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NASA IS FULL OF PANSIES

It looks like NASA has discovered life in space. They've called a press conference "to discuss an astrobiology finding that will impact the search for evidence of extraterrestrial life." It's set to take place this Thursday at 2pm EST. Unless this is another one of those "we've found a bit of ice that might have been shat out by some space bacteria 357m years ago" type announcements, there's a chance that the most important news in human history will arrive just after Hollyoaks. Even more depressing is the idea of us relying on the scientists who'll be at Thursday's presser to fight off the alien hordes, because by the looks of things Jeff Goldblum could batter all five of them simultaneously.

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That's "could" not "would." Three of them are women, ffs.

MARY VOYTEK

Mary is the director of Astrobiology at NASA HQ in Washington. According to her bio she "has worked in several extreme environments including Antarctica [ice], hypersaline lakes [salt water], deep-sea hydrothermal vents [underwater volcanoes], and terrestrial deep-subsurface sites [big holes]." She doesn't look all that tough to me, though. I don't think she'd last too long if you consider that the things she's up against could be armed with literally anything: such as the ability to scream a woman to death or guns that make the "Brown Sound." Even if aliens haven't figured out how to do any of that futuristic, sci-fi shit yet, all one would need is a claw to tug at her earrings and she'll have lost the ability to hear--and hearing is a key asset in battle situations.

FELISA WOLFE-SIMON
You know when you live with someone and they ask if one of their old schoolmates can stay at your house this weekend, and you say "yeah" immediately, because in your head you're already spooning someone at least three rungs above you on the pretty ladder who'll leave you in peace to go look at Buckingham Palace in the morning? And then she turns up with her square face trying to talk to you about why she's been studying mud and Jack Johnson, and you're a child so you spend all night sulking and trying to start fights that avoiding conversation has made you far too drunk to win.

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I have no idea what this means in relation to fighting off an alien race, but I guess some experience in fighting off males of your own species would be good training.

PAMELA "PAN" CONRAD (above, left)

Not sure about hand-to-hand combat, but that's a fucking huge gun. I'm going to approach this one optimistically and imagine she's the astrobiological equivalent of Arkan. She also has a semi-cool nickname and a hard-working face, so she gets a PASS, but her friend has to stay at home and make sure all the kids get their Crispy Chicken Dippers this Christmas.

JAMES ELSER
If you've ever had a girlfriend you'll know this guy, because he was her dad. He's also the least qualified member on this team, but in Hollywood terms that just means he's the one with the most to prove who'll inevitably drag the mission back up by the scruff of its neck once the eggheads all start flaking out and throwing bad, open fist punches at each other. From what I can gather, he's also the only one on the team who looks for proper life in space rather than just traces of carbon or water, which, again, in Hollywood parlance means he's basically Bruce Willis in that film where he saved the world so that Ashton Kutcher could fuck his ex-wife and steal his children.

STEVEN BENNER
According to the NASA press release, this guy's main credential is the fact he's a "distinguished fellow," which seemed promising at first, but I just googled it and it turns out it's some honorary title given to him by HIS OWN COMPANY. I was about to write him off as just another self-congratulating boffin with no earth-saving skills, but then I saw this on his Wikipedia page:

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EXPERIMENTAL PALEOGENETICS

The Benner laboratory was an originator of the field of experimental paleogenetics, where genes and proteins from ancient organisms are resurrected using bioinformatics and recombinant DNA technology. Experimental work on ancient proteins has tested hypotheses about the evolution of complex biological functions, including the biochemistry of ruminant digestion[8], the thermophily of ancient bacteria, and the interaction between plants, fruits, and fungi at the time of the Cretaceous extinction.

No matter how many times I look at it, my brain won't let me do anything but scan read, but I think he's basically saying he's gonna do that thing that the cartoon DNA explains at the start of Jurassic Park. So presumably, that's what these guys will be explaining at the press conference: that there's aliens coming, but it's NBD, because we can make dinosaurs to fight them off.

CONCLUSION: Dinosaurs will save us.

KEV KHARAS & JAMIE LEE CURTIS TAETE