FACT CHECK: Viral Image Claims ‘I Am Legend’ Was Set In 2021 And Features ‘People Turned Into Zombies Because Of The Wrong Vaccines’
An image shared on Facebook claims the movie “I Am Legend” was set in the year 2021 and featured “people turned into zombies because of the wrong vaccines.”
Verdict: False
The film is set in the year 2012 and involves humans who were turned into “vampire-like mutants” by a genetically engineered measles virus, not the “wrong vaccines.”
Fact Check:
The Facebook post shows two images from “I Am Legend,” a 2007 film which depicts fictional virologist Dr. Robert Neville’s quest to find a cure after a “plague kills most of humanity and transforms the rest into monsters,” according to the film’s description on IMDb. The first image shows Neville (played by actor Will Smith) walking with his dog down a street strewn with abandoned cars, while the other image shows one of the “monsters.”
“Just wanted to remind you all that in the movie I Am Legend the year was 2021, and people turned into zombies because of the wrong vaccines,” reads text beneath the two images. (RELATED: Did CNN Air A Chyron About COVID-19 Vaccine Recipients ‘Eating Other Patients’?)
However, “I Am Legend” was set in New York City in 2012, according to a transcript of the movie. Warner Bros describes the creatures in the movie as humans that have become “vampire-like mutants” who are “hungry for Neville’s blood.” The “vampire-like mutants” were created by a genetically engineered measles virus meant to cure cancer, as the film’s opening scene explains.
In the film’s opening scene, the character Dr. Alice Krippin explains to a news broadcaster that she developed a genetically engineered measles virus that has cured some 10,000 clinical trial participants of cancer. It is subsequently revealed in the movie that the virus became deadly and turned some humans into the “vampire-like mutants.”
The erroneous post about “I Am Legend” has circulated as countries around the world continue to implement COVID-19 vaccination programs. As of March 25, over 133 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines have been administered in the U.S., according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
