Worried about mass extinction? Take our quiz on plague-inspired books and movies.
Remember when a global pandemic was either history or the stuff of science fiction? As the “tripledemic” of RSV, flu, and COVID eases after a holiday bump, this is as good a time as any to remind ourselves that at least we have not encountered a zombie apocalypse. How has the threat of extinction percolated through literature and pop culture through the decades? Take our quiz on plague-centered books, stories, and movies for a brief tour.
1) In P.D. James’s 1992 novel “The Children of Men,” global infertility threatens the survival of the human race. Which of the following is not an effect that looming mass extinction has had on British society in the book?
a. People treat puppies and kittens like newborns, pushing them around in prams and holding christening ceremonies for them.
b. People over the age of 60 are forced to extinguish themselves in a mass suicide called a Quietus.
c. All men of procreating age must take a state-dispensed supplement called Xan in hopes of increasing their sperm count.
d. The state has opened pornography centers and installed special radiation-emitting transmitters to increase libido. 2) At the end of “Contagion” — Steven Soderbergh’s 2011 pandemic movie starring Matt Damon and Kate Winslet — the teenage Jory and her boyfriend Andrew are allowed to attend prom after Andrew receives his vaccine against a deadly global outbreak. What song is featured at the prom?
a. “Don’t Stand So Close to Me” by The Police b. “All I Want Is You” by U2 c. “Forever Young” by Alphaville d. “Without You” by David Guetta
3) Geraldine Brooks’s “Year of Wonders” (2001) is based on the true history of Eyam, a small town in England which was afflicted by the bubonic plague in 1666. What first brings the plague to the village?
a. A box of infected fabrics from London
b. A visitor from Plymouth who unwittingly carried the disease into the community
c. A church gathering where the rector, having returned from London, was infected but not symptomatic
d. An infestation of rats
4) “I Am Legend,” the 2007 post apocalyptic thriller based on a 1957 novel by Richard Matheson, centers around a genetically re-engineered measles virus meant to cure cancer that goes rogue and turns people into vampire-like mutants called Darkseekers. The theatrical release featured one ending, but the 2008 DVD edition featured an alternate ending. What happens in the alternate ending?
a. Under attack, virologist Robert Neville, played by Will Smith, returns a female mutant on whom he has been conducting medical trials to her male companion, and realizes that, in the eyes of the Darkseekers, he’s a monster who experiments on the infected.
b. Under attack, Neville, having discovered a cure for the disease, gives a vial of blood containing the cure to a couple of other survivors of the outbreak before blowing up the Darkseekers and himself with a grenade.
c. Under attack, Neville and a couple of fellow survivors escape the Darkseekers by using the female mutant test subject as a decoy.
d. Neville cures the female mutant and realizes, in doing so, that she possesses information about the Darkseekers that he can use to eradicate the disease forever, setting the stage for a sequel.
5) The premise of HBO’s “The Last of Us” (2023), in which a fungus exerts mind control over the infected and turns them into zombies, is a scientific reality, though not in humans. What animals can fungi control for their own ends? a. birds b. insects and spiders c. worms d. certain kinds of amoeba
Answers:
1) c. P.D. James has said that “The Children of Men” was written in contemplation of the question “If there was no future, how would we behave?” In the book, people behave by elevating dolls, puppies, and kittens to the status of children; trying to encourage libido via pornography centers; and forcing people over the age of 60 to participate in a euphemistic-sounding mass suicide program called a Quietus. They do not, however, force men to take supplements, though a nonexistent sperm count is the reason for global infertility.
2) b. In “Contagion,” after a pig- and bat-borne virus rips through countries across the world, killing 26 million globally (the WHO estimates 14.9 million excess deaths related to COVID worldwide in 2020 and 2021) and wreaking havoc on the social order, a vaccine is finally developed, though there is a lottery to determine who can receive it. Andrew, having been vaccinated, arrives at Jory’s house for a twoperson prom held in her living room, where the couple dances to “All I Want Is You.”
3) a. A tailor, George Remington Viccars, develops symptoms of the bubonic plague after receiving a box of fabrics from London. Following his death, several villagers fall ill and die, and in the ensuing hysteria, other villagers murder the mother-daughter pair of village herbalists and midwives in the belief that they are witches.
4) a. In the original theatrical ending, Neville blows up himself and the attacking Darkseekers with a grenade to make sure that a vial of female mutant blood containing the mutation’s cure will remain safe with the two fellow survivors he has entrusted with it. In the alternate ending, Neville realizes that the Darkseekers have been hunting him in order to recover the female mutant he captured for medical purposes; the emotional reunion between the female and her Darkseeker mate prompts Neville to see himself in a new light — as the enemy rather than the hero.
5) b. The premise of the zombie video game-turned-HBO hit “The Last of Us” — a fungus hijacks the human brain, turning its hosts into zombies — is not a fiction for some insects and spiders, who, if unlucky enough to be infected, end up serving the fungi’s lusty desire to scatter itself as far as possible, throwing their bodies into stock tanks or walking long distances and then climbing trees to just the right height before their heads burst, showering the ground below with fungal spores.