Poles Apart

No! Nothing To Do With Warsaw And Krakow
Bear with me, this will take a bit of developing.  Okay, you may or may not be familiar with that post-apocalypse work of fiction "On The Beach" by Nevil Shute.  It is an immensely depressing end-of-the-world-with-a-whimper work, which Your Humble Scribe has both read and seen.  Art?

A smile.  The only one in this film.

     That's Ava Gardner, in case you were wondering.  The plot is centred on the impending end of the world only slightly delayed, a year after nuclear war in the northern hemisphere has ended all life there.  The reason for this is not so much the immediate effect of nuclear warheads, but rather the radiation thereof, which is slowly beginning to move into the southern hemisphere.  Shute attributes this to the extensive use of cobalt-salted nuclear warheads, and he's not wrong with the theory there.
     A slight aside here.  Okay, if you wrap your Big Bang Bomb with a dainty cladding of cobalt, then all bets are off.  It will take an estimated 100 years before the fallout from such a weapon declines to safe levels, which is why these things were regarded as Doomsday Weapons in films such as this and "Doctor Strangelove".

Quite.

     Such cheery thoughts.  Anyway, Shute also propounded that nuclear weapons proliferation both horizontal and vertical was also to blame, with even fifth-rate states like Albania gaining a nuclear arsenal, presumably also along with an attitude of What The Heck.  Fallout favours no friends, fact fans.  When the shoe drops, everyone starts blowing up their neighbours, even distant ones, despite knowing that the fallout will kill them as well.

Say hello to the Cobalt fellow.

     Conrad wonders how this film got made twice, as it is not a barrel of laughs.
     "Gee, what a buzzkill this big fat biffer is today," I hear you quibble.  "Next thing you'll be handing out suicide pills."
     Not quite.  Mister Shute has a very gloomy outlook on things, yes indeed, though over in the opposite corner we have -

The tea-drinking eyebrow-waggling wonder-worker himself!

     Another child of the Fifties.  What relevance does this have to Doomsday?  I thought you'd never ask!
     Dan's world is one of established positivity, even if seen through the prism of life seventy years ago.  What happens when the dreaded Red Moon shows up, preparing to destroy all life on Earth as it had previously done to Mars?  Why, the Interplanet Space Fleet tools up with the entire United Nations strategic stockpile of nuclear weapons, all 12 of them, which are notably limited-yield fission weapons.  As Sir Hubert Guest, Controller of Space Fleet, explicitly states, all fusion weapons were dismantled in the Sixties under the auspices of the UN.  Non-proliferation with a vengeance.  Not only were they dismantled, construction of same was forbidden.

Neither Dan nor Digby are so crude as to ever swear.

     Incidentally, we never get to discover just what a horrified Digby witnessed when the "Anastasia" skims over the surface of the Red Moon, a cliffhanger that is never resolved, and don't think I'll ever forget about it, Mister Hampson*.
     So there you have it, two mutually opposed views of how the future would be, and I know which one I prefer.
     Motley, let's watch "Doctor Very Strangelove" again!

What The Heck!
Bitten on the nethers by the Coincidence Hydra AGAIN.  Really, my rump must be delicious for all the dining out that beast manages. 

Hungry for human.

      "What is the white-haired loon babbling about now?" I hear you ask.  Pausing only to state that the correct term is "snowy-haired", I shall explicate.
     You recall, OF COURSE, that I was documenting South Canadian popular culture references as present in "The Stand", so that you don't have to.  The name "Tom Swift" came up, and Your Humble Scribe illustrated same with a picture.  Art?

Because every boy needs a lethal weapon.

     Did you know Tom's middle name begins with an "A"?  Me neither.  This is important, because the initials to "Tom A Swift and his Electric Rifle" spell "Taser", which, as you probably know, is a variety of electric rifle.  Well, a pistol at least.  Art?

Not so much Tom as it is Swift.

     Really, world, can you stop doing this?  It's getting hard to sit comfortably.

     Two things you're not going to get today: an entry from the "51 Science Fiction Novels You Must Read" and the BBC's webpage about science fiction predicting stuff, because the first one won't load on my work machine, and I cannot find the link for the other.  Just so you know**.  Meanwhile -

Back At Strategic Rocket Forces Base Number 16, Semipalatinsk -
Those rascally scamps Misha and Grisha have been busy, since their cousin came back from a visit to the evil capitalist West with buckets of Lego; plus there's not a lot to do when on duty in the icy wastes of Western Siberia.  Art?

Freud would love love love this.

     Surprisingly enough, the Colonel wasn't that bothered by their spending time on such childish pursuits, reportedly because having to use fine motor skills meant that they weren't indulging in the national Ruffian vice***.

Finally -
That Ian Fleming bloke.  First he invents James Bond, and then, not content with creating a legendary character, he goes on to invent Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, another legendary character, as Conrad insists the car is as much a character as Dick Van Dyke or <thinks> whoever played Truly Scrumptious.

Conrad unsure if this is actually a viable flying machine

     Sally Ann Howes, apparently.  Anyway, one thing that Ian Fleming didn't create was The Child Catcher, whom was added by scriptwriter Roald Dahl, which doesn't surprise me as he had a particularly dark sense of humour.  He - The Child Catcher, not Roald Dahl - has been put forward as one of the scariest villains in cinema, which is a bit of a joke when you consider documentary film-maker John Carpenter's "The Thing".  Go show that to your little ones and see how traumatised they are afterwards!

         
                          The Child Catcher                                                The Thing
     I shall, of course, deny all responsibility for therapy bills and bed-wetting.  I'm horrid that way <sniggers>

And with that, we are done!


*  I can bear a grudge for an infinitely long time.  Just so you know.
**  How informative we are.
***  Vodka.