Pondering Supernovas

An item in today's paper mentioned a star in our galaxy that might go supernova one of these days. It could provide a great sky show (in the southern hemisphere) or, much less likely, it might spew us with radioactive gamma rays and pretty much wipe out life as we know it.
On the list of things to worry about, this one falls somewhere lower than starched boxers, but it does pose some interesting questions for end-of-time folks. Would Jesus use gamma rays when he comes back to destroy his enemies? Or would it be the antichrist using gamma rays? It couldn't be that "we are star dust, and to star dust we return" could it? Could we get super-hero powers like Spiderman? (OK, so that's not an end-time prophecy, but it would be cool anyway.)