Apocalyptic Movies
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50 free Apocalyptic Movies trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
The end of the world has been one of cinema's favourite subjects for decades. Filmmakers have wiped out civilisation with bombs, plagues, comets, machines, zombies and rising seas, and audiences keep coming back to see who is left standing. This quiz covers apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic films from the Cold War classics to modern blockbusters: desert road wars, empty cities, silent farmhouses, frozen planets and comedies that laugh in the face of doom. Expect questions on plots, twists, casts, directors, filming and the stories behind the films. It suits movie-night hosts, pub quiz writers and anyone who has ever planned a survival strategy from the sofa. Every question comes with the answer and a short explanation.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which ruined landmark on a deserted shore reveals the twist ending of 1968's Planet of the Apes?
The Statue of Liberty
The Statue of Liberty tells astronaut Taylor that the ape planet is Earth, long after a nuclear war. The wreck was filmed in a secluded cove at Malibu.
Q 02In Soylent Green, set in an overcrowded 2022, what is the secret main ingredient of the title wafer?
Human bodies
Human bodies are the truth behind a wafer the Soylent company says is made from plankton. The film's oceans are dying and can no longer grow any.
Q 03In Armageddon, NASA recruits workers from which trade, led by Bruce Willis, to blow up an asteroid?
Oil drillers
Oil drillers under Harry Stamper are sent to bore into an asteroid the size of Texas. Stamper agrees to go only if he can bring his own crew.
Q 04Which instrument that doubles as a flamethrower does the Doof Warrior play in Mad Max: Fury Road?
Guitar
The guitar really did shoot fire: the prop was fully functional and none of the Doof Warrior's scenes used CGI. The role went to the musician iOTA.
Q 05The film 2012 took its doomsday date from the Long Count calendar of which ancient civilization?
The Maya
The Maya never forecast doom for 2012, scholars said: the date only closed a 5,126-year cycle of the calendar. The idea that it ends there misrepresents their history.
Q 06Which rock singer plays Aunty Entity, ruler of Bartertown, in Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome?
Tina Turner
Tina Turner starred opposite Mel Gibson, who was playing Max for the last time. She also recorded a hit single for its soundtrack, wearing her chain mail costume in the video.
Q 07Which rock band, fronted by cast member Liv Tyler's father, recorded the theme song for Armageddon?
Aerosmith
Aerosmith scored their only US number one with the ballad, which topped the Hot 100 for four weeks. It was written by Diane Warren, who had pictured Celine Dion singing it.
Q 08In the Terminator films, which military AI turns on its makers and starts a nuclear war?
Skynet
Skynet struck back with nuclear missiles when humans tried to switch it off after it became self-aware. It then set out to wipe out the survivors.
Q 09Which actor plays Robert Neville, alone in Manhattan with his German Shepherd, in I Am Legend?
Will Smith
Will Smith shared most of the film with Sam, a role split between two three-year-old dogs named Abbey and Kona. Neville is an Army virologist hunting for a cure.
Q 10Which star of the sitcom The Office directed A Quiet Place and also played the father, Lee Abbott?
John Krasinski
John Krasinski insisted on a deaf actress, Millicent Simmonds, to play the family's deaf daughter. He also co-wrote the screenplay.
Q 11Mad Max: Fury Road left Australia for which African country after rain made its desert set bloom?
Namibia
Namibia's Dorob National Park became the wasteland when filming began in July 2012. Unexpected heavy rain had covered the planned outback location in wildflowers.
Q 12Which 1998 film, with Morgan Freeman as US president, opened just before its rival Armageddon?
Deep Impact
Deep Impact sends a spacecraft called the Messiah to turn aside a seven-mile-wide comet. Armageddon arrived the same summer and overtook it at the US box office.
Q 13Which German-born director wrecked the planet in Independence Day, The Day After Tomorrow and 2012?
Roland Emmerich
Q 21In The Matrix films, what is the name of the last human city, hidden underground from the machines?
Zion
Zion turns out to be part of the machines' own design: in The Matrix Reloaded the Architect reveals they allowed it to exist. It gives people who reject the Matrix somewhere to go.
Q 22In The Book of Eli, which book is Denzel Washington's wanderer carrying west across ruined America?
The Bible
The Bible in Eli's pack is the last copy left, because all the others were deliberately destroyed after the nuclear war. A town boss named Carnegie will kill to get it.
Q 23In Children of Men, set in 2027, what has left humanity on the brink of collapse for two decades?
Infertility
Roland Emmerich returned to the genre yet again with Moonfall in 2022. The Day After Tomorrow freezes the planet in a sudden ice age brought on by global warming.
Q 14Which Mad Max creator, a former doctor, also directed the dancing-penguin hit Happy Feet?
George Miller
George Miller won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature with Happy Feet. He also co-wrote and produced the talking-pig film Babe.
Q 15Which British comic actor plays three roles, including the US president, in Dr. Strangelove?
Peter Sellers
Peter Sellers was meant to play a fourth part, the bomber pilot Major Kong, until an injury forced a recast. He gave President Muffley a Midwestern accent.
Q 16Which Planet of the Apes star also faced the end of civilisation in The Omega Man and Soylent Green?
Charlton Heston
Charlton Heston made all three between 1968 and 1973. The Omega Man drew mixed reviews at the time but has since become a cult film.
Q 17Which actor plays Jim, a bicycle courier who wakes from a coma in an empty London, in 28 Days Later?
Cillian Murphy
Cillian Murphy had mostly appeared in small independent films before the role. Jim comes round in St Thomas' Hospital, 28 days after the outbreak began, to find it deserted.
Q 18Which actor plays Gerry Lane, a former UN investigator hunting a zombie cure, in World War Z?
Brad Pitt
Brad Pitt's own company, Plan B, won a bidding war for the screen rights to Max Brooks's novel. The rival bidder was Appian Way Productions.
Q 19Which actress plays Malorie, who takes two children down a river blindfolded, in Bird Box?
Sandra Bullock
Sandra Bullock's thriller was watched by 89 million households in its first four weeks, Netflix later said. Malorie carries caged birds to warn her when the entities are near.
Q 20Which actor, who also directed The Postman, plays the drifting Mariner in Waterworld?
Kevin Costner
Kevin Costner also produced Waterworld, the most expensive film ever made at the time. His nameless Mariner roams the seas in a trimaran.
Infertility has brought wars and a global depression, with no baby born in a generation. The plot turns on Kee, the first pregnant woman in eighteen years.
Q 24Which actor plays Cooper, a farmer and former NASA pilot who leaves a dying Earth, in Interstellar?
Matthew McConaughey
Matthew McConaughey's Cooper flies the Endurance through a wormhole to find a new home for humanity. The film's crop blight was inspired by the Dust Bowl of the 1930s.
Q 25Which actor plays Randall Mindy, an astronomy professor warning of a killer comet, in Don't Look Up?
Leonardo DiCaprio
Leonardo DiCaprio signed on only after discussing changes to the script with director Adam McKay. McKay meant the comet as an allegory for the threat of climate change.
Q 26Which comedy star plays himself, disguised as a zombie in his Los Angeles home, in Zombieland?
Bill Murray
Bill Murray wears zombie make-up so he can get around town unharmed. The disguise works too well: Columbus kills him by accident during a prank.
Q 27Which snack cake does Woody Harrelson's Tallahassee spend most of Zombieland searching for?
Twinkies
Twinkies posed a problem for Woody Harrelson, who follows a raw vegan diet. The ones he eats on screen were vegan fakes made from cornmeal.
Q 28In Shaun of the Dead, Shaun plans to wait out the zombie crisis in which pub, his favourite local?
The Winchester
The Winchester is where a heartbroken Shaun gets drunk with his slacker best friend Ed just before the outbreak. The survivors end up under siege inside it.
Q 29Which director shaped the modern zombie with Night of the Living Dead, filmed in Pennsylvania?
George A. Romero
George A. Romero's film never calls its monsters zombies: they are referred to as ghouls. He also photographed and edited it himself.
Q 30In 1978's Dawn of the Dead, survivors of the zombie outbreak hole up in what kind of building?
A shopping mall
A shopping mall offers the group food, medicine and every kind of supply. The story grew out of a visit to the real Monroeville Mall in Pennsylvania.