I’ve been struck by the way that people in Lucifer’s Hammer seem both repelled by and yet somehow attracted to the idea of the apocalypse. At first it’s presented as a ludicrous idea — there’s even doubt as to whether or not the comet would even be visible from Earth — and something worthy of extended jokes (the ice cream sundae comet). But as the comet gets closer, and the odds of not only visibility but an impact get better and better, the attitude changes to not just horror but fatalism with a touch of fascination.<\/p>\n
I think that we’re seeing the appeal of a real-life reset button in an apocalypse. Everyone thinks that they’ll be one of the ones who survives, and needs to make their way in a whole new world. All the sins, all the responsibilities, all the problems of your life are wiped away. You’ll be in a world where it doesn’t matter if you can’t make your mortgage payment or if you lost your temper and started a bar fight. It’s the fantasy of the gleaming cherry-red Mustang screaming through the deserted streets of New York City or the romantic Middle Ages where you’re a knight of the round table and not the serf bound to the land you were born on. It’s the idea of getting to start your whole life over, but in a way that isn’t your fault — you didn’t divorce your wife and fake your own death, but all that stuff is wiped away anyway and so you get to enjoy it guilt-free.<\/p>\n
Gordie is a poignant character for me in that respect. He’s out to abandon the game, just when the reset button is about to be pushed for him. Embezzlement is meaningless in the post-Hammer society and he’s about to get his chance to start over, if he can just live long enough to see it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I’ve been struck by the way that people in Lucifer’s Hammer seem both repelled by and yet somehow attracted to the idea of the apocalypse. At first it’s presented as a ludicrous idea — there’s even doubt as to whether or not the comet would even be visible from Earth — and something worthy of… Continue reading The attraction of the apocalypse<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[10],"tags":[15],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2009\/459\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2009\/459\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2009\/459\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2009\/459\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2009\/459\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=97"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2009\/459\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":99,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2009\/459\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97\/revisions\/99"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2009\/459\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=97"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2009\/459\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=97"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2009\/459\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=97"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}