By Rhea Dee
There were a lot of things I knew before going to see Paul.
I knew I would love it. I have been dedicated to Pegg and Frost since Shaun of the Dead; that dedication went into overdrive after I saw Hot Fuzz. The only thing that would make me hate Paul is if they un-ironically decided to dedicate the film to Sarah Palin. And even if they did that (which thankfully they did not) I would probably construct some excuse as to why they did it and still love the film anyway.
I knew the film would be one gigantic geek fest. It turned out to be even more specific than that: Paul was one gigantic Star Wars geek fest. I’ll admit, I’m not the biggest Star Wars fan–despite watching the original movies repetitively in my youth, I just think other sci-fi films do it better. (I’m a total sci-fi snob these days. Plus, I can never forgive those God-awful prequels.)
And finally, I knew Pegg and Frost would be adorable. I mean, when are they not? Never, that’s when.
But there was one thing that I didn’t know. I had no idea that Paul, the awesome geek fest of a movie written and starring Simon Pegg and Nick Frost, would be so amazingly atheist.
Color me surprised. Delightfully surprised.
The film starts out as a normal geek fantasy: two British guys vacationing in the United States run into a recently escaped alien as they’re touring famous UFO sites in the American southwest. They decide to help the alien, Paul, get back to his homeworld. It’s very E.T., if E.T. were an alien that cussed a lot, smoked pot and had a snarky personality.
On their travels, Graeme (Pegg) and Clive (Frost) meet Ruth Buggs (Kristen Wiig), and Graeme immediately develops a little crush. Ruth is a nice girl, but the pair goes head to head when Ruth reveals herself to be a fundamentalist Christian when she shows Graeme and Clive her t-shirt that says “Evolve this!” featuring Jesus Christ shooting Charles Darwin in the head. When she asks Graeme and Clive if they believe in the glory of God, the pair stand their ground and say they’re men of science. Ruth gets angry and starts spouting out Creationist bs, which gets Paul, who’s hiding, to rail against Ruth’s small minded views. The two get into an argument which ends abruptly when Paul reveals himself to debunk Ruth’s ridiculous views. But when she refuses to believe Paul’s an alien, and starts to pray fervently to dispel the “demon” Paul, Paul touches Ruth’s forehead, sharing his enlightened, secular view of the universe. Ruth “sees the light” so to speak, and immediately realizes that she’s been incredibly small-minded and that her life has been sheltered and repressive. Now free from her fundamentalist small-mindedness, she starts to do things she was forbidden to do before, like cussing at every opportunity (I swear Kristen Wiig came up with the best swear word combos) and groping Graeme’s junk.
Ruth’s enlightenment may seem a bit silly (this is, after all, a comedy) but it was still totally refreshing to watch. And Pegg and Frost (and the director Greg Mottola) really stuck to their guns to deliver this secular theme. Graeme never tried to pick up religion in order to identify with Ruth more. Ruth never turned back towards her religious roots. And best of all, nobody was apologetic for their atheist beliefs.
And you know what? The movie didn’t suffer because of this. Paul took a chance and decided not to pander to religion, something that a lot of sci-fi films and TV shows seem to do nowadays.
Instead, Paul decided to focus on the glory of science, and how science can be enlightening, while firmly staying away from anything spiritual. In that way, the film reminded me of 2001: A Space Odyssey. Of course, 2001 is a bit more serious (and epic in scale) than Paul, but both movies found beauty in science and space through an alien influence.
At end of the film, Ruth’s father (also a fundamentalist Christian, and also a major a-hole) thanks Paul and references the events that transpired to be the glory of God. To which Paul responds “Yeah, sure. Whatever.” Paul’s response may seem a bit cold to some, but to this atheist, it was absolutely perfect.
Rhea Dee is a Midwest nerd who spends her time collecting vintage junk, daydreaming about Eli Roth, and pondering the genius of John Carpenter soundtracks.
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Rhea Dee is a Midwestern fat girl floating through space with a donut and an attitude. She's the co-host and co-creator of the podcast Badland Girls. 
GREAT article! I loved the atheism in "Paul" too. From the other reviews I've read, those "spiritual" "souls" that believe in a vengeful sky-gawd are not pleased with this movie.
Good.
I may have to see this just to support the atheistic world view.
Nice artical, but you gotta admit it though, the christians believe and faith system is weak in some ways, like for exmaple “God created us in his own image” If you keep thinking like that then any life from a different universe will demolish your faith. Don’t get me wrong, I believe in God but not a HUMAN god. Life wouldn’t make sense if there weren’t a god.. just think about it.
Can’t wait to see PAUL. What attracted me to it was all of those 1-star ratings on all of the christian web sites.
I recently watched the movie Paul, being a fan of Pegg I knew I would enjoy this movie. I gotta say I was really enjoying it until the atheistic views reared thier heads. As a Christian who believes in God and as a nerd who loves sci-fi I’m sure to baffle many atheist readers on here. I take God as truth and sci-fi for what it is… Fiction. I’ve never understood why atheist exsist. I mean isn’t the idea of life after death better than nothing? I guess not. I really think it all boils down to control and pride. As humans we like to think that we understand and control everything. Not so! I’m sure that this post will either removed and I’m counting on it being harshly criticized but I am here to simply say that nothing is just a coincidence especially life and this universe and there is a Creator that is far greater than our finite minds can perceive.
We only delete abusive comments, which yours isn’t.
I promise you, you’re not baffling anyone. Everything you’re saying, we’ve heard many times before from family/friends/co-workers who invite us to their lunchtime prayer group.
I think you’ll be hard pressed to find an atheist that believes humanity understands and controls everything. We know what we don’t know. And that’s a lot. Look at the size of the universe – there’s a lot there to not know! However, I’ve run into plenty of Christians who do feel like they understand and control everything because they know God and God has a plan.
What you find in God, I find in science and, as Dr. Neil Degrasse Tyson has said, science is true whether you believe it or not.
If you really want to talk to atheists on this topic, I suggest you watch an episode of Curiosity that aired recently on the Discovery Channel (episode title: Did God Create the Universe?). It won’t change your mind, but it will help you understand why you can’t change ours.
trying to find a clip of the scene where paul touches Ruth’s (kristen wiig’s) forehead and shows her all his experiences.