History Main / PlanetLooters

* 1983's ''{{V}}'', as well as the sequel miniseries ''The Final Battle'' and eventually ''The Series'', had aliens not only intent on strip-mining the planet (of water), but considered humanity as a food resource (along with small birds and rodents). The {{Novelization}} makes a rather worthy attempt to [[JustifiedTrope justify]] it - it's not so much plain water and food they are after, but ''relatively pure'' water and ''meat''; in their experience, all civilizations [[GreenAesop pollute their worlds irreversibly]] in the process of developing interstellar travel, and recycling technologies have trouble efficiently supporting millions, let alone billions of people. Starfaring civilizations are thus constantly warring over what little clean water and produce remains. When the "Visitors" discovered a life-sustaining world that had not yet developed even basic spaceflight... well, OM NOM NOM NOM.

* ''VideoGame/SuperRobotWars'' features a few of these among it's original villains: The Ze Balmary Empire of the ''VideoGame/SuperRobotWarsAlpha'' series seeks to turn Earth's population into mind-slave soldiers, the Ruina in ''VideoGame/SuperRobotWarsDestiny'' looks to use humans as cattle, the Fury in ''VideoGame/SuperRobotWarsJudgment'' want to eradicate humanity and use the planet as their new home, while the Database in ''VideoGame/SuperRobotWarsW'' take the Brainiac route.

Another way around the question is to make Earth's abundant ecosystems and temperate climates the resource. In this version, the aliens simply view primitive humans as unworthy pests infesting an ideal new home or vacation spot.

Sometimes they can be InvadingRefugees.

* In ''Film/{{Transformers}}: Dark of the Moon'', the reason why Megatron and [[spoiler:[[FaceHeelTurn Sentinel Prime]] want to pull Cybertron into Earth's atmosphere is to use its inhabitants as slave labor in its reconstruction]]. [[FridgeLogic This would probably destroy Earth]], [[FridgeBrilliance but why would the Decepticons care?]]

* General Zod and his band of Kryptonian exiles attempt this in ''Film/{{ManOfSteel}}''

* The Combine in ''[[{{Half-Life}} Half-Life 2]]'' and its episodic sequels hijack worlds across dimensions rather than space, but the idea is the same. The native life-forms are used to construct bio-organic combat units, the most successful of which are exported to use on the next world; humanity seems to be in the process of becoming the new fodder units as the game opens. The physical material of the planet itself is also exploited: supplemental material explains the barren coastal areas in the game are a result of the Combine teleporting away a fair fraction of the Earth's ocean water over the past decade, lowering global sea levels by several feet.

** The Solarian League's Office of Frontier Security is this as well. Theoretically, they exist to stabilize frontier planets to ensure they don't become a source of piracy; by the time of the novels, they're thoroughly corrupt and have sweetheart deals with a whole pack of {{Mega Corp}}s, and routinely manufacture excuses to [[CorporateWarfare conquer new planets for said corporations to loot]]. The worst part is that the League is already rich, and OFS does the looting apparently just because there's no reason not to.

** The Solarian Office of Frontier Security is this as well. Theoretically, they exist to stabilize frontier planets to ensure they don't become a source of piracy; by the time of the novels, they're thoroughly corrupt and have sweetheart deals with a whole pack of {{Mega Corp}}s, and routinely manufacture excuses to conquer new planets for said corporations to loot. The worst is the fact that the League is already rich, and OFS does the looting apparently just because there's no reason not to.

* In a rare example of humans doing it to other humans, the [[PeoplesRepublicOfTyranny People's Republic of Haven]] from ''Literature/HonorHarrington'' regularly conquers and loots other planets simply to prop up their own failing economy. Things turn ugly when they try to do it to the Star Kingdom of Manticore and their Short Victorious War turns into a long and bloody one. Making matters worse for Haven is the fact that unlike a lot of nonhuman Planet Looters, the Havenites build their newly conquered planets into their own empire. Which means that each looted planet eventually becomes a new drain on the budget, because the cost of keeping it under control will sooner or later be higher than the rewards of looting whatever is still left after ten or twenty years. The parallels to AncientRome may or may not be deliberate.

Planet looters are a race of aliens that have run out of something, and must steal it from others -- [[EarthIsTheCenterOfTheUniverse frequently, from us here on Earth]]. This is a bit peculiar in that their demonstrated level of technology makes one wonder why they'd target Earth when it would be far easier to find an uninhabited planet and strip-mine that.

To {{Handwave}} that problem, they often need some particular resource which is supposedly rare except on Earth. Water is apparently one of them. Countless aliens have needlessly lost their lives in futile attempts to steal Earth's water. For some reason they overlook comets, dwarf planets and moons in the outer solar system which are not only made of mostly water in convenient prepackaged frozen form but don't have anyone out there to stop them from simply flying away with it.

At other times, [[HumanResources we are the resource]], and they want to take us as [[WeWillUseManualLaborInTheFuture slaves]] or [[ToServeMan tasty, tasty food]]. Neither of these really make sense either. If they need food, they might as well go steal the cattle equivalents on several planets that ''should'' be much closer, with even ''less'' native hostility. As for slavery, it's hard to imagine any sufficiently advanced race that has figured out interplanetary space travel would ''need'' slaves for any reason other than to fulfill a [[ScaryDogmaticAliens cultural, religious or egotistical need]] to conquer the galaxy's "weak". Although maybe we make good pets.

It's fairly popular to make ''humans'' [[HumansAreTheRealMonsters fill this role]] (to the horror of the SpaceElves), as an {{Anvilicious}} GreenAesop about exploitation of natural resources.

* The [[ScaryDogmaticAliens Scrin]] from ''VideoGame/CommandAndConquer'' seed planets with [[GreenRocks Tiberium]], then wait for the spread of the material to drive the planet's inhabitants into extinction. Then they begin collecting up the Tiberium on the now dead world. Unfortunately for them, they didn't expect GDI and Nod to still be existant when they arrived on Earth. It was [[XanatosRoulette all according to]] [[DarkMessiah Kane's]] plan.

* The Reapers in the ''MassEffect'' universe do this, and they're of the "using humans/other sapient races as resources" variety. They convert many into mindless cybernetic horrors to fight their grounds wars; the rest are [[spoiler: liquified into goo and used to build new Reapers.]]

* ''PS238'' examines and {{lampshades}} this trope (along with AlienInvasion); Herschel [[http://nodwick.humor.gamespy.com/ps238/comics/index.php?date=2007-02-28 explicitly points out]] that the only reason why any aliens would choose to invade a world would be if the planet contained ''something'' that can't be found anywhere else. Raw materials are far more efficiently gained by mining asteroids, planetoids, moons, and other celestial bodies without an atmosphere, high gravity and a local population. The Earth is invaded by a species of planet looters later, however: [[spoiler:The aliens, for whatever reason, cannot breed on their own and unleash a bio-plague on the planet intended to rewrite all human DNA and turn all following generations of humans into their species.]]

* This is how corporations in ''Fallen Dragon'' recoup the massive investments required to build a colony; After the colony has had time to terraform, grow and actually start producing something, the corporation shows up with a well-armed fleet in orbit and start demanding dividends.

* Subverted in DougalDixon's ''Man After Man'':[[spoiler: the invaders in the end are ''humanity's descendants'', which recolonized the Earth after re-engineering themselves beyond recognition for life in space and stripping various other planets of their resources]]. Guess what happens afterwards.

* Subverted in DougalDixon's ''Man After Man'':[[spoiler: the invaders in the end are ''humanity's descendants'', which recolonized the Earth after stripping other planets off their resources]]. Guess what happens afterwards.

* Subverted in DougalDixon's ''Man After Man'':[[spoiler: the invaders in the end are ''descendants'', which recolonized the Earth after stripping other planets off their resources]]. Guess what happens afterwards.

Planet looters are a race of aliens that have run out of something, and must steal it from others. Frequently, from us here on Earth. This is a bit peculiar in that their demonstrated level of technology makes one wonder why they'd target Earth when it would be far easier to find an uninhabited planet and strip-mine that.

* General Zod and his band of Kryptonian exiles attempt this in ''ManOfSteel''

** The Tyranids are a HordeOfAlienLocusts who use a multi-stage infestation. Once all resistance is eaten, the tyranids assemble in reclamation pools, where all the ingested organic matter is dissolved (that is, the 'nids themselves throw themselves into the pool). Then the main hive ships suck up the soup in the pools and atmosphere. The result is a completely barren and airless rock undergoing volcanic activity due to tectonic imbalance.

* In a rare example of humans doing it to other humans, the [[PeoplesRepublicOfTyranny People's Republic of Haven]] from ''Literature/HonorHarrington'' regularly conquers and loots other planets simply to prop up their own failing economy. Things turn ugly when they try to do it to the Star Kingdom of Manticore and their Short Victorious War turns into a long and bloody one. Making matters worse for Haven is the fact that unlike a lot of nonhuman PlanetLooters, the Havenites build their newly conquered planets into their own empire. Which means that each looted planet eventually becomes a new drain on the budget, because the cost of keeping it under control will sooner or later be higher than the rewards of looting whatever is still left after ten or twenty years. The parallels to AncientRome may or may not be deliberate.

* StephenBaxter uses PlanetLooters in ''ManifoldSpace'', but the aliens attack any planetary bodies they come across. It's just that there are so many of them (with so many different needs) that sooner or later they'll get to the inhabited ones. All of known space has been picked over repeatedly for hundreds of millions of years.

* {{Inverted|Trope}} in ''Film/{{Avatar}}'' and ''[[DuelingMovies Delgo]]'', where [[HumansAreBastards militant Earthlings]] are looting an alien planet for literal {{Unobtanium}} and a place to live, respectively, after making their own planet a CrapSackWorld. Diplomacy was attempted in ''Avatar'', but by the time the film starts it's broken down.

To HandWave that problem, they often need some particular resource which is supposedly rare except on Earth. Water is apparently one of them. Countless aliens have needlessly lost their lives in futile attempts to steal Earth's water. For some reason they overlook comets, dwarf planets and moons in the outer solar system which are not only made of mostly water in convenient prepackaged frozen form but don't have anyone out there to stop them from simply flying away with it.