Will SoCal’s Barbie Doll or NorCal’s Bobby Oppenheimer Destroy the World First?

Forget the Big Box Office War of Summer 2023. Barbenheimer Is a Tale of Two Competing California Apocalypses

Which region is the greater threat to humanity: Northern California or Southern California?

That’s the most urgent question raised by 2023’s great cinematic contest between Oppenheimer and Barbie.

Sure, these are entertaining films about a physicist and a doll. But both movies are also, in no small part, California-based stories about global nightmares, about the Earth-altering threat of bombs and bombshells alike.

Embedded in those nightmares are warnings about the damage that Northern and Southern California can do when we send our ideas out into the world.

Oppenheimer is the Northern California nightmare. While …

TK TK | Zocalo Public Square • Arizona State University • Smithsonian

Civilization Has Always Been Collapsing for Somebody

While the Apocalypse Is Relative, Humanity’s Pursuit of Technology Perpetually Creates and Defuses Existential Threats

The question of whether civilization is on the verge of collapse may be as old as civilization itself.

This enduring query brought together a group of panelists that moderator Edan Lepucki …

In San Juan Bautista, It’s Apocalypse—Now

The Site of a Famous Mission, and a Hitchcock Masterpiece, Is a Good Place to Ponder Human Fall-ibility

If the apocalypse comes to California, I’ll be ready. After all, I’ve been to San Juan Bautista, which has centuries of experience with the ending of worlds.

I visited the San …