Post on 2024/8/14

By Billy Song

In the movie "Arrival", the author's portrayal of an alien civilization that is precisely identical to human civilization must have made a profound impression on everyone. Today, I'd like to discuss this intriguing civilization with you.

First and foremost, in the film, humans, like the audience, have their first encounter with extraterrestrial civilizations upon seeing their spaceships. In terms of appearance, these spacecraft are shaped like a paraboloid on one side and relatively flat on the other. The spacecraft adopt different postures when landing and taking off, and they are depicted as not only extremely large but also extremely fast. The characteristics of these spacecraft all reflect the highly advanced level of science and technology of this alien civilization, yet it also lays the foundation for the subsequent development of the film: What is the purpose of such a highly developed civilization in coming to Earth? But in reality, we have no knowledge of the specifics of the spacecraft, such as the material and structure. The author also has no intention to elaborate. On the one hand, it is not of great significance to the story; on the other hand, not presenting things too explicitly also helps to reflect the sense of oppression and mystery.

In addition to the extremely astonishing shape of the spaceship, the alien entities encountered after entering the spaceship and the peculiar atmosphere created by the movie must also be a major memorable aspect of the film. There is no doubt that these creatures look highly distinct from humans. They resemble squids more than humans. They possess seven legs and can spew black liquid to form words for communication and have the ability to almost float in the air. Based on their appearance and the description in the movie, it is not difficult to infer that the place where they reside is highly different from Earth. In fact, I think the writer or director did not aim for us to clearly see the aliens, thus they spent most of the time in a white fog. Similar to the spaceship, this is not the key point of the story.

For the most significant part of the film, the alien language, I believe I can discuss it in a separate article, and I wish to commence from here with you to utilize the available information to develop some imagination about what these alien places might be like. First of all, it is clearly stated in the movie that they have a highly distinct air composition from Earth, so the atmosphere composition of their planet must be very different. Maybe they have plants that absorb all kinds of radiation for energy, or perhaps the surface is so inhospitable that most life exists underground. According to their frequent presence in the white fog, communication through only black words, and the appearance with no more obvious sensitive organs visible, perhaps their vision is not very good, only meeting the basic need to distinguish the text. Here are just a few of my sudden notions, to offer you a starting point. I believe that there will be more interesting and novel ideas to be discovered.