10 Sci-Fi Movies That Broke All The Rules

2. The "Protagonist" Dies Half-Way - Alien

Ridley Scott's Alien is one of the most innovative and influential sci-fi films of all time, and of its many creative masterstrokes, perhaps the greatest of all is its expert use of a decoy protagonist to completely throw the audience off the narrative scent.

Viewers spends the first half of the movie quite understandably assuming that the Nostromo's steely, hyper-masculine Captain Dallas - played by acting vet Tom Skerritt, no less - is the film's bulletproof protagonist.

But at the mid-way point, Dallas ends up unexpectedly cornered and killed by the Xenomorph, to the surprise of everyone watching.

Ultimately, it's not really until the third act that Ripley - played by the not-remotely-famous Sigourney Weaver - is revealed to be the true protagonist and, eventually, the Nostromo's sole survivor.

It's an ingenious switch that flies in the face of precisely what audiences expect from sci-fi movies and tentpole cinema as a whole.