divine angst

I’m watching Independence Day on TV right now, and I have a few questions that did not occur to me in the summer of 1996, when this movie came out (and I remember that VERY clearly, because that was the same summer I worked at summer camp and was in the Beastie Boys car accident).

Anyhoo, here’s what I wonder:

The aliens obviously knew enough about Earth to know what cities were important—or at least that there were many cities to choose from and which ones would be best to destroy (a disproportionate number were western, but that’s neither here nor there). So if they knew this, why did they not know other things, like that most world leaders would take to safety under a mountain? Or that SOMEONE (and likely not Jeff Goldblum, in the REAL WORLD) would realize why satellite communications were cut off? Why didn’t they keep monitoring Earth, via whatever method they used to figure out that LA and DC were more important than Duluth, and blast other things, like major roads, nuclear reactors, or water supplies? Basically, I wish the writers and directors had made the aliens think more like aliens and not like stupid Earth villains.

That is all.

(And yes, I skipped my yoga class tonight. Sue me.)