posted by Matthew Belinkie on Thursday, November 19th, 2009 at 10:31am
A terrible plan.
Spoilers for 2012 follow. Although I’m not sure giving away the plot to a special effects pornstravaganza constitutes “spoiling” it. It’s a lot like revealing the plot to an actual porn movie–that’s not really why you rented it in the first place.
Roland Emmerich loves to destroy the earth. 2012 is his third disaster epic, after Independence Day and The Day After Tomorrow. But there’s one crucial difference this time around, and it’s not just the lack of the word “day” in the film’s title. In 2012, the leaders of the world know about the impending apocalypse. They have years to plan. But the plan they come up with is mystifying stupid. Basically, they keep the news very quiet while they construct a bunch of giant boats high in the Himalayas. This is largely financed by charging the richest people in the world one billion euros for tickets.
Deep breath…
1. Why not just tell everyone? Evil bureaucrat Oliver Platt explains that there would be complete chaos if the truth got out. The important thing is to preserve the human species, and if everyone knows they are going to die in three years, there’s no way they can pull off the logistics of building and stocking giant-ass boats. There’s a certain logic to that. But I also think that if everyone knows they’re going to die in three years, then everyone would work really, really hard to prevent that. Think about how many giant boats could be built if everyone in the world was spending every waking moment welding? Not to mention, the extreme secrecy means that 99.99% of the world’s smartest scientists never even knew about the problem, much less get a chance to solve it. I’m not saying anyone could have stopped the earth’s crust from collapsing. But they could have tried, or at least corrected some of the dumber parts of the ark plan. For instance…
posted by Matthew Wrather on Monday, November 16th, 2009 at 1:44am
Matthew Wrather hosts with Peter Fenzel, Mark Lee, Josh McNeil, and special guest podcaster Amanda Marcotte to overthink the end of the world, 2012, the now not-so-secret diary of a call girl, and Sarah Palin’s new book.
(By the way…do you actually want to buy this? Maybe you should check this out instead. And we don’t even get an affiliate fee.)
Tell us what you think! Leave a comment, use the contact form, email us or call 20-EAT-LOG-01—that’s (203) 285-6401.
posted by Think Tank on Friday, November 13th, 2009 at 7:00am
Look out behind you!
Disaster movies, like Roland Emmerich’s 2012 (debuting this week), always feature our protagonists speeding away from some onrushing threat. Whether a giant monster, a geological phenomenon, a torrent of lasers, or a terrifying combination of the above, the margin between life and death is measured in miles per hour.
Hurry up! Run!
The chase says so much about the genre and humanity’s relation to it. It’s man vs. nature writ large. Nature goes from indifferent to cruel, targeting our heroes with falling debris, obscuring smoke and other unfortunate people who just weren’t fast enough.
It’s gaining on us! Step on it!
The panel of Overthinkers sprinted to safety this week and, while catching their breath and staring at the wreckage of a major American metropolis, debated on what was the Greatest Escape in a Disaster Movie. Read our verdicts and weigh in by voting in our poll.
And make sure you read all the way to the end for our Mystery Guest Judge!
