Code Red: the Rubicon Conspiracy is a 2001 TV movie aired by UPN involving a dishonorably discharged Army Lieutenant by the name of Peter Doyle (played by Brian McNamara) who is called in for a rescue mission regarding the Rubicon Station in the midst of Africa. His brother, James Doyle, may be the last remaining member of the last mission squad. He was also the reason for Peter's discharge, The Rubicon Station has a nuclear failsafe due to detonate in 20 hours if it's not reset and there are local rebels in play. Furthermore, Doyle quickly learns that some of his opposition is not from this planet, but not all of them are enemies.
This film contains the following tropes:
- Dwindling Party: They start with six soldiers. They're picked off with predictable regularity.
- Enemy-Detecting Radar: Part of the team has a device which is being used to track the surviving member of the team... except that it then suddenly tracks the aliens too.
- Good All Along: The Predator Expy is revealed to be a good guy that's actually trying to stop the Alien expies from destroying the Earth. He never even killed any of the squaddies.
- In a Single Bound: The preferred method of travel for the "Predator" alien.
- Made-for-TV Movie: The production values are low and the script is unoriginal, but it's competently handled.
- Normal Fish in a Tiny Pond: On the "Predator" alien's homeword, the "Xenomorph" aliens are seen as little more than pests like cockroaches. On Earth, they're killing machines threatening all life on the planet.
- Predator Pastiche: The film involves a very Predator-like alien that runs into soldiers in a jungle.
- Snowy Screen of Death: Seen with the initial squad. Not only were their video transmissions very low definition due to transmission issues, but the screen displaying their EKG reading accommodatingly goes to static when the transmission is cut off.
- Translator Microbes: One of the squads carries a translation device which is "loaded with the Global Alphabet" and translates the spoken dialect of 74 languages into English.
