Pandemics, Authoritarian Populism, and Science Fiction: Medicine, Military, and Morality in American Film

With a focus on I Am Legend and Day of the Dead—two series of film remakes of popular science fiction stories—this book addresses the social origins of the recent surge in authoritarian and populist social movements. Exploring the ways in which the themes of tribalism, confidence in medical science, and confidence in military violence changed over the years in the process of re-telling these stories in popular culture, the author identifies the shift towards a narrowing of moral scope, an e...