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The humanity! I can't bring myself to live in this world!
Eh. I'm over it.
I'm gonna start a fire in the concrete shell of an old warehouse and look for canned food.
This is an absolutely true story: My best friend and I have a pact that if the end comes, we'll split our food, water and ammunition 50/50.
I'm gonna go to the library and read until another survivor comes along and eats me.
I'm gonna go to the library and read until another survivor comes along and eats me.
I'm gonna go to the library and see if there's a cute women there reading and waiting for another survivor to comes along and eat her.
I found a deer carcas, so. You guys read and starve, I'm having some steak and looking for blankets.
I'm gonna take this opportunity to ask you guys, please, never to do a commentary for "The Road."
Cause if you do, either you guys will sit and talk through it and be dishonest motherfuckers, or it'll just be two hours of four grown men quietly sobbing.
I live in an abandoned NORAD bunker surrounded by partially decommissioned nuclear warheads that leak glowing green fluid. Most of my body parts have been replaced with steel and silicon, and my few remaining biological components are kept in a state of permanent vigor via regular doses of blood plasma distilled from the corpses of the hapless fools who come seeking the source of my decoy radio beacon that broadcasts an automated message of false hope.
Oh, sorry - I meant to post this in the Introduce Yourself thread.
I enjoyed that way, way more than I should have.
...man, Trey just fucking killed this thing.
Dayum.
I just want to point out that Fig would have no idea how to go from "dead deer" to "steak," and I would probably spend a few hours enjoying that comedy routine before Eddie went Sam Fisher on me from behind for no reason.
It's the apocalypse, all bets are off.
Yeah, I think Fig gave himself away by not realizing that steak comes from cows, not from deer.
Also, just exactly how weird is it that I'm now trying to decide whether to spend my evening reinstalling World of Warcraft or trying to build an automated message of false hope? This forum is weird.
Yeah, I think Fig gave himself away by not realizing that steak comes from cows, not from deer.
Jeff will not survive this apocalypse, for he has never heard of veal steak.
Veal comes from cows too, Greg.
I'm no butcher, but I'm pretty sure you can cut a steak from Deer.
Anyway...
Not sure what it says about my psychological make-up (go ahead, call me crazy), but I always thought I'd be just fine with the notion of being a sole survivor.
I was always more partial to the scenarios that left infrastructure pretty much intact though; the "waking up to find that you are the last human on Earth" was always my personal preference.
I'd love to see someone do that premise a-la Sean of the Dead.
Imagine, you wake up, and you realize that no one else is around. Maybe it even takes you a while to notice. At first you're confused, but once you get over that you realize that, for example, there's no point in going to work.
Then there's the shopping sprees, driving expensive cars, spending days on end in a bathrobe playing video games on an insanely big t.v., etc.
Finally reality kicks in. The power goes out, the garbage is piling up, there's no running water, and maybe winter's coming on.
I'd leave it to a *better writer than myself, but that's the gist of it.
*BTW, if you're that better writer, I reserve story credit. ; )
Ugh, there's a novel … or movie? … that has just that premise. It takes place in New Zealand. Hang on, lemme google…
Got it! It's a movie, and it's called "The Quiet Earth."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Quiet_Earth_(film)
Short version: Guy wakes up to find he's apparently the only human left. Everyone has just disappeared.
I've always been seduced by tales of apocalypse myself. I've never really talked that much about it, 'cause I just assumed I was the only one. I can see the National Mall and the Capitol and stuff from my window, and I've had many a dream about a brilliant flash and the crumbling aftermath.
Oh. And the steak thing? I was just being a dick.
Is there an apocalypse story in which there is in fact only one person left alive? The only one I can think of off hand is that Twiligh Zone episode I referenced. I'm not sure you could hang a longer story on just one character. Unless you aped Castaway and give that character a Wilson to talk to.
There are several that end with just a single surviving human. "Childhood's End," for example, has a character who serves as the witness to man's passing. It's been a really long time, but I think "Cat's Cradle" ends that way too, with just a sole survivor.
A guy named Morrow wrote a book called "This is the Way the World Ends" that, well, sort of has just a single surviving character. But it's complicated. Fantastic book. Rip your heart right out, man.
I think it'd be inherently easier to do that in prose than on film. Unless you're Terence Malick.
I'm reminded of "Knock" the shortest story ever written.
"The last man on earth sat alone in a room. There was a knock on the door...."
Hemingway's shortest story was only six words long.
"For sale: Baby shoes. Never worn."
Interesting.
I'd leave the actual problem of "where'd everybody go?" completely out, my one piece of magic. And I'd leave other people completely out.
Mine would essentially be the story of a guy who is probably failing at life, hates his job, and can't relate to other people; someone who'd welcome the prospect, relish in it for a while, but ultimately realize that the world was better with other people around.
I could come up with most of the first two acts, but I'm stuck on the third, and even then there would have to be some sort of pay-off that would need setting-up in the first two thirds.
Last edited by Matt Vayda (2010-04-27 01:28:45)
I'm really going to have to ask you to stop trying to write my biography, Matt. It's just rude.
Now if you'll excuse me, I've got some boar sinew that needs twisting into a new bowstring.
Veal comes from cows too, Greg.
Sorry, I meant venison steaks. Still, I'm eating a steak from a deer, and you're looking for a cow.
Jeff: Well, if it's any consolation, I'm basically thinking of what I would do in such an event. It's an interesting psychological exercise.
Sure I'd miss friends and family, and maybe that's the way I would take the ending somehow, but I'm pretty sure I'd be OK for a while. The tricky part is in trying to objectively extrapolate what I would do, and how I would feel after the initial "party" is over, and the lights start going out.
The ending would have to be a self-revelation. I guess the over-arching premise can be boiled down to be careful what you wish for, though I would not explicitly state it.
The idea is appealing to me as a story because I have a feeling it's one of those things that everyone thinks about, but doesn't really talk about. The political response would be to admit that "man, I'd go crazy all by myself," and I'm sure there are a good deal of people for whom that would be accurate. But by saying "yeah, I'd probably be alright," you're risking the stigma of a "crazy person." What sane person would want that for themselves?
Maybe want is too strong a word, but suffice to say that, particularly in this day and age, there are those that would welcome relief from the day to day stress imposed by needing to find work, pay bills, "am I going to be able to afford to eat this week," etc., all things made easier by a lack of other people. No boss, no bill collectors, no one to answer to; who wouldn't want that?
I guess the problem with eliminating all people, is that you also eliminate society. As much as we hate paying the electric bill, without the people (who your bill helps pay) keeping that power plant going, pretty soon you won't have electricity at all. Now expand that analogy to include everything that society maintains, on which we as individuals rely everyday. There's your ending, somewhere.
Do you really think everybody thinks about that kind of thing? Cause kidding aside, I totally do. Like … often. It's a favorite daydream, along with the one where I wake up seven years old again.
Have you ever watched that show "Survivorman?" I don't think it's being made any more, but it was a staple on the various Discovery Channel-type channels for a while there. This guy would get himself dropped off alone in the middle of absolutely nowhere with just the clothes on his back and a set of tiny camcorders, and he'd film himself surviving and making his way to civilization. I've probably seen every episode three times — except the one where he decided to bring a friend along on the adventure. That spoiled the whole notion for me. Cause what's the point of being alone, cut off from the things of man, if you bring a friend? Friends mean conversation at times when you want to be silent, and eventual arguments about whose turn it is to spear down the jaguar, and next thing you know you're up to your elbows in gore and seriously considering learning what human flesh tastes like grilled.
Honestly, I think I'd be okay if I were the last man on earth. Yeah, I'd get lonely eventually, but I think I'd get over it. Every time I longed for the sound of another human voice, I think I'd just remember that I don't have to follow any goddamn rules any more, and that'd cheer me right up.
But then, sooner or later … sigh. It's inevitable, and I can't deny it. Eventually I'd get a toothache. I figure anything else I could deal with. Appendicitis? Well, either I'm gonna live or I'm gonna die; it's not like I can perform surgery on my own abdomen and expect to survive. Broken leg? Same deal. Either I live or I die. But a toothache, that's the kind of pain that's enough to make me wanna die. And there's just nothing I'd be able to do about it on my own.
Hm. Maybe I need to do a little reading on amateur self-dentistry. Just in case.
Do you really think everybody thinks about that kind of thing?
Well, yes. To some degree anyway. It's just logic. We're social creatures, and we possess an imagination, so sooner or later it's inevitable to wonder, even in passing, what it would be like to be on our own.
Granted, I doubt that everyone goes so far as to come up with a "zombie plan," which is really all this is, but I believe it crosses everyone's mind at some point.
That's another reason I like it as a story. The best stories tap into things that everyone can relate to, even if they've never actively thought about it; the ones that make you go, "I've never thought about that before," and then make you think about it.
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