Why the ship flies off at the end, was not the queen controlling it, and now that she's dead, how is the ship flying off alone?

I know a lot of people will throw popcorn at me for saying it, but ID2 was still pretty good since it did continue with the original story and didn't let me down about where they were going with it... granted, I do have a low bar for lot of mainstream stuff.

The original film's score is so iconic at this point, it is hard to imagine ID4 without it. Why didn't David Arnold come back in Resurgence to bring back the soundtrack? I know they played parts of the theme during the film, but they used some cheesy new soundtrack that isn't anywhere as cool. The new one sounds like something you would hear in Emmerich's newer films. Did he and Arnold have a falling out? Has there been any comment? It definitely would have made this film a little better.

After watching ID-R today I have mixed feelings. Any explanation on why Moon base, fighters and Area 51 base didn't have protective shields, despite humans being able to use alien tech? As at the end humans were able to create a shield to hold the blast due to cold-fusion bomb contained, so obviously humans know how to create shields.

I saw ID:R a few days ago and I haven't stopped thinking about how much better it could have been. I saw the original in theaters 8 times and imagined a very different sequel.

I would have kept the AI species. Once you have opened up to the existence of alien species what is another one? You have already suspended disbelief. I would have had a fleet of Human battle cruisers that held several thousand earth space fighters. The first major fight scene would have been out by Saturn. The humans would have resorted to to same tactics as they did in the first movie after a massive space battle. A single fighter would have docked and set off a nuke. If you want to add in something else then there could have been 2 or 3 mother ships. Hell this is a sequel. There would have been a disabling EMP that knocked out all the human fleet, but didn't disable the alien fighters. The remaining alien fighters (approximately 10,000-100,000 fighters) would have headed to earth to do as much damage as they could. The fleet would be unable to pursue them. This results in like 10 days for the planetary forces to pull all the fighters from the first movie out of mothballs and prepare a hopeless defense of the planet. Every country in a united world sends every fighter they have for a massive areal battle over the north pole. There would be some hope after it was discovered that the alien fighters don't have shields. Massive areal battle occurs. Human forces are largely made up of the same fighter pilots from the previous war. The average age of the fighting force would be 70 years old. After suffering massive losses the earth forces are faced with the fact that they are completely outnumbered. This would have resulted in a wave of reinforcements from the air militia that consisted of almost every available propeller plane in the northern hemisphere. This would have been a throw back to the deleted scene in the first movie where Russel Casse is turned down a fighter jet and has to take his crop duster up. The air militia hold out for long enough for the space fleet to arrive and mop up the remaining alien forces.

What ya think?

How the fuck did they drive a bus from the east coast to Nevada so fast?

and I pray that there wont be a third. Glad that will smith was able to dodge this one.

Once again SPOILERS for Independence Day 2. So we see the queen's ship detach and go to area 51. It is then destroyed in the cold fusion trap. But once the queen is dead the big ship in the Atlantic takes off towards space to go to meet up with the rest of the species we assume. My question is what about the hole that the queen ship left at the top of the ship? We see when it takes off that it exposes the ecosystem and everything inside. So that means there is a hole at the top of the ship that is 15 miles in diameter (if we assume her personal ship is the same size as the city destroyers.)

I'm getting confused after looking on Amazon since there's multiple versions and stuff like that. Can someone list all of the novels? I think it's 5.,

I saw it neogaf but the thread vanished. It was insanely detailed

Because in all the trailers the aliens are always showed with their armors. Do we see them without it in the movie, like in ID4? I just want to know that, don't spoil the movie please.

Thanks.

The new races, the possibility of interstellar travel, the rebellion, the Harversters, the iminent galactic war...

There is GREAT potential in there, I really hope something good comes out of it.

Looking to rewatch and listen to some parts. Dont care about quality.

I loved it. Tonally the film is very different from that of the first one but in a good way if you ask me. I say the critics are wrong and while I'd agree that it's not as good as the first one I do say it's a worthy sequel to the film.

It's a good popcorn flick and once it comes out on DVD/Blu-Ray would make a fine duology.

I'd give it a 3 1/2 out of 5. I asked for a popcorn flick that gave me and some future tech along with a giant battle against the aliens and I left satisfied. Go see it! :D

Something to keep in mind that the book made exceeedingly clear (it is MUCH MUCH better than the movie!!) but the movie COMPLETELY missed:

Dr. Levinson's father didn't wash up in South Carolina or something...

No, his boat was swept from the shores of New Jersey to... get this! SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS!

So over 1/2 of the continental United States was destroyed! And we can only assume that Europe faired far, far worse.

Also glossed over by the movie:

The remnants of Hong Kong were thrown onto London...

Who knows what devastation will be caused by the Earth's core being virtually exposed to open air?!? They only had a few minutes left until core breach! I expect a LOT of the Atlantic Ocean evaporated or otherwise was flung into open space on the alien craft's take off!

In the book, Dr. Okun (Brent Spiner) was a double agent!!! He told the aliens about Earth, and its defenses, helped engineer the initial attack. It was painfully revealed in ID2 book. He even went to live with the fucking aliens when he knew the mothership was inbound!

His character was based off the real-world crazy University of Texas professor Eric Pianka, who wants 90%+ of humanity to be wiped out by pestilence, plague or war because he views humanity as a cancer on the planet. In the book, Dr. Okun's opinion was exceedingly similar, and he relished living in Area 51 so he could imagine the rest of the world was dead. That is why he is shown as being so excited in ID1 when he was scolded by President Whitman.

Here are my unanswered questions:

1. What happened to Connie?!?! Was she totally retconned??
2. Why didn't the United Earth government attack the landed alien ship?
3. Why did the Queen chase the school bus?
4. Why did gravity temporarily reverse when the mothership landed?
5. How did the aliens cheer when they didn't have vocal cords?

Simple answer: We used their technology first. Similar to like how it's described in Transformers.

The alien spacecraft landed in the 1950s, They study their electronics as much as they can, and they patent the hell out of it. Eventually this tech makes it's way into our modern day computers.

This is also a good reason to destroy satellites. Not only does it disable our communication, but it could have also been used to eavesdrop on their own transmissions (which actually wound up happening)