142 RüdigerKunow
piece, which created a veritable media panic, was Paul de Kruif, whom
wewillmeetsoon.
As time went on, the militarized language of disease control
migratedintopopculturalnarrativeformatswhicharetodayitsprincipal
"home." What I am calling here themilitaryresponsenarrativehas by
and large come to determine the culture of the contemporary United
States where, as W.J. T. Mitchell has noted, "models of terrorism [are]
based on biological invasions" (xv, 73f.).^90 Such a diagnosis refers not
only to the political culture, where notorious images perform nefarious
ideological work, but also to the popular culture, where the
militarization of biological matters has proliferated, especially in filmic
representations.
Aside from the blockbuster Outbreak, to which I have already
alluded, there are films likeContagion(2011; Stephen Soderberg, dir.),
WorldWarZ(2013; Mark Forster, dir.),TwelveMonkeys(1995; Terry
Gilham, dir.),Doomsday(2008; Neil Marshall, dir.), and28DaysLater
(2002; Danny Boyle,dir.)—the latter two being British in a world-wide
media market. In referencing these films, the idea is not to suggest, in
analogytoJohnCawelti'snotionof"formulafiction,"thatthenarratives
of these films are more or less alike, rather that they might best be read
as so many variations on a common theme: the invasion from the
outside seems an almost indispensable component of most disaster
narratives,filmicortextual.Also,themilitaryasprincipalagentfighting
this invasion plays a significant role in the post-apocalyptic world of
thesestories,evenifitdoesnotalwaysoccupynarrativecenterstageas
inOutbreakorTwelve Monkeyswhich even takes the viewers to the
trenches of World War I. Equally often, the "solution" to the pandemic
depicted consists of "the right stuff," preferably a Wunderwaffe, a
superweapon, "a magic bullet" to "wipe out" the disease/enemy (for
furtherdetailscf.Wald,Contagious3-24;Slack14-19).
In a general perspective, this military invasion format is often
characterized by a complex interplay between the individual and the
(^90) Mission Impossible IIfeatures a Bond-type villain, Vladimir Neckhorvich,
whoisseekingtodestroytheworldbyreleasingthedeadlysuper-virusChimera.
The all-American hero, played by Tom Cruise, manages to thwart these plans
withthehelpofcounter-viruscalledBellerophon.Thisplotisclearlyavariation
ofthetraditionalWesternshootout,onlythatthe"bigguns"herearebiological.