This week’s task focused around the super popular genre of science fiction. https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b0bf7wrl/mark-kermodes-secrets-of-cinema-series-1-4-science-fiction

I chose pretty much the same task as the one I did for last week’s Rom-Com homework, ‘Write a one page synopsis for a feature film which deals with one of the following sci-fi tropes: Time Travel, Space Travel, Lost In Space, Aliens, Robot Companions, Technology Takes Over or The Future.’

The reason for choosing this task is because one of the only things keeping me sane in lockdown is being creative and I’ve found that these writing tasks offer the most opportunity for creativity, allowing me to engulf myself in a fictional world, so I will most likely continue choosing similar tasks until my real world situation becomes more exciting.

I, personally, have always been conflicted over my opinion of Science Fiction movies as films in the genre can often be quite silly and over the top and often pretty predictable. But on the other hand, when done well, sci-fi has established itself as one of the best genres for exploring humanity and the human psyche, just take films such as 2001: a space odyssey, ex machina or even Wall-E.

Because of this, my sci-fi is going to be a film about humanity and the human psyche disguised as a film about space conquest.

As a child, one of my favorite movies was James Cameron’s Avatar. I really loved how they made humans the enemy against an alien race trying to protect their home. I have now realized Avatar is basically a massive rip off of Dances with Wolves but the core story still manages to work as a sci-fi and my narrative will be loosely similar.

Another film I will be taking inspiration from is The Martian. In The Martian, Mark Watney is stranded by himself on mars and he has to figure out how to get back to earth. I was disappointed when I both watched the film and read the book as I felt they failed to delve very deep into the psychological impact of being stranded in space and I felt it was a real missed opportunity.

My story will not follow one man but a group of astronauts stranded on a distant planet with no way of contacting earth and, unlike the Martian, it will focus heavily on the psychological impacts of this and how each of the crew members deals with it. It won’t be a story about trying to get back to earth but instead a simple story of survival.

I have recently finished reading Alex Garland’s novel, The Beach, about a group of travelers living on a hidden beach and how they deal with being away from society and it has a big focus on the human psyche. My vision for my Sci-Fi film started as The Beach, but in space. (I must also mention that The Beach was made into a movie and I take absolutely zero inspiration from the film adaptation as it is absolute garbage).

In terms of the different options we were given I went for the idea of being ‘Space travel’ or, more appropriately ‘Space Colonisation’. I will follow a group of astronauts tasked with colonizing a planet believed to have the correct conditions for human survival. Our main focus will be on the second wave of astronauts who join an already partially developed colony and are tasked with scientific research of the planet and search for any intelligent life forms already living on the planet.

As you might have guessed, this whole set up is very similar to the real life colonization of the Americas by the Europeans. But instead of drawing inspiration from the systematic removal and extermination of the native people (like Avatar did) I am instead drawing inspiration from the lesser known events of an early colony known as Roanoke. To summarize, early English settlers set up a small colony on an island on the outer banks of the American mainland known as Roanoke. Everything seemed to be going fine but when a resupply convoy arrived a year later the entire colony had dissapeared and, to this day, nobody knows what happened to the people on the island. While it only took up half a page of my history textbook, this story fascinated me and I often pondered over the experiences of the settlers and what it must have been like for them. This week’s task seemed like a great opportunity to delve back into my fascination with the story of Roanoke as my film will be exactly that, early pioneers tasked with colonizing a new world with no way of communicating with anyone except themselves. The only difference is that it will be set in space.

One of the greatest parts of writing a Sci-fi film is that you are not tied down by any real world limitations when it comes to world building and can really come up with anything you want. Despite this, I plan on keeping the setting of my film quite simple as I don’t want my film bogged down in the science and laws of an unknown planet.

Eden

The world in which my film is set will be heavily inspired by Avatar’s Pandora, it will be like a paradise. The atmosphere will be extremely similar to that of earth’s meaning our characters will be able to live on the planet without the need of external life support. The planet will also be able to support human crops. Despite this, all the natural vegetation on the planet will be poisonous to humans meaning the only food they can eat will be the rations brought with them and any crops they can grow themselves. The water will also be poisonous if drank straight from the source but the early settlers will have already installed the tech necessary to make it drinkable.

Other than the problem of food, the planet will be easily inhabitable, with resources similar to that on earth such as wood and rocks and the odd lifeforms they have already discovered will be simple insects which pose no real danger to humans other than the fact they are not safe for human consumption.

The official name of the planet will be Kepler-452b as that is the name of the real life planet considered most inhabitable for humans. My Planet will of course be a fictionalized version of Kepler-452b, taking only it’s name and the hope that it could, one day, be a second home for our species. The human settlers living on the planet will refer to it as Eden, after the garden of Eden from the bible. The astronauts will give it this name simply because they think of the planet as a sort of paradise. But the hidden meaning behind the name hints at some of the crew members attitude towards the planet, believing they have an almost religious ownership of the planet and considering themselves to be deities, giving the planet a purpose, like Adam and Eve.

The comparison to the garden of Eden will also foreshadow the colonies eventual descent into chaos.

The Basic Plot

Before I introduce you to the characters I will quickly outline the basic idea for the film to help you understand what part each character plays.

The second wave of astronauts join the early settlers and begin their tests and examinations of the planet Kepler-452b. An Alien Biologist discovers Alien life forms which are quite primitive in their evolution and pose no real danger to the humans. On the same day the Aliens are discovered a massive storm hits the base, the storm passes but huge clouds remain in the sky making it impossible to communicate with earth and drastically slowing down the productivity of their farms.

Luckily they have a good supply of emergency rations and agree to get on with their mission while they wait for the clouds to pass over. None of the scientists on the planet have a concrete answer on when they expect the clouds to disperse but they are hopeful it won’t be too long. They also know that there is a supply ship about a 2 month journey away from them so worst case scenario they will just have to hold out till then.

A couple of discoveries are made such as, The Alien biologist discovers the body of an Alien who died in the storm which she is able to run an analysis of and a valuable metal (still haven’t decided on a name) is found by the team’s geologist who insists it could make them all billionaires back home. Other than these two advancements everything goes pretty routinely in the passing two months. But still the clouds refuse to disperse.

Regardless, the group receives a message from the supply ship 2 months later (as it is now right above Keplar-452b and it can send signals through the cloud) saying that they will drop off some supplies which will keep the group going till the clouds disperse when the ship will be able to properly land and pick them up. The group rejoices and soon they see the hull of a ship break through the clouds. Their joy soon turns to horror as the ship is suddenly picked up by a strong burst of wind and is thrown into a nearby mountain, being destroyed on impact. The group goes to examine the wreckage but none of the supplies or crew survive the crash.

Suddenly the group is properly alone; No nearby supply ships, no off-planet communication, no sense of when the clouds will clear and running seriously low on their emergency previsions.

A day later the tests on the dead alien return and a major discovery is made – The alien’s flesh is safe for humans to eat. And the moral dilemma is set: Do the humans carry on trying to grow their own food, running the serious risk of them all starving to death, or do they wipe out the local population in order to survive?

Characters

Now onto the most important part, who are our characters?

The first characters we will be introduced to in the film will be on the second wave of astronauts coming to support the first settlers. The biggest difference between the first and second wave is that the mission of the first wave was to set up a base on Eden, so it mainly consists of engineers, a small security force, and a group of scientists tasked with setting up a food and water supply. The second wave is more focused on analyzing the planet and consists of scientists in a variety of different specialisms such as Geologists, Botanists, chemists, biologists, etc. The first wave priorities the survival of the group above all else whereas the second wave has a lot more respect and interest towards the planet itself, this will cause a rift in the group as the story evolves.

Of the second wave scientists we will only be properly introduced to three; a botanist, a geologist and an alien biologist.

The Alien Biologist

Our Protagonist. Inspired by Avatar’s Jake Sully and Dances With Wolves’s Lieutenant Dunbar, The Alien Biologist is the alien sympathizer. She will be the one to first make contact with the aliens and seemingly the only one to view them as intelligent life forms instead of something to analyse.

Our protagonist will also take a lot of inspiration from Arrival’s Louise Banks in the way that she will be totally fascinated by the aliens and strive to find ways of communicating with them peacefully.

I can’t think of a clever name for our Alien Biologist right now so for the time being we will just call her Kate.

One of the first things we notice about Kate is that she struggles with autism, making it hard for her to properly fit in with the rest of the group on Eden. Taking inspiration from X+Y’s Nathan Ellis, Kate will have struggled in social situations growing up leading her to feel very distant from the people around her and become obsessive over her studies into Alien Biology. Her love of Aliens was really born out of her difficulty understanding humans, this causes her to feel very conflicted when she does discover the Aliens as throughout her life she has always felt closer to Aliens than humans.

This is also the reason she was chosen to take part in the mission. The purpose of the mission is to colonize Kepler and make peaceful contact with any intelligent life forms they may find there. Kate was chosen because she respects Aliens and feels a real connection towards them meaning she is the best person to make first contact as she is extremely unlikely to come across hostile.

Throughout the film, Kate won’t have a massive character arc but will have similar development as Lieutenant Dunbar in Dances With Wolves, she will discover the alien colony and spend all of her time learning their culture and the basics of their language. As the humans slowly grow more hostile towards the aliens she will be forced to choose where her loyalties lie.

The Botanist

The Botanist gets along with Kate and seems to be the only person she is truly comfortable around at the start of the film.

The botanist will be one of the younger members of the team and we will learn that he worries about the opinions of those around him, this is the main reason why he gets along with Kate because she is non-judgmental.

The botanist will be in charge of researching possible food sources already growing on the planet. He will soon discover that pretty much everything on the planet is unsafe for human consumption which will annoy him as he worries people will think he is not doing his job well. He decides to try genetically engineering the planet’s resources to make them safe for humans as he thinks this will win him favor from the group.

In terms of the main narrative, I picture the botanist playing a similar role to Etienne in The Beach: He arrives in the new world with the main protagonist but becomes a background character while the protagonist undergoes their journey, popping up from time to time as a friendly face and carrying their own little subplot which will eventually come back to affect the main narrative later in the story.

Of course, we cannot talk about a space botanist without mentioning The Martian’s Mark Watney. So, the botanist in my film will be known as Mark.

The Geologist

The Geologist will have the least screen time out of these three characters but he’ll still play a part in the main narrative. All you really need to know about The Geologist is that he begins the film in high spirits, always talking and cracking jokes, almost giddy with excitement to be on the mission. This creates a very noticeable language barrier between himself and Kate.

A subplot of the film will be The Geologist discovering the rare and expensive material on Kepler. He will become almost obsessed with it as the story progresses and his frustration with the fact he is sitting on a gold mine with no way of cashing it in causes him to be the first crew member to psychologically crack.

This subplot about the rare material is inspired by the mission director in Avatar, Parker Selfridge. Therefore, The Geologist will be called Parker.

The rest of the second wave scientists won’t ever be properly introduced to us but for the most part they will make up the alien sympathizers with only one or two wanting to eat the aliens.

But the story won’t only follow the second wave astronauts, three of the first wave settlers will also play a key part in the narrative, The captain of the first wave, the head of the group’s food supply and the head of security.

The Captain

I decided early on that I wanted to name The Captain after an American General who committed violent acts against the native population as the film is a commentary on all kinds of colonization. I did a bit of research and settled on General Anthony Wayne. To summarize, Anthony Wayne was a soldier in the American Revolution who was promoted to Major-General for his heroic acts. This promotion led him to play a major part in the removal of native Americans from the North-West colonies. General Wayne led American troops in The Battle of Fallen Timbers where his army defeated the natives. After the battle, the native population were forced to leave the north-west territories to make way for white settlement.

The reason I chose Anthony Wayne is because he didn’t join the army with the goal of wiping out an indigenous people like many later American generals, he joined the army to fight for the freedom of his people and fought bravely for a just cause in the American revolution.

All of his horrific acts against the native population stemmed from a completely lack of empathy and the horrendously skewed perception that the natives were Alien and white settlers were the rightful owners of the American Continent. This perception meant he was able to justify his own actions as he put the comfort of his people above the lives of others.

This is exactly the mindset of the Captain in my film and therefore he will take the entire name of General Anthony Wayne and be known as Captain Anthony Wayne.

Captain Wayne will be put in charge of the mission because he is a proven and well decorated Captain in the Galactic fleet. As a member of the first wave his only priority is the survival of his men. Captain Wayne will be fully in support of the eating of the native population because, like his namesake, he views them as a lesser species. Because of this he will eventually take up the role of antagonist but this will only develop after the ship crashes at the midpoint of the film, he will not start out as the antagonist.

Head of Food

This character will actually be referred to as head Botanist but I didn’t want there being confusion between them and Mark in the blog. The head botanist will be one of only a handful of scientists on the first wave and her job will simply be to maintain the supply of human food (such as wheat, potatoes, etc) while Mark’s job is to research the planet’s food supply.

The Head Botanist will be the eldest and most experienced member of the entire crew. We will learn that she has taken part in two failed attempts at colonizing a planet before this one which greatly frustrates her. This will cause her to be quite bitter and maintain the mindset of ‘victory at any cost’.

Her desperation for victory is very loosely inspired by Colonel Mackenzie from 1917 so she will therefore be referred to as Mackenzie.

Head of Security

The final character to get a decent amount of screen time is the Head of Security. He is the only character in the film (along with his small security force) who isn’t a scientist or an engineer and is simply there to look after everyone else while they do their jobs. Due to the very peaceful nature of the planet and its inhabitants this character finds himself with very little to pass the time except keep an eye on the aliens while Kate learns about them. This leads the two to spark up an unlikely friendship as the head of security is completely fascinated by the Aliens, unclouded by science and experimentation, just a childlike curiosity (think E.T)

In my mind, this character is a direct contrast to your classic gun-slinging alien fighter such as Avatar’s Colonel Miles Quaritch. My Head of Security will be a war veteran who has become disillusioned by war and unnecessary violence. He was chosen for the mission because he is calm and collected and will only act out in defense. Unlike most military characters in films, he doesn’t have a burning desire for action and is actually far more comfortable in peace. The passive nature of the aliens will be another source of intrigue and he will grow very fond of their well mannered, innocent nature.

The Head of Security will end up being the loudest voice against eating the Aliens as the film develops.

I decided to name this character after American fur trader Jim Bridger. Jim Bridger was very tolerant of the native Americans and came to know a lot about them, even learning their language allowing him to become a mediator between the natives and the colonists. In this story, the head of security will act as the main spokesperson for the Aliens’ right to not be eaten so it seems natural that he would be named after the famous Mountain Man. He will be known as Bridger.

Robots

You may have noticed that I have mentioned nothing about Robots so far in this blog post and that isn’t an accident. The film is set in the future where robots will be common place in human society just like a mobile phones and laptops are today. Every scientist will have a robot companion to assist them in their studies but other than that they will mostly be ignored by the humans and play little part in the plot simply going unnoticed in the background.

The only robot who plays any real role in the film is Kate’s robot. All the robot’s will have the ability to communicate with the humans but only Kate will engage in conversation aside from work with her robot. Due to her autism, Kate will find it very refreshing and easy speaking to her robot who always gives straight and honest responses. Because of this, Kate will actually have her most open and honest conversations with her robot and the audience will learn a lot about her through the conversations they have together.

I decided to add robots into my story for quite a simple reason actually. The most common ‘enemy’ in sci-fi movies are either Aliens or Robots. Because of this I thought it would be a nice way to subvert audience expectations by having Aliens and Robots be the most passive and peaceful characters in my film and have all fighting take place between the humans.

I did also want the robots to represent cultural assimilation but I realized to pull that off I would have to put a fair bit of focus onto them and that could really clog up and over complicate the story so I decided just to keep them as background characters, peacefully going about their lives while the humans kill each other.

The final part Kate’s robot will play in the story is that the robot will be programmed to put the lives of the humans above all else meaning the robot believes that Kate and the others should eat the aliens. Kate has to then undergo the difficult task of explaining why it is inhumane to kill the aliens, most of the moral questions posed in the film will be addressed in the conversations between Kate and her robot.

Aliens

Appearance

The main inspiration for the appearance of my Aliens are the Ewoks from Star Wars: Return of the Jedi as I want them to come across very nonthreatening. The Aliens in my film will have similar clothing to Ewoks and be a similar size, about waist height on humans. I want the humans to be taller than the aliens to show how they literally look down on them (everytime Kate or Bridger communicate with the aliens they bend down to their height; they sees them as equals).

But I don’t want them to have fur like Ewoks, instead having similar textured skin to humans except with colorful complexions. I want their skin to almost mimic the planet’s wildlife with bold pastel colors, each alien having different colors and patterns, kind of similar to the skin of the Banshees in Avatar.

In terms of skeletons, I imagine the aliens to have very similar proportions to humans, just smaller. The final thing I am set on is I want them to have big eyes to connote innocence and wonder.

Home

The Aliens will be extremely primitive compared to their human counterparts and will live in very similar conditions to the untouched tribes in the Amazon Rainforest with simple shelters made out of the immediate supplies around them.

Tools

Most of the aliens daily routine consists of gathering fruit and plants (they eat a completely plant based diet) gathering resources, building new shelters, repairing damaged shelters, making clothes and making other things such as furniture and beds, etc.

The aliens will develop tools to serve these purposes so their tools will resemble axes, scythes, whittling knives, etc. While some of these tools may come across dangerous to us, the aliens will have no concept of weapons and the tools will simply be used for practical purposes.

All of their tools will be made out of the extremely valuable resource the geologist discovered.

They will also have discovered fire which means pretty much all the scenes after the storm will be lit by firelight (because I love firelight cinematography).

Food

As I mentioned, the aliens will only eat the plants and fruit found on Kepler-452b and those food sources will be in high supply. The Aliens will have a very similar culture to the native Americans meaning they do not believe in greed and ownership so they are very mindful to only pick the food they need, this allows the planet to easily keep up with their demand and they really don’t have to worry about ever running out.

This is a key reason as to why they are so passive. Their reliable food source means they have no need to kill animals and their culture of community and disbelief of ownership and possessions means they have no reason to kill one another.

Religion

The Aliens won’t have any gods but they worship mother nature and conduct a number of ceremonies around the worship of nature. The only ceremony we actually see in the film is a funeral. This worship of nature is inspired by the native american culture.

Language

I am still unsure of what I want the alien language to be but as of right now, I like the idea of their communication being a mixture of speech and sign language. They will be able to make noises like humans (of course in a different language) but they will incorporate movement alongside it. I don’t really know where this idea came from but I think it would be cool

I think that pretty much covers everything you need to know, shall we actually get on with the task I was set now?

Act One

The film opens with the second wave on their spacecraft arriving on Kepler where we are introduced to Kate, Mark and Parker and, through their brief interchanges, we learn a bit about who they are and what their different jobs are.

The ship lands at the basic camp set up by the settlers and we are introduced to Captain Wayne, Mackenzie and Bridger. Captain Wayne briefs them (and the audience) on the planet, Mackenzie fills them in on the food situation and Bridger explains that they have yet to discover any intelligent life forms but believe it is likely some exist on the planet. After the brief Bridger will meet Kate and explain that he will be her personal security officer as she is undergoing the most dangerous job.

We will then jump forward to the pair, with Kate’s robot, exploring Eden and looking for intelligent life. Through their conversation we will learn more about them and what brought them to the planet.

We then get a pretty cliche sequence of the pair hearing a noise in the undergrowth, they go on alert, tension, tension, blah blah blah, minor jump-scare, they discover the first Alien. The Alien they find is simply collecting fruit and seems completely unafraid of the pair (like the dodos, the aliens have no natural predators on Kepler so they haven’t evolved to fear other creatures).

Kate and Bridger realise the Alien isn’t hostile and follow it as it heads out of the woods and soon they discover an alien camp. They decide to let the team back at the base know about their discovery and head back just as a storm cloud comes into sight.

We jump forward to Kate and Bridger telling Captain Wayne about the Aliens while the storm rages outside. He seems cautious but accepts the pair’s analysis that they are non-threatening. Throughout their conversation, crew members pop in to report storm updates such as, the ship that brought the second wave in has been damaged, the farms set up outside of the shelters have been pretty much destroyed and all the comms are down.

Act Two (part one)

The storm passes but the sky remains blacked out by clouds. Wayne and Mackenzie pull together an emergency meeting where they explain that they still have no way of communicating with anybody off planet due to the dense clouds and they have lost a good chunk of their food supplies and any new food will be very difficult to grow. Despite this they are optimistic as there is a resupply ship only a two month journey away and, worst case scenario, they will be forced to hold out till then. The last thing they mention is that they have no idea when the clouds will pass but are optimistic they will be gone soon.

The symbolism of the clouds is that the settlers slowly come to think of themselves as gods. The clouds are a subtle reminder that, no matter how far we advance our technology and our species, we will always be at the mercy of nature. Another symbolism of the clouds is that they cast the planet into darkness for the rest of the film making it feel sinister and deadly despite us already knowing it is completely safe. As the storm comes the same night the Aliens are discovered, the darkness symbolizes how the planet is trying to protect its native population, the humans are the ones who don’t belong and nature is almost rejecting them.

As they have no control over the clouds and know they have an escape route if they run out of food, the group decides to just carry on with their individual missions.

The next day, Kate and Bridger come across the body of an alien who died in the storm which they take back to base to run tests on.

Kate checks in with Mark from time to time to track his futile attempts at genetically engineering Kepler’s natural resources but everytime he injects something alien into the fruits they die (metaphorssssss).

Other than the brief check ins with Mark, the first half of act two mainly focuses on Kate and Bridger learning about the aliens and their culture. They essentially learn everything I outlined in the Aliens chapter of this blog post and Kate even develops the basics of their language. We notice how Kate seems to become a new person when she interacts with the aliens, completely coming alive.

Bridger reveals to Kate that his wife and daughter were killed in a car accident back on earth. The sight of an alien mother with her child strikes a chord with Bridger and he develops a massive respect for the aliens as their own people, not just something to marvel over and he develops a real care for them and a desire to protect their simple way of life.

Time passes but still the clouds refuse to disperse which causes some concern amongst the camp and we soon see the first signs of tensions forming. But for the most part they are let go of while they wait to hear from the resupply ship which they are trying to convince themselves is coming.

The final major event before the midpoint is Parker discovering the valuable material, it is only mentioned in a brief conversation but I want this plot point to be set up before the midpoint.

Midpoint

Two months passes from when the storm hits and the group begins to grow anxious, worrying it may not come. But, just after I’ve had enough time to build up some tension, the group receives a message that the supply ship is above the planet and is going to drop down some supplies. But, if you’ve been paying attention, you’ll know that the ship crashes on entry to the planet. This marks the midpoint of the film.

Act Two (Part Two)

The group is thrown into panic and again calls a meeting to figure out what to do. They decide to focus all their efforts on sorting out a reliable food supply. Plans are made to tear down large parts of Kepler’s forests to make room for more farmland. Kate and Bridger try to argue this will jeopardize the alien’s food supply but they are ignored by Wayne.

A lot of pressure is suddenly put on Mark to bring forward some results and out of desperation he runs his own tests on the dead alien and discovers that their flesh is safe for human consumption, he quickly alerts the group of his discovery.

Some of the first wave settlers insist they should go about harvesting the aliens. Bridger argues hard against this, explaining that the aliens are completely innocent and shouldn’t have to die just to get the camp out of their own mess. The group accepts and agrees to prioritize sorting out their own food supply but it is clear many people are in two minds.

Disclaimer: This next part of the film takes place over a period of 4 months as the group’s situation gets worse and worse.

Kate and Bridger are aware that they won’t be able to look after the aliens if the camp completely runs out of food. They try to warn the aliens but cannot communicate the issue to them as the aliens have no concept of murder.

Kate has some difficult conversations with her robot who believes the group should eat the aliens as the robot is programmed to do everything in its power to keep the humans alive. Kate is forced to wrestle with her own morals as she tries to explain the humans are the aliens and it would be better for them to die than to wipe out the innocent native population.

Mark is in support of keeping the aliens as a backup food supply because he is worried about his reputation due to all his experiments being failures but Bridger is able to talk some sense into him and he agrees they should prevent any harm coming to the aliens at all costs.

Mackenzie oversees the destruction of more and more of Kepler’s forests being destroyed to make farmland. As a consequence, the aliens begin to run low on food and soon they start to show early signs of starvation. Kate insists the deforestation has to stop which causes a big clash between herself, Mark and Bridger against Wayne, Mackenzie and the rest of the first wave settlers. The two sides are now very clear for all to see; First wave settlers against second wave scientists, Parker remains neutral for the time being.

As the tensions become unbearable in camp, Parker descends into madness over the existence of the valuable resource and his inability to cash in on it and goes to Captain Wayne insisting that they have to eat the aliens otherwise they will all die.

Wayne calls a final meeting where he informs the group that eating the aliens is now back on the table. Another heated argument breaks out.

Realizing the damage is done, Kate rushes off to the Alien camp to make a final attempt at warning them of the danger they are in.

Despite the outcry, Wayne puts together a team to head to the alien camp, they arm themselves with the weapons they brought to Kepler to keep themselves safe from danger. Bridger arms a couple of the scientists, including Mark, with guns of their own and they rush out to try and talk Wayne and his men out of it.

Kate arrives at the camp and begins pleading with the aliens to run but they are preoccupied with something: Two of the Aliens have died of starvation and the rest of the tribe is conducting what appears to be a kind of funeral. Kate just watches the ceremony with helplessness and sadness, she quietly despairs to her robot as the aliens begin singing dark, ceremonial hymns (I decided the aliens can sing because singing is often refereed to as a universal language).

Wayne’s men are about to reach the outskirts of the camp. Bridger and the scientists desperately beg them to rethink and see the insanity of what they are doing but are shut down under the argument that humans must kill to survive. The begging turns to threatening and the two sides begin an intense stare down which attracts the attention of the whole camp who all pick a side and join in the furious argument, both sides have men armed with guns. Unavoidably, a shot is fired.

The battle is not pretty, better described as a bloodbath. The shots of violence are inter-cut with the alien funeral, their hymns lending a soundtrack to the whole scene. We, the audience, are not part of the battle but instead watch it through the eyes of the many robots brought along to assist the humans. They sit away from the battle, watching their masters slaughter each other, emotionless. Just as quickly as it began, the battle ends with no clear winner or survivors. We are left with an image of Kate watching the aliens burying the bodies of their dead, completely unaware of what has occurred back at camp.

Act Three

Kate wakes up in one of the alien huts, she concludes Bridger must have talked Wayne out of killing the aliens and heads back to camp with her robot. As she is walking she suddenly stops in realization, the clouds have dispersed. Overjoyed, Kate rushes back to camp.

When Kate arrives she sees the aftermath of the battle and is overcome with grief and begins desperately searching for survivors. She finds Bridger still breathing. He comes to and the two have a brief exchange where Bridger explains that this was the best outcome for the planet, how humans were never meant to be there and had only brought pain and damage to the world and its people. Bridger almost rejoices that the aliens will get there paradise back and can continue living without fear. Bridger dies in Kate’s arms.

Although devastated, Bridger’s words stick with Kate and she lets them sink in as she goes to examine the camp. In Mark’s lab she finds a tiny flower growing in the soil. Kate gets Mark’s robot to run a diagnostic and discovers it is safe for human consumption.

Kate then goes about deactivating all the robots and machinery the humans brought to Kepler. As she is turning off the communication devices she notices a message has come through from main command stating a relief ship is on its way to pick them up. Without hesitating, Kate types a response – PLANET UNSAFE, ABORT RELIEF MISSION, CAMP DEAD (or something along those lines).

Kate then grabs the last of the human food and water left on the farms, carefully puts Mark’s plant into a container and throws it all into a rucksack.

She leaves the camp and finds her robot, the only piece of machinery still running. She considers shutting it down but eventually decides against it. She takes a last look at the carnage and damage the humans were able to cause in less than a year on Eden before heading into the forest.

Final thoughts

This could probably go without saying but pretty much everything in the story is liable to change as I only had the initial idea about 5 days ago and still have a lot of problems to iron out, this is simply how the story stands 5 days into development.

The writing of the moral dilemma still needs a lot of work to ensure it doesn’t come off preachy but hopefully you can see what I’m going for.

Overall, I think it is quite a cool premise and I would love any feedback on the story itself as I think it has potential.

Also I apologize for completely ignoring the task brief, I can’t help but get sucked in to these writing tasks.