This Plot Has Been Used Already

OK, so I’m a little behind in my movie watching…  I’m sure you’ve seen “Kingsman: The Secret Service” already, and you’ve probably forgotten all about it.  I’m now going to remind you of the “existential danger” plot in that movie; this is a subset of the adventure movie plot.  In order to create adequate tension, a catastrophe that the movie’s heroes must avert, the bad guys have a plan which, if it succeeds, will result in loss of lives and destruction sufficient to keep the viewer’s interest.  This is the part of the plot of movies that involve “secret agents”, supermen and superwomen, demigods, and heroes with special abilities that come into play in the process of foiling the bad guy’s plans.

In “Kingsman” the villain, played by Samuel L. Jackson  tells the story about half way through the movie, before the hero’s companion is killed: a group of powerful people have  have decided to kill almost everyone in the world to save the Earth from global warming.  They use the following reasoning:

Humanity is like a virus infecting the planet Earth.  When an organism is infected by a virus, the organism starts to run a fever in an attempt to throw off the virus.  In an analogous fashion, global warming is the fever that the Earth is developing when it tries to stop the infection by humans.  The end result is the virus kills the host or the host kills the virus; partial solutions are also possible, in which the two coexist for a period of time.

The group of powerful people intend to cure the Earth of the human infection, in this particular movie by controlling certain people with microchips implanted in their brains who are then commanded to kill everyone around them.

I won’t reveal the end of this movie, but you can be sure the world is saved from immediate massacre, without mentioning what happens if global warming continues.  The point I am making is that this is a subset of the adventure movie that involves the myth of the “secret agent” a la James Bond, and it is necessary for this type of movie that there be a gigantic evil conspiracy that has malignant intentions towards the rest of the world.  It is important for the plot that the evil conspiracy have a particularly sinister goal in mind.  In this case, the goal is the extinction of nearly all of the human race in order to improve living conditions for a tiny minority.

Please read that sentence again: the goal is the extinction of nearly all of the human race in order to improve living conditions for a tiny minority.  I won’t accuse any Republican senators of being in on this conspiracy, but it’s really not much of a stretch.