Summer Waxing Summer Moon
I’m a sucker for sci-fi catastrophe movies. Well, ok, for a lot of other kinds of movies, too, but the sci-fi catastrophe so often get made for tv. The scenario is pretty straightforward: an unsolvable problem emerges much to the surprise of the scientific establishment. A renegade scientist, long ago discredited and/or fired by the VERY AGENCY now wanting him or her back resists, then with reluctance agrees to try to save the world. Once they’re back in the good graces of the system, that is, people have begun to listen to them, a military expert comes up with a solution to the problem–no matter what it is–that involves an atom bomb. After much hooing and hahing, the chief decision maker decides against the renegade scientist becauses atom bombs always seem so damned convincing.
The bombs go out or in or over depending on the source of the problem: the moon, the earth’s core, the magnetic field, an incoming asteroid or alien invader. They fail. The chief decision maker, chastened by experience returns humbly to the renegade asking again for their help. Well, you see where this goes. There are no On The Beach endings on TV, nor in a lot of movies either.
Tonight, in the strange way TV has of reshuffling actors, the old JAG leading man joined up with the female lead of a new show about lawyers, and built a machine that electro-hemishpherically supercharged the whizzidizigit, thereby expelling the brown star that had collided with the moon. This, trumpets and then a sappy romantic flourish, saves the earth. Again.
I know. So why do I watch them? Because I find the notion of uber competent scientists who have our back as compelling as the next guy. THre’s always something to cheer for and a romance seen through to completion. What’s not to like? Oh, all right. A decent script, maybe. Often the technical affects are cheesy. Sometimes, well, usually, the acting is atrocious. Oh, hell, I don’t know why I watch’em. I just do.
Reminds me of that song: I don’t know why I love you, I just do.
