The Unicorn Blog

“People” by Jordan Bolton

Superman: Man of Tomorrow #12 - “Superman’s Day Off” (2020)

1- They make their own art themselves. - Transformers don't use a generative program to make pictures. They do the art themselves by hand or with their own tools from their own imaginations. Boulder paints, Frenzy plays a guitar, Jazz makes his own music, Salvage plays the harmonica and let's not forget how Reflector takes photographs himself.

2- They train and practice to get better at something. - Transformers do not simply download a chip with information like Baymax from Big Hero 6 does. They they train, they do the hard labor and grueling work to do something and the results vary from bot to bot. Even Decepticons train and respect true strength.

3- All factions abhor artificial augmentation. - It's not for nothing that bots like Lockdown in TFA are so hated. He gets ahead and upgrades by stealing the abilities and parts of other bots not with hard work or effort. What he does is considered as deplorable by any faction. Even Swindle doesn't sink to that level for a reason. Sure, he's a thief too, but he does not augment himself artificially.

4- They have schools. - Like I said before, they don't simply download information into their heads. They get lessons, do homework, problem solve and learn skills. And do it from when they are kids meaning learning to do things yourself and do them yourself is a part of their society.

Sure. Humans fight each other all the time, aliens would probably think we’re the worst, right?

But what if we’re not?

What if the aliens come, and the first thing they say is, “Hello! We are so glad we found you! We are so pleased to meet you!” Similar to how humans greet puppies that we really want to meet and not scare, except it’s aliens that have been following radio messages across light years to find us.

We’ve spent so long wondering about what’s out there, and we see ourselves almost as a blight on our own planet, when we’re probably just fine. We’re trying. Maybe, just maybe, we’re okay. Maybe an outsider would look at us and think, “Look at them! They’re trying to be good! They name rocks and waters and cleaning robots! I love them for it!”

We tend to think that we must be the worst, the most backward, the blandest, least interesting or intelligent creatures in the galaxy.

I wonder how aliens would actually look at us.

We play whale noises into the black. We send greetings. We send probes with videos and audio tracks out explaining who we are and what we do on earth, just in case there’s someone else out there wondering if they’re alone in the universe. We tame predators to be companions because we are compassionate and we want to be friends with anything that will have us.

Maybe we’re not so bad.