2012-03-16
Original: 2012-03-16 on Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
Transcript
Panel 1 (caption): People decided putting water in a bottle made it better.
Panel 2 (caption): The next step was inevitable.
Woman 1: You drink BOTTLED water? How do you know it's safe bottled water?
Woman 2: Oh, this is bottled bottled water. I think it tastes better.
Panel 3 (caption): The trend became a phenomenon.
(A graph showing an exponential curve rising steeply. Y-axis: PLASTIC PER 01 H2O. X-axis: TIME.)
Panel 4 (caption): Eventually it became easier just to bottle everything else.
(A cityscape of tall bottle-shaped buildings.)
Panel 5 (caption): By the time we noticed our mistake, it was too late.
Man: Oh god! We're running out of air. We need a chainsaw or a blow torch to get out!
Woman: But all of the petrochemical we used to make bottles!
Panel 6 (caption): Some day, visitors will find our world.
(A starscape with a flying saucer approaching a planet.)
Panel 7 (caption): They will be intrigued.
Alien: These creatures left a perfectly preserved record of their final day.
Panel 8 (caption): But they will not be surprised.
Alien 1: Gadly, they did not survive the sixth test of civilization.
Alien 2: Finding out the Higgs mechanism also generates free brownies?
Alien 1: No, that is the seventh test.
Votey:
Alien: What's the fifth test?
Other alien: Kirk Cameron.
Panel 2 (caption): The next step was inevitable.
Woman 1: You drink BOTTLED water? How do you know it's safe bottled water?
Woman 2: Oh, this is bottled bottled water. I think it tastes better.
Panel 3 (caption): The trend became a phenomenon.
(A graph showing an exponential curve rising steeply. Y-axis: PLASTIC PER 01 H2O. X-axis: TIME.)
Panel 4 (caption): Eventually it became easier just to bottle everything else.
(A cityscape of tall bottle-shaped buildings.)
Panel 5 (caption): By the time we noticed our mistake, it was too late.
Man: Oh god! We're running out of air. We need a chainsaw or a blow torch to get out!
Woman: But all of the petrochemical we used to make bottles!
Panel 6 (caption): Some day, visitors will find our world.
(A starscape with a flying saucer approaching a planet.)
Panel 7 (caption): They will be intrigued.
Alien: These creatures left a perfectly preserved record of their final day.
Panel 8 (caption): But they will not be surprised.
Alien 1: Gadly, they did not survive the sixth test of civilization.
Alien 2: Finding out the Higgs mechanism also generates free brownies?
Alien 1: No, that is the seventh test.
Votey:
Alien: What's the fifth test?
Other alien: Kirk Cameron.
Alt text
A tall multi-panel SMBC comic with narrative captions tracing an escalating bottled-water trend to humanity's doom. Caption: people decided putting water in a bottle made it better. Two women talk; one is shocked the other drinks bottled water, the other explains hers is 'bottled bottled water' and tastes better. A caption says the trend became a phenomenon, shown as a steeply rising exponential graph of 'plastic per oz H2O' over time. Soon everything is bottled, depicted as a skyline of tall bottle-shaped buildings. A man and woman panic inside, realizing they are running out of air and need a chainsaw to escape, lamenting all the petrochemical used to make bottles. In space, a flying saucer approaches the dead planet. Two aliens examine it: one notes the creatures left a perfectly preserved record of their final day, and remarks they failed the sixth test of civilization. The other guesses it was discovering the Higgs mechanism also generates free brownies, but is told that is the seventh test. Votey: a hand-drawn black-and-white panel of two aliens. One asks 'What's the fifth test?' and the other answers 'Kirk Cameron.'
Transcribed by Claude Opus 4.8.