[Neosutra]

Maybe you are just making up really retarded excuses for obvious plot holes?

[EternityEnd]

Maybe you're just way over-analyzing things.

[Knightmare]

I just remembered that the aliens landed in the late 80's so it kinda makes sense that 20 years wouldn't be enough to figure things out.

[Neosutra]

Maybe you're just way over-analyzing things.

Im sorry if an unrealistic representation of human behavior and technical abilities ruins the "realism" that I enjoyed about the movie. Im a tech guy, if you get the details wrong, or make incorrect assumptions, it takes away from the movie.

Allowing a private company (instead of governments themselves) to pretty much own/run an entire alien race is unrealistic.

Allowing an advanced spaceship to just hover above w/o doing anything is unrealistic.

Having alien tech for 20 years and having it not drastically influence/change society, or at least give humans a large leap in tech is unrealistic.

[chazzyphizzle]

They were South African, South Africans are not tech savvy. Plot hole filled.

[Neosutra]

Ah yes, aliens land in Africa and the US(and rest of the world) just stays out of the whole mess. That's realistic.

[chazzyphizzle]

So is my post actually being serious.

[grantlogan]

Oh for fucks sake it's a godamn movie. Holy shit.

[Fhloston]

Maybe you're just way over-analyzing things.

Seriously...

Saw this last week, really enjoyed the film. Really felt bad for Christopher and his son when he was showing him the pamphlet for D10. The special effects were superb. I would be fine if this was a standalone movie without a sequel. I'm worried that a second movie will kill the franchise..but you never know.

Also, I lol at people criticizing Copley's performance, or stating that he was an idiot in the film. That only means that he did his job as an actor. I loved his character's development in the film.

[Stiker]

I just remembered that the aliens landed in the late 80's so it kinda makes sense that 20 years wouldn't be enough to figure things out.

This.

It really doesn't seem to be that big of a stretch that MNU was unable to successfully genetically engineer a prawn/human hybrid with today's technology.

How many genetic defects to you see easily cured today? And that's with us knowing all we do about the human genome. I have just a slight feeling making a prawn/human hybrid is just slightly more difficult.

[Neosutra]

Yes, because the only way to learn anything from their technology is to genetically engineer a hybrid that can use their tech..

Oh wait, or we could just take their shit apart, find out what base pairs triggered response to get past the locking mechanisms OR just fucking build them for ourselves once we saw how the physical reactions actually happened. You guys are treating this stuff like magic, reverse engineering isnt as psuedo-science "lets experiment on bodies yay" as this film made it out. There are obvious logical gaps and it does take away from the realism.

That being said, I liked the movie for the kickassery at the end mostly. The human/praun treatment and complete inability to assimilate the alien tech kinda made the first part of the movie unrealistic and boring for me, but it was vastly made up by the many body explosions and ownage of the last 20 minutes.

[EternityEnd]

Maybe you couldn't take them apart. Maybe you couldn't build them for yourselves, since they were built with alien materials. Maybe it's fucking built from completely unknown alien materials which we have zero experience with, with an energy source we haven't discovered yet. Maybe it self-destructs when you try to disassemble it. We don't know.

This isn't a religion thread, Neo, get over yourself.

[Xno Kappa]

Okay, maybe you guys might not agree with Neo but ultimately it was a plot-hole in a movie that had several. Does it automatically make the movie bad? No. And no one here is saying that.

[travOtaku]

My god @ this overanalyzation. Its always funny to me, that, as a work of complete fiction, people relate it to the real world. The Earth in District 9 is not the Earth we live on, it is a fictional place. The earth in the Time Traveler's Wife is a fictional earth. The earth in Transformers is a fictional earth.

If we had real alien weapons on our planet that we easily reverse engineered with little trouble or difficulty, and then this movie was released portraying our fictional human selves unable to perform something we had easily done then I could understand it being a plot hole.

When was the last time our government has reverse engineered some kind of technology we took from a race of sentient alien beings? Never? Really?

It seemed like a stupid plot hole to rip the movie apart over, but then I saw that Neo pointed it out and wasn't surprised anymore. He finds a way to dislike everything.

[Lockecole7]

My god @ this overanalyzation. Its always funny to me, that, as a work of complete fiction, people relate it to the real world. The Earth in District 9 is not the Earth we live on, it is a fictional place. The earth in the Time Traveler's Wife is a fictional earth. The earth in Transformers is a fictional earth.

If we had real alien weapons on our planet that we easily reverse engineered with little trouble or difficulty, and then this movie was released portraying our fictional human selves unable to perform something we had easily done then I could understand it being a plot hole.

When was the last time our government has reverse engineered some kind of technology we took from a race of sentient alien beings? Never? Really?

It seemed like a stupid plot hole to rip the movie apart over, but then I saw that Neo pointed it out and wasn't surprised anymore. He finds a way to dislike everything.

Exactly everyone's point Neo. Guess what "tech guy who only found the graphic violence at the end of the movie entertaining." It's not a plot hole or unrealistic if the things that bothered you have NEVER come up ever in our current reality. You act as if 20 years is a long time for anything to be done, let alone dealing with unknown materials, energy sources,, and loads of other possible issues.

If we've never reverse engineered alien technology or succesfully done any of the things you claim to be unrealistic in that movie, then you're just some guy on a video game message board speculating why he hated a movie. I think I'll trust the guys who made the movie and spent months/years in creating it.

[Xno Kappa]

Don't really care about the whole reverse-engineering bit though it did irk me. I thought the bigger plot hole was why the aliens didn't own the shit out of MNU, seeing as it only took 1 and a half of them to wreak havoc.