Assignment: Politics and the Apocalypse: Dictators, the UN, and Resistance
One of the major themes of the first few movies, and of the biblical book of Revelations, is the relationship between citizens and government. They are extended meditations on how minorities (religious or ideological in these examples) living in a state that has assumed the power to control their destinies.
This assignment asks students to explore the theme of an individual’s relationship to government (through concepts like fascism or resistance). Students might choose to reflect on one particular story or film, or they might decide to connect two short stories (like Minority Report and Harrison Bergernon). Students can also identify a theme or an important observation they made of a pattern in the films (one of the best papers last year was on the clothing of government militias in the films).
