"Yet there’s also something oddly poetic about the way in which so many artists - especially those working on the fringes of the system - return to civilization’s demise to craft their idiosyncratic entertainments. In a sense, they’re rebuilding society in their own image, commenting on a mainstream that never really expressed a desire to indulge their personal visions. So, in the absence of anything resembling normalcy, these rogues can play God, rebuilding while actively chiding those institutions that they always found stuffy, antiquated, or downright immoral. Because when you’ve reached the literal End, and there’s nothing left but rubble, dirt, and dust, all that's left is to do is create something shiny and bright in its place, hoping that those who remain will tune into a frequency which could very well save their lives."
Alexei lives.
The Holy Russian Empire shall endure.
There is much to be done.
— "The Silent Regent" description, The New Order: Last Days of Europe
We begin in the year 2293, and the apocalypse has come and gone. The Australians are wasting fossil fuels, the Japanese are punching people a lot, the Americans are taking potshots at mutants with portable nukes, and the British are doing... this.
"It's all over and I'm standin' pretty
In this dust that was a city
If I could find a souvenir
Just to prove the world was here"
In this dust that was a city
If I could find a souvenir
Just to prove the world was here"
— Nena, "99 Red Balloons"
"Oh we're so tired
Watching the world expire
Time that we retire
Up in cathedral spires".
Watching the world expire
Time that we retire
Up in cathedral spires".
— "Cathedral Spires" by Judas Priest
"The once green earth
Is scattered with horror and gray
No winners, just losers
Who die with a few months delay"
Is scattered with horror and gray
No winners, just losers
Who die with a few months delay"
— "Straight to Hell" by Running Wild
"The war is over
The crypt we now taste
In the late 1900's, there is no human race
We split the planet with atomic birth
Man has died
We seal the urn"
The crypt we now taste
In the late 1900's, there is no human race
We split the planet with atomic birth
Man has died
We seal the urn"
— "Beyond The Black" by Metal Church
"Not one will know of the war, not one
Will care at last when it is done.
Not one would care, neither bird nor tree
If mankind perished utterly.
And Spring herself, when she woke at dawn,
Would scarcely know that we were gone"
Will care at last when it is done.
Not one would care, neither bird nor tree
If mankind perished utterly.
And Spring herself, when she woke at dawn,
Would scarcely know that we were gone"
— "There Will Come Soft Rains", Sara Teasdale,
"Termination (termination)
Expiration (expiration)
Cancellation (cancellation): Human Race
Expectation (expectation)
Liberation (liberation)
Population (population) laid to waste
See our mother
Put to death
See our mother die
Smouldering decay
Take her breath away
Millions of our years
In minutes disappears
Darkening in vain
Decadence remains
All is said and done
Never is the sun
Never!"
Expiration (expiration)
Cancellation (cancellation): Human Race
Expectation (expectation)
Liberation (liberation)
Population (population) laid to waste
See our mother
Put to death
See our mother die
Smouldering decay
Take her breath away
Millions of our years
In minutes disappears
Darkening in vain
Decadence remains
All is said and done
Never is the sun
Never!"
— Metallica, "Blackened"
"Quiet now
Will we gather to conjure the rain down?
Or will we now
Build a civilization below ground?
And I'll be crowned the community kick-it-around"
Will we gather to conjure the rain down?
Or will we now
Build a civilization below ground?
And I'll be crowned the community kick-it-around"
— The Decemberists, "Calamity Song"
"Learn by heart this poem of mine
so, dead, I still will share the time
when you cannot endure a house
deprived of water, light, or gas,
and, stumbling out to find a cave,
roots, berries, nuts to stay alive,
get you a cudgel, find a well,
a bit of land, and, if it's held,
kill the owner, eat the corpse.
I'll trudge beside your faltering steps
between the ruins' broken stones,
whispering 'You are dead; you're done!
Where would you go? That soul you own
froze solid when you left your town.'
Learn by heart this poem of mine."
so, dead, I still will share the time
when you cannot endure a house
deprived of water, light, or gas,
and, stumbling out to find a cave,
roots, berries, nuts to stay alive,
get you a cudgel, find a well,
a bit of land, and, if it's held,
kill the owner, eat the corpse.
I'll trudge beside your faltering steps
between the ruins' broken stones,
whispering 'You are dead; you're done!
Where would you go? That soul you own
froze solid when you left your town.'
Learn by heart this poem of mine."
— György Faludy, Learn by Heart This Poem of Mine
They called it The Last War. Not because it was the last war that was fought, but because it was the last one that would ever be fought. It began over the usual shit, but this time the men in the fancy hats didn't know when to put their toys away. When it was over, it was over for good. The lakes were sand, the fields were ash and the cities were all cemeteries. Humanity was a cloud of dust blowing over everything it had built. Senators and their speeches, priests and their bibles... all they were now was soot that floated in the air and clogged in your nostrils. Cockroaches inherited the earth and mankind's survivors learned their ways. No law, faith, or creed would ever unite men again. There was nothing left to come together over, nothing left worth having. Of course, there was still plenty left to fight about.
— The opening for Weapon Brown
Four hundred centuries have passed since man stepped out into the cold depths of space. Forty thousand years. An age so long that its history lies shrouded in legend. Who knows how Mankind came to be scattered across a million disparate worlds? Who remembers the wars that tore ancient Earth asunder and dragged man down to the level of brute beasts? Who could recognise the names of Earth's ancient ruins, of nations destroyed and peoples long since crumbled to dust? To these questions, there can be no answers. From these times there come only whispers of horror and death.
"A long, long time ago, there weren't any monsters. People used to live in one place and never move. They worked in small rooms and slept in small rooms and only went outside to move between the rooms. We know this because sometimes we find books and papers in the ruins."
— Clorian, A Moment of Peace
"I do not know with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones."
The explosion that destroyed our city
Razed our home, transformed our fields into wasteland
Was nothing compare to what was now happening
To those who survived
Razed our home, transformed our fields into wasteland
Was nothing compare to what was now happening
To those who survived
— 65daysofstatic, "Another Code Against the Gone"
"'Thou Shalt Not Kill... And ye Shalt build up the old wastes...' Sounds like a mighty good book o' rules. Too bad they didn't listen..."
— Grandpa Squirrel, Peace on Earth
Oh, Gamesverse. So many collapses. They're standing on the shoulders of so many giants that their heads are brushing the upper atmosphere. Or would be, had most of the giants not tripped one another up, stabbed each other in the kidney and generally fallen over in various different ways, in ages past. So what they're really standing on is a pile of giants' skeletons, some of which have still-spiky bits of ribcage and femur sticking out to gore whoever's currently on top in the ankle.
— Aleph, author of Game Theory
"It was not, as some had predicted, the end of the world. Instead, the apocalypse was simply the prologue to another bloody chapter in human history."
— Ron Perlman, Fallout 3 intro monologue.
"There's a certain liberty in hopelessness, isn't there? 'Cause things can't get 101% fucked."
Cathy: Does the future always have to be post-apocalyptic?
Dewey: No, but it helps.
The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed. The desert was the apotheosis of all deserts, huge, standing to the sky for what might have been parsecs in all directions. White; blinding; waterless; without feature save for the faint, cloudy haze of the mountains which sketched themselves on the horizon and the devil-grass which brought sweet dreams, nightmares, death. An occasional tombstone sign pointed the way, for once the drifted track that cut its way through the thick crust of alkali had been a highway and coaches had followed it. The world had moved on since then. The world had emptied.
— The Gunslinger, book one of The Dark Tower
I travelled across the world — from the ruins of New York to the fusion mills of China, right across the radiation pits of Europe; and everywhere I went I saw people just like you, living as slaves.
— Martha Jones, Doctor Who, "Last of the Time Lords"
I'll try and continue this emergency broadcast for as long as we can hold out here. The city is almost completely deserted now. There are only a few stragglers left on the streets. There are no emergency services, the fires continue to burn out of control. This incredible epidemic of random mass killing has spread to every country in the civilized world. Every hour, more people are becoming infected, being driven to senseless acts of extreme violence. We have gotten reports - sketchy at best - of people... mutating, their bodies swelling and distorting. Changing, somehow. Locally, the mass killings appear to have moved inland. All the major cities on the East Coast are silent. We lost contact with Los Angeles and the West Coast last night, so it's impossible at this time to know how many unaffected people are left. If for any reason you are one of us who hasn't become infected, take shelter immediately. Do not trust any friends or family members. I repeat: do not tru-
—Emergency Radio Broadcast, In the Mouth of Madness - Ending via Killed Mid-Sentence.
Oh, my god. I'm back. I'm home. All the time, it was... we finally really did it. You maniacs! You blew it up! Ah, damn you! God damn you all to hell!
— Taylor, Planet of the Apes (1968) - Realizing it was Earth All Along.
"In the desert sun, every step that you take could be the final one
In the burning heat hanging on the edge of destruction
You can't stop the pain of your children crying out in your head
They always said that the living would envy the dead"
In the burning heat hanging on the edge of destruction
You can't stop the pain of your children crying out in your head
They always said that the living would envy the dead"
"There was a nuclear war. A few years from now, all this, this whole place, everything, it's gone. Just gone. There were survivors. Here, there. Nobody even knew who started it. It was the machines, Sarah."
—Kyle Reese, The Terminator
"Three billion human lives ended on August 29th, 1997. The survivors of the nuclear fire called the war Judgment Day. They lived only to face a new nightmare: the war against the machines."
—Sarah Connor, Terminator 2: Judgment Day
"There's nothing left to destroy in this world."
—Prisoner KSC2-303, Versus
"This is Earth. Mankind's violent nature had resulted in many civil wars and five great world wars.
During the last war, someone from somewhere launched a nuclear warhead into the South Pole. In a finishing blow to the existing problem of global warming, the water levels of the oceans rose, submerging most of the landmasses on the planet. The human population was decimated.
There were some who believed in the future... And some who fled underground... Despite their efforts, mankind perished."
During the last war, someone from somewhere launched a nuclear warhead into the South Pole. In a finishing blow to the existing problem of global warming, the water levels of the oceans rose, submerging most of the landmasses on the planet. The human population was decimated.
There were some who believed in the future... And some who fled underground... Despite their efforts, mankind perished."
— "From Man to Squid" comic, The Art of Splatoon
"This is the future. The world as we knew it is gone. Acid rain has left the land barren and the water toxic. Scarred by endless wars humanity struggles to survive in the ruins of the old world, frozen in an everlasting nuclear winter. This is the future... This is the year 1997."
—Frederic, Turbo Kid
"After a million of years of pollution, war, and untold abuses from man— Earth has been simply used up! It's just a contaminated globe of waste material now!"
"Listen up, cause I'm only telling you this once. I'm not bedtime story lady, so pay attention. It's 2033. The world is *screwed* now. You see, a while ago this humongous comet came crashing into the earth. Bam, total devastation. End of the world as we know it. No celebrities, no cable TV, no water. It hasn't rained in 11 years. Now 20 people gotta squeeze inside the same bathtub - so it ain't all bad."
—Tank Girl, Tank Girl
"In the third millennium, the world changed. Climate, nations, all were in upheaval. The Earth transformed into a poisonous, scorched desert, known as "The Cursed Earth". Millions of people crowded into a few Megacities, where roving bands of street savages created violence the justice system could not control. Law, as we know it, collapsed. From the decay rose a new order, a society ruled by a new, elite force. A force with the power to dispense both justice and punishment. They were the police, jury and executioner all in one. They were the Judges."
—Narrator, Judge Dredd
"That day, humanity was executed. The righteous and the sinful were called to be rendered according to their deeds. And we hid from God's sight in the Metro, and we were saved from His wrath. And He apparently decided that flushing us out wasn't worth the trouble. Then He went about His business, or perhaps, died. While we stayed on this used up and discarded Earth and continued just going with it... Going nowhere."
— Artyom, Metro: Last Light
"Long ago, two races ruled over Earth: HUMANS and MONSTERS. One day, they all disappeared without a trace."
Bernard: My children are the buried seeds of life. When that time comes, the thing itself will open up the door, and my children will go out to inherit the Earth.
Freya: What Earth, Bernard? What Earth will you leave them? After all that Man has made, and still has to make! (crying) Is this the extent of your dream? To set nine ice-cold children free, in the ashes of the universe?
"So how did science fiction move from "Things are gonna get bad!" to "Things are straight up gonna end!"? The answer's simple: The Cold War. In 1955, the Soviet Union tested their first hydrogen bomb, and it became clear to the world that, for the first time in human history, we really did have the power to wipe everything out."
"It's all right, I've planned ahead. We're just three miles from a primary target. A millisecond of brilliant light and we're vaporized. Much more fortunate than the millions who'll wander sightless through the smoldering aftermath. We'll be spared the horror of survival."
— Dr. Stephen Falken, WarGames
For the end of the world was long ago,
And all we dwell to-day
As children of some second birth,
Like a strange people left on earth
After a judgment day.
For the end of the world was long ago,
When the ends of the world waxed free,
When Rome was sunk in a waste of slaves,
And the sun drowned in the sea.
When Caesar's sun fell out of the sky
And whoso hearkened right
Could only hear the plunging
Of the nations in the night.
When the ends of the earth came marching in
To torch and cresset gleam.
And the roads of the world that lead to Rome
Were filled with faces that moved like foam,
Like faces in a dream.
And all we dwell to-day
As children of some second birth,
Like a strange people left on earth
After a judgment day.
For the end of the world was long ago,
When the ends of the world waxed free,
When Rome was sunk in a waste of slaves,
And the sun drowned in the sea.
When Caesar's sun fell out of the sky
And whoso hearkened right
Could only hear the plunging
Of the nations in the night.
When the ends of the earth came marching in
To torch and cresset gleam.
And the roads of the world that lead to Rome
Were filled with faces that moved like foam,
Like faces in a dream.
"This is one of the cities built by colonizing humanoids ages ago... History tell us they finally left this world because of terrific climatic changes!"
— Brainiac 5, "The Unknown Legionnaire"
"Death clears space for new life; it is the non-negotiable price of admission to the great banquet of existence."
—Why Understanding Limits Is the Key to Humanity's Future
by Richard Heinberg
by Richard Heinberg