TOPICS: SCI-FI & THE APOCALYPSE in Spring 2026 (CM2910A)

We are living in an epoch many call the ”Anthropocene,” or “The Age of Man” – where human activities have had such an impact on the Earth that it is entering a new geologic age. How has the Anthropocene, and its associated apocalypse, been imagined in film? This course explores different visions – and realities – of how the world ends, as found through the history of cinema. We unpack the ways these imaginaries reflect the current sociopolitical and environmental fears of the time. Though these films are science-fiction, they enact genuine fears and concerns that can have real political and societal consequences. We will chart films about monsters, giant ants and other mutants, tsunamis, earthquakes and volcanoes, WWII American war films, asteroids, aliens, zombies, pandemics, the atomic bomb, the post-nuclear dystopias, to techno-fixes-gone-wrong. We will veer left towards comedy, right towards horror, and straight towards science-fiction, while always trying to understand the historical context each of these films engages with. We will also transcend the apocalypse to look at films from cultures whose worlds have already ended – what are their visions of the future now, post-apocalypse?