Invasion of the Body Snatchers

We watched the Invasion of the Body Snatchers and it was relate-able to our theme xenophobia because the snatchers were afraid of the normal people and the people were afraid of the snatchers. In the movie the snatchers would place a pod next to the person they want it to become, and as the body grows and develops during the day when the people fall asleep, that is when it takes all of your memories. There is a scene that spreads terror as  the doctor comes back to town, a boy runs out into the street screaming that his mom is not really his mom. This touches on a deep fear of losing ourselves, those we love, or our way of life, to outsiders. This is similar to the Twilight Zone episode Monsters on Maple Street.
The movie not only fits squarely into the Sci Fi genre, it is also Horror because of the use of fear and possession.

Random Sample and King of the Beasts!

In class we read the short stories: Random Sample by T.P. Caravan and King of the Beasts by Philip Jose Farmer. We are still talking about xenophobia and  the fear of outsiders or someone different. In the first story, Random Sample, it was talking about a little girl who is very bad and not very nice. She is encountered by aliens visiting Earth and they put her through all these tests and of course she fails them all and hits them. She takes them outside and shows them what she likes to do, killing ants. The aliens seem not to like that and they leave. So my take on this story is that the aliens came down and took a random sample of what human is and they just happen to get someone who was not very nice. Then at the end of the story the aliens decide humans are not worth keeping alive so they start killing the humans by burning them like she was doing to the ants. We always assume that when aliens make contact, they will communicate with the "right people."  Who is to stop them from coming up to the wrong person showing only the bad side of humanity?
King of the Beasts is a short story about only re-creating the higher animals, and the beautiful ones, to make up for all of the brutality and stupidity of destroying species. It's pretty much is saying that man is the most dangerous yet a beautiful animal, and the visitor in the story had to get special permission to grow it. At first you don't realize that the biologist isn't human; and not only do we get to see how we are viewed through alien eyes, we also realize that we have become extinct.

Planet of the Apes!

Well, as we know xenophobia means the fear of someone who is different, an outsider. In the first Planet of the Apes movie with Charlton Heston, the apes were scared of him because he was different, he could talk. He had knowledge of things outside of their experience. Also the leaders, who were the Orangutans, knew that before them man was the dominate species, so when they found Taylor (Charlton Heston) they got scared. 
This movie also has a lot to say about class warfare and discrimination. In the movie, they were talking about how all apes are created equal, and it almost mirrors our culture and how we say all men are created equal. However, we know some are put unfairly before others and that's how it was with their society. The Gorillas were the warrior class, the Orangutans controlled the government and the religion (convenient), the Chimpanzees were the thinkers and the scientists; they also were more compassionate, more humane. The apes considered the humans as a sub-standard species, and the appearance of Taylor threatened the "natural order" of things. 
I know that our government hides a lot from us, so it didn't surprise me when in the movie we saw that the Orangutans hid stuff from the other apes. When they found the baby doll at the end and it started crying, they blew it up. The only evidence they had that questioned their power they blew up, so that no one would ever find it and wonder. No, ignorance may seem bliss for the ape society at the beginning but throughout the movie it unravels. I truly believe that everyone should know the truth no matter what the cost is. I wouldn't say that there is no hope for the future of the ape society. It's just that if they keep hiding big things like that and someone does find out about it, they could have an uprising on their hands.   When a society is based on fear, ignorance and deception, it's only a matter of time.