Today, as promised, we continue to compare and contrast the famous and influential film Alien with the less well-known but nonetheless celebrated short story “Bloodchild” by Octavia Butler. In this essay, I will tease out some of the themes and concepts behind Alien.
For much of the content in today’s post and in subsequent posts, I am indebted to Xenopedia, the Alien vs. Predator wiki, where hardworking fans have compiled a lot of history and trivia, as well as an essay I read many years ago and have not (alas) been able to relocate.
It was this essay, of unknown title and authorship, that first made me aware of the sexual symbolism behind the creature designs and situations in the Alien movie. The premise of the essay was that Alien is ultimately about “fear of female sexuality” (that men are terrified of horny women is one of feminism’s most popular canards). Although exhaustively explaining the film’s imagery, the essay failed to make its case, and I came away from it with the opinion that Alien is a mishmash of sexual menace with no real point behind it—an opinion I still hold, and which I will ultimately defend.