Cosmic Queries – ALIENS! with Jake Roper

About This Episode

On this episode of StarTalk Radio, Neil deGrasse Tyson and comic co-host Chuck Nice are answering your fan-submitted Cosmic Queries about aliens in film alongside Jake Roper. You can find Jake on the YouTube channel Vsauce3 and as the host of the YouTube series Could You Survive The Movies?, where Neil was recently Jake’s guest.

To start, Jake tells us what alien movie might be the easiest to survive. Your immediate answer might be E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial but don’t be so sure. Neil shares what Steven Spielberg told him about E.T. that’s sure to change your understanding of the character. Speaking of Spielberg, we investigate the weaponry used in his film War of the Worlds. We also debate if the government could ever set up a secret organization to monitor aliens similar to Men in Black. 

Find out why your assumptions of how extraterrestrial life takes shape might need to be open to more possibilities. Jake explains why he thinks the deep ocean could be home to extraterrestrial life as well. Discover more about The Blob, The Thing, and why Chuck loves the alien from Alien. We explore the film Arrival and its depiction of aliens and the personnel used to communicate with aliens. Also, Neil airs his grievances about Close Encounters of the Third Kind. 

We explore Contact and its portrayal of how humanity would react to the discovery of intelligent life. We ponder the likelihood that humans will end up how they’re imagined in WALL-E. Lastly, we discuss of there’s a protocol for first contact. All that, plus, Jake tells us why he thinks Paul Rudd should be Earth’s representative to meet with intelligent life.

Thanks to this week’s Patrons for supporting us: Matthew Iskander, Cody Stanley, David Adair Wolford Jr, Kim Shoemaker, Dawn Jordan.

NOTE: StarTalk+ Patrons and All-Access subscribers can watch or listen to this entire episode commercial-free.