Hey, How Come We Never Get the Asteroid Strike?

There is a species of made-for-TV movies for which a summary of the screenplay might go something like this:

• A brave scientist (or meteorologist, or volcanist, or epidemiologist, or etymologist) has been ostracized by his or her colleagues for his or her insistence upon a personal theory that, if left unattended to in an absent-minded moment, leans heavily towards the complete destruction of the human race.

• This loyalty to the theory has separated our hero or heroine even from those that most love him or her.

• Subsequently, the hero or heroine is something of a loner, and we see a lot of this fellow – let’s just call him a fellow this time and avoid the whole him or her thing – we see a lot of this fellow riding alone on his motorcycle, wandering moodily down the ocean shoreline or moseying down city alleys, but in particular driving along in his car banging on the radio when he’s not getting news fast enough over the airwaves. Because…

• While our friend was out wandering moodily and bearing the weight of this secret knowledge that really ought to be shared with all humanity so as to avoid the catastrophe, the catastrophe has picked this exact moment to hit, coincidentally right when we’re watching TV.

• The news is sketchy over the car radio, which is why our friend is pounding on it, but the radioactive insects or boiling lava flowing through the sewers or elephant-sized crocodiles or speeding meteors or whatever it is, is now happening full-bore to one of those major cities that all viewers all sort of recognize – hold on to this major city bit – and though it’s awfully hard to get the whole picture, it seems as though his theory is coming true right before our eyes.

• We switch then to this city, let’s say it’s San Francisco, where reams of pretty ordinary images of pretty ordinary people doing pretty ordinary things – walking in and out of Laundromats, for instance – are overlaid with unconvincing special effects and close-up scenes on non-busy streets showing those danged meteors, for instance, banging down on that fine city and anihilating secondary characters with vigor and even relish.

Well, it goes on from there, with the whole response team pulled back together at headquarters, including all the science guys and the ex-girlfriend who didn’t believe him before now all looking pretty sheepish while they watch a wall-sized monitor of the country showing the spread of the lava or the ice or cloud of irradiated mosquitoes making its way due east from San Francisco and clearly showing Denver and Chicago right in the path of the destruction.

You get a general feeling that we have to stop this thing before good old Denver or Chicago succumbs…and that’s where I’d like to stop.

This is where I'd like to take a deep breath and draw your attention to what is going on here.

Now, I shouldn’t have to point this out, but there are some damn fine cities between San Francisco and Denver and, again, between Denver and Chicago, including this very one that I’m typing in.

Am I the only one who thinks it’s a blow to civic pride to be thought unworthy of a place on this wall-sized monitor of cities in the path of destruction?

Are we chopped liver?

Any proud citizen has a perfect right to ask: how come these other cities get all the asteroid strikes and herds of rampaging dinosaurs? Don’t we rate?

I like Chicago. I like Denver. I’ve never had a bad time in either place. I’ve got nothing against them, and from everything I’ve experienced, the people there are perfectly charming. This isn’t a slam against them.

My point is that we’re a perfectly impressive city by anyone’s standards, us right here, with a robust convention and visitor’s trade, a solid manufacturing base, strong ties to the land and to agribusiness, and abounding in famous food and famous music. 

Two interstates cross paths right here, and enormous swaths of the flat river-scoured terrain are given over to one of the largest freight railyards in the world.

We are served by excellent regional universities nearby and on occasion one of our professional sports teams rises to the level of national prominence. The air and water are clean, the foliage is abundant, the default point of view or tone of voice is one of polite pleasantness.

In other words there’s nothing second-rate or second-class about us in the least.

So why are we never visited by biblical plagues in these movies like these other fine cities?

It gives you that left-out feeling, like you’re just not good enough.

It’s the type of thing that I would have my eye on if I were one of those Chamber of Commerce fellows charged with protecting the reputation of a city.

I don’t know that there are ratings agencies for city attractions, but if there are, I imagine there’s a downgrade in the future for any municipality that can’t even draw enough attention to itself to be destroyed by hurtling meteors on late night TV.

It's a black eye to a city's reputation when gigantic Larva Creatures or flocks of Ravenous Rabid Pterodactyls can't even be bothered to visit, despite our fine bike-way system, walking paths, and burgeoning craft beer scene.  

Millennials pay attention to this stuff and are likely to think, "well, if they're giving it a miss, these gigantic Larva Creatures and flocks of Pterodactyls, maybe I will too. There can't be much there to get you excited. I'll go to some wacked out music festival in Austin instead. That fine city got destroyed by the Rampaging Rat People just last week on cable. That's a scene I've just got to make!" That's Millennials for you. Fickle.

But it's not limited to one demographic slice.

It’s not beyond conjecture that when deciding where to take the family on vacation, when Father looks around the living room and asks the crew for their honest feedback, little Jimmy raises his hand and says “let’s go to Denver or Chicago! They’re important metropolises full of interesting people and fascinating things! I know this because I saw them get obliterated by radioactive meteors the other night!”

You let a trend like that get out of hand and you’re just asking for it.

Next thing you know you’re boarding up the Tourist Bureau lock, stock, and barrel and converting the space to a Mr. Goodcents, packing away the tri-fold brochures trumpeting the amenities available to convention-goers, and making a point of not looking each other in the eye while you tape up the cardboard boxes.

It wasn’t always this way.

There was a time in these parts when the closest university town was selected for destruction by one means or another on a made-for-TV movie.

I’ll tell you, we couldn’t have been prouder. National exposure at last!

Watching the show we'd point out familiar stores and streets still identifiable since the radioactive frogs hadn’t yet made their way up that particular block, and call people long distance to make certain that they knew that this Armageddon was taking place in our very back yard. 

And not theirs, as it turned out.

Not their cities at all, which we implied by word and tone were solidly in the category of also-rans or wannabes. Just calling 'em like I see 'em, my friend.

Looking back, we were impossible to live with, I see that at this remove. Maybe we’re paying for that now. Pride goeth before the fall.

But, my, that’s been years now, a quarter century on I would imagine, and the region has clearly faded from the national consciousness.

No one has to spell it out. When you’re not even worth destroying with a New Ice Age or Boiling Tar Whirlwinds, the message is clear enough.

So here’s my pitch to the Hollywood crowd. Let’s broaden the base a bit, let’s make a point of being inclusive.

The Silent Majority, The People of the Inland Territories, The Land of the Great Flyover? That’s us. We’re viewers too and we buy your advertisers’ products. We’re part of this great land.

If you want to win our hearts and minds and wallets, and you’re looking for a good city to destroy with a Plague of Locusts or Rivers Turned to Blood or Sonic Booms from Outer Space, keep an open mind.

I know just the place.