Rachel Mercer

(this the weekly piece that I write over at Input/Outcast. Original post can be found here)

For any of you who didn't catch it, a re-imagining of the early 80's miniseries "V" premiered last week on ABC. If you haven't yet watched the pilot, saunter on over to Hulu to check it out, I dare you not to be intrigued.

The premise of the show is certainly intriguing to the average viewer, aliens have come and settled their spacecraft over what seems to be every major metropolitan area on the planet, but instead of releasing hostile forces, instead we see a humanoid form very similar to our own, speaking a message of peace. After the minor crisis, we witness the human population's growing obsession with the V, with the wildfire spread of merch, tourism venues offered on board motherships, and growing "ambassador" projects for young and old alike to join and spread good feeling about the Visitors, referred to as the V. It is when it is revealed that the V are not actually humanoids, but reptilian beings that have been staging a hostile takeover for decades, that is when the internal crisis is triggered in our nerd minds.

Personally, I would think that if some humanoid-esque aliens came to our planet, offered us some pretty sweet new technologies, and allowed us to tour their ships, I would be totally stoked and likely embrace it. I feel that many people who have long watched shows like Battlestar Galactica, Firefly, or have even been a fan of the Star Trek / Wars franchises can be with me on this one. The reaction would be something along the lines of "Holy Shit, Aliens do exist" combined with "take me to your mothership and how to I get one?" However, I feel that many of us would like to think that, especially in the context of V, we'd be smarter than that. Would we be easily duped by the glamour and greatness of an alien race, one that we've longed for contact with in our wild imaginations since childhood? Or would we approach the newcomers with distrust and hostility? I feel that no nerd really wants to be duped in such a way, but if you were in that situation, would you?