Aliens--how do you like yours? Tall, short, weird, humanoid, familiar, strange? I've been watching Shrek with my granddaughters. He's a hero. A reluctant hero, true. But the heroine still falls in love with him. He's green, round, and um...rude. Yeah, rude is a good word.I've been observing all sorts of alien types, whether it's the fellow from Beauty and the Beast or that odd guy on SG-1 with the gold circle on his forehead. From E.T. to Superman, there are a wide array of aliens to choose from.
I'm kicking around a possibility for a story. My heroine will find herself on an alien world. The difficulty lies with the world building and the aliens themselves. What will they look like? How will their culture function? What technology level are they living with? Who's in charge? What sort of planet/atmosphere do they live on? There are dozens and dozens of questions to find answers for.
But first, most importantly, is the hero. Without a picture of him in my mind, it's difficult to envision his world. Is it a sunny world? Or does he live in a jungle? Maybe he lives underground--or in a soaring spire high above the surface.
I'll be talking about my hero and planet all week. Drop me a comment and add your thoughts about alien heroes and their worlds. At the end of the week--on Saturday--I'll draw a name from the commenters to win a twin pack, print copies of Dancer's Delight and Carnal Camelot (autographed, of course) along with some other goodies.
So speak up!
anny
We've already discussed this a bit and I really think you can have an alien guy who is HOT. Personally, I've read stories about aliens before where the hero is just too weird looking for me to wrap my brain around. I like to see more human features with just slight variations.
ReplyDeleteI'm with Regina. I like my heroes to be more humanoid than not. They can be a different color or have some interesting features, but they need to resemble a human male. The cultural differences would be the biggest difference. How he relatest to his own culture, and to the heroine's. The possibilities are endless.
ReplyDeleteYou'll pull it off! No doubt in my mind at all. Gee, they could be blue with pointy ears like the people in Avatar...
ReplyDelete(ducking the heavy object being hurled at my head, though you know you're laughing too!)