Film / Deep Impact

Heaven and Earth are about to collide.

In 1998, Hollywood almost destroyed the Earth from space. Twice. This is about the one that didn't involve Bruce Willis.

Deep Impact is a 1998 sci-fi/drama Disaster Movie released by Paramount Pictures in the United States and DreamWorks SKG internationally (with the former later gaining the latter's share of the film by purchasing the studio in 2006). The film was directed by Mimi Leder, and stars Elijah Wood, Téa Leoni, Morgan Freeman and Robert Duvall. It is loosely based on a book by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle called Lucifer's Hammer.

The plot is roughly divided into these plot-lines:

• A Teen Genius (Wood) and amateur astronomer who discovers what turns out to be a previously unknown comet. He strongly values his girlfriend (Leelee Sobieski).
• An Intrepid Reporter for MSNBC (Leoni) who thinks she's found a scandal when she asks a just-resigned cabinet member (James Cromwell) about "Ellie." Due to a misunderstanding, she believes "Ellie" is his mistress; the White House believes she's uncovered the truth and treats her accordingly, chasing her down with the FBI. She has an irascible father (Maximilian Schell) from whom she is estranged and a virtuous single mom (Vanessa Redgrave) as a boss, whose insistence on giving her lame stories is why she's so ambitious.
• The president (Freeman), who announces some months late that an ELE—an Extinction Level Event—threatens the earth. But he has several plans involving a large underground bunker and a special shuttle.
• The crew of the special shuttle sent to save the world from disaster; the younger members of which (Ron Eldard, Mary McCormack, Blair Underwood, and Jon Favreau) are a little grumpy about having an old-timer along (Duvall).

Although the film's premise is similar to that of the more famous Armageddon (1998) of the same year, the two movies are only superficially similar otherwise. Deep Impact is a drama movie first and foremost, and unlike the action-packed Armageddon, focuses mostly on depicting the effects of the meteor's impending arrival.

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This film contains examples of:

• Action Film, Quiet Drama Scene: Aging pilot "Fish" Tanner consoles the recently-blinded Oren after their mission's failure, and then reads Moby-Dick to him.
• Altar the Speed: Leo and Sarah quickly get married so her family can join his in the Ark. But her name still doesn't get onto the list.
• America Saves the Day: There's an all-American crew of astronauts heading out to destroy the world-ending comet, notwithstanding the token Russian cosmonaut. The smaller comet lands in the Atlantic; that this also affects Europe, Africa, South America and the Caribbean is passed over in one line of a speech.
• Apathetic Citizens:
  • The throngs (far too many to simply be facing death with dignity) in New York City still calmly going about their business downtown even though the President has warned that the Eastern seaboard (including New York City) is about to be destroyed by a tidal wave.
  • There seems to be massive public indifference to the comet's existence for over half a year, all the way up until the Messiah fails in its initial mission. At the press conference where the story is broken to the world, there is a brief agitated murmur when the President makes his announcement...and then everyone either calms down or (in the case of the news media) scrambles to find out anything they can about comets or natural disasters in order to make for must-see TV news coverage. Immediately after this sequence, there are some inappropriately lighthearted scenes, first of Leo Biederman receiving honors from his school for discovering the comet and being told that he is now going to lose his virginity, then of the younger astronauts chatting at a backyard barbecue and then in a country-and-western-themed bar, bragging and putting down Spurgeon Tanner.
• Apocalypse Anarchy: When the American President reveals that a comet is on a crash-course for Earth, he immediately attempts to head it off by declaring martial law and invoking emergency powers to freeze wages and prices. This is shown to be mostly successful: barring a few riots, society keeps functioning. Things start breaking down as the comet's impact grows imminent and the government retreats to its shelters, with the entire East Coast attempting to evacuate at once (with predictable results).
• Apocalypse How: If the comet hit in full, it would've caused a Class 2 for humanity with select survivors protected by shelters, and a Class 4-5 for the rest of Earth's biosphere due to the ensuing impact winter. Though the larger chunk of the split comet is stopped, the smaller chunk does cause a major Class 0 to Class 1, creating a Giant Wall of Watery Doom in the Atlantic which destroys the U.S. East Coast, Europe and Western Africa, and a view from space shows the Caribbean islands having more than a little problem on their hands.
• Apocalyptic Gag Order: The Intrepid Reporter actually thought she was chasing a cheating scandal or a disgraced politician scandal. But the President's people thought that she knew the truth about the incoming comet and treated her as such. The President shows some knowledge that something this huge is impossible to keep secret for long, and takes the appearance of the reporter to mean the jig is up: people are beginning to notice something's going on, and even if they silence this reporter, another will come along shortly. The information goes public a couple of weeks later, and the President issues orders on national television intended to keep society together as long as possible: no price gouging on gas, water, or other necessities.
• The Ark: It's not mobile, but the underground bunker is specifically called "the Ark" by one of its security staff, and cages of wild animals are seen being brought inside to preserve them.
• Artistic License: The Messiah is taken into space by a rocket called The Orion which, like its hypothetical counterpart, is nuclear powered. However, rather than being propelled by a series of nuclear detonations, it is depicted as having a continuous conventional thrust. It could be something like a NERVA rocket, but then the name doesn't make much sense, and it's not really suitable as an ascent stage anyway.
• Artistic License – Physics: Several around the climax.
  • A comet the size of Biederman passing so "close" overhead would have at least blinded and more likely incinerated everyone on the highway.
  • While a tsunami or wave surge of some kind would have been likely, the East Coast-flooding megatsunami would be highly improbable, given the angle that Biederman impacted; it would have been more likely to devastate Europe and Africa than the United States.
  • Finally, shattering a comet's mass in the atmosphere is not a viable tactic. It does nothing to its actual energy and so the friction of that much material entering the atmosphere will still cause the same global firestorm an impact and the resulting high velocity fallout does. Small asteroids burn harmlessly in the atmosphere because they are small. Any fragment left dozens of meters across or larger is at least a large nuclear bomb.
• Bittersweet Ending: The larger chunk of asteroid is blown up by the team of astronauts sent to destroy it, thus sparing humanity, but the smaller chunk hits and causes massive damage and millions of deaths. In addition to that, the astronauts were forced to drive their ship into the larger chunk of the asteroid which cost their lives as well, and they are also grieved by their families.
• Blinded by the Light: In a very literal sense. Commander Oren Monash is permanently blinded when he fails to close his face shield before being exposed to unfiltered sunlight on the surface of the comet.
• Chekhov's Gun: The dirt bike that Chuck, Sarah's father, bought. Leo uses it to find Sarah as they're fleeing the coast.
• Citywide Evacuation: The Biederman fragment of the comet will impact the Atlantic ocean, causing a massive tsunami that will destroy many coastal cities. New York City (and presumably others) is evacuated once this becomes clear.
• Colony Drop: By the comet Wolf-Biederman. After the Messiah mission only creates two chunks, the smaller comet is named Biederman (which hits in the Atlantic Ocean) and the larger one is named Wolf (which was calculated to hit Western Canada, but was fortunately destroyed).
• Comet of Doom: A comet is set to impact Earth and bring another extinction-level event.
• Cool Starship: The Messiah and its Orion Drive. In the movie, it's supposed to be the most ambitious spacecraft ever developed by man.
• Creator Provincialism: The Beiderman comet splashes down in the Atlantic Ocean - specifically, in Cape Hatteras, which is just off North Carolina. North America, South America, western Europe and western Africa all get swamped by the massive tsunami; Asia and Australia are apparently completely spared. That alone could be handwaved, at least until we learn the other comet will hit the Earth nowhere else than Canada, disregarding the fact how improbable it would be for it to land less than 3000 miles away from the first impact zone. In any case, with a few exceptions, the entire film takes place either around New York, Washington DC, or "in the soft limestone hills of Missouri."
• Cruel and Unusual Death: Gus Partenza is blasted into space by an outflow of gas, and dies either by starving to death, freezing to death, or being burned alive by the radiation of the sun.
• Danger Deadpan: Andrea, while the Messiah is flying up into the comet, is completely unflustered by the house-sized rocks passing by. In fact the whole Messiah crew usually fall into this, even while discussing their suicide mission towards the end. They are astronauts/cosmonauts after all.
• Dead Guy Junior: Oren lives just long enough to know that his wife named their son after him.
• Deadpan Snarker: The entire crew of the Messiah, but particularly Spurgeon Tanner and Dr. Gus Partenza.
• Deathbed Confession: Played for Black Comedy. Jenny gives up her seat on the escape helicopter to face The End of the World as We Know It with her estranged father. She finds him standing on the beach waiting for the tsunami, and the following conversation takes place.
  Jenny Lerner: When I was 11, I stole $32 from your wallet.
  Jason Lerner: When you were a baby I once dropped you on your head.
• Death of a Child: We clearly see children among the masses of people trying in vain to escape the torrent of water that destroys the East Coast. Also subverted as Leo and Sarah manage to haul the latter's infant brother to higher ground where it's safe.
• Demoted to Extra: Dougray Scott appears intermittently throughout the start and middle of the film. At the climax, while drawing straws for the last seat on a helicopter, there are hints that he and Tea Leoni's character are in some sort of relationship, though their main interactions must have been lost to editing.
• Deus ex Nukina: A group of nukes is used to break up the asteroid.
• Disaster Movie: A giant comet on a collision course with Earth. The final disaster is minimized thanks to the Messiah's actions but there's still a lot of destruction and loss of life by the time the credits roll.
• Distant Reaction Shot: The comet Beiderman enters the atmosphere and leaves a titanic smoking trail across the sky. Helpless people stand and watch as it plummets towards Earth. Then it hits in the Atlantic ocean, and before there's even a sound, the camera cuts to an outer-space view that shows the tremendous shockwave clearing away clouds for thousands of miles, and a funnel of flames rises from ground zero all the way to the ionosphere. Likewise, when the Messiah plunges into the depths of the larger, deadlier ''Wolf'' comet, the camera follows it almost all the way through... then we cut to the exterior of the comet as it explodes into harmless chunks.
• Double-Meaning Title: The meteor makes a deep impact with Earth, the fallout leaves a deep impact on society.
• Driven to Suicide: Implied with Jenny's mother who is seen changing into an evening dress and putting on jewelry shortly before Jenny is called to a hospital and given the necklace in an envelope.
• Dull Surprise: Téa Leoni's performance in this film has been criticised as falling into this. She does okay as the Smug Snake Intrepid Reporter looking for a political scandal. It's when the end of the world is confirmed and she has to show she has hidden depths, that her acting takes a turn for the worse.
• Earth-Shattering Poster: The poster has a meteor impacting Earth and actually followed through on that promise.
• Elaborate Underground Base: Created to put a million people underground for 2 years.
• Embarrassing First Name: Spurgeon Tanner, which became "Sturgeon," which became "Fish," and all on his first day at the naval academy.
• Emergency Presidential Address: The President makes the announcement about Wolf–Biederman, and then makes another announcement that the Messiah has failed but there are back up plans with the Titan missiles and the caves (the Ark). This is followed by a third announcement after the Titan missiles fail, which is to confirm that disaster is coming — and if anyone has any way at all to get out of the path of destruction they better get going.
• Every Car Is a Pinto: The astronomer who discovers a comet capable of ending humanity races from his observatory to tell the world, only to run off the side of the road. On the very first bounce against the rocks on the way down the cliff, the car explodes in spectacular fashion.
• Explain, Explain... Oh, Crap!: Subdued because of how fast the rest of the Messiah crew accepts it (including one of them joking about how they will all get schools named after them), but in the final act as Tanner explains his idea of using the remaining nukes to blow up the bigger "Wolf" part of the comet, all of them keep asking how Tanner expected them to do an EVA with their damaged ship before Oren (who figured it out quicker) bluntly says "we don't".
• Face Death with Dignity
  • "Look on the bright side. We'll all have high schools named after us." Also counts as "Facing the Bullets" One-Liner.
  • The families that knew they couldn't outrun the wave and chose to send their last moments in meaningful, loving embrace rather than futile panic.
• Failed a Spot Check: When the tsunami hits Manhattan, we see a man in a park reading a newspaper who doesn't notice the massive wave destroying the city until it swamps him. Doubly hilarious because everyone knew the asteroid was supposed to hit on that day, so even assuming someone did print a newspaper that morning, there would be nothing else worth reporting. Since he looks over 70 and wouldn't be eligible for the Ark as a result, it could be another instance of Face Death with Dignity.
• Fatal Family Photo:
  • When Jenny's estranged father returns and gives her several family photos, it begins a series of events where Jenny gives up the chance to escape the mega-tsunami created by the smaller half of the comet and spends her last moments with her father.
  • Tanner sticks a photo of his late wife and his sons on the flight console when they first land on the comet, and looks at it right before commencing their Heroic Sacrifice.
• Free-Range Children: As Sarah's father is chaining up his motorcycle and putting bars on the window of his house because society is breaking down as the comet approaches, his daughter is away from home, by herself. True, she's an older teen - but it certainly provides some dissonance as to what her father really cares about.
• Fulton Street Folly: Justified, in that the tidal wave naturally takes out the part of Manhattan Island that faces the bay.
• Fun with Acronyms: Jenny spends the initial chunk of her character arc mistakenly assuming that the "Ellie" everybody in Capitol Hill is worriedly whispering about is a mistress only to discover with an early Nineties Wiki-walk that it's the acronym for Extinction Level Event.
• Gallows Humor: After the initial plan to destroy the comet fails, splitting it in two and putting the smaller fragment on an irreversible trajectory towards Earth, it's determined that nothing can be done about the smaller piece, so the crew of the Messiah decide that the only way to destroy the larger fragment is to fly inside it and use the remaining nukes to blast it into dust. When one of the crew members asks how they're supposed to accomplish that when they have almost no fuel to maneuver properly, never mind return to Earth, it dawns on the others that they won't be going back to Earth. Another crew member then quips: "Well, look on the bright side. We'll all have high schools named after us."
• Government Conspiracy: Played more realistically than most, they can only keep it secret for about a year. But still, constructing an Elaborate Underground Base requiring thousands of people and a new spacecraft? Surely someone would have blabbed sooner.
• Heroic Sacrifice: Though the crew of the Messiah counts (see below) counts, it's more about Jenny's last-second choice to give up her space on the Ark to a coworker and her baby daughter. This allows her to finally reunite and make peace with her father.
• Hollywood Science: The four nuclear devices causing a clean cut in the comet (as shown in a graphic in the movie) is impossible on several levels.
• Hope Spot: When the impact wave hits New York, people can be seen running out onto the roofs of several skyscrapers. And then we see that the wave eclipsed even the Twin Towers, the tallest buildings in the city...
• Hope Springs Eternal: The tagline for the movie is "Oceans rise. Cities fall. Hope survives."
• I Need a Freaking Drink: Jenny downs an entire martini when meeting her father, because she has just realized the world is going to end.
• I Warned You: President Beck tells his advisor Entrekin "See? What did I tell you?" when Jenny says they should have picked a better cover story than "sick wife."
• Idiot Ball: The astronomer in the beginning panicking about his discovery. He knew the world had well over a year until impact, yet still drove recklessly despite how precious his cargo of information was. Not to mention he didn't try to phone anyone about it until he was driving, rather than calling from the observatory.
• Impeded Messenger: Astronomer Marcus Wolf (Smith), who realizes that the object is a comet on a collision course with Earth, tries to get the information out, but dies in a car accident before he can alert the world.
• Indy Ploy: The Intrepid Reporter thinks she's investigating a sex scandal involving a woman called Ellie...until the moment the President of the United States enters the room and demands "What do you know about the E.L.E?" She has to bluff out a response on the spot.
• In Space, Everyone Can See Your Face: Averted. As the astronauts worked on the dark side of the comet their face shields were open, only closing them as the Sun approached the horizon. This scene also realistically portrays the effects of failing to use face shields when one astronaut fails to close their shield in time. The exposure of only a few seconds results in immediate permanent blindness and severe sunburn.
• It Has Been an Honor: The astronauts Spurgeon and Andy, the former being the aged mission commander and the latter one of his subordinates, tell each other that "it's been an honour" just before they detonate the nukes on their ship to blow up the meteor from within.
  Andy: It's been a pleasure serving with you, Commander.
  Tanner: The honor's all mine, Andy.
• Just Before the End: While society remains intact and humanity survives, there are a lot of moments where people feel like they’re waiting for the end as the early efforts to destroy the approaching comets fail. There are Citywide Evacuations into the mountains, lotteries to select who will be evacuated to bunkers, a spike in suicides, and people who end up milling around the coastlines to cling to some semblance of routine as they wait for their deaths.
• Last Wish Marriage: Happens to the main character and his girlfriend. Despite being very young teenagers, they want to (and are allowed to) get married due to the possibility that they might die soon anyway because of the meteor.
• Lottery of Doom: Inverted—there is a lottery for the limited space in the underground bunker.
• Made of Explodium: The astronomer's jeep, which is run off the road by a semi and explodes in midair.
• May–December Romance: This is one of the reasons the reporter, Jenny Lerner, resents her father: In her own mother's words: "You now have a stepmother who is two years older than you". In the end, his father's wife abandons him when the comet is about to hit Earth, something she feels well deserved for him.
• Meaningful Name: The shuttle sent to destroy the comet and save the Earth is named "Messiah." Fittingly, the Messiah and its crew sacrifice themselves to save humanity. Also, novice reporter Jenny Lerner.
• The Medic: Dr. Gus Partenza serves as this for the Messiah, though he isn’t able to put his skills to use on account of being the first of the crew to die.
• Messianic Archetype: In a literal and symbolic sense, the Messiah really does save the Earth with its final Heroic Sacrifice.
• Monumental Damage: The Statue of Liberty, Brooklyn Bridge, Washington Square Arch, Times Square and the World Trade Center are all seen getting swallowed up by the tsunami, with the Twin Towers being the only buildings visible poking out of the water after it hits; one of the towers leaning up against the other. Later on, while we don't see it being destroyed, the US Capitol Building is shown to be in ruins and under extensive renovation during the president's speech.
• Monumental Damage Resistance: A brief (but iconic) shot of New York after it is flooded by the impact's tidal wave shows the Statue of Liberty's head and a seemingly intact yellow taxi being slowly moved by the current. This is after we've seen the statue, Brooklyn Bridge and Washington Square Arch destroyed with the detail that the best computer effects allowed in 1998.
• Mood Motif: The moment where Jenny hits the net to find out what ELE is — and discovers it stands for Extinction Level Event, thus making her understand why the White House is willing to go to extremes to keep it secret.
• The Mountains of Illinois
  • Well, at least it was the same state...
  • The hill Leo proposes to Sarah on is rather obviously in Southern California.
• Mr. Exposition: Most of President Beck's scenes consist of him addressing the nation and explaining what is going to happen.
• Nice Guy: Tanner.
• The Night That Never Ends: The president explicitly states after the comet splits in two that the larger piece will cause an impact winter that will darken the Earth's skies for two years.
  "All plant life will be dead within... four weeks. Animal life within... a few months."
• Noah's Story Arc: The underground refuge, designed to ensure continuity of the species in the face of an impending extinction-force impact, is called the Arc.
• No Antagonist: There is practically no villainous behavior on anyone's part, and of course we can't hate the comet for doing what Nature intended for it. At the announcement, President Beck announces he is freezing all wages and prices, ensuring that no one will be able to take quick advantage of the crisis. Secretary Rittenhouse and Jenny's stepmother seem to be designated villains at the beginning; the stepmom is Put on a Bus and never heard from again, and Rittenhouse is quickly revealed to have resigned as quietly as possible for pragmatic reasons (he doesn't believe the Messiah project will work and wants to prepare for impact with his family).
• Noah's Story Arc: The underground refuge, designed to ensure continuity of the species in the face of an impending extinction-force impact, is called the Arc.
• No Endor Holocaust: The movie generally plays its physics straight, with three notable exceptions that stop it from being a cold exercise:
  • The smaller comet (Biederman) should have blinded everyone watching it on its incredibly low flight towards the ocean, that is if it didn't pulp them outright with shockwaves.
  • There is no apparent impact winter from Biederman, which it alone is easily energetic enough to create.
  • The big one: Destroying an object the size Wolf on the edge of the atmosphere would accomplish nothing. All of that energy is still going directly into Earth, except distributed across the entire facing side of the atmosphere rather than punching through into the ground. At a bare minimum, the atmospheric heating from that much material would burned North America (Biederman hits near the Atlantic Seaboard and Wolf is slated to strike Western Canada) to a crisp.
• Not So Stoic: President Beck's first news conference is routine, with only a brief pause as he contemplates what Messiah failure would mean. He progressively loses composure over the following months as he has to inform the nation of worsening developments.
• One Dialogue, Two Conversations:
  • This occurs early in the film when Jenny is asking Allen Rittenhause about "Ellie" in connection with his resigning as U.S. Treasury Secretary. She assumes the name is a woman he was having an affair and he assumes that she knows that "Ellie" is really "ELE" (Extinction Level Event)—information on the upcoming comet impact. He thinks she is asking him about his discussions with the President about the comet and she thinks he is just talking about an extramarital affair.
  Jenny: [to herself after finishing the interview]: "Biggest story in history"? What an ego!
  • It happens again when Jenny is brought before the President, who spells out "ELE" as he asks what she knows. Realizing something is up, Jenny acts like she knows more than she really does. Thus, the President is convinced she's about to break this and they need to get ahead with a press conference. It's not until she checks the Internet that Jenny realizes what she's really stumbled on but naturally never tells the President she had no idea.
  • In a sense, it occurs for a third time when Jenny is speaking with her father and stepmother. They believe her erratic behavior is due to her dislike of their marriage. While this is the case, Jenny has just realized the truth behind the government cover-up, but cannot reveal anything.
• One-Way Trip:
  Mark: How do we set the nukes inside the comet and get out before they blow?
  Orin Monash: We don't.
• Orion Drive: The Messiah, the spaceship sent to nuke the meteor, has an Orion Pulse Drive.
• Outrun the Fireball: The young man who was the co-discoverer of the asteroid that strikes earth, and is creating a tidal wave 3000 feet high striking near Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, basically destroying the Eastern Seaboard of the United States and probably anything within 1,000 miles, and moving across land at 1100 miles per hour is trying to outrun the tidal wave on a motorbike! His wife is riding on the bike with him.
• The Peter Principle: Jenny Lerner wasn't exactly a great reporter in the first place but got very lucky - and ended up being a stiff, nervous anchor (though, in her defense, under the circumstances, anyone would have been nervous).
• Precision F-Strike: The film largely sticks to PG-13 language but a few F-bombs slip through. During Jenny's initial investigation she speaks to Rittenhouse's former secretary who says his sudden retirement (metaphorically) fucked her. Tulchinsky drops another while trying to convince Sturgeon to go after Gus when the latter's blown into space.
• Product Placement: For MSNBC. Leoni's character was originally supposed to work for CNN, but they rejected the offer, saying it would be "inappropriate." MSNBC jumped at the opportunity, since their network had only just been founded and wanted to get exposure. Ironically, the film's rights-holders Paramount is now under common ownership with CBS while MSNBC, and NBC News as a while, is co-owned with rival studio Universal.
• Promotion to Parent: Sarah Biederman is forced into the role as her parents outfit her with carrier, diaper bag, and baby so she and Leo can get safely to high ground before the meteor strike floods and kills everyone at ground level. Sarah's parents don't even bother trying to get to high ground themselves. They just stand there and gaze at each other with resigned affection. That's kinda justified, in that the water was already coming, and the only reason they had the opportunity for her to get to safety is that her boyfriend just showed up on a bike looking for her and they couldn't exactly fit four grown people and a baby on a single bike.
• Reasonable Authority Figure: Once the existence of the comet is revealed to the world, President Beck is quite open and honest with the public about what's going to happen, and while he remains hopeful, he doesn't mince words when it's clear that things are not going well.
• Reports of My Death Were Greatly Exaggerated: The first public announcement about Wolf-Biederman makes it sound like both Dr. Wolf and Leo Biederman died in the same accident. Leo and his family are slightly bemused to hear his name crop up during the broadcast. During an assembly at his school Leo guesses that because Dr. Wolf put both their names on his notes the officials who investigated got confused and thought Leo was also dead.
• Rousing Speech: President Beck is quite good at giving these, though most of them are bittersweet, in that they're meant to help people prepare themselves for the end. His final speech is a straight example, though.
  The President: We watched as the bombs shattered the second comet into a million pieces of ice and rock that burned harmlessly in our atmosphere and lit up the sky for an hour. Still, we were left with the devastation of the first. The waters reached as far inland as the Ohio and Tennessee Valleys. It washed away farms and towns, forests and skyscrapers. But, the water receded. The wave hit Europe and Africa too. Millions were lost, and countless more left homeless. But the waters receded. Cities fall, but they are rebuilt. And heroes die, but they are remembered. We honor them with every brick we lay, with every field we sow, With every child we comfort, and then teach to rejoice in what we have been re-given. Our planet. Our home. So now, let us begin.
• Rule of Drama: Used very conspicuously in the shuttle storyline. The mission to blow up the comet is entrusted to an aging veteran who hasn't been in space in years and a bunch of unqualified technicians who have never been in space at all nor ever manned a spacecraft outside of simulations.
• Russian Humour: At the barbecue, the Russian cosmonaut is chatting up some American girls by describing the Orion drive and saying it was built by the same guys who built Chernobyl. One of the girls is put off a little by this, and he replies, "Well, Chernobyl almost worked."
• Shown Their Work:
  • To be fair, most of the science is pretty realistic, and certainly a lot more realistic than Armageddon (1998).
  • The piece of the comet that hits the Atlantic Ocean produces a radial impact and mushroom cloud appropriate for a kinetic impactor.^note striking with such force that its components are rent by the force of the impact
• Soft Water: A wave that tall would have scoured the entire East Coast to the bedrock.
• Someone Has to Die: The crew of the spaceship Messiah sacrifice themselves so that everyone on Earth can survive.
• Spotting the Thread: When talking to the President who spells out "E.L.E.", Jenny realizes the spelling of that is off and plays like she knows more than she does. As the President goes on about how they couldn't hide so much spent money in the budget and talks to his Chief of Staff, Jenny looks around the large room and spots that it's stacked with at least a ton of bottled water and various canned foods and it hits her something far more serious is going on.
• Suicide Mission: The crew of the spaceship Messiah assign themselves one last mission, well aware of the fact that the remaining nukes to destroy the comet will have to be armed and detonated inside the Messiah cargo bay.^note Not that they will end up any deader this way than if they sat back and let the Earth get totalled.
• Sunken City: An asteroid impacts into the Atlantic, causing giant tsunami waves and flooding over the East Coast, Western Europe, and West Africa, though New York is the only city shown.
• Tagline: "Oceans rise. Cities fall. Hope survives."
• Take Care of the Kids: When Sarah's parents realize they can't escape before the meteor-induced flood hits, they ask Sarah to take her baby brother and get to high ground with Leo. The parents die, but both teenagers and the baby survive.
• Television Geography: It's to be expected in a film of this size:
  • Sarah's family is fleeing inland from Richmond, Virginia—stuck on the highway by a sign saying "Virginia Beaches 6 miles". Richmond is MUCH farther than 6 miles from the coast.
  • There are no big hills such as the one Leo and Sarah find safety on within 6 miles of the coast there.
• Together in Death: Jenny gives up her seat on the escape helicopter to reunite with her estranged father at their beach house, which puts them at the front line when the tidal wave from Beiderman hits. Sarah's parents, having sent her and their baby son off with Leo, spend their last moments looking into each other's eyes rather than trying to outrun the wave themselves. When the Messiah crew are saying goodbye to their families via video link Sturgeon mentions his late wife and how he's going to be seeing her again soon.
• Too Dumb to Live:
  • Sarah's parents. They let their child refuse to go into the ark tunnel and then when Leo comes back for her, they don't try to follow on foot just because he has a motorbike. And yet they're redeemed, when they spend their last few moments in each other's arms, giving each other a loving hug.
  • After being found by the FBI and taken before the President, Jenny says "I'm expected back at MSNBC at 6." Evidently it didn't occur to her that, being a Government Conspiracy, it wouldn't take much effort for them to arrange an "accident." Of course, President Beck wouldn't sink that low, but she might have not been that lucky if a different politician was in power.
  • You would think that the idea to send out an additional spaceship (preferably more than one) tasked with nuking the asteroid in the unlikely scenario the first Messiah crew would fail their mission would have occurred to somebody involved in putting together the most critical project in the history of mankind.
  • The fact that, despite it being outright told that one fragment of the comet will cause a massive tsunami that will affect a ton of countries and kill millions, that people will do everything they can to get out of its way. Cue the impact, when you see millions of people either still in cities like nothing is happening, or even on vacation rather than on a plane or somewhere that won't fall victim to the tsunami, like a mountain.
• Trailers Always Lie: According to Morgan Freeman's narration in the official trailer, two comets were discovered heading for Earth. In the actual movie, there is only one comet to start with; the other one is actually a large piece of the first, nuked off by the Messiah crew.
• Trailers Always Spoil: The trailer compresses the whole movie into 3 1/2 minutes without anything important cut out.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: We never find out if Jenny's young stepmother survived the tidal wave caused by the comet impact. The subplot about the resigning U.S. Treasury Secretary wanting to spend time with his daughter and sick wife is also dropped without resolution early on.
• While Rome Burns: Jenny ends up spending her time at home with her dad as a huge comet approaches the Earth. A minute later, as a huge wave is destroying New York, we see a man on a park bench quietly reading a newspaper just before he's swept away. One wonders what could have possibly been in the newspaper... He's reading a DAILY NEWS with the headline Comet to City: 'DROP DEAD' (a nod to the Daily News headline back in 1975 referring to President Ford) and the sports page at the back says GAME OVER.
• Window Love: One of the shuttle astronauts shares Window Love with the infant son he's never seen and still can't see, because he's been flash-blinded and about to make a Heroic Sacrifice by way of a video screen.
• You Are in Command Now: Commander Oren Monash is blinded while on the comet, so Captain Tanner takes command of the Messiah.
• Your Days Are Numbered: As soon as the Wolf–Biederman comet is revealed to the public, the world is told the projected timeline for the impact. First, the countdown to the Messiah mission begins, then to the actual catastrophe.

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