Well, as the failure of "top kill" showed, BP is utterly useless when it comes to cleaning up their oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. So the feds have called in someone else: Avatar director James Cameron. Wait, what?

It looks like we've officially hit the "just throw shit at the wall and see what sticks" phase of the ongoing Deepwater Horizon leak: The feds have called together "a group of scientists and other experts" to meet with Environmental Protection Agency officials to "brainstorm" ideas about the spill. (Just like Armageddon!) One of the "experts" is James Cameron, who once directed a famous movie about a boat.

Ha, yes! What is Cameron an "expert" in, exactly, besides "writing and directing incredibly embarrassing movies that are inexplicably successful"? Well, he is "considered an expert on underwater filming and remote vehicle technologies." Which would be very useful! If our goal was to film the worst environmental disaster in U.S. history, in IMAX 3D, instead of stop it. [Update: Okay, okay, so filming the disaster is one of the goals, and James Cameron is a big-time expert in "making stuff work underwater, especially when it's, like, really deep," and really, can he do worse than BP already has?]

But good luck to him nonetheless! Maybe all the government really needs to fix this mess is a wooden romance and an epic CGI-laden set piece.

[AP; pic via Getty]