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Originally Posted by dreamless
Why not? If I know I'm going to die in March 2005 with the entire world, then all the more reason to enjoy what little time is left of my life, so I'll spend all my money eating the best food and drink the best drinks and enjoy every last moments of the world before it goes boom  |
Fair enough. But I meant that, no matter what you do, some day you will die (so will I, so will everyone else) not because the world is going to miraculously explode in March 2005 but simply because we'll grow old and die. And if knowing something is going to end makes doing anything to preserve it useless, then also knowing that you are going to die should (logically.. although logic is pretty stupid sometimes) dictate that there is no point in eating to keep yourself alive
now because you're just going to die someday anyway. We know that the earth will be destroyed shortly after Macross Zero, but the characters don't. So the story for Macross Zero becomes the sacrifices and effort that they make which might on its own be inspiring but in the larger context means absolutely nothing.
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Originally Posted by dreamless
because both species are engineered by Protoculture, and thus both are technological products of Protoculture?
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Yeah. But I mean, in terms of the themes of the story and not just the sci-fi universe that they made up for it. I would say that the similarity between humans and Zentradi is supposed, thematically, to bring their conflict around to a place where it can still be relevant to human conflict and relationships. If you have humans versus the aliens from the Alien movies, then it's kind of impossible to take their problems with each other allegorically as a discussion about how we deal with each other. On the other hand, with the Zentradi and humanity being so closely linked genetically, we can look at the Zentradi as people and, in a way, the Humans vs. Zentradi conflict becomes a way of discussing human conflicts. And the problems that the Zentradi have assimilating into human culture
can be then more of a story about how difficult it is to keep people content and have a society where everyone is accounted for and respected. As opposed to "Argh. Stupid dumb big aliens don't understand why it's important to lift boxes for mankind's benefit. Argh." In my opinion, the Zentradi = almost human aspect of the story was intended to a) imply that the Zentradi are not just the alien bad guys, but also a representation of the aggressive aspect of humanity and b) move on to discussing the problems of civilization, cooperation, etc. If they were just aliens that were inherently completely different than humanity then the story wouldn't be any more complex than Sigourney Weaver fighting the Aliens: "We don't understand them and they want to destroy us. Kill, kill. Nyargh!"
Hmm.. I'm starting to think that I communicate through irrelevant illustrative examples too often.
