What are some alien species from media that interest you?

Burnouts3s3

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I've been watching a lot of sci-fi/space opera media lately and a question popped into my head: What are some alien species you've seen from movies, games, tv, etc. that you'd like to see more of.

Just some examples:
-The Salarians, Elcor, Hanar, Volus and Drell from Mass Effect.
-The Xelayans and Moclans from Seth MacFarlane's The Orville.
 

Silentpony_v1legacy

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40k Orks. Everyone needs space pirate hoolaggin fungus apes with a gestalt psychic ability to warp reality to fit their beliefs.
I mean any species that can have a Human mechanic take apart one of their guns and declare not only is there not port for ammunition, there is no firing mechanism and the trigger isn't linked to anything, and he still saw this gun kill 2 Space Marines(Its a Deathwatch story...) deserves more attention.
 

EvilRoy

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The Aliens from Alien. Fast, dangerous and stealthy predators, reproduce extremely fast, extremely efficient digestive systems (that much movement and damage takes huge amounts of energy, but they hardly seem to need eat to be able to maintain that), they don't seem to suffer from aging, and on and on.

What planet did they come from, and what in gods name is it made of that these creatures wouldn't instantly overrun it. Its possible that they only reproduce as fast as they do because something about humans works really well for it, but considering the extreme difficulty in killing even one and their low food requirements to survive even at large size and you have a species that should overpopulate and overrun immediately. The only thing that makes sense to me is that on their home planet there is another even bigger predator that keeps their numbers low. Or the the planet is populated by megafauna, and the Aliens and Queen function more like a wasp colony, jumping the megafauna infants while they are vulnerable to implantation - but largely unable to damage creatures 100x their size and thus limited by protective parents laying down the stompies.

I could work with that.
 

Hawki

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There's far too many aliens and series for me to list every single personal example, so I'm just going to respond to the stuff here.

Burnouts3s3 said:
-The Salarians, Elcor, Hanar, Volus and Drell from Mass Effect.
I find the salarians and drell interesting culturally, the elcor and hanar interesting physiologically, and the volus kinda fill in both.

-The Xelayans and Moclans from Seth MacFarlane's The Orville.
Yes to the xelayans, no to the moclans.

The xelayans have the potential to be interesting, and of what little I've written for 'The Orville', they're the focus for a reason. On the other hand, I don't find the moclans interesting, and what we know of their culture makes them seem pretty repugnant when you get down to it.

Silentpony said:
40k Orks. Everyone needs space pirate hoolaggin fungus apes with a gestalt psychic ability to warp reality to fit their beliefs.
I mean any species that can have a Human mechanic take apart one of their guns and declare not only is there not port for ammunition, there is no firing mechanism and the trigger isn't linked to anything, and he still saw this gun kill 2 Space Marines(Its a Deathwatch story...) deserves more attention.
Mixed on the orks.

On the one hand, they're interesting from a physiological standpoint, what with their gestalt ability and means of reproduction. On the other, the orks, like their namesake, have no real culture to speak of. They're an unthinking horde where every ork is going to think and act the same way.

EvilRoy said:
The Aliens from Alien. Fast, dangerous and stealthy predators, reproduce extremely fast, extremely efficient digestive systems (that much movement and damage takes huge amounts of energy, but they hardly seem to need eat to be able to maintain that), they don't seem to suffer from aging, and on and on.

What planet did they come from, and what in gods name is it made of that these creatures wouldn't instantly overrun it. Its possible that they only reproduce as fast as they do because something about humans works really well for it, but considering the extreme difficulty in killing even one and their low food requirements to survive even at large size and you have a species that should overpopulate and overrun immediately. The only thing that makes sense to me is that on their home planet there is another even bigger predator that keeps their numbers low. Or the the planet is populated by megafauna, and the Aliens and Queen function more like a wasp colony, jumping the megafauna infants while they are vulnerable to implantation - but largely unable to damage creatures 100x their size and thus limited by protective parents laying down the stompies.

I could work with that.
https://avp.wikia.com/wiki/Xenomorph_Prime

https://avp.wikia.com/wiki/Alien%3A_Covenant

Take your pick of origin story.
 
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I like the Hanar due to them being very non-human. Always like the ones that aren't just humans but with a different skin (like most of the other aliens in Mass Effect. And Star Trek. and Star Wars. And Doctor Who. And so on)
 

WhiteFangofWhoa

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Several races in Star Wars, such as the Wookiees, Chiss (post continuity reboot), Kaleesh and Barabel (only non-evil reptile race ever?).

I tend to like races with a focus on cunning, intelligence or loyalty to family/clan. I'm told the Romulans in Star Trek were an analogy for the Chinese in the Cold War back in the day, but it might be nice to see them realized more three-dimensionally post-reboot.
 

Hawki

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WhiteFangofWhoa said:
Chiss (post continuity reboot),
Found them interesting pre-reboot, can't comment post-reboot.

Barabel (only non-evil reptile race ever?).
-Volm (Falling Skies)

-Sangheili and kig-yar (Halo)*

-Drell (Mass Effect)

-Xi'an (Star Citizen)

-Old Ones (Warhammer 40,000)**

And others.

*While both have done pretty evil things, it would be pretty simplistic to call either race "evil."

**Though the slaan (which may be their descendants) are amphibious, so stick this in the "maybe" pile.
 
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Hawki said:
Silentpony said:
40k Orks. Everyone needs space pirate hoolaggin fungus apes with a gestalt psychic ability to warp reality to fit their beliefs.
I mean any species that can have a Human mechanic take apart one of their guns and declare not only is there not port for ammunition, there is no firing mechanism and the trigger isn't linked to anything, and he still saw this gun kill 2 Space Marines(Its a Deathwatch story...) deserves more attention.
Mixed on the orks.

On the one hand, they're interesting from a physiological standpoint, what with their gestalt ability and means of reproduction. On the other, the orks, like their namesake, have no real culture to speak of. They're an unthinking horde where every ork is going to think and act the same way.
Yooo ZOGGIN WOT?!? Ya cheeky gitz... youz come over ere an say dat, and lemme give you a lesson in Ork Kulture!

Yer gotz yer Evil suns, yer gots yer goffs, bad moons, deff skulls, yer snake bites, even dem oomie lovin blood axes!

Den yer gotz yer feebooter types, kult of speed, yer stormboyz, some of em even go off da railz and start worshippin Khorne. Den yer got yer bad docs, yer madboyz, yer weirdboyz, yer warpeads, painboyz, mekz, nobz, goff rockers, runtherdz, kommandos. Oh yeah, and da boyz, can't forget da boyz now can we?
 

Silentpony_v1legacy

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Zykon TheLich said:
Hawki said:
Silentpony said:
40k Orks. Everyone needs space pirate hoolaggin fungus apes with a gestalt psychic ability to warp reality to fit their beliefs.
I mean any species that can have a Human mechanic take apart one of their guns and declare not only is there not port for ammunition, there is no firing mechanism and the trigger isn't linked to anything, and he still saw this gun kill 2 Space Marines(Its a Deathwatch story...) deserves more attention.
Mixed on the orks.

On the one hand, they're interesting from a physiological standpoint, what with their gestalt ability and means of reproduction. On the other, the orks, like their namesake, have no real culture to speak of. They're an unthinking horde where every ork is going to think and act the same way.
Yooo ZOGGIN WOT?!? Ya cheeky gitz... youz come over ere an say dat, and lemme give you a lesson in Ork Kulture!

Yer gotz yer Evil suns, yer gots yer goffs, bad moons, deff skulls, yer snake bites, even dem oomie lovin blood axes!

Den yer gotz yer feebooter types, kult of speed, yer stormboyz, some of em even go off da railz and start worshippin Khorne. Den yer got yer bad docs, yer madboyz, yer weirdboyz, yer warpeads, painboyz, mekz, nobz, goff rockers, runtherdz, kommandos. Oh yeah, and da boyz, can't forget da boyz now can we?
Dont forget the stormboyz are known for their blatant regard for the rules! Also there was a story, I think in Codex Grey Knights, about Orks mistaking a icon of Nurgle for Gork and becoming Nurgle Orks.
 

RJ 17

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Yautja (Predators).
Gotta love a race of intergalactic serial killers with advanced technology and a code of honor.

And on the flip-side: Xenomorphs (Aliens)
YEARS ago (just about 7 years ago, to be exact) I made a topic on this site asking which would be "more survivable": a zombie apocalypse or a xenomorph infestation. The resounding majority said that the zombies would be easier to survive. Suffice to say that there's a reason that they're called "The Perfect Organism" within their universe. Incredibly deadly, incredibly cunning/crafty, and they've got the numbers to zerg-rush. Predator might have been my favorite race in every AvP game that's come out...but Alien was - by far - my best race in every AvP game that's come out.

And on that note, regarding what I'd like to see more of....

AvP god damnit!

But the AvP movies got it all wrong. This spin-off was never meant to be set in the modern day, it was ALWAYS meant to be set in the Aliens timeline. That way you get Aliens vs Predators vs Colonial Marines. Think of Aliens (the 2nd movie, to be clear) but then toss in a Predator to mix things up. That would be a god damn awesome movie.
 

Thaluikhain

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Hawki said:
Mixed on the orks.

On the one hand, they're interesting from a physiological standpoint, what with their gestalt ability and means of reproduction. On the other, the orks, like their namesake, have no real culture to speak of. They're an unthinking horde where every ork is going to think and act the same way.
Eh, depends on the writer. But GW has avoided ork characters as such, so they are limited. We've never really got a bunch of orks sitting round talking about things.
 

Hawki

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RJ 17 said:
Yautja (Predators).
Gotta love a race of intergalactic serial killers with advanced technology and a code of honor.
Um...do you?

This isn't so much directed to you, but AvP fandom in general. Like, I get why people find the yautja "kewl." What I don't get is why so many people see them as being anything other than what you describe.

Yes, the yautja have a code of honour. They're still a race of serial killers that hunt sapient beings, human or otherwise. On ff.net, there's a plenthora of humanxyautja fics (why? Just, why?), and even in tie-in fiction, I've noticed a trend of humanizing the yautja. And while nothing I describe above prevents the yautja from having an in-depth culture, it still doesn't change how their culture is pretty repugnant when you get down to it. Even when we get a "good" yautja in 'The Predator', he still murders numerous people, even stringing them up, when all he'd have to do was just drop off his gear and bug out.

Thaluikhain said:
Eh, depends on the writer. But GW has avoided ork characters as such, so they are limited. We've never really got a bunch of orks sitting round talking about things.
Yeah, but even if we get orks sitting around talking about things, what are they going to talk about? All orks talk and think the same way. That doesn't rule out conflict between them, but it's conflict that's going to boil down to "who's da biggest?" or something similar.
 

skywolfblue

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I always found Xenomorphs to be absurdly implausible. Especially their life cycle.

Most of my favorite Aliens come from books.
-Moties from "The Mote in God's Eye" by Larry Niven. A set of specialized species with different talents that reproduce extremely fast. In some ways they are more advanced then humans, but suffer the misfortune of being trapped (lacking the FTL drive and shielding that humans invented by accident). So they are caught in vicious cycles of population explosions and warfare.

-The Primes from "The Commonwealth Saga" by Peter Hamilton. Well, not really a "race" as much as a single hivemind. It is interesting to see how it controls and influences humans.

Hawki said:
-Sangheili and kig-yar (Halo)*
Ditto on the Sangheili. I prefer the pre-halo 4 versions, halo 4 came along and made them dumb and ugly. "Halfjaw" is my favorite, he speaks with such weight. ?You are the Arbiter, the will of the Prophets, but these are my Elites. Their lives matter to me, yours does not.?
 

Thaluikhain

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Hawki said:
[Yeah, but even if we get orks sitting around talking about things, what are they going to talk about? All orks talk and think the same way. That doesn't rule out conflict between them, but it's conflict that's going to boil down to "who's da biggest?" or something similar.
You can't really say orks all talk and think the same way, because GW has mostly avoided depicting orks when they are talking or thinking. There's bits and pieces hinting at this, which have never been developed, mostly, I think, due to laziness. This was mostly in the older fluff, but even in the recentish Beast series, you had:

Each of the 6 clans of orks had one giant ork leader, and the 6 of them sat round in a council chamber seemingly as equals and ran things together
 

Xprimentyl

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Between the mix of sci-fi and the macabre, I?ve always been partial to the Borg from Start Trek, at least until they introduced the Queen who was a prototypical villain and removed most of the ambivalence and mystery from the species.
 

Cicada 5

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The Reach from DC's Blue Beetle. It isn't often you see alien species that achieve conquest through bureaucracy and good publicity than brute force.
 

CaitSeith

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The Hanar from Mass Effect. They seemed to have so much potential in the first game that's almost a crime on how little development they ended up having on the whole trilogy (although the same could be said about most other alien species in the games).
 

Hawki

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Thaluikhain said:
You can't really say orks all talk and think the same way, because GW has mostly avoided depicting orks when they are talking or thinking.
Basically "absence of evidence isn't evidence of absence?"

At least in White Dwarfs (that I read back in the day), it wasn't exactly hard to get snippits of ork thoughts. If they're depicted all talking and acting the same way, then I'm going to assume they ARE that way.

There's bits and pieces hinting at this, which have never been developed, mostly, I think, due to laziness.
How can the orks even be developed though?

I mean, sure, they've got lore over the years, but if you had orks that deviated outside the norm, it would probably be kind of universe breaking, or at the least, not orky.

This was mostly in the older fluff, but even in the recentish Beast series, you had:

Each of the 6 clans of orks had one giant ork leader, and the 6 of them sat round in a council chamber seemingly as equals and ran things together
And what were they discussing?