diff --git a/core/includes/bootstrap.inc b/core/includes/bootstrap.inc
index f01a3de..c22a48d 100644
--- a/core/includes/bootstrap.inc
+++ b/core/includes/bootstrap.inc
@@ -983,7 +983,26 @@ function variable_initialize($conf = array()) {
     }
     else {
       // Proceed with variable rebuild.
-      $variables = array_map('unserialize', db_query('SELECT name, value FROM {variable}')->fetchAllKeyed());
+      $variables = array();
+      // We can run into unparsable values
+      $err_variables = array();
+      $rows = db_query('SELECT name, value FROM {variable}')->fetchAllKeyed();
+      foreach ($rows as $name => $db_value) {
+        // Suppress the notice.
+        $value = @unserialize($db_value);
+        // If the unserialize call returned FALSE and the stored value is NOT a
+        // boolean FALSE, list it in the report.
+        if ($value === FALSE && $db_value !== serialize(FALSE) && !isset($conf[$name])) {
+          $err_variables[] = $name;
+        }
+        $variables[$name] = $value;
+      }
+      // We throw an exception before storing the variables otherwise
+      // this exception is only thrown once which is bad
+      if (count($err_variables)) {
+        $err_variables = join (", ", $err_variables);
+        throw new Exception("Cannot unserialize variables $err_variables. Check your database or hotfix through settings.php");
+      }
       cache('bootstrap')->set('variables', $variables);
       lock_release($name);
     }