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The Best Fictional Doomsday Devices

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the doom-proof dept.

Ostracus writes to tell us that Wired has an interesting summary of some of the best fictional doomsday devices. These devices have featured heavily in movies, television, and fiction; their list includes favorites from Dr. Strangelove to Futurama. What devices have they missed? "By the time Futurama's sci-fi satire hit the scene, creator Matt Groening had the doomsday-device shtick down. Case in point: the Spheroboom. This highly explosive space/time-bending device isn't just the prized jewel of the show's mad scientist, Professor Farnsworth. It also destroys anyone/anything not wearing a 'Doom-proof Platinum Vest.'"

18 of 340 comments (clear)

  1. Wired slideshow by WK2 · · Score: 5, Informative

    It's a Wired slideshow, on 8 separate pages. If you value your time, don't even bother to RTFA. If you don't value your time, please try to find an "all on one page" version for the rest of us.

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    1. Re:Wired slideshow by lysergic.acid · · Score: 2, Informative

      to be fair, there's a thumbnail gallery that lets you jump to any page you want. also, since each device description comes with a large image or a YouTube video, it's probably better that they are put on separate pages for users with older powerful computers or netbooks/smartphones/PSPs/etc., which do not have a lot of memory.

      besides, it's not really a slide show as it doesn't have a JavaScript timer that automatically flips to the next slide. it's just a paginated list. and it isn't presented in a tiny pop-up window that only uses a quarter of the screen like a lot of other sites.

  2. The Doomsday Machine - Star Trek - missing one by ACK!! · · Score: 5, Informative

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Doomsday_Machine_(TOS_episode) Overview: The starship Enterprise plays a deadly game of cat-and-mouse with an alien planet-killing machine. Come on if you cannot list a Star Trek episode where is the geek cred?

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    ACK /ak/ interj. 2. [from the comic strip "Bloom County"] An exclamation of surprised disgust, esp. i
    1. Re:The Doomsday Machine - Star Trek - missing one by Bovarchist · · Score: 2, Informative

      Peter David wrote a novel called "Vendetta" that expanded on the Doomsday Machine story. His idea was that the one encountered by the Enterprise was just a prototype for a machine to destroy the Borg. Picard and crew find the real machine which is much, much bigger and nastier but was never activated. Not the greatest book in the world, but an interesting extension to the story.

      --
      Hell is other people's code.
  3. Monty Phyton by Andr+T. · · Score: 5, Informative

    You missed the funniest joke in the world!!!!

    --

    Any life is made up of a single moment, the moment in which a man finds out, once and for all, who he is.

  4. Hands Down Best FICTIONAL Doomsday Device... by rshol · · Score: 2, Informative

    Global Warming.

  5. Re:ICE-9 by Psiren · · Score: 4, Informative

    Again, not strictly a doomsday device, but nevertheless, the Lazy Gun is the most ingenious weapon ever inventerised!

  6. Re:Mass Driver by $RANDOMLUSER · · Score: 2, Informative

    The Moties had used asteroid bombardment in 1974.

    --
    No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism. - Winston Churchill
  7. Re:ICE-9 by Cornwallis · · Score: 4, Informative

    ICE-9 is great but I've always been enamored with Ren & Stimpy's "History Eraser Button"

  8. Good news, everyone! by Drakkenmensch · · Score: 4, Informative

    Don't forget the professor's Universe-in-a-box, which ended up containing our own universe at the conclusion of the episode. Imagine that - a simple cardboard box that could destroy reality as we know it, simply by being tossed into the recycling bin. Seems like the practice meant to save the environment is going to doom us all in the end!

  9. Re:Mass Driver by Evil+Pete · · Score: 3, Informative

    And before that in 1966 there was The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress" during the war between Luna and Earth. Though I wouldn't be surprised if there were even earlier examples.

    --
    Bitter and proud of it.
  10. Re:Mass Driver by idontgno · · Score: 2, Informative

    The Loonies were using mass-driver bombardment (albeit from the Moon) in 1966.

    I don't know if that's the first occurrance of orbital bombardment by mass driver in SF history; I'm trying to do a quick Google survey between interruptions, but I'm not making any progress. (Too many interruptions, too little "between".)

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  11. Re:Ren & Stimpy - History Eraser Button by X0563511 · · Score: 2, Informative

    You can't link to tripod images offsite, if your referral header is missing or not from the site, you get their logo instead.

    --
    For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
  12. Re:ICE-9 by butalearner · · Score: 2, Informative

    Ice-nine was the first one I thought of when I read the headline, but I'm surprised nobody has mentioned the Little Doctor.

  13. Doc Smith Lensman Weapons by onkelonkel · · Score: 2, Informative

    The ever more potent weapons of Doc Smith's Lensmen. First the Sunbeam, where the entire solar system is turned into a vacuum tube and the suns output is focused into a single beam. Then we have the Negasphere, a planetary sized chunk of anti-matter you toss at an enemy planet (with a tractor beam, because it's antimatter, see). The Nutcracker, two planets from another dimension, travelling in opposite directions, both exceeding the speed of light and then collided with the enemy planet in between. His ultimate weapon is so cool, I won't give it away, just in case you haven't read the books. You should read the books, if only to see who was playing with these ideas about 50 years before Lucas did Star Wars.

    --
    None of them can see the clouds; The polished wings don't care.
    1. Re:Doc Smith Lensman Weapons by CrimsonAvenger · · Score: 2, Informative

      The ever more potent weapons of Doc Smith's Lensmen

      Actually, the planetary negamatter bomb was first. They used it on Jalte's world, on the way to the Second Galaxy. Then the nutcracker - two normal planets with intrinsic velocities in opposite directions to crunch Jarnevon. Then the Sunbeam. Then the nutcracker with FTL planets to use on Ploor and it's sun.

      That said, the best weapon Smith ever invented wasn't in the Lensman series. It was the one used by Doctors Seaton and Duquesne to destroy the Chloron Galaxy. Now THAT was a doomsday weapon - it destroyed two entire galaxies.

      --

      "I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
  14. Re:ICE-9 by gnick · · Score: 2, Informative

    Indeed - Another soul has received his vin-dit and will soon become a part of our karass, with Cat's Cradle as our wampeter. Sure, Bokonism may be largely comprised of foma, but it's a welcome escape from the slashdot granfaloon.

    The new-convert's guide

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    He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
  15. Re:Lensman by idontgno · · Score: 2, Informative

    Well if you're gonna go for sheer exotic exuberant overkill... "negaspheres of planetary anti-mass" come to mind.

    Although where the Galactic Patrol found entire planets made of organized antimatter*, I'll never figure out. That's one of those little things that "Doc" didn't even bother to hand-wave. You need to suspend disbelief with a Bergenholm inertialess drive to buy the entire hurried ending of the series.

    *Not our conception of antimatter, but the older "Dirac sea" vacuum anti-energy. But I still liked them.

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    Welcome to the Panopticon. Used to be a prison, now it's your home.