"Battleship" Trailer

The trailer looks surprisingly awesome and there's a good chance I'm going to go see it when it comes out.  Yes, I know it's based on a board game that has no plot.  However, it looks like it's going to be pretty entertaining.

However, one objection: The whole "invincible alien energy shields" thing is overdone.  A friend of mine describe this movie as "Independence Day with ships" and the energy shields go a long way to bolstering his point.  Plus both the 1950s and the 2006-ish version of War of the Worlds used them and they weren't even in the book.

It'd be a lot more creative if the aliens had a nearly impenetrable point-defense capability--perhaps using lasers--that is very good at taking out missiles and aircraft but cannot track artillery shells.  In this situation, the mighty aircraft carriers would be all but neutered and the heavy guns of old-school battleships would be what saves the day.

John Ringo's novels Legacy of the Aldenata novels have used this concept with the Posleen--their defensive weapons are murderous on aircraft and missiles but they're useless in dealing with artillery.

In order to have a big human defeat to presage the final battle, perhaps the carriers launch a massive "Alpha Strike" (a large attack by a carrier air wing) bolstered by huge numbers of cruise missiles fired from the other ships.  The attack is stopped cold with minimal damage to the aliens by a laser point-defense system, but some surviving aircraft pilot points out that when he used his plane's guns, they weren't able to counter it.

Then we get the big naval artillery brought in.  :)