BDO, a great sci-fi experience

In the way Villeneuve has always done, Dune continues using enormous objects to complete a grand narrative. But to be honest, I do not understand the grand narrations. The enormous objects are good-looking.

The Emperor's ambassador's airship arrives in Caladan, Paul's homeland, and the spherical hull descends oracularly into the oasis.

I think this is one of the most beautiful shots in the whole Dune.

01. What is a BDO?

Giant objects are not a style of art innovated by Villeneuve. In 1993, the Australian academic Peter Nicholls invented a fictional concept called BDO, big dumb object.

BDOs have three characteristics:

1. It is "made" (not a natural product) but not "human-made".

2. Its maker does not appear.

3. It is large enough, usually closed and silent.

In a narrow sense, a BDO is a science fiction concept. Only giant silent objects not created by humans are BDO.

Villeneuve, for example, successfully portrays a BDO in Arrival (2016). 12 giant alien ships appear, like God's black pawns, out of nowhere. That is BDO in the narrow sense.

How far apart are Earth's transports from the alien ships in Arrival?

Probably the difference between a supercomputer and the laws of the universe.

In Rendezvous with Rama, the famous science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke depicts an impressive BDO. A giant spaceship with the appearance of a perfect cylinder machined from a lathe, 40 kilometers in diameter, and a mass of ten trillion tons.

There are several versions of the cover of Rendezvous with Rama. It is one of my favorites.

In Star Trek: The Motion Picture, V'Ger is a cloud-covered giant spacecraft, spanning 82 astronomical units in diameter, some 12.2 billion kilometers.

In reality, it is the 6th iteration in the Voyager program in the USA

Forbidden Planet, one of the most famous science fiction films of the 50s, predates Star Wars by 20 years. The BDO in the film may not seem like much today, but in that year it is groundbreaking.

The BDO ship in Forbidden Planet

In a broad sense, anything that evokes a similar emotion counts as a BDO. For example, the Argonath, the Pillars of the Kings from The Lord of the Rings.

The Argonath has many aliases and is over 600 feet in height.

The figures are images of Isildur and his brother Anarion.

02. Why are BDOs a regular feature in science fiction films?

It is hard to imagine the size of something if people cannot see it in real life. Huge beyond and even shocking to the common perception. Science fiction, then, needs to visualize impacts, to make us realize just how big the immensity is.

BDOs are not human-made. They represent the ideas and manufacturing capabilities of other species. The helplessness of humans when faced with BDOs also means that this species is technologically more advanced than humans, even in dimensions beyond human comprehension. And their silent state articulates indifference and rejection. They do not want to identify their species or communicate with humans.

If you remember 2001: A Space Odyssey, scientists try to destroy the monolith, all to no avail. Then, in despair, everyone laughs at themselves: "Only the incarnate people will destroy what they do not understand when they touch it, but perhaps humans themselves are the incarnate people compared to the creatures who made it.”

The black monolith from 2001: A Space Odyssey.

It occurs to me that there is a similar tribute scene in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

The BDO gives so few clues about itself, yet it is so powerful. Human attitudes towards BDOs can be complex: reverence, fear, curiosity, and ferocity. Whichever emotion BDOs stir in the human heart, it is real human emotion toward other civilizations in the universe.

That is the theme of science fiction films since the beginning: to explore the relationship between the small individual and the universe. As animation and special effects technology develop, I believe there will be more and more BDOs on the screen.

03. The inner world of man may be broader than BDOs

BDOs are a regular feature in science fiction films, but not all BDOs end up well.

The remains of a giant of unknown origin washed up on the beach in Love, Death & Robots season 2, episode 8. The people first revered the giant as a god and began to loot and wash it away after being accustomed to it.

Some sat on the giant's ears and read books. Some threw rubbish into its eye sockets and dismembered its remains. In the end, the butcher's shop took the giant's ribs for doorstops. The head got abandoned at the roadside with his organs soaked in a jar for exhibition. The magic and absurdity of the story reach their peak when the giant wreckage fully integrates into the hustle and bustle of the town's daily life.

This episode adapts from J.G. Ballard's famous story "The Drowned Giant"

I like this episode because it uses "dismemberment" to make the giant less sacred and to make our dulled senses aware of the irrationality behind BDO's extreme. This subversion of common sense is in itself an unnamable spectacle.

Human nature is very complex. If a BDO is an objective, the subjective world of man is, perhaps, broader and more mysterious than the universe.

Imagining the subjective human experience of an unimaginable object is the pure sense of science fiction.