The second trailer for Independence Day: Resurgence has some confusing new reveals for armchair ID4 xenobiologists. The aliens dropping Dubai on London makes perfect sense - no objections here - but what’s going on with the new alien biology briefly on display?
The original Independence Day presented us with an invading alien species that stomped Earth with its technological superiority. Not only did they have more maneuverable ships, but they had shields that were impenetrable to our nukes. Their advantage was in both numbers and tech.
The new Independence Day: Resurgence trailer introduces a new element of tactical superiority heretofore unsuspected:
It can first be spotted around 2:07, as two Earth Space Defense ships swoop through a vortex of alien craft to fire at an immense creature stomping through a military base. It crushes a Humvee moments later.
These are the Independence Day aliens:
They’re moist nerds! Big eyes, two fingers, colossal crested cranial cavity…
Only their biomechanical armor, all swirling tentacles and bone shielding, makes them formidable infantry warriors. Even with all that, Will Smith managed to punch one out cold.
It looks like the larger alien mothership in Independence Day: Resurgence will also bring along an immense ruling caste of some sort. Could these moments from the trailer dramatize the Queen’s last desperate bid to stomp humans?
There’s also the possibility that these monstrosities are themselves biomechanical armor, with the normal nerds buried somewhere deep inside the hard candy coating. But the way the ships flock around in a protective pattern makes it appear as if that thing is much more than a tank.
Whatever it proves to be, these brief moments from the Independence Day: Resurgence trailer 2 suggest we’ll be getting more than bigger, bigger, bigger from the Independence Day sequel. Hopefully we’ll also be getting an alien society worthy of a larger mythology.
