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No Biochemical Barriers: Difference between revisions
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[[File:Cit ^ ^ - THEY COME FROM THE DEPTHS TO FEAST ON YOUR DORITOS - SURRENDER YOUR SNACK OR FACE IMMEDIATE DESTRUCTION.jpg|frame|Puny humans, surrender your Doritos to [[Starcraft|the Swarm]] or be destroyed!]]
{{quote|'''R2''': "Obviously the air is highly caustic and poisonous."
'''Obi-Wan''': "Apparently not."|''[[Darths and Droids]]''}}
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== [[Literature]] ==
* ''
** Also specifically averted, as Ford tells Arthur that things like nuts and berries native to alien planets may well kill you. (Or they may not, but there's normally no way to tell except to try them, so only try them when you're at the point of dying if you DON'T find something edible.)
* Averted in ''2061'' by [[Arthur C. Clarke]]. A spaceship lands on Europa, one of the crew is killed, and the corpse is eaten by a large water creature. Said creature promptly dies, because the biochemical differences means that human flesh is poisonous to it.
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** Another example is that there is apparently only one human bartender on Tatooine, due to the insanely large amount of information about drinks that needs to be memorized so as to not kill customers with the wrong drinks. In another novel Han mentions that the bartender at the bar better not be watering down the drinks, since the species he's serving is ''allergic'' to water! Said bartender was also attempting to develop a perfect drink for Jabba. A single drop of the prepared liquor was enough to leave him convulsing on the floor.
** After Tycho kills a cave creature in the ''[[X Wing Series]]'' comics:
{{quote|
'''Tycho''': "Might be dinner."
'''Wes''': "Are you nuts? What if it's toxic?"
'''Tycho''': "Let's cook it and see how it smells." }}
*** Turns out that it's a ronk. Female ronks are physically nearly identical to males, but their flesh is ''highly'' toxic when eaten. Fortunately, Tycho killed a male.
** Hutts are also apparently indigestible, even to the Sarlacc, but Hutts can seemingly eat anything; in a story about Jabba before he was killed, it was revealed that someone was attempting to poison his food. The problem for the investigators? Over half of what Jabba ate was poisonous to most other species.
** An aversion comes up as a [[Noodle Incident]] in ''[[Death Star]]''.
{{quote|
"You could have looked it up. You plan to [[Interspecies Romance|date outside your species]], it's on you to know what's poison and what's not."<br />
"[[Never Live It Down|You're never going to let me forget it, are you?]]"<br />
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* Subverted in [[Terry Pratchett]]'s ''Strata'' where an important plot point is that the carnivorous Silver has a different biological makeup that makes it impossible for her to eat meat from a different planet. Being a predator, she will however turn into a ravenous badass killing beast which will still kill everyone in sight if her hunger gets the better of her.
* Also subverted in Pratchett's [[Discworld]] novel "[[Discworld/Moving Pictures|Moving Pictures]]".
{{quote|
'''Other Troll''': Swallow. We don't swallow. }}
* Used somewhat in Allen Steele's ''Coyote''. A colony ship of humans going to a new, alien world doesn't know, while in orbit, if the planet has the right kind of soil(dextro versus levo amino acids may have been involved) to grow Earth crops; the colonists couldn't have survived on native food from the wrong kind of soil. They were lucky.
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== [[Video Games]] ==
* Justified in ''[[Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri]]'', where you have to research the appropriate technologies in order to harvest resources from xenofungus squares. This quote from an in-game character sums it up:
{{quote|
** Furthermore, although it's mostly [[All There in the Manual]], it's explicitly stated that although terrestrial plants take to Chiron like flies to honey (or perhaps more precisely vinegar) humans must wear oxygen masks and filter their water with ozone lest they die of nitrogen narcosis.
* Averted in ''[[Mass Effect]]''; turian, quarian and volus biology is such that they cannot eat the same food as most other species. Turians and quarians both [[Mirror Chemistry|require dextro-amino acids in their proteins]] and can't derive nutrients from levo-foods, and at best the food will pass right through, providing no nutrients, as opposed to humans, salarians and asari, who all use levo-amino acids. Volus, meanwhile, have an ammonia-based biochemistry, which is utterly incompatible with everyone else's.
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* Completely averted in ''[[Invader Zim]]''. Water is caustic to the eponymous alien, and meat actually fuses to his flesh. He does attempt to build up a tolerance, but GIR, being a robot, can (and does) eat anything.
** There was one Earth food Zim discovered he ''could'' eat (to his own surprise) in the episode [[Exactly What It Says on the Tin|Zim Eats Waffles]], [[Lethal Chef|except the ones made by GIR]] because he put peanuts and ''soap'' in them.
{{quote|
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** Later in the [[Star Wars Expanded Universe]], an engineered bioweapon was developed for use against the Yuuzhan Vong, who were ''extra-galactic'' -- there were significant amounts of DNA they had that no known organism in the galaxy far, far away did.
** Medically, bacta seems to work on just about anything, but other medicines and treatments vary from species to species, as illustrated in the [[Med Star]] Duology, a [[Star Wars]] novel that serves as a medical drama.
{{quote|
'''Bariss''': "And he'll be dead before he hits the floor." }}
** Bota, called "an adaptogen that can cure anything but a rainy day" does something different for every species, anything from medicine to nutrients to incredibly potent drugs, and briefly raises Force-Sensitives into something very like [[A God Am I|godhood.]] Everything on that planet is said to have similar mutagenic power, but mostly what it does is make people sick. By the end of the duology, bota has mutated itself into uselessness.
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** Used as a plot point in Mordin's recruitment mission: everyone you speak to in the plague zone knows the disease ravaging the area has to be an intentionally released bioweapon precisely because it's infecting every species except humans (and vorcha, but they're [[Healing Factor|immune to everything]]).
** Also used humorously in a throwaway line by Mordin on the ''Normandy'', where he mentions he's trying to figure out how a "Scale Itch" infection got on-board... considering it's an STD carried only by varren.
{{quote|
* In ''[[Sword of the Stars]]'', the disease bio-weapons need to be invented only once and are equally useful against all species. They can be fired in a first-contact situation (before you'd logically be able to dissect a member of said species and find their disease markers) and will not lose any efficiency. The only exception is the [[Super Soldier|Zuul]], who are immune to all plague weapons except for the [[Grey Goo]] missile no matter what you try.
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* Most of the aliens in the ''[[Men in Black (film)|Men in Black]]'' films and [[Men in Black (animation)|the cartoon]] get along fine without special respirators, although there are exceptions: one species risked premature aging in earth's atmosphere, while "Atlantis" (actually a [[Ancient Astronauts|sunken space ship]]) is a posh resort for (salt)water-breathing aliens. When Agent Jay is surprised at the fish-like aliens, Agent Kay [[Lampshade Hanging|lampshades]] this with "You think ''all'' aliens breathe oxygen?"
* [[Lampshade Hanging|Lampshaded]] and played hilariously straight in ''[[Galaxy Quest]]'', when [[Cloudcuckoolander|Tech Sargent Chen]] opens the door of the ship while it's on an alien planet:
{{quote|
Chen: (sniffing a few times) Seems okay. }}
* Present ''and'' subverted (and generally just plain [[You Fail Biology Forever|screwed up]]) in M. Night Shyamalan's ''Signs''. Aliens are seen walking around on Earth apparently sans any kind of protection whatsoever, but then turn out to be fatally allergic to water. ([[Fridge Logic|But let's not go into why hydrophobic aliens would decide to invade a planet 75% covered with water, nor how they managed to run through a misty cornfield at night]].)
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== [[Western Animation]] ==
* Lampshaded for comedic effect in ''[[Toy Story]]''. Woody opens Buzz Lightyear's helmet accidentally, and Buzz starts choking, expecting something deadly. He suddenly realizes...
{{quote|
** Even funnier when one considers that he doesn't even ''have'' lungs, being a molded hunk of plastic.
* Cybertron in ''[[Transformers]]'' is shown to be equally hospitable to humans, various aliens, and robots with no need to breathe. This is despite there being no visible atmosphere in most of its depictions.
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