The Top Five Leadership Spills on Screen

Wednesday, June 26, 2013 will go down as one of the most exhausting and absurd days in Australian parliament's history. There were retirements, there were bills proposed, and hijacking headlines and Twitter feeds across the country was the Labor Party's leadership spill, where the caucus sharpened their knives again to farewell Julia Gillard and give Kevin Rudd another chance to shake his sauce bottle all the way to election glory.

The whole process played out like an elaborate film or TV plot, so we decided to take a look at the top five leadership battles the screen has offered and see how they compare.

1. Game of Thrones

When the excellent #RuddWedding began trending, there was no way to look past the most popular show on television and its parallels with Australian politics. Whilst Red Wedding meme manipulators are casting Kevin as the murderous Lord Bolton, perhaps it would be more appropriate to stick Bill Shorten's head on his shoulders. Either way, we are down to a two-horse race for Australia's iron throne.

2. Rocky

Whilst Rocky may have lost his first battle, professional fight against Apollo Creed, the Italian Stallion refused to go down, weathering the blows before rising to deliver a knockout blow and regain the prime ministership. Here is hoping that the plots continue to overlap and we witness a montage of Gillard training Rudd before they treat us to a Rocky III freeze frame ending.

3. Ron Burgundy vs. Veronica Corningstone

Whilst Kevin Rudd may not sport Ron Burgundy's glorious moustache, he still held the leadership of his news team until Veronica Corningstone ambitiously took it from him. Ron fought to claim it back though, and whilst there will be no co-anchorship between Rudd and Gillard, we can still look forward to Anchorman 2.

4. Harry Potter vs. Lord Voldemort

When ABC reporter Mark Simkin dipped into the pages of Harry Potter to cover the spill — stating "neither can live whilst the other survives" — he wasn't wrong. Gillard has remained true to her word and retired, making Kevin Potter the boy who lived, ready to take on his next nemesis. Whilst we wait for the battle, let us ponder on how much more enjoyable Question Time would be if everyone was wearing robes, clutching wands and shouting 'expelliarmus' at each other.

5. Sideshow Bob vs. Mayor Quimby

In Springfield's political showdown of the century, Sideshow Bob rides to victory over Mayor Quimby on a wave of charisma and popularity. Rudd has the charisma and popularity; here's hoping he hasn't masterminded a rigged vote like Sideshow Bob did that would plunge Australian politics into an even larger comedic hole of errors.

Bonus: Star Wars Filibuster

Yesterday also saw a busy day on the international politics scene, as Democratic state senator Wendy Davis filibustered a package of laws that would restrict access to abortion in Texas. She was controversially cut short at ten hours on a technicality for speaking off topic, which earned her a third strike — at least we can say that the rules of baseball don't dictate Australian politics. Whilst her filibustering was far more topical than this offering, Patton Oswald's rant on Parks and Recreation certainly lightens the mood of defeat.