It's from the lyrics of “The end of the world as we know it” by REM. Corny, I know.
Now, speaking as a fellow film buff, I'm disappointed in you, Bob. How can you talk about “end of the world” type films from the '50s and not mention true classics like “When Worlds Collide” or “War of the Worlds”. Instead we get Bert I. Gordon and Robot Monster?
Alright, Bob, answer honestly…did you only see Robot Monster and Beginning of the End through MST3k?
Seriously though, why all the hate on the Happening? I mean, you get all snooty about 'plant farts' right before you get gushy over process-shot grasshoppers and Ro-Man. I thought The Happening was probably closer to The Birds than anything else…the idea that a seemingly innocuous natural force would suddenly and violently turn on humanity, and how helpless we would be. None of this BS about Jon Cusack daringly hijacking a plane to save his wife, son, and cute puppy from the end of days…just cold empty streets more evocative of Silent Hill 2 than Day After Tomorrow
Heya Bob, big fan of both your MovieBob stuff and Game Overthinker vids.
I think you hit the nail on the head about how the apocalypse and the breakdown of society allows people to really show what they're made of.
Speaking on that, I know that you're a fan of anime and manga, so I thought I might share some particularly good end-of-the-world depiction in there as well. Obviously End of Evangelion deserves a mention. The Instrumentality sequence sends shivers down my spine even as I think about it, especially with the eery soundtrack dissonance. But recently I've read a manga called High School of the Dead, where a bunch of high schoolers try their best to survive and adapt in a world where almost everyone has been infected with a disease that effectively turns them into zombies. The themes of showing your true moral fiber and trying to resist the nihilistic pull of all-out hedonism and the selfish dog-eat-dog mentality when all social norms are gone is a prevalent theme throughout.
Point of order, the triffids did not invade. They overgrew. Its not like they were aliens or something, they were soviet GM crops that weren't dangerous until 98% of the populace was blinded.
And yes, that means that in Soviet russia, corn eats you.
Yay for unexpected video (You're still doing one Friday yes? please)
As often with a lot of your more “general information” videos I feel that I could easily listen to something 5 times the length (and you could probably deliver)just so you could cover it even better. Alas I'm pretty sure that just doing this is a huge amount of work so I'm ecstatic about what we got 🙂
@Hanchen: Good examples, but I think Zombie Movies are sort of in their own category given the number of unique conventions they have, even though they are, by any definition, end of the world movies.
As for End of Eva…well, Anime is one of the key players in apocalypse depictions (I'm surprised Bob didn't mention anime at all)
Susan Napier, who wrote the definitive piece of American anime scholarship, “Anime, From Akira to Mononoke: Experiencing Contemporary Japanese Animation”, categorized three major categories of Anime. 'Festival', fun poppy visual feasts, 'Elegy' deep emotional examinations, and 'Apocalypse', depictions of the end of the world and life after the end.
It isn't hard to see why Japan would have a fascination with the apocalypse since the nation actually lived through months of fire falling from the sky and cataclysmic explosions. There's an absolutely stellar scene from “Millenium Actress” where the characters, walking through various pastiches of Japanese Film History, step out of a bunker into a bleak blasted landscape of ruins and red skies, and a younger character asks “Is this science fiction?” An older character immediately gets angry at him, and then a siren blares, and they all take shelter as a squad of B-52s washes over them.
If I had to make a grand statement about Japanese vs American apocalyptic visions, and I do, it would be that Japan very much does not subscribe to the “see what you're made of version of the apocalypse”, and instead go for a “the apocalypse cannot change the human character” vision. Works like Ghost in the Shell, Speed Grapher, “Cannon Fodder” from the Memories feature, depict humanity barely surviving a great catastrophe only to slip back into the same skeleton of capitalist society, just with different technology powering it.
mostly unrelated but bob- you are wrong. Need me to be more specific? Book of eli didn't suck! it was a Zatoichi blind swordsman remake and thus needs not those palty accessories like plot and narrative! it only needs a badass swordsman goin round fucking peoples shit up! well thats my rant- love your work
I never said he was a bad director. I haven't watched the whole Alfred Hitchcock canon, I just hated how boring The Birds was. It's just innuendo piled on innuendo.
No real scare or money shot in the whole piece. Not like I'd care if anything did happen, as I never found myself empathizing with any of the characters. The whole time I'm watching it, I'm thinking, “When is something going to happen, already?” And then it ends.
How is a flock of birds swarming on children and ripping them to pieces not something happening? How is birds swooping from the foreground and smashing into a phonebooth violently not something happening? How is a woman creeping through her house to find a hole in her ceiling and then suddenly have flocks of birds swarming on her and ripping at her nothing happening?
I get that it seems less impactful now because so much of what people think of as standards of the apocalypse movie are drawn from The Birds, but really it was revolutionary.
I've always been a big fan of the zombie apocalypse, yes I know that its popular to say that at the moment as the sub genre is pretty well represented. But the idea that even though there are flesh eating monsters outside humans beings still struggle to get along is a strong message to me.
MOVIEBOB CENTRAL 
One Cake Jelly Bean Bomb? Someone going to have to explain that to me.
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It's from the lyrics of “The end of the world as we know it” by REM. Corny, I know.
Now, speaking as a fellow film buff, I'm disappointed in you, Bob. How can you talk about “end of the world” type films from the '50s and not mention true classics like “When Worlds Collide” or “War of the Worlds”. Instead we get Bert I. Gordon and Robot Monster?
For shame, Bob, for shame …
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Escargoon! man do i love the kirby cartoon.
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Alright, Bob, answer honestly…did you only see Robot Monster and Beginning of the End through MST3k?
Seriously though, why all the hate on the Happening? I mean, you get all snooty about 'plant farts' right before you get gushy over process-shot grasshoppers and Ro-Man. I thought The Happening was probably closer to The Birds than anything else…the idea that a seemingly innocuous natural force would suddenly and violently turn on humanity, and how helpless we would be. None of this BS about Jon Cusack daringly hijacking a plane to save his wife, son, and cute puppy from the end of days…just cold empty streets more evocative of Silent Hill 2 than Day After Tomorrow
LikeLike
Heya Bob, big fan of both your MovieBob stuff and Game Overthinker vids.
I think you hit the nail on the head about how the apocalypse and the breakdown of society allows people to really show what they're made of.
Speaking on that, I know that you're a fan of anime and manga, so I thought I might share some particularly good end-of-the-world depiction in there as well. Obviously End of Evangelion deserves a mention. The Instrumentality sequence sends shivers down my spine even as I think about it, especially with the eery soundtrack dissonance. But recently I've read a manga called High School of the Dead, where a bunch of high schoolers try their best to survive and adapt in a world where almost everyone has been infected with a disease that effectively turns them into zombies. The themes of showing your true moral fiber and trying to resist the nihilistic pull of all-out hedonism and the selfish dog-eat-dog mentality when all social norms are gone is a prevalent theme throughout.
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Point of order, the triffids did not invade. They overgrew. Its not like they were aliens or something, they were soviet GM crops that weren't dangerous until 98% of the populace was blinded.
And yes, that means that in Soviet russia, corn eats you.
LikeLike
Yay for unexpected video (You're still doing one Friday yes? please)
As often with a lot of your more “general information” videos I feel that I could easily listen to something 5 times the length (and you could probably deliver)just so you could cover it even better. Alas I'm pretty sure that just doing this is a huge amount of work so I'm ecstatic about what we got 🙂
LikeLike
@Hanchen: Good examples, but I think Zombie Movies are sort of in their own category given the number of unique conventions they have, even though they are, by any definition, end of the world movies.
As for End of Eva…well, Anime is one of the key players in apocalypse depictions (I'm surprised Bob didn't mention anime at all)
Susan Napier, who wrote the definitive piece of American anime scholarship, “Anime, From Akira to Mononoke: Experiencing Contemporary Japanese Animation”, categorized three major categories of Anime. 'Festival', fun poppy visual feasts, 'Elegy' deep emotional examinations, and 'Apocalypse', depictions of the end of the world and life after the end.
It isn't hard to see why Japan would have a fascination with the apocalypse since the nation actually lived through months of fire falling from the sky and cataclysmic explosions. There's an absolutely stellar scene from “Millenium Actress” where the characters, walking through various pastiches of Japanese Film History, step out of a bunker into a bleak blasted landscape of ruins and red skies, and a younger character asks “Is this science fiction?” An older character immediately gets angry at him, and then a siren blares, and they all take shelter as a squad of B-52s washes over them.
If I had to make a grand statement about Japanese vs American apocalyptic visions, and I do, it would be that Japan very much does not subscribe to the “see what you're made of version of the apocalypse”, and instead go for a “the apocalypse cannot change the human character” vision. Works like Ghost in the Shell, Speed Grapher, “Cannon Fodder” from the Memories feature, depict humanity barely surviving a great catastrophe only to slip back into the same skeleton of capitalist society, just with different technology powering it.
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Bob, what did you think of the alternate ending of I Am Legend?
I just saw it, makes the movie a whole better for me personally
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mostly unrelated but bob- you are wrong. Need me to be more specific? Book of eli didn't suck! it was a Zatoichi blind swordsman remake and thus needs not those palty accessories like plot and narrative! it only needs a badass swordsman goin round fucking peoples shit up! well thats my rant- love your work
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I think it's kind'a funny how you never actually mention the movie “The Day After”… which is just as well, I guess, since it sucked anyway.
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Protoman likes to sit on Bob's lap.
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Book of Eli sucked so hard Kirk Cameron is now permanently stuck with an O-face.
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Good one… until the end.
Really Bob? Really now? The Birds? Were you trying to rickroll everyone?
That's like my number one defense of The Happening: Hey at least it isn't as bad as The Birds.
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Yeah, Zaxser, let's try to hear you explain how Alfred Hitchcock is a bad director. The Birds was a masterpiece.
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I never said he was a bad director. I haven't watched the whole Alfred Hitchcock canon, I just hated how boring The Birds was. It's just innuendo piled on innuendo.
No real scare or money shot in the whole piece. Not like I'd care if anything did happen, as I never found myself empathizing with any of the characters. The whole time I'm watching it, I'm thinking, “When is something going to happen, already?” And then it ends.
LikeLike
How is a flock of birds swarming on children and ripping them to pieces not something happening? How is birds swooping from the foreground and smashing into a phonebooth violently not something happening? How is a woman creeping through her house to find a hole in her ceiling and then suddenly have flocks of birds swarming on her and ripping at her nothing happening?
I get that it seems less impactful now because so much of what people think of as standards of the apocalypse movie are drawn from The Birds, but really it was revolutionary.
LikeLike
I've always been a big fan of the zombie apocalypse, yes I know that its popular to say that at the moment as the sub genre is pretty well represented. But the idea that even though there are flesh eating monsters outside humans beings still struggle to get along is a strong message to me.
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