Nuclear Weapons in Popular Culture - in Comedy

In Comedy

• The comedian/lyricist Tom Lehrer penned a number of humorous and well known songs relating to nuclear weapons. His song Who's Next? took up the issue of nuclear proliferation, chronicling the acquisition of nuclear weapons by various nations, then theorizing on "Who's Next," ending with Luxembourg, Monaco, and Alabama becoming nuclear powers, while We Will All Go Together When We Go looked at the brighter side of nuclear holocaust (not having to mourn over the death of others, since "When the air becomes uranious/ We will all go simultaneous"). It assumes that the entire planet will be instantaneously wiped clean by nuclear fire, and bypasses the much grimmer idea of radiation poisoning. A third song by Lehrer, "So Long Mom (A Song From World War III)", was introduced as existing because, "If any songs are going to come out of World War III, we had better start writing them now," and tells the tale of a young soldier marching off to nuclear war, promising his mother that "Although I may roam, I'll come back to my home/ Although it may be a pile of debris" and also satirizing the likely extremely short duration of a major nuclear war ("And I'll look for you when the war is over/ An hour and a half from now!").

• "Weird Al" Yankovic also made a light hearted spin on nuclear annihilation in his song "Christmas at Ground Zero", which describes "A Jolly Holiday underneath a Mushroom cloud".