Armageddon — starring Bruce Willis, Ben Affleck, and Liv Tyler — was the highest-grossing film of 1998, pulling in $534 million worldwide.
What you probably remember the most are the scenes in space where a very ’90s group of actors (Owen Wilson! Steve Buscemi! The guy from The Green Mile!) fight to blow up the asteroid before it makes earth go kablooey.
But we're here today to discuss a scene that comes much earlier in the film, when the film's young lovers — Affleck's brash, hotheaded A.J. Frost and Tyler's underwritten female character Grace — share a private moment together.
This is what has come to be known as the "Animal Crackers Scene," and it is just a great big bag of bad.
The scene begins with Affleck and Tyler driving their product placement, er, BMW down a dirt road while Tyler's dad, Steven Tyler, sings "I Don't Want to Miss a Thing" on the soundtrack.
The lovers then park and lie together next to the car. Why they decide to do this at a gas station in the middle of nowhere is anyone's guess, but there they are.
Affleck begins things by saying, "You know what I was thinking?"
Considering the Earth may soon end, you might think Affleck has some serious existential thoughts to express. But the filmmakers decided to go in...another direction.
"I really don't think the animal cracker qualifies as a cracker," Affleck says.
"Why?" Tyler responds, seemingly fascinated by this.
"Well, ’cause it's sweet, which to me suggests cookie, and, you know, I mean, putting cheese on something is sort of a defining characteristic of what makes a cracker a cracker. I don't know why I thought of that."
At this point you're probably wondering, "What is happening? Did someone write this? Or is it improv? It's got to be improv, right?" But things only get worse...
Affleck puts an animal cracker on Tyler's stomach and pretends it's walking around. "I got, like, a little animal cracker Discovery Channel thing happening right here," he says.
This makes Tyler bust into a huge laugh, because the line "I got, like, a little animal cracker Discovery Channel thing happening right here" is just so funny!
As if you weren't suffering enough secondhand embarrassment for all involved, Affleck next affects a (bad) Australian accent and says, "Watch the gazelle..."
"...as he grazes through the open plains."
He then decides to get really crazy and add a second animal cracker into the mix. "Now, look as the cheetah approaches. Watch as he stalks his prey."
"Now the gazelle is a little spooked."
Affleck inches the first animal cracker upward. "He could head north to the ample sustenance provided by the mountainous peaks above."
"Or he could go south," Affleck says, moving the animal cracker back down.
"The gazelle now faces man's most perilous question."
The gazelle can go "north," Affleck says, again inching the cracker upward...
"Or south, way down under."
At that point...AT THAT POINT...as if all of this wasn't already squeamishly, need-to-take-a-shower awkward, he sticks the animal cracker INTO HER UNDERWEAR.
How does she respond to this? By biting her lip seductively.
Like all transcendently bad things, though, right when you think it couldn't get any worse, it somehow does just that.
"Baby?" Tyler asks dreamily. "Do you think it's possible that anyone else in the world is doing this very same thing at this very same moment?"
To which Affleck responds: "I hope so. Otherwise what the hell are we trying to save?"
The two then make out as Tyler's dad's starts to sing again — you know, as if things weren't already so, so incredibly awkward.
