1 00:00:03,080 --> 00:00:06,120 Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio. 2 00:00:10,360 --> 00:00:13,160 Speaker 2: Hi, my name is Robert Lamban. This is The Monster Fact, 3 00:00:13,360 --> 00:00:15,760 Speaker 2: a short form series from Stuff to Blow Your Mind, 4 00:00:15,800 --> 00:00:24,680 Speaker 2: focusing on mythical creatures, ideas, and monsters in time. Previously 5 00:00:24,720 --> 00:00:27,520 Speaker 2: on The Monster Fact, I devoted an eight part series 6 00:00:27,640 --> 00:00:31,840 Speaker 2: to the various xenomorphic organisms of the alien universe, along 7 00:00:31,840 --> 00:00:35,199 Speaker 2: with bonus episodes on the creatures of Alien Earth and 8 00:00:35,240 --> 00:00:39,839 Speaker 2: the events of the Aliens Versus Avengers Comics crossover. If 9 00:00:39,880 --> 00:00:42,159 Speaker 2: you're new to the podcast, you can find these and 10 00:00:42,360 --> 00:00:44,560 Speaker 2: other episodes in the Stuff to Blow Your Mind archive 11 00:00:44,600 --> 00:00:48,560 Speaker 2: wherever you get your podcasts. So I covered a number 12 00:00:48,640 --> 00:00:51,720 Speaker 2: of alien forms, but I skipped over one of the 13 00:00:51,720 --> 00:00:56,920 Speaker 2: most iconic xenomorphs of all time, the Alien Queen. Perhaps 14 00:00:56,960 --> 00:01:00,200 Speaker 2: because she's such a high profile and beloved monster, I 15 00:01:00,240 --> 00:01:02,920 Speaker 2: figured there just might not be that much new to highlight, 16 00:01:02,960 --> 00:01:06,400 Speaker 2: and hey, maybe there isn't, but here we go. You'll, 17 00:01:06,440 --> 00:01:09,520 Speaker 2: of course remember the Queen from nineteen eighty six's Aliens, 18 00:01:09,560 --> 00:01:12,679 Speaker 2: in which Ripley and her fellow survivors find out exactly 19 00:01:12,760 --> 00:01:15,600 Speaker 2: what's laying all of those eggs at the heart of 20 00:01:15,640 --> 00:01:19,720 Speaker 2: the LV four twenty six terraforming colony. The xenomorph queen 21 00:01:20,120 --> 00:01:24,840 Speaker 2: proves a deadly and highly intelligent adversary, capable of coordinating 22 00:01:24,880 --> 00:01:27,920 Speaker 2: the other xenomorphs in her hive as well as exploiting 23 00:01:28,000 --> 00:01:32,920 Speaker 2: human technology. Basically, she resembles the various other alien morphs 24 00:01:32,959 --> 00:01:35,840 Speaker 2: in her hive, only much larger in stature, with an 25 00:01:36,080 --> 00:01:40,240 Speaker 2: enormous armored headcrest dorsal spikes on her back in a 26 00:01:40,319 --> 00:01:43,480 Speaker 2: second set of arms I assume for egg manipulation or 27 00:01:43,520 --> 00:01:47,280 Speaker 2: possibly resin manipulation, because, of course, when established at the 28 00:01:47,319 --> 00:01:50,000 Speaker 2: center of a hive, she also boasts an egg sack 29 00:01:50,240 --> 00:01:53,480 Speaker 2: so enormous and engorged with xenomorph eggs that she has 30 00:01:53,520 --> 00:01:57,560 Speaker 2: to essentially be secured in place with resin tendrils that 31 00:01:57,600 --> 00:02:01,360 Speaker 2: are secreted by the worker morphs in the hud. This 32 00:02:01,400 --> 00:02:05,760 Speaker 2: of course, closely resembles the bloated abamin of the termite queen, 33 00:02:06,240 --> 00:02:09,560 Speaker 2: which can grow to many many times the size of 34 00:02:09,600 --> 00:02:12,400 Speaker 2: her body, enabling her to lay tens of thousands of 35 00:02:12,400 --> 00:02:16,240 Speaker 2: eggs per day, all while secured in her royal chamber. 36 00:02:16,840 --> 00:02:19,680 Speaker 2: We have to consider this as the primary natural world 37 00:02:19,760 --> 00:02:23,799 Speaker 2: analog here for the alien queen, as we discussed before, 38 00:02:23,919 --> 00:02:27,040 Speaker 2: within the Alien universe lore, and I'm rather partial to 39 00:02:27,080 --> 00:02:30,440 Speaker 2: the free League Alien RPG overview of everything here, but 40 00:02:30,520 --> 00:02:34,440 Speaker 2: you may differ. Xenomorphs can produce eggs without the aid 41 00:02:34,680 --> 00:02:39,320 Speaker 2: of a queen. This ties into some deleted scenes from 42 00:02:39,320 --> 00:02:43,320 Speaker 2: the original Alien motion picture that have been I believe 43 00:02:43,360 --> 00:02:46,440 Speaker 2: been restored in some cuts. So a drone can secure 44 00:02:46,440 --> 00:02:49,880 Speaker 2: a host with resin secretions and use its tail to 45 00:02:49,960 --> 00:02:53,160 Speaker 2: inject the host with a cocktail of enzymes and hormones, 46 00:02:53,560 --> 00:02:56,800 Speaker 2: thus causing the host to transform into an egg or 47 00:02:56,840 --> 00:03:00,560 Speaker 2: ovo morph. This process, however, is of course slow, and 48 00:03:00,680 --> 00:03:03,560 Speaker 2: a larger scale reproductive method is going to be necessary 49 00:03:03,840 --> 00:03:08,440 Speaker 2: when xenomorphs set up hives in host rich environments. Now, 50 00:03:08,440 --> 00:03:11,560 Speaker 2: there are plenty of natural world analogs to look at 51 00:03:11,560 --> 00:03:15,960 Speaker 2: here in which organisms employ different reproductive strategies depending on 52 00:03:16,120 --> 00:03:21,080 Speaker 2: environmental conditions. You have facultative parthenogenesis. This is a great 53 00:03:21,120 --> 00:03:24,480 Speaker 2: example in which animals that normally reproduce sexually with a 54 00:03:24,520 --> 00:03:29,240 Speaker 2: partner can reproduce asexually generally due to lack of available partners. 55 00:03:29,800 --> 00:03:32,880 Speaker 2: We see this in some birds, sharks, rays, and large 56 00:03:32,880 --> 00:03:36,800 Speaker 2: reptiles like the komodo dragon. Coming back to the high environment, 57 00:03:36,920 --> 00:03:39,520 Speaker 2: we also see this in bees, in which some queens 58 00:03:39,880 --> 00:03:44,240 Speaker 2: workers and solitary bees can reproduce without fertilization if need 59 00:03:44,320 --> 00:03:49,880 Speaker 2: be in resource triggered switching or cyclic parthenogenesis. So an 60 00:03:49,920 --> 00:03:52,720 Speaker 2: example of this would be water fleas a change can 61 00:03:52,760 --> 00:03:57,000 Speaker 2: take place due to available resources. Density can also determine 62 00:03:57,000 --> 00:04:00,280 Speaker 2: sex determination in the case of the green spoon worm, 63 00:04:00,520 --> 00:04:04,280 Speaker 2: as can social environment in the cases of the clownfish, 64 00:04:04,480 --> 00:04:07,800 Speaker 2: and temperature as we see in sea turtles and crocodilians. 65 00:04:08,560 --> 00:04:11,520 Speaker 2: We might also understand the queen's role by thinking about 66 00:04:11,600 --> 00:04:15,280 Speaker 2: cases in which animals like rats and mice may ramp 67 00:04:15,360 --> 00:04:19,080 Speaker 2: up their reproduction into a kind of plague mode due 68 00:04:19,080 --> 00:04:22,640 Speaker 2: to an abundance of resources, either due to natural botanical 69 00:04:22,680 --> 00:04:27,640 Speaker 2: cycles or human agricultural abundance. In the case of the aliens, 70 00:04:27,960 --> 00:04:30,640 Speaker 2: this landfall of resources is going to present itself in 71 00:04:30,640 --> 00:04:33,400 Speaker 2: the form of, say, a fresh off world colony, and 72 00:04:33,480 --> 00:04:37,520 Speaker 2: they're more than happy to make a plague of themselves. Granted, 73 00:04:37,600 --> 00:04:42,000 Speaker 2: the xenomorpse life mission might lean more overtly destructive than 74 00:04:42,080 --> 00:04:45,680 Speaker 2: natural world propagation. This could be due to it being 75 00:04:45,720 --> 00:04:50,279 Speaker 2: an extraterrestrial invasive and therefore a naturally disruptive force in 76 00:04:50,360 --> 00:04:53,640 Speaker 2: any given ecosystem that it did not evolve to thrive 77 00:04:54,080 --> 00:04:57,359 Speaker 2: within and find balance within. It could also have as 78 00:04:57,440 --> 00:05:00,480 Speaker 2: much to do with the artificial human manipulated rorements it 79 00:05:00,560 --> 00:05:04,640 Speaker 2: keeps turning up in, or, of course, they could constitute 80 00:05:04,720 --> 00:05:08,960 Speaker 2: part of a rather apocalyptic biological weapons armory. Part of 81 00:05:09,000 --> 00:05:11,919 Speaker 2: the fun of the Alien Universe is that it keeps 82 00:05:11,960 --> 00:05:15,720 Speaker 2: us guessing. Tune in for additional episodes off the Monster, Fact, 83 00:05:15,800 --> 00:05:19,240 Speaker 2: the Artifact, or Animalius Dependium each week. As always, you 84 00:05:19,279 --> 00:05:22,200 Speaker 2: can email us at contact at Stuff to Blow your 85 00:05:22,200 --> 00:05:31,640 Speaker 2: Mind dot com. 86 00:05:31,720 --> 00:05:34,680 Speaker 1: Stuff to Blow Your Mind is production of iHeartRadio. For 87 00:05:34,760 --> 00:05:37,599 Speaker 1: more podcasts from my Heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, 88 00:05:37,720 --> 00:05:40,480 Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.