"The heptapods are neither free nor bound as we understand those concepts; they don’t act according to their will, nor are they helpless automatons. What distinguishes the heptapods’ mode of awareness is not just that their actions coincide with history’s events; it is also that their motives coincide with history’s purposes. They act to create the future, to enact chronology. Freedom isn’t an illusion; it’s perfectly real in the context of sequential consciousness. Within the context of simultaneous consciousness, freedom is not meaningful, but neither is coercion; it’s simply a different context, no more or less valid than the other. [...] Knowledge of the future was incompatible with free will. What made it possible for me to exercise freedom of choice also made it impossible for me to know the future. Conversely, now that I know the future, I would never act contrary to that future, including telling others what I know: those who know the future don’t talk about it."
We’re throwing an intergalactic party this week, so prepare to make friends with a ton of aliens of all shapes and sizes! Luckily, the A Star to Steer Her By hosts each have a number of favorite extraterrestrials to talk about, and they’re about as varied as they get! Whether they’re big and unfathomable or little and squishy or something in between, these are the aliens we would invite over any day in the hopes of becoming BFFs.
A lot of these characters come from races that are fascinating departures from the human race, and yet it’s always most interesting to find the common ground among us and even the most alien thing you can think of. So read on below for who’s at the top of our guest lists or have a listen to this week’s podcast episode for the full discussion (beam aboard at 59:14), featuring even more of our otherworldly besties. E.T.s, phone all your homes!
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Jake’s picks
Jake went with a theme for his top aliens: better Worfs than Worf! Teal’c from Stargate SG-1 may be technically human, but let’s count him anyway because he’s a Jaffa warrior who starts the series under the control of the Goa’uld. This guy could definitely have an honor-off with Worf, as he spends much of the series fighting to free his planet, Chulak. Let’s also hear it for one of our favorites from Farscape: Ka D’argo (though frankly, everyone from Farscape is worthy of being a favorite). This Luxan warrior is such a great friend to have, as he’ll always have your back whether you need backup in a fight or a wingman at the club. Finally, Seth MacFarlane certainly based the Moclan officer Bortus very consciously off Worf when he developed his Trek parody The Orville, and he really does justice to a character who seemed to start off as a single gag! For a man from an unigendered species, Bortus is refreshingly progressive and allows for some deep dives into issues on human (er, Moclan) rights, as good science fiction should!
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Chris’s picks
Chris is starting things off as he typically does: with a video game. The Mass Effect series has no shortage of interesting aliens (we’ve brought it before in another listicle because of that!), but Chris’s pick is going to Mordin Solus. This Salarian is enjoyable enough because of unusual way of speaking and quirky sense of humor, but his backstory of his people having developed the Genophage adds a fascinating moral quandary when he dedicates his life to undoing the wrongs they’ve caused. We also bring up Futurama quite a lot, so it’s only fitting to highlight one of its many recurring alien characters, this time in Zapp Brannigan’s constantly tormented underling Kif Kroker. The running gags concerning just how awkward Kif is get funnier and funnier, but this amphibious sweetheart gets an ongoing arc that develops his delightfully odd character. Finally, you get a full selection of characters that all comprise The Doctor from Doctor Who, whose Time Lord nature grants him the ability to regenerate—a handy super power to have when your television series can take advantage of being able to recast the role, but also a compelling layer in creating a character made up of several histories!
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Caitlin’s picks
We praise Alan Tudyk a lot on this podcast, and it’s well deserved. Resident Alien already made Caitlin’s best sci-fi comedies list, so it’s no wonder that its lead protagonist/antagonist Harry Vanderspeigle (or the alien who has stolen said identity, I suppose) tops out this list. It is just TOO FUNNY watching this fish out of water dealing with our human shenanigans, and Harry’s obvious disdain for people is truly relatable. Another hilarious alien can be found in our second Seth MacFarlane comedy to grace this list: Roger from American Dad! This alien whom Stan saved from Area 51 is such a delightfully catty bitch, and the running gag of his different disguises to conceal his identity makes for some really funny visual gags. Lastly, here’s another vote for The Doctor from Doctor Who. Caitlin wanted to share some love specifically for the fourth doctor, portrayed with that typical British style of camp whimsy by Tom Baker. His aloof weirdness, signature milelong scarf, and fondness for Jelly Babies make him a fan favorite Doctor—this from a collection of standout Doctors!
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Ames’s picks
My picks all started off as books on my shelf, because of course that’s what I tend to highlight. Go watch Arrival if you haven’t seen it yet. The Ted Chiang short story “Story of your Life” is good on its own, but the film is absolutely stunning, and I’ll not spoil it by telling you what I love about its alien characters Abbott and Costello, the two heptapods, except to say that it’s worth going in cold if you can because they’re SO COOL. We’ve also included The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy in a number of these lists so far, so it’s only fair to give a lot of that credit to Ford Prefect, whom I find endlessly fascinating. As a contributor to the titular Guide, he’s full of absolutely random knowledge from around the universe, and he’s just so charming and weird that he warrants including. And I greatly debated including this last one but I love Rocky from Andy Weir’s Project Hail Mary too much to keep dithering. The issue is there’s a movie adaptation coming out next year, and I want to go in without any preconceived expectations for how they’ll treat what I find to be an absolutely brilliant character design and concept from a book I absolutely adore!
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Last call before we send all our new alien friends on their merry way, but we hope you at least got some phone numbers (assuming your calling plan can reach that far). Next week, we’ve got more unusual characters to make nice with: this time it’s going to be with artificial lifeforms! So stay tuned for that and also make sure you’re listening along to the podcast on SoundCloud or wherever you subscribe for more of our Discovery watchalong. You can also crash all our alien mixers over on Facebook and Bluesky. And brace yourself before you look at the long distance bill!
Our biggest source of confusion was the heptapods' "writing.” It didn't appear to be writing at all; it looked more like a bunch of intricate graphic designs. The logograms weren't arranged in rows, or a spiral, or any linear fashion. Instead, Flapper or Raspberry would write a sentence by sticking together as many logograms as needed into a giant conglomeration.
This form of writing was reminiscent of primitive sign systems, which required a reader to know a message's context in order to understand it. Such systems were considered too limited for systematic recording of information. Yet it was unlikely that the heptapods developed their level of technology with only an oral tradition. That implied one of three possibilities: the first was that the heptapods had a true writing system, but they didn't want to use it in front of us; Colonel Weber would identify with that one. The second was that the heptapods hadn't originated the technology they were using; they were illiterates using someone else's technology. The third, and most interesting to me, was that the heptapods were using a nonlinear system of orthography that qualified as true writing.
