Earth Day is a time to consider the actions you can take to protect the planet. But you shouldn't forget just what it is you're protecting it from. So here are the greatest threats to our world according to Hollywood, along with tips you can use to prevent a global catastrophe.
Photo by Frank Masi/Touchstone Pictures/Kobal Collection, WireImageCAUSE: Giant Falling Rocks
As Seen In: Armageddon & Deep Impact
At any moment, meteors can start falling from the sky, crushing Paris, creating tidal waves, and causing worldwide panic. When this happens, the best thing to do is assemble a rag-tag band of Texas mavericks, put them on the Space Shuttle with a couple of Aerosmith albums, and hope for the best.
What You Can Do: Avoid living in cities with easily recognizable landmarks.
Photo by 20th Century FoxCAUSE: Viral Outbreaks
As Seen In: 28 Days Later, 28 Weeks Later & I Am Legend
Next time the guy in the nearest cubicle sneezes, beware. It might be a common cold, or it could be the start of a vast pandemic caused by a scientific experiment gone wrong that will wipe out most of humanity. Even worse, it might even turn people into brainless, sunlight-averse monsters, leaving survivors with no one to talk to but dogs and mannequins.
What You Can Do: Vitamin C. A lot of Vitamin C.
Photo by Kobal Collection, WireImageCAUSE: Satan (and Son)
As Seen In: End of Days & The Omen
According to theology, the Devil loves little more than to tempt humans into straying from the path of righteousness.
But according to Hollywood, Lucifer is only really interested in one thing: fathering more children than Kevin Federline. Adoptive parents of Satan's spawn tend to have terrible accidents, so it is best to leave these biblical matters in the capable hands of Austrian bodybuilders-turned-politicians.
What You Can Do: Invest in Holy water.
Photo by United Artist/Kobal Collection, WireImageCAUSE: The Dead Rising
As Seen In: Night of the Living Dead, Dawn of the Dead, Day of the Dead & Land of the Dead
If your long-dead great aunt shows up for Sunday dinner hungry for warm brains, then the mortal world may be playing unwilling host to Hell's overflow population. The best thing to do in this circumstance is to hole up with a band of disparate strangers in a farmhouse, shopping mall, or futuristic high-rise and hope that they finish that new expansion of Hades soon.
What You Can Do: Practice your aim -- the head is a small target.
Photo by Hawk Films/Kobal Collection, WireImageCAUSE: Nuts With Nukes
As Seen In: Dr. Strangelove
Never stand in the way of a man and his precious bodily fluids. When the nukes rain down on our nation's cities and Russia's doomsday machine blots the sun from the sky, be content with the idea that this is all because of general Jack D. Ripper's cold fury over the dangers of water fluoridation.
What You Can Do: Get picked to live in the government's safe, undisclosed, underground colony. Drink plenty of bottled, non-fluoridated water.
Photo by 20th Century Fox, Everett CollectionCAUSE: Greenhouse Gasses
As Seen In: Waterworld & The Day After Tomorrow
Every day your neighbor's SUV spews carbon dioxide and other pollutants into the air, trapping the sun's radiation and heating up the atmosphere. This may result in either a) the polar ice caps melt, forcing mankind to live on boats with Kevin Costner or b) the gulf stream stops, turning New York City into an enormous ice cube. Either way, it's your neighbor's fault.
What You Can Do: Reduce your carbon footprint. Beat up your neighbor.
Photo by Touchstone PicturesCAUSE: Alien Bureaucracy
As Seen In: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Alien invaders may never succeed in taking over the Earth. They always get stopped by microbes, Macintosh computers, or glasses of water. But if alien pencil pushers -- like the Vogons -- get the appropriate permits, they most certainly will blow up the planet to make a hyperspace expressway. Though resistance to their mindlessly bureaucratic ways may be futile, getting blown up is still preferable to listening to their poetry.
What You Can Do: Lodge a formal complaint at the local intergalactic planning office on Alpha Centuri.
Everett CollectionCAUSE: Angry Robots
As Seen In: The Terminator &
The Matrix Trilogies
Nothing says human obsolescence like an army of ruthlessly-efficient sentient robots. So think twice the next time program your TiVo, cruise the web on your laptop, or download a cool app to your iPhone. Your favorite gadgets are right now plotting, in binary code, your inevitable doom.
What You Can Do: Watch your iPhone to see if it does anything suspicious.
Photo by Ricky Francisco/20th Century Fox/Kobal Collection, WireImageCAUSE: Angry Monkeys
As Seen In: Planet of the Apes Series
We do not know for sure what role monkeys had in the nuclear war that wiped out humanity, but they certainly didn't do anything to stop it either. And when they became number one in the species pecking order, they wasted no time lording it over us. Chimps share 99% of our DNA and they are undoubtedly bitter about that remaining 1%.
What You Can Do: Stand up for yourself and the whole human race. If a chimp at the zoo flings feces at you, throw some right back.
Photo by MGM/Kobal Collection, WireImageCAUSE: Angry Bunnies
As Seen In: Night of the Lepus
When extinction comes for humankind, it will be with nasty, big, pointy teeth. That's right, giant carnivorous rabbits -- the most foul, cruel, and bad-tempered rodents the Earth has ever known. Grown to the size of houses by medical researchers playing God, they replaced their hunger for veggies with a mad craving for live flesh. As they go forth and multiply (like rabbits, obviously), they will eat your cows, your pet dog, and most assuredly you. Their feet don't seem so lucky now, do they?
What You Can Do: Nothing. The bunny-pocalypse is inevitable.
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