![In a departure from the normal XKCD format, this Work presents a movie proposal in the vein of blockbuster, scientifically-illiterate “disaster porn” movies whose plots are a thinly veiled excuse for massive displays of special effects. The most recent example of this type of movie would be “2012”, in which the nature of elementary particles suddenly changes just for the Earth’s interior, thus causing a collapse of the entire planet.
The 2003 movie, “The Core” [imdb], a quintessential movie in this style, used the premise of a scientific experiment to stop the earth’s core to motivate a special effects illustrated romp to the center of the molten earth. This and other similar movies are practically redolent with classic 90’s and 80’s movie stereotypes such as:
The “good scientist”, who is very humble and grounded, typically dressed like a truck driver or sales clerk at The Gap. During the 90’s it became popular to cast this character as a woman, but we will use the masculine pronoun for the sake of expediency. He typically works by seeming random acts of inspiration rather than a more realistic and focused process. Typically such characters are proposing a theory or explanation that is poorly accepted by the mainstream scientific establishment. He is inevitably always right.
The “bad scientist”. Elitist, smug, and typically dressed like a salesman from The Men’s Warehouse. His (it is almost never a woman filling this role) primary role in the plot is to oppose the “good” scientists or technicians by claiming “things are impossible.” He frequently demands proof and is considered an asshole for being skeptical. He almost never meets a good end in the movie, unless he has a profound epiphany and starts accepting things on faith and trust rather than fact and science.
The “doer.” Typically a character that is closely connected to the good scientist, the doer is the only way the plot drags itself ponderously through its course. Usually the only character who can deal with any non-scientific crisis, the doer and his cohorts are the only physically competent people in the entire universe. There is often a mistake or black event in the doer’s past that brings artificial conflict to the character. In “The Core”, the doer was Hilary Swank’s character, Rebecca Childs.
The Bomb. It is almost inevitable that a nuclear bomb is set off in these movies, typically for positive effect. In “The Core”, nuclear bombs were used to restart the spin of the Earth’s core.
The Author proposes a movie whose name puns the increasingly controversial practice of turning clocks to match the expected dawn hours with the changing daylight hours as the seasons change. An inexplicable scientific dilemma (the Sun’s fusion is nowhere near running out, and the idea that it could anytime soon is almost entirely ruled out by modern physics), leads to a group of “doers” taking a ship to the Sun to presumably launch a nuclear bomb into it, thus adding a tiny fraction of the star’s energy in presumably “the perfect place” calculated by the good scientist to save the human race.
Throughout the course of this Work, the Author seems unable to “play it straight” and places jabs against the genre in each panel. For example, the good scientist (see note below) points out the “Sun’s fusion is failing” to the immediate resigned out-of-character commentary by assistants. Likewise it is pointed out that a team of the “hottest” astronauts should be the ones assembled, which is an observation that it is rare that astronauts look like movie models whose profession is being attractive.
The Work culminates in a panel which shows a proposed movie poster, which follows the typical “people walking away purposefully” meme which so pervades action movie promotions in the 1990’s. Not only is the title a pun as described, but the tagline “Never Fall Back” puns on the cliché of war and disaster drama movie tag lines, which frequently expound the indomitable spirit of survival and stubbornness that such movies speak to.
CURATOR’S NOTE: It should not be tremendously surprising that The Author has chosen to cast the “Good Scientist” protagonist as a woman. It has been shown by extensive literary analysis (e.g.,: [1] [2] [3]) that the Author considers women to be smarter, more intuitive, and more balanced than men. Via this prism, a female is a natural cast choice.
However, in a (perhaps unconscious) nod to notoriously critical Hollywood beauty standards, the Author chose to make the good scientist female blonde and wear a more elaborate hairstyle.](../../27.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_kuelsaAgYu1qao43ho1_500.png "In a departure from the normal XKCD format, this Work presents a movie proposal in the vein of blockbuster, scientifically-illiterate “disaster porn” movies whose plots are a thinly veiled excuse for massive displays of special effects. The most recent example of this type of movie would be “2012”, in which the nature of elementary particles suddenly changes just for the Earth’s interior, thus causing a collapse of the entire planet.
The 2003 movie, “The Core” [imdb], a quintessential movie in this style, used the premise of a scientific experiment to stop the earth’s core to motivate a special effects illustrated romp to the center of the molten earth. This and other similar movies are practically redolent with classic 90’s and 80’s movie stereotypes such as:
The “good scientist”, who is very humble and grounded, typically dressed like a truck driver or sales clerk at The Gap. During the 90’s it became popular to cast this character as a woman, but we will use the masculine pronoun for the sake of expediency. He typically works by seeming random acts of inspiration rather than a more realistic and focused process. Typically such characters are proposing a theory or explanation that is poorly accepted by the mainstream scientific establishment. He is inevitably always right.
The “bad scientist”. Elitist, smug, and typically dressed like a salesman from The Men’s Warehouse. His (it is almost never a woman filling this role) primary role in the plot is to oppose the “good” scientists or technicians by claiming “things are impossible.” He frequently demands proof and is considered an asshole for being skeptical. He almost never meets a good end in the movie, unless he has a profound epiphany and starts accepting things on faith and trust rather than fact and science.
The “doer.” Typically a character that is closely connected to the good scientist, the doer is the only way the plot drags itself ponderously through its course. Usually the only character who can deal with any non-scientific crisis, the doer and his cohorts are the only physically competent people in the entire universe. There is often a mistake or black event in the doer’s past that brings artificial conflict to the character. In “The Core”, the doer was Hilary Swank’s character, Rebecca Childs.
The Bomb. It is almost inevitable that a nuclear bomb is set off in these movies, typically for positive effect. In “The Core”, nuclear bombs were used to restart the spin of the Earth’s core.
The Author proposes a movie whose name puns the increasingly controversial practice of turning clocks to match the expected dawn hours with the changing daylight hours as the seasons change. An inexplicable scientific dilemma (the Sun’s fusion is nowhere near running out, and the idea that it could anytime soon is almost entirely ruled out by modern physics), leads to a group of “doers” taking a ship to the Sun to presumably launch a nuclear bomb into it, thus adding a tiny fraction of the star’s energy in presumably “the perfect place” calculated by the good scientist to save the human race.
Throughout the course of this Work, the Author seems unable to “play it straight” and places jabs against the genre in each panel. For example, the good scientist (see note below) points out the “Sun’s fusion is failing” to the immediate resigned out-of-character commentary by assistants. Likewise it is pointed out that a team of the “hottest” astronauts should be the ones assembled, which is an observation that it is rare that astronauts look like movie models whose profession is being attractive.
The Work culminates in a panel which shows a proposed movie poster, which follows the typical “people walking away purposefully” meme which so pervades action movie promotions in the 1990’s. Not only is the title a pun as described, but the tagline “Never Fall Back” puns on the cliché of war and disaster drama movie tag lines, which frequently expound the indomitable spirit of survival and stubbornness that such movies speak to.
CURATOR’S NOTE: It should not be tremendously surprising that The Author has chosen to cast the “Good Scientist” protagonist as a woman. It has been shown by extensive literary analysis (e.g.,: [1] [2] [3]) that the Author considers women to be smarter, more intuitive, and more balanced than men. Via this prism, a female is a natural cast choice.
However, in a (perhaps unconscious) nod to notoriously critical Hollywood beauty standards, the Author chose to make the good scientist female blonde and wear a more elaborate hairstyle.")
In a departure from the normal XKCD format, this Work presents a movie proposal in the vein of blockbuster, scientifically-illiterate “disaster porn” movies whose plots are a thinly veiled excuse for massive displays of special effects. The most recent example of this type of movie would be “2012”, in which the nature of elementary particles suddenly changes just for the Earth’s interior, thus causing a collapse of the entire planet.
The 2003 movie, “The Core” [imdb], a quintessential movie in this style, used the premise of a scientific experiment to stop the earth’s core to motivate a special effects illustrated romp to the center of the molten earth. This and other similar movies are practically redolent with classic 90’s and 80’s movie stereotypes such as:
- The “good scientist”, who is very humble and grounded, typically dressed like a truck driver or sales clerk at The Gap. During the 90’s it became popular to cast this character as a woman, but we will use the masculine pronoun for the sake of expediency. He typically works by seeming random acts of inspiration rather than a more realistic and focused process. Typically such characters are proposing a theory or explanation that is poorly accepted by the mainstream scientific establishment. He is inevitably always right.
- The “bad scientist”. Elitist, smug, and typically dressed like a salesman from The Men’s Warehouse. His (it is almost never a woman filling this role) primary role in the plot is to oppose the “good” scientists or technicians by claiming “things are impossible.” He frequently demands proof and is considered an asshole for being skeptical. He almost never meets a good end in the movie, unless he has a profound epiphany and starts accepting things on faith and trust rather than fact and science.
- The “doer.” Typically a character that is closely connected to the good scientist, the doer is the only way the plot drags itself ponderously through its course. Usually the only character who can deal with any non-scientific crisis, the doer and his cohorts are the only physically competent people in the entire universe. There is often a mistake or black event in the doer’s past that brings artificial conflict to the character. In “The Core”, the doer was Hilary Swank’s character, Rebecca Childs.
- The Bomb. It is almost inevitable that a nuclear bomb is set off in these movies, typically for positive effect. In “The Core”, nuclear bombs were used to restart the spin of the Earth’s core.
The Author proposes a movie whose name puns the increasingly controversial practice of turning clocks to match the expected dawn hours with the changing daylight hours as the seasons change. An inexplicable scientific dilemma (the Sun’s fusion is nowhere near running out, and the idea that it could anytime soon is almost entirely ruled out by modern physics), leads to a group of “doers” taking a ship to the Sun to presumably launch a nuclear bomb into it, thus adding a tiny fraction of the star’s energy in presumably “the perfect place” calculated by the good scientist to save the human race.
Throughout the course of this Work, the Author seems unable to “play it straight” and places jabs against the genre in each panel. For example, the good scientist (see note below) points out the “Sun’s fusion is failing” to the immediate resigned out-of-character commentary by assistants. Likewise it is pointed out that a team of the “hottest” astronauts should be the ones assembled, which is an observation that it is rare that astronauts look like movie models whose profession is being attractive.
The Work culminates in a panel which shows a proposed movie poster, which follows the typical “people walking away purposefully” meme which so pervades action movie promotions in the 1990’s. Not only is the title a pun as described, but the tagline “Never Fall Back” puns on the cliché of war and disaster drama movie tag lines, which frequently expound the indomitable spirit of survival and stubbornness that such movies speak to.
CURATOR’S NOTE: It should not be tremendously surprising that The Author has chosen to cast the “Good Scientist” protagonist as a woman. It has been shown by extensive literary analysis (e.g.,: [1] [2] [3]) that the Author considers women to be smarter, more intuitive, and more balanced than men. Via this prism, a female is a natural cast choice.
However, in a (perhaps unconscious) nod to notoriously critical Hollywood beauty standards, the Author chose to make the good scientist female blonde and wear a more elaborate hairstyle.
