As we can see from that early concept art, some of the alien designs were way stranger than the final version. Why were those rejected? Were you told to tone down the nastiness?

Those designs weren't necesarily rejected outright, we just evolved away from them. A huge amount of work was done designing these things. There were so many iterations, by the time the final design was nailed down, these early images were out of sight and out of mind. The technical approach to realizing the creatures was always in flux, so that affected the look. I'd like to note that the reason the aliens in the early concept art have such human eyes was because they were, at first, intended to be actors in make-up. Due to budgetary constraints, we didn't think the aliens could be done as pure CG, which is what they ended up being. They were originally conceived as practical make-up with digital replacement over certain parts.

Neill actually encouraged us to make the aliens gross and unpleasant. He was very keen that the aliens should look revolting when they were eating, and left it up to us as to what that meant exactly. So I did my take of what an open alien mouth would look like, and some viewers have been disturbed by it! They took note of the genitalia-like aspect. It's my job to disturb people sometimes, and to be honest, I was only a little worried that genitaliia-esque aliens were old hat. But I think they continue getting such visceral responses because they remind the viewer of his or her own vulnerability, not because of the shock value. In the end, that aspect didn't make it into the final alien, possibly due to censorship issues, but as I said, these illustrations were old news by then. Oh well, it's all good.

It seems like a lot of the meaning of the story changes depending on how aggressive or how loveable the aliens appear. Was there ever any talk of making them cuter? Or more scary and soldier-like?

Definitely for the little child alien, Neill wanted to make him very cute. I collaborated on the child alien with Jamie Beswarick, and Neill encouraged us to play up the big eyes and rounded head, etc. For the the general alien populace, Neill wanted them to be intimidating due to physical strength and size, and off-putting. I think the endearing quality of the generic aliens was due to their ineptness and victim status, one felt sorry for their plight. There was another design phase of the Prawns I personally liked, where they looked very much like those early concept images, but with larger bug eyes. That evolved further into the final aliens. Neill really pushed the eyes to be bigger and bigger, which I initially wasn't sure about, but upon seeing the final movie, I understand the decision. A lot of people seemed to prefer that. It seemed so obvious to have big puppy dog eyes, but without them, perhaps no one would care about Christopher Johnson and his kid.

So the aliens were pure CG, not a mixture of CG and practical effects as you'd considered. How would that mixture have worked? And were any of the alien body parts still done with practical effects?

The Prawns themselves were entirely CG, from head to foot. The alien parts on Wikus were prosthetics built and applied by Weta Workshop (Sarah Rubano and Joe Dunckley took care of the make-up work on location), and there were various alien corpses that we fabricated physically, such as in the laboratory dissection scene. Initially, the aliens were to be an actor in a suit, who would then be augmented with digital replacement in some areas, at an earlier stage we considered mechanical puppetry mixed with prosthetics. Ultimately the decision was made to have them be pure CG.

The aliens in D9 are amazingly expressive — they do a lot of "acting" with their eyes and mandibles. It seems like the biggest problem for a really alien creature is getting human audiences to identify with it or feel its emotions. How did you approach this problem?

That credit should mainly go to the animators and Neill Blomkamp. They solved how this thing we designed should move and emote. But from a design standpoint, it would go back to the eyes. Throughout most of the design process, the aliens had mammalian eyes with pupils and sclera, etc., so we always knew they would be able to emote warm-blooded emotions. Neill didn't go with our versions of the eyes as solid black or cephalapod pupils, so they retained a relatable humanity to them.

Obviously, a lot of the press about D9 focused on its low budget. How do you create aliens who look more convincing and interesting than most big-budget movie monsters, on such a low budget?

Of course, that credit goes to Neill's filmmaking sensibilities. I was part of an initially larger team of designers who were later scaled down to Greg Broadmore, Leri Greer and myself. I worked as lead creature designer, concentrating on the organic creatures. Greg designed all the robots, bio-suits, weaponry, vehicles, the mothership, etc., and was the lead concept designer. In his role as art director, he also contributed studies of the alien's body coloration, as well as some subtle last minute tweaking on the final version aliens. Leri did the graphic design, logos and costumes. With Neill directing me, I just offered up as many possibilities as I could, bearing in mind that it had to be relatable to human audiences and based around a roughly humanoid shape. Initially, we tried not to heed any budgetary or technical constraints, so as not to become creatively impaired, but those things factored in later on. Eventually, time just ran out.

The aliens in the film are standing in for South Africans during Apartheid, but they don't act or appear like any human ethnic group — did you have any discussions about avoiding the "Jar Jar Binks" effect, and making them look less like members of a human ethnicity and more like real aliens?

I don't remember that we did. They spoke in an utterly inhuman language and were so insectile, they didn't really run the risk of mirroring any human ethnic group. Personally, I never thought our space lobsters would strike anyone as ethnic caricatures!

In the film, we got very little information about the aliens' social structure and how they came to be in such bad shape. Were you told anything more about this, during the design phase? Is it true that most of the aliens on Earth were worker drones? Did you have any ideas about what other aliens, like their Queen, might have looked like?

I think the idea was that the vast majority of the aliens were workers, and that Christopher Johnson was much brighter than most. Which sort of explained why the overall population were so lost and ineffectual. There was definitely talk of the social structure of the aliens during the design phase. It factored into how we designed them. There was a lot of stuff designed and talked about that never made it into the film. It's possible that Neill may want to save some of these ideas for other future projects, so I don't know if I should talk about it.

We've talked to Broadmore about space weaponry before, specifically his love of ray guns. But you can check in on the man who helped craft Neill Blomkamp's alien power suit over at his blog.

There were a lot of splattered humans and aliens in this movie. It reminded me a lot of early Peter Jackson. Was it your idea or his to make the victim just explode when they get hit by the alien guns?

No, that was definitely me. But I think that he appreciates it. I think that he likes that stuff. And it's not surprising that I was hired to do Halo, [since] we may have the same sensibilities, in a lot of ways. So it's not a surprise that, that splatter exists in a film with both of our names on it.

Why did you decide to make the people or aliens explode into bits in the film, as opposed to chunks? It's quite violent.

Yeah, it is violent. Usually, it's that energy weapon that's making that happen. It has that electric Tesla arc, that was hitting the people. Even though there's a lot more fantasy in the film than I like to believe — it's less science fiction and more fantasy really — but when we were designing the weapons, we did try to apply some kind of scientific thought to it. So the idea of those Tesla coils hitting the guy, what would happen would just be some sort of violent almost like molecular level of shredding, where everything just gets pulled apart. If that's what it is on a conceptual level, then the visual way to achieve that would be just obliterating whatever the target was.

Was it always going to be rated R?

Yeah there was no discussion about anything else. I think within a day or two of us deciding to do District 9, I said to Pete that I wanted it to be rated R. And then he just totally agreed.

Was there anything you thought up that you decided was too violent?

[Pauses, thinks] No. If anything, I always think that there isn't enough.

See the coil action here:

Because of the budget did a lot of things in District 9 that had to be cut?

Peter Jackson: Everything that Neill wanted to put into the film, we tried to make happen for him. We didn't have to compromise. It's weird because it was a relatively large budget film, i mean relative, $30 million is still a lot of money. It was enough money to be able to put on screen the story that Neil wanted to - it helped it largely by the style that he shot it in, which was very documentary, realism style. So we didn't have to put a gloss on it like some of the bigger budget movies have. We could be down and dirty and seem like some of it was shot with a handy cam, we had that ability which helped the budget immensely. It gives the film a vibrancy and a feeling of being improvised, it has that quality about it.

Would you ever consider making another alien film?

Possibly; I have no plans or rules about doing anything in particular. I just operate from some kind of instinct, that if I read a book or think of a story idea that I get excited about that ... it becomes a film that I want to make. At the moment I'm concentrating on The Hobbit, which we are shooting two movies back-to-back [that] I'm producing and Guillermo Del Toro is directing. And and I've got Tintin with Steven [Spielberg]... But beyond that, we'll see; I don't know the project for the future. It could be aliens, I've got no issues with aliens, happy to shoot some more movies with aliens.

Two great clips have been released that truly show you exactly how District 9 is filmed, and set up. It relies fairly heavy on the shaky cam, but I can tell you it won't distract you from a thing. D9 will be in theaters this Friday.

At Comic-Con, we interviewed Neill on camera, and he mentioned his hive mind concept about the aliens of District 9. Later on, we got to press further about the entire alien world that Neill had built around his alien creatures, past the hive.

What is your own back story for these aliens? What's their home planet like? Why did the end up on Earth?

The hive mind [concept] is the most important thing to me, because I love the idea of a civilization that can build all of that technology and then, at the same time, just have a massive population that was just drones that needed direction, and were absolutely incapable of building that stuff on their own. I found that to be a really interesting concept. Also, it sort of explains why they don't turn on the humans. Individually, they may be feeling oppressed, but they don't have it together enough to form a resistance and back one another. So I found that really interesting.

I think that they do have a home planet, it's pretty far away probably in the Andromeda Galaxy, but what I like is that they'll live on the ship for thousands of years. Obviously, there's much more of a population on the main planet, but the ships will go out and get the minerals and the ore and whatever resources they need and then bring them all back home.

The other thing is that the ship was meant to clip together with other ships. So there's, like, vast amounts of resources that they're bringing to the parent planet. And the ship, when the army generals or the queen of that particular ship died off by some sort of virus or bacteria that they picked up on some other planet, that killed them off. And it didn't effect these sort of resilient, hardy sort of drone workers. Then the technology is usually the thing that they relied on to save them, but in this case it sort of screwed them because it brought them to a planet that kind of treated them pretty badly, but it was the ship that realized that, unless it gets to a life sustaining planet everything is going to die, which is a cool idea. So the ship just auto pilots to the closest one in the Goldilocks band, and it's our planet and then pulls up and hits the breaks.

Where does this leave Christopher Johnson [an abnormally smart prawn who sparks a bit of a revolution... Not to give too much away]?

I think it's taken 20 years. I think because there is a subconscious hive mind happening, really what they should do is lay one egg that has a different embryo in it that grows into a Queen or being someone that dictates direction. But I think in the interim, because they may have done that, there may be an egg out there with that, but as that being is growing, I just like the idea that he may have been a lot more directionless in the beginning. But the hive structure of their society may just pick one or two that starts to become the leader. Like the overall structure of his brain may change because the hive may want that to happen. So he starts having a direction and a goal. Which is an interesting idea and it's just enough to kick start them to be able to get to the ship to get back.

Iron Man 2:

Justin Hammer may start out as a rival arms dealer to Tony Stark, but actor Sam Rockwell hints he may turn into something else:

I think it's still developing. We don't know what Justin Hammer becomes. He becomes something else. He's starting off one way.

It's not an unreasonable question to ask whether Hammer poses a physical threat to Tony. And Rockwell says Hammer's main motivation is "jealousy," like Salieri in Amadeus. [Cinematical]

Resident Evil 4:

Milla Jovovich says the army of Alice clones will turn up in the fourth movie, filming soon:

The clones are definitely in it. You've got multiple Alice's kicking serious butt. And definitely the real Alice has some pretty major things happen to her that change the stakes a little bit. That's probably all I can give you in a vague sort of way. It's definitely going to be a different Alice than who we're used to.

[Bloody Disgusting]

District 9:

Director Neill Blomkamp says the movie's aliens don't cause trouble by being troublemakers, but just by having valuable technology:

[They're] refugees that bring a hell of a lot of potentially profitable stuff with them. So, it's like worst-case scenario because the humans want whatever the technology may mean for us. And because of that, they're willing to do what they need to do quicker to get there — it's all about the bottom line. So, I think, yeah, the thing that really interests me about the film is the idea about a whole bunch of refugees that were really novel and amazing when they got here. And then [people] very quickly lose interest with [the aliens] and put them in their shanty town.

[Starpulse]

And here are some stills I don't think we've shown you before. [IGN]

Doctor Who:

Russell T. Davies says "Waters Of Mars" is "one of those claustrophobic submarine-type dramas, all trapped in an enclosed space with sort of increasing darkness and intensity. It all takes place in a very small location in Doctor Who terms." And he says the Doctor likes being the Tenth Doctor and will fight against giving that up as hard as he can — even though the writing is on the wall with all that "knock four times" stuff.

Also, David Tennant's final two-parter, airing later this year, is "a personal epic. That final story, it becomes, yes, epic. Almost like a fairytale. But in that there's, like, a seven-minute scene of David and Bernard Cribbins having a conversation together in a cafe, it's really intimate at the same time." (If it was anybody else having a seven-minute conversation with the Doctor, I'd be dubious. But Bernard Cribbins? Cannot wait.) [Premium Hollywood]

V:

A new "press bundle" offers a bit of a more detailed synopsis for this show's pilot:

While the world quickly becomes fascinated with the V's and their link to wonders just beyond the reach of human understanding, FBI Counter Terrorist Agent Erica Evans (Elizabeth Mitchell) discovers a secret hidden beneath the skin of every V– a secret that may threaten the lives of everyone close to her. Yet for her teenage son, Tyler (Logan Huffman), the V's are his ticket to something big and hopeful — a new chance for mankind to unite in common goals. To Chad Decker (Scott Wolf), a career-hungry news anchor, his exclusive interview with Anna (Morena Baccarin), the leader of the V's, is crucial to his dominating the airwaves. Also unsure about the Visitors is Father Jack (Joel Gretsch), a priest questioning his faith in the wake of the Visitors' arrival. Seeking answers outside the church, Father Jack discovers there are other dissidents who believe the Visitors are not who they say they are, including Ryan Nichols (Morris Chestnut), who is faced with his own life-altering decision when the V's show up. Never has there been more at stake — it truly is the dawning of a new day.

[SpoilerTV]

FlashForward:

And there's a "press bundle" for this show as well:

It's just another normal day in Los Angeles. FBI agent Mark Benford (Joseph Fiennes, "Shakespeare in Love") and his partner, Demetri Noh (John Cho, "Star Trek," the "Harold & Kumar" film series), are in the midst of a car chase monitored by their boss, Stanford Wedeck (Courtney B. Vance, "Law & Order: Criminal Intent") and colleague Janis Hawk (Christine Woods); Mark's wife, Dr. Olivia Benford (Sonya Walger, "Lost"), is in the middle of surgery; Dr. Bryce Varley (Zachary Knighton) is weighing a potentially life-ending decision; Mark's friend, Aaron Stark (Brían F. O'Byrne, "The International"), is working high above the ground on power lines; and Nicole (Peyton List) — baby-sitter to Mark and Olivia's daughter, Charlie — is in the throes of passion with her boyfriend when suddenly and without warning, every person on Earth blacks out for two minutes and seventeen seconds and sees a series of events from their own future, taking place on April 29, 2010 at 10:00 p.m., Pacific Time. For some the future will be joyous and hopeful; for others, shockingly unexpected; and for a few, it simply doesn't seem to exist.

Everyone in the world will eventually begin chronicling what they saw in their flashforwards on a worldwide website — the Mosaic Collective — that will further draw people together. And some of the flashforwards just might help Mark and his colleagues piece together the cause of the blackout.

Knowing their fate will alter each person's life in one way or another and poses the questions: Can destiny be changed? And by changing just one destiny, what effect would that have on those of others?

[SpoilerTV]

True Blood:

As you've probably gleaned, Alexander Skarsgard says we'll be seeing more of the loyal, sensitive side to Eric this year. He doesn't care for very many people, but the ones he likes, he's fiercely loyal to. Meanwhile, when Daphne's corpse is discovered, people suspect Sam of being the killer. And Sookie and Eric grow closer, after Eric is injured and Sookie helps him. [E! Online]

Smallville:

Sounds like Tess Mercer gets into a scrap with Zod, right in the first episode. "We start out heavy. In the first episode, we start out really going at it, and it's really fun," says actor Cassidy Freeman. And she'll figure out eventually whether she's bitten off more than she chew. [E! Online]

Warehouse 13:

We'll actually meet the Regents, the secret society who run the warehouse, later this season, and we'll learn more about the dynamic between Artie and Mrs. Frederic. And Pete and Myka go searching for an artifact that's eluded Artie for years, and "unfortunately," they find it, says producer Jack Kenny. And that season-finale twist involving B&B keeper Leena will change everything. [E! Online]

Defying Gravity:

Here's the description for episode five, "Rubicon":

It's a humbling moment for the crew of the spaceship, as each of them deals with a personal point of no return, while the Antares itself crosses a critical boundary when going back to Earth is no longer an option, and the home planet becomes just another twinkling light in a vast canopy of stars.

And here are some pics from the episode.[SpoilerTV]

Eastwick:

Some new casting calls give us some hints for this "Desperate Housewitches" show. In episode three, we'll deal with the divorce between Kat and Randy — the mysterious Darryl Van Horne brings in his beautiful, exotic attorney, Ivanka, to represent Kat. Meanwhile, Randy takes their kids to buy a new puppy, and Kat calls the sheriff because she thinks he's kidnapping them. Randy hires his fishing buddy, Frank, to represent him, and Frank is totally out of his league because he didn't even finish law school. [SpoilerTV]

Additional reporting by Alexis Brown.

Iron Man 2:

Mad Men's John Slattery plays Tony Stark's dad Howard, and he says he just appears in flashbacks. But those flashbacks may actually become important in other upcoming Marvel movies, most notably The Avengers, Slattery hints. (Remember Captain America's shield on Tony's workbench? Am I on crack, or was there some talk of Howard having developed it for Cap back in the day?) [Sci Fi Wire]

Marvel's Kevin Feige says the new movie is much more Jim Rhodes-centric, not least because it introduces War Machine. And the film's climactic fight scene is bigger and more spectacular than the first movie. Also, Nick Fury may not bust out the big fighting moves yet, but he is the conduit by which all the superheroic characters (including the Avengers) connect up. [IESB]

Aliens In The Attic:

Ashley Tisdale says she doesn't deal with the aliens in the film as much as the guys do, and in fact her character had a much smaller role in the film until Ashley came on board. She gets a big scene where she tells off her boyfriend Ricky for bad-mouthing her family. [IESB]

District 9:

This is a "very original chase movie," about aliens who landed 20 years ago, their ship out of fuel — though it still hovers, dead, over the city 20 years later. The aliens have been forced into makeshift camps, and they need a black substance to fuel their ship and their sophisticated weapons. You need alien DNA to operate those weapons, but a Nigerian underworld boss named Obesandjo buys them all up anyway, for cat food, which the aliens love. A private company, Multinational United (MNU) is put in charge of the aliens, and decides to relocate them to a rural camp, a task it assigns to "by-the-book wimp" Wikus, a field operative.

Wikus delivers eviction notices, and comes across an alien lab run by an alien named Christopher Johnson. Wikus gets infected with an alien virus that changes his DNA, and he grows an alien claw for a hand. The claw can operate that alien machinery and weaponry, and he becomes the "most valuable business artifact on Earth." Wikus' own father in law decides to harvest his organs. The MNU starts chasing after Wikus, who flees, and his main pursuer is the film's villain, Koobus. Also chasing Wikus is Nigerian gangster Obesandjo, who wants to eat Wikus' alien arm. Wikus hides out with Christopher and his son, and it turns out that virus is actually a substance Christopher was developing for the past two years to refuel the mothership so the aliens can get home. [Hollywood Reporter]

Caprica:

The SyFy Channel got a "failing" grade for its depiction of gay characters, and promised to do better — for one thing, there's Ming-Na's lesbian character on Stargate Universe, and her wife, played by Reiko Aylesworth. But also, it turns out one of the major characters on Caprica is gay and has a husband — and it's a "goodfella" type gangster, who's a stereotypically macho leg-breaker. (And AfterElton thinks this character is Sam Adama, Joseph's brother and Bill's uncle. Which would make sense, since Sam's spouse is named Larry.) Separately, another major Caprica character is actually in a group marriage, with both men and women. And in all these cases, the character's sexuality isn't made into a big deal, says SyFy's Mark Stern. [TV Guide and AfterElton]

FlashForward:

New promo artwork is pretty bland, but maybe there's a hidden message. Like, what's that sunrise over the water mean? A flood coming? [SpoilerTV]

So there's a casting call for episode five, and it sounds as though we'll encounter some kind of political crisis. We meet Dave, a powerful, commanding, egotistical Latino government worker who takes charge of the room; Joyce, a forceful and brusque fiftysomething woman who spars with a number of individuals; Abner, a "pinched-faced suit" who's "high up in politics" and plays it safe; and Judith, a maternal lady who's a friend to everyone but conceals a lot of anger.

There's also Maya, the attractive and sardonic chef at a hip Los Feliz restaurant. And Noland, a middle-aged man who runs a business meeting and diagnoses a situation. There are some reporters and a newscaster who cover a press conference. And a Tae Kwon Do instructor who's impressed by his student's sudden moves. And finally, Joan, a former drug addict who becomes a hit doing a one-woman show about her experiences. [SpoilerTV]

And then there's a casting call for episode six as well, which sounds like it's going to get very Lost-ish. A mental patient named Bishop starts painting "bizarre, cryptic canvasses" in his room, and (shockingly) these paintings turn out to have a wider significance. Meanwhile, an African American Pentecostal preacher named James has his world rocked when he starts hearing messages from God over the radio. Like I said, very, very Lost.

There are two possibly recurring characters in episode six: An eccentric coroner named Dewey, who has a lightness about his job, and a computer geek named Harold, who's dorky but accepts his own dorkiness. There's also a bus driver with a short fuse, a gang member who sticks up for someone being picked on, a masked teenager who gets caught doing something bad and is terrified his parents will find out, and a gorgeous woman who has a flirtatious encounter with a know-it-all and "holds her own." [SpoilerTV]

Lost:

Apparently when Dominic Monaghan stepped on stage at this show's panel and waved to the fans, he had "Am I alive?" written on his palm. [TV Guide]

Heroes:

Claire has a new arch-nemesis. Tessa Thompson, who played Jackie Cook on Veronica Mars, will play Becky, an upperclassman and sorority pledge master who torments Claire. And Becky has a secret of her own. [TV Guide Magazine]

And here are some set pics featuring Milo Ventimiglia and Deanne Bray, who plays Peter's hearing-impaired new girlfriend. Peter is wearing his paramedic uniform, then he changes into his black leather civvies and has an argument with his new girlfriend — maybe he told her what happened to his last girlfriend, and she got understandably upset? Then he saves her from some kind of peril, involving greenscreen and maybe flying. More pics at the link. [AccidentalSexiness via SpoilerTV]

Chuck:

Adam Baldwin says Casey will be toting some new and improved weapons including a badass minigun. [E! Online]

One of the skills the Intersect 2.0 gives Chuck is "guitar-playing." [TV Guide]

Warehouse 13:

Allison Scagliotti says that now that Claudia has rescued her long-lost brother from teleportation limbo, she's stuck trying to figure out what to do with the rest of her life. "Once Claudia settles into the warehouse, she definitely finds her groove and finds her confidence; likes to have fun, sometimes at the expense of the warehouse and always at the expense of Artie's nerves. But also brings her new-age, steam-punk skill set to the IT system." [SF Universe]

Additional reporting by Alexis Brown.

I hope the retelling of alien landings becomes my generation's defining moment of "I'll never forget where I was when I heard..." Should be interesting to see how District 9 handles this sort of mentality, but I know I'm ready for it. It's time for a better caliber of summer movie, and my money is on D9 to deliver it.

So apparently the aliens have invented a spray that turns jumpy MNU agents into "one of us" — delightful. Also, there are little baby bug aliens, and now we know how they are spawned. Plus secret underground space ships that the aliens are most likely using to get the hell off this godforsaken rock.

District 9 will be out on August 15th. Check out the high def version over at Yahoo.

The District 9 computer game has you running around squashing an alien uprising as a human, or gathering fuel cells as an alien bug creature who's stuck on this planet. As an alien, you're warned you'll either be arrested or shot if caught, but those MNU officers always shoot first and ask questions later. I wonder if there'll be an actual fuel gathering alien resistance in the film? We know from the trailer that the illegal aliens are out of fuel. Are the Earthlings holding out on them?

Here are a few screen grabs from the new District 9 game, where tolerance is best learned at the business end of a rifle.

For once I can finally say, I've got a good feeling about this movie's ARG. Looks like Sony is investing lots of time and money creating a layered look at the tensions between humans and illegal aliens, for Neill Blomkamp's new flick.

We've already run a round up on the immense online campaign of MNU's website, plus the anti MNU bloggers (and their mysterious disappearances). Seriously, you could spend hours reading all the material D9 has provided.

D9 will be in theaters August 14, 2009.

The film follows an unfortunate race of aliens stranded on Earth. Unable to leave, they take up residence in Africa, causing unrest and uneasiness among the human population. Tensions grow high as the aliens are continually abused by the government and forced to live in slum-like conditions. The mockumentary takes you behind scenes between the human MNU security force and their daily dealings with our illegal alien problem.

Here are a few screengrabs from the new trailer. I'm pretty shocked by how much emotion is being expressed on that bug-like alien face. It's heartbreaking.

First Showing has the summer movie report from the current Rolling Stone which exposes a little bit of MNU violence. For those of you who are not aware, MNU (Multi-National United) is the team of police sent to govern over D9, and they appear ready to use force when necessary.

In the article, director Neill Blomkamp reveals a little bit more about his downtrodden aliens:

These aliens arrived 20 years ago in a dead, derelict mothership, which hovers above Johannesburg. It's enormous, like the size of 10 football fields. The aliens have ended up in a Soweto-style township beneath the ship. It's clear that they're not really integrating into society. They like to scavenge things, rip up train tracks. So the authorities shift them 200 miles away, into the African belt. They've built a concentration camp." Obviously, the concentration camp is known as ‘District 9′

D9 will be released on August 14.

[Pictture via ">District9News]

The mockumentary-looking film focuses on the slums we force an unfortunate alien race to live in on Earth, and our not so human response to their presence. If this film is anything like we've seen from Blomkamp before it promises to be an incredibly challenging and thought provoking feature, with the visual appeal of producer Peter Jackson. D9 will be released on August 14.

Blomkamp was originally tapped to direct Halo but when that fell through Peter Jackson brought him on to helm this alien-discrimination flick.

District 9 follows the segregation that takes place in Africa when a large UFO lands just above Earth and it's inhabitants are forced to live amongst humans. I'm assuming the cultural divide and fear between the two species is how the poor aliens get stuck in their own quarantined zones, but I guess we'll have to wait and see.

According to reports, the movie sounds like it was shot very similar to Joburg, in a pseudo-documentary style. The movie follows a main character who gets squirted with some sort of liquid while inspecting one of the many alien shanties, which turns this guy into "one of them."

Slashfilm:

Even though it was not complete, everything looked very real and gritty, and not so other worldly like other sci-fi films. The alien creatures are tall and red, and the closest thing I can compare them to is the Predator. The end of the footage featured a lot of quick cuts, but we got to see a bunch of explosions and the use of alien-looking weapontry.

First Showing has a good description:

The aliens, which we got a few glimpses of, reminded me a lot of the turians from Mass Effect. They were much taller than most humans and came in different sizes and colors. We saw some actions scenes with explosions and the MNU police attacking the aliens, but all in small scale (a lot like Cloverfield).

Cinemablend:

But at some point this new infection inspires him to go back into District 9 and actually get to know the aliens, who apparently speak English and have names like Christopher. He tells them "I did not know they were doing this to you guys," over footage of aliens being beaten by armed guards, and then is seen shooting a gun in the general direction of fellow humans.

Check out the sites for the full detailed recap, I'm literally turning Orion Slave-girl shade of green, with jealousy over everyone who got to see this footage. Debuting a bit of footage at ShoWest, paired with the insane viral marketing that covered the halls, bathrooms and restaurants at San Diego Comic Con, can only mean one thing, I'll be sitting front row in center the the very likely District 9 panel at this year's Comic Con. You can have your AVATAR - I'll take down-to-Earth anti-alien intolerance any day.

Here's Alive In Joburg to give you a taste of Blomkamp's work and, hopefully, what everyone is talking about:

Alive In Joburg - Neill Blomkamp from Spy Films on Vimeo.

MNU stands for Multi-National United. Their site appears to be a completely legit corporation that excels in "space technology." But upon reading their propaganda you get the feeling of an extreme bias against aliens, as they keep repeating "human" help over and over. Also there are plenty of ads inviting you to join up with the MNU force, and you and I both know private security militias never lead to anything good. What do you want to bet MNU has a basement full of poor aliens being tortured and experimented on?

The District 9 rules and regulations page (which explains the ins and outs of Earth alien life) has both an entrance for both human and non-human users. When opened you can see the District 9 refers to an "alien only" district that humans are discouraged from entering and aliens are not allowed to leave. The MNU has a list of rules for both human and alien species ranging from what to so with unregistered eggs to urging humans to "refrain from the manufacturing or distributing of things that glorify non-human cultures."

You could spend hours exploring the many rules for dealing with non-humans or perusing the list of alien crimes. It looks like MNU is trying to keep a tight hold over their new alien residents, but makes no attempts to actually communicate with this culture. The site advises that "drawing pictures or using simple sign language is an effective way of communicating with non-humans, but should be used with caution."

For every overpowering government there is an opposition, which can be found at the MNU Spreads Lies blog. The author, George, writes in alien tongue, but it's easily translated. George writes about terrible injustice that happens behind the closed door of MNU, and how many of his fellow revolutionaries are "disappearing." His blog promotes alien-human equality and gives little hints about the alien back story. District 9 appears not only to be where the aliens are allowed to hang, but also a crash site. Perhaps our alien pals crash landed here by accident? Also there is a militant pro-alien movement called the Pro-Forma group. This group has lead many suicide missions and made the area close to D-9 extremely dangerous. George is constantly worried for his safety along with many of his friends.

According to his blog, he used to work for MNU but quit when the injustices started to happen. His job seemed to be linked to the "tags" that MNU requires everyone to have. George is mighty suspicious of these tags as well as the "egg registration" MNU forces the aliens into. "He" even goes as far to suggest that perhaps these alien babies are being disposed of.

Finally there is the Maths From Outer Space site, supported by MNU. This kid-friendly site encourages people to volunteer to expand their mind. Take a test and find out if you've got the goods to "enhance the spacial logic of the human body." Which seems to point directly back to the theory that aliens are being tortured for their superior technology and intelligence.

District 9 looks like it could be Peter Jackson's take on Guantanamo Bay mixed with the racial injustices and segregation that happened in America, but with aliens. It's actually pretty plausible because one of the things human know how to do best is destroy and control anything we don't understand. As long as D-9 demonstrates its motives without getting overly preachy I'm game for the alien revolt.