As much a horror story as science fiction, "The Screwfly Solution" explores a remarkable number of meaty themes within a short story: love, gender, violence, aliens, mass death, religion, and entomology. She sneaks off to visit her father, and he murders her, killing himself after the horrific realization of his action. "The Screwfly Solution" draws a comparison between humanity and the titular bug, which was all but exterminated in the 1950s through an interruption of its reproductive cycle, and the story's protagonist is a scientist who devises another sort of pesticide that compels male cane-flies to mate with the females' heads rather than the right way around, just as human males are compelled--by a 'pesticide' of extraterrestrial … He was sweating heavily, stripped to his shorts in the hotbox of what passed for a hotel room in Cuyapán. Some scientists suspect a biological cause for this sexually selective insanity (selected observations of lab animals indicate that the normal male sexual urges are spiraling out of control, resulting in death), but the murderers feel it is a natural instinct and have constr… When the religion initially arises, prior to the organized murders, little is done to stop the ideology's spread, nor are their actions of evicting women from the areas the men control prevented. At one point, it is even said, to extent, that the Earth had summoned them to exterminate the human race for causing so much environmental destruction. The end of the story implies that they succeed with their goal. Alan, a sensitive, kindly man, realizes that he himself is succumbing and tries to resist the impulses, as well as isolate himself from women. In Alice Sheldon's disturbing 1977 sci-fi short story " The Screwfly Solution ", men all over the world suddenly become misogynistic and murder countless women and girls in the process. It's brought up to a far more disturbing level when men all over the world begin acting in a similar manner. Alan realizes that the disease causes male sexual impulses to instead become violent impulses. "The Screwfly Solution" is a quick read, and although knowing the ending doesn’t remotely spoil it, I’m hesitant to spell out too much. The premise is a cynical, even nihilistic one: people are … The main protagonist Anne Alstein tries to save her daughter during the onslaught but loses her to her affected husband Alan. The Screwfly Solution" is a 1977 science fiction short story by Raccoona Sheldon, a pen name for psychologist Alice Sheldon, who was better known by her other nom de plume, James Tiptree, Jr. Ultimately, the plot is unraveled to be the work of a bizarre race of energy being Aliens with bodies composed of bright light. "The Screwfly Solution" is a 1977 science fiction short story by Raccoona Sheldon, a pen name for American psychologist Alice Sheldon, who was better known by her other nom de plume James Tiptree, Jr. Some scientists suspect a biological cause for this sexually selective insanity (selected observations of lab animals indicate that the normal male sexual urges are spiraling out of control, resulting in death), but the murderers feel it is a natural instinct and have constructed elaborate misogynistic rationalizations for it. The Screwfly Solution. It is based upon the 1977 science fiction short story of the same name by Alice Sheldon (under the alias Raccoona Sheldon), credited in the film as James Tiptree, Jr. During the onslaught, a new religious movement composed entirely of male Christians called the Sons of Adam is spreading along with the murders, and they believe that women are evil, that the Garden of Eden was a paradise with the first man Adam living alone in a state of innocence and bliss before the birth of the first woman Eve, and that God is telling them to get rid of all of the women. Alan, a sensitive, kindly man, realizes that he himself is succumbing and tries to resist the impulses, as well as isolate himself from women. It received the Nebula Award for Best Novelette, and has been adapted into a television film. The hunters attempt to kill one that effortlessly kills the hunters with a beam attack. It received the Nebula Award for Best Novelette, and has been adapted into a television film. 3. The title refers to the sterile insect technique, a technique of eradicating the population of screwflies by the release of large amounts of sterilized males that would compete with fertile males, thus reducing the native population more with each generation this is done. Like in the story, their efforts lead to the extinction of the human race. "The Screwfly Solution" was adapted into a television film by screenwriter Sam Hamm and director Joe Dante for the Showtime network's Masters of Horror series, premiering December 8, 2006. Director Joe Danteread the story in the 1980s and had wanted to make a film version ever since. The titular method is a scientific procedure to exterminate screwflies by causing them to become murderously aggressive towards the females of the species when aroused. One of the Aliens as described in Alice Sheldon's "The Screwfly Solution". This story concerns a similar distortion of human sexuality with disastrous results. Anne flees north, to Canada, since the disease began in the tropical zones and spread outward. The Doors of His Face, The Lamps of His Mouth, Time Considered as a Helix of Semi-Precious Stones, Sinner, Baker, Fabulist, Priest; Red Mask, Black Mask, Gentleman, Beast, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_Screwfly_Solution&oldid=965984942, Nebula Award for Best Novelette-winning works, Works originally published in Analog Science Fiction and Fact, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, This page was last edited on 4 July 2020, at 16:02. The logic of the central premise is carried to its stark conclusion, with no deus ex machina descending to save the good-at-heart humans. In the Masters of Horror adaptation however, there is a peculiar environmental motive given/theorized as the aliens' reason for enacting the extermination of the human race. In the woods, Anne comes across the light-like aliens that have been prompting the self-destructive tendencies of the human race. He presented the story as straight horror, eschewing his usua… by Raccoona Sheldon. Many of the scenes in Sam Hamm's script are expansions of single lines in this epistolary story. "The Screwfly Solution" is the seventh episode in the second season of Masters of Horror. Towards the conclusion of the story, it is revealed that the onslaught was prompted by the arrival of aliens that engaged the same kind of procedure on the human race so they could have the planet. One of the Aliens as seen in the Masters of Horror adaptation of The Screwfly Solution. The Screwfly Solution tells the story of a world where violence towards women becomes epidemic, and spreads in patterns like an infectious disease. The story begins with an exchange of letters and news clippings between Alan, a scientist working on parasite eradication in Colombia, and his wife Anne at home in the U.S., concerning an epidemic of organized murder of women by men. The story begins with an exchange of letters and news clippings between Alan, a scientist working on parasite eradication in Colombia, and his wife Anne at home in the U.S., concerning an epidemicof organized murder of women by men.