On this day in history, back in 2009, two satellites in low-earth orbit smashed into each other. The impact wrecked both objects. The incident between Iridium 33 and Kosmos-2251 was a first, which is saying something considering there’s A LOT of junk floating around our beautiful blue planet. The idea of space junk brings me here, to you, fair reader. Because just like science often leads humans to create more junk, people also make movies about science that are absolute junk. However, there is hope. Even bad science fiction movies have some pretty clever parts. Maybe, just maybe, if those clever parts are smashed together with the clever parts of other bad films, it might make for a good movie. It might also make for a bad movie that’s fun to watch. Either way, win-win!
Ultimate Science Fiction Movie Mashup!
Bicentennial Man and The Happening
It’s an epic science fiction battle between the last hope of man and the planet itself. In The Bicentennial Happening it’s just moments after the last humans have died at the hands of mother nature, but one man created an artificial life-form — Bicentennial Man. The Android is unaffected by mother nature’s assaults, and shit gets weird. The planet begins to build elaborate ways to destroy Bicentennial Man who is busy using his super strength to punch his way down to the core of the world. Down there, Bicentennial Man will rip the very heart of rage out of mother nature and allow humankind to flourish once more.
A Sound of Thunder and Battlefield Earth
If you remember, in A Sound of Thunder, a team of scientists is sent back in time to the dinosaur age, and things go wrong. Ray Bradbury’s short story is great, but the movie would make you think otherwise. However, in A Sound of Battlefields, the team travels back from the future to stop John Travolta from ever making Battlefield Earth in the first place. The scientists chase Travolta who will get the movie made once he delivers the script. But things get crazy when real Psychlos invade Earth!
The Core and Planet of the Apes (2001)
In The Core, a team of scientists uses some improbable drilling device to dig down to the center of the earth in the hopes of “restarting” the core before we all die. Thanks, scientists! But when the team digs down, they discover that the earth is hollow and inhabited by evolved apes. These apes, however, being out of the sun too long, are pale, and have scraggly hair, looking enough like Tim Burton that the movie is a joyful revenge ride against the director for making his Planet of the Apes reboot.
The Sphere and Waterworld
On a warm, summer day, actors Kevin Costner and Dustin Hoffman go for a dive together. They hold hands and leap merely into the water. As they swim, they follow a talking crab to the sphere. From then on, each actor experiences their worst nightmares. For Costner, he relives making Waterworld, and for Hoffman, he relives coming to Costner’s house in the first place. After a homoerotic adventure beneath the sea, both actors agree to never speak of that day again.
Hollow Man and Prometheus
Paul Verhoeven’s unfortunate update of The Invisible Man was pretty lackluster, but in Hollow Men, the Hollow Man exacts revenge on the awful characters in Prometheus. First, he kills the geologist who shows almost no interest in the rocks of an alien world. Next, he goes after the biologist who is scared of an alien corpse one scene then practically makes out with an alien tentacle-creature in another. In a twist, it turns out Hollow Man is the only human ever made a warrior by … The Predator!
