The world ending is an untrumpable story. Aliens? Pfft, that's nothing after the world has exploded into a stampeding ball of fiery death. Intergalactic travel? You won't be travelling nowhere when the universe is gravitated into a tiny ball of immense destruction. This means if you want a story, the best ones all involve our deaths. It's seen constantly time and time again in books, tv and games - what does the evil villain want? To suck the life out of the earth with a straw and then spit the resulting juice into the sun causing it to explode and destroy everything ever. According to the media we've all died countless times and we're all going to die countless more times in the near future. Solar flares in 2012 you say? I'd love to see the predicted solar flares in 2010, 2011 and 2013 for that matter. Besides that, solar flares are happening constantly. If it does anything, it'll probably slightly increase the rate of cancer or something. "Solar flare" by no means depicts a giant blast of flaming sun obliterating the Earth and all its inhabitants.