Weird Idiocracy facts, like the cult movie itself, are burned into the backs of the minds of those who saw it. Despite Idiocracy having been released nearly two decades ago, rewatching it today may yield some surprises. Idiocracy became a cult classic when it predicted one of the bleakest futures for humanity with a simple, yet infinitiely rewatchable, premise — society simply becoming too stupid to keep going. In Idiocracy, a painfully mediocre military experiment "volunteer" who ends up the smartest man alive by default, Joe, alongside a prostitute named Rita, try to survive humanity's collapse. However, this doesn't even begin to scratch the surface of the Idiocracy weird facts iceberg.
Indeed, Mike Judge's Idiocracy painted a strange and vibrant version of the post-apocalypse, one in which the end of the world seemed to be the least of humanity's worries. Along the way, the movie made eerie predictions about the future of the real world, masterfully dodged corporate lawsuits, and snuck in some hard jabs at the current state of human society. Here are the best of Idiocracy's weird facts, predictions, and social commentary which viewers may not have noticed from their first viewing.
10 Recycling Sucks...
500 years after Joe and Rita are placed in their respective hibernation pods to be forgotten by the world, "The Great Garbage Avalanche of 2505" is what shakes them awake and out of the pods. After that, the monumental ecological disaster isn't mentioned again, and the world that Joe and Rita discover is basically a giant trash heap built around ruins of the old world. Amid the bright lights and corporate logos of the future painted in Idiocracy, humanity's relationship with garbage hasn't changed one bit.
9 Fox Special
Arguably the most hilarious of Idiocracy's weird facts, every logo in the future is transformed in some way, except one. Fox News maintains the same logo throughout 500 years of societal decline. Whether the statement is that it's timeless, correlated, or responsible in some way for things being the way they are isn't addressed. The hosts of Fox News are hardly dressed either. They're little more than eye candy for viewers as they deliver vapid teleprompter-led reports and struggle to turn towards the videos they're presenting out of sheer stupidity.
8 Family Tree-For-All
At the beginning of the movie which features Clevon's family tree, there are a few questionable branches. Mike Judge's animated father and son from King of the Hill, Hank and Bobby Hill are there. There are also some animal representatives in a dog, a chimp and a goat. Lastly, despite it making zero sense unless there's more time-travel involved than we get to see, there's Donald Rumsfeld, George W. Bush, and Condoleezza Rice. Various other sources have different lists of people they've spied in the extensive tree, and they're simultaneously the best and worst of Idiocracy's weird facts.
7 Almost Nobody Saw It At The Cinema
Probably the saddest of Idiocracy's weird facts is that it barely garnered audiences upon release. That said, the very definition of a cult classic is that its original theatrical run was a blink-and-you-miss-it situation. Due to the studio not knowing how to market it, or not being willing to, Idiocracy received a minuscule release to satisfy contracts and then went to DVD where it found an audience. As the world has gotten sillier and sillier it has attracted more viewers, especially since many of its predictions about the future actually came true.
6 All For One When Making Fun
What's the most impressive of Idiocracy's weird facts? The bevy of companies who allowed their logos and names to be made fun of in Idiocracy is unparalleled among films. According to Mike Judge, the trick was to not pick on just one brand, but all of them equally. Besides Walmart and a couple of others, every other brand was cleared for use and Judge couldn't believe his luck. This was put to great use in the film, such as reimagining Costco as a post-apocalyptic goods warehouse and law school in one.
5 Beware Of Crocs
Idiocracy's weird factsDuring his Joe Rogan Experience interview, Idiocracy director Mike Judge revealed that they went with Crocs both because they were cheap and that "no one would ever wear them." To the surprise of Judge and Idiocracy's wardrobe department, by the time the film came out after a delay, Crocs were all over the place. Indeed, not even this list of Idiocracy's weird facts could escape Crocs.
4 Re-Invention Of Lying
This movie shares a strange relationship with Ricky Gervais' film The Invention Of Lying. In both films, the protagonist ends up in a position where they can simply make up whatever they like. Everyone else around them is either too trusting or simple to not believe them. Both Gervais' character and Maya Rudolph's Rita use this to get sex/avoid sex but, still get paid. Also, like Joe, Gervais ends up wielding ruling power because of things getting out of hand.
3 Beef Supreme Is Not Sure's Brother
Here are some of Idiocracy's weird facts behind the scenes. Only taking the role if he could remain silent to avoid a SAG card, Andrew Wilson played the legendary Beef Supreme during Monday Night Rehabilitation. This odd casting quirk came about due to Andrew having recently helped his brother Owen Wilson out of a deep depression that he blamed the Screen Actor's Guild for. Thus, he avoided getting involved with them but was able to star alongside his other brother, Luke Wilson.
2 There's Room For Office Space
Alumni from Mike Judge's other cult classic, Office Space, make appearances within this idiotic future. Michael Bolton/David Herman and Milton/Stephen Root both find themselves in the future. Herman as a member of President Camacho's cabinet and Root as a judge respectively. Both get to be hilarious in their relatively short parts, playing thorough idiots in power. That power? Brought to the viewers by Carl's Jr.
1 The Movie Is Ridiculously Prophetic
The best of Idiocracy's weird facts are undoubtedly its hilariously accurate predictions of the future. Apart from the above-mentioned popularity of Crocs, this includes electing fools like President Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho into positions of great power. There's also companies blithely poisoning water supplies for profit like Brawndo, and consumers' blind trust in electrolytes. Even the way the government brings in one 'smart guy' and expects him to fix everything isn't far from how the U.S. operates today.
Perhaps the eeriest Idiocracy prediction happened when it staged a riot in front of the White House - in response to Joe watering plants with water instead of Brawndo. Indeed, Idiocracy may be the silliest movie in Mike Judge's filmography. However, this cult comedy holds up to this day not just because of its consistently funny scenes, but also because it's peppered with these weirdly accurate predictions about humanity's near future.