Chapter 14

 

Chapter 14: The Critics

The reviews of Earth's six-month performance season were starting to come in from cosmic publications across the multiverse, and they were... complicated.

The Universal Entertainment Weekly gave humanity four out of five dying stars, with the reviewer noting: "Earth's commitment to their artistic vision is admirable, but sometimes the spectacle overshadows the genuine existential terror. Still, their finale of 'Democratic Process: The Musical' was a masterpiece of choreographed political dysfunction."

The Interdimensional Times was more critical: "While Earth's productions are undeniably entertaining, one sometimes gets the feeling that they're enjoying their own destruction too much. True despair requires a certain lack of self-awareness that humanity seems to have lost in their transition to professional apocalypse."

But it was the review in Cosmic Critic Quarterly that really stung: "Earth's apocalypse theater, while technically proficient, suffers from what we might call 'performance syndrome.' They've become so good at staging their own destruction that they've forgotten how to actually be destructive. Their nuclear brinksmanship feels rehearsed, their climate disasters too choreographed, their social collapses overly dramatic. In trying to be the best at being the worst, they've accidentally become... competent."

Dr. Pestilence read this review aloud to the emergency session of the Apocalypse Programming Committee, which now included world leaders, theater directors, and several cosmic entities who had become unofficial consultants.

"They're saying we're too good at being bad," she summarized. "Apparently, our professional approach to self-destruction has made us too... professional."

President Doom-Harbinger frowned. "So our success is our failure?"

"It gets worse," Secretary of Creative Self-Destruction Timothy Misery announced, waving a copy of the latest cosmic ratings report. "Mars is gaining on us. Their 'accidentally poisoned the water supply again' show last week got higher authenticity ratings than our carefully choreographed 'Economic Collapse: The Interpretive Dance Experience.'"

Through the cosmic communication link, they could hear Colonial Administrator Bleakworth's latest performance: "Today, like every day, I woke up hoping that maybe, just maybe, something would go right for once. The atmospheric processor was still broken. The hydroponic garden had somehow grown vegetables that actively made you more depressed when you looked at them. And I received a message from Earth asking if we wanted to collaborate on a 'cross-planetary apocalypse spectacular.' I said no, not because I don't want to collaborate, but because the very idea of having hope for collaboration made me feel worse about everything."

The cosmic audience was eating it up. Several entities were taking notes on what they called "pure, unfiltered existential authenticity."

Emperor Cannibalus looked concerned. "PERHAPS," he suggested tentatively, "EARTH COULD... TRY BEING LESS COMPETENT AT INCOMPETENCE?"

"You want us to be worse at being terrible?" Dr. Pestilence asked.

"I WANT YOU TO BE MORE... NATURALLY TERRIBLE. LESS THEATRICALLY TERRIBLE."

General Blastmeyer raised his hand. "With respect, Your Apparent Magnitude, but we've spent six months perfecting our terrible-ness. We can't just go back to being accidentally awful. We're professionals now."

"That's exactly the problem," Jenkins observed from his corner, where he was now working on what appeared to be a doctoral dissertation titled "The Paradox of Professional Amateurism in Cosmic Entertainment." "We've solved the problem of being human by turning it into a performance. But humans aren't supposed to be solved. We're supposed to be problems."

Dr. Pestilence stared at him. "Jenkins, that might be the most insightful thing anyone has said in this entire crisis."

"Which crisis?" Jenkins asked. "The original cosmic entity crisis, the Mars competition crisis, or the current success-induced authenticity crisis?"

"Yes."

President Doom-Harbinger stood up with the determined look of someone who had just figured out how to fail successfully. "I have an idea. What if we... stopped trying?"

The room fell silent.

"Explain," Dr. Pestilence said carefully.

"What if we just... went back to being human? Not performing humanity, not staging humanity, just... being human. Badly. Naturally. Without any cosmic oversight or artistic direction."

Emperor Cannibalus's tentacles writhed with interest. "YOU MEAN... UNSCRIPTED APOCALYPSE?"

"Exactly! Reality TV, but it's actually reality. No choreography, no musical numbers, no synchronized disasters. Just humans being humans, which is naturally catastrophic anyway."

Secretary Misery looked horrified. "You want to give up our artistic vision? Our professional standards? Our Cosmic Choice Award nominations?"

"I want to give up trying to be good at being bad," President Doom-Harbinger replied. "Let's just be bad at being bad. Naturally."

The suggestion hung in the air like a toxic cloud of possibility.

"It's crazy enough to work," Dr. Pestilence admitted. "Or crazy enough to fail spectacularly, which would actually be perfect for our brand."

"UNSCRIPTED HUMANITY," Cannibalus mused. "NO ARTISTIC DIRECTION. NO PROFESSIONAL GUIDANCE. JUST... PURE, NATURAL INCOMPETENCE."

"When you put it that way," Jenkins said, "it sounds almost appealing."

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Chapter 15