Tuesday, December 9, 2008

The future is now! 2008








I'm always amazed at the capacity of fiction writters to write about the future. Because, obviously, there are things you never see coming, so your future, when it becomes a present, will make your future look outdated. I guess that's why the term "Not too distant future" was invented.

That said, let's look at some of the stuff foreseen, shall we?


The original Megaman!

Plot:

Dr. Wily, Dr. Light's assistant, who is angry that his contributions have not been acknowledged by the world, reprograms the six Robot Masters that they had designed for industrial purposes and uses them in an attempt at world domination. He also attempts to reprogram Rock, the robot they had designed as a lab assistant, but Rock resists the reprogramming. In order to stop Wily's evil plan, Dr. Light upgrades Rock into a battle robot called Mega Man. Mega Man fights and destroys each of the Robot Masters before journeying to Wily's fortress to defeat him once and for all. Mega Man eventually wins the battle, but Wily bows down and begs for forgiveness, which Mega Man grants. Mega Man then walks home to meet Dr. Light and his "sister", Roll.

Hey, it was the 80's. Everyone assumed we would have mastered robotics enought to make robots that can fuck us up. Alas, the gimmick robot revolution is just now beggining...







Ghost Recon

Plot
Russia attempts to reunite the Soviet Union and invades several Eastern European countries. The UN intervenes with peacekeeping forces.

Eh...Does the U.N. EVER fuckin' intervene on anything? Seriously, dude! What's the use of your keen geopolitical spider-senses if you can't predict something as simple as apathy?

Isaac Asimov's Franchise

Plot 1955 short story Franchise takes place in 2008, the premise being that the U.S. president will be selected by a computer program looking for the "most representative citizen".

You wish machines made the system fairer! As is, so far, it's been a bumpy ride.


Cloned

Plot:

This speculative TV movie is set in the year 2008, as grief-stricken married couple Skye (Elizabeth Perkins) and Rick (Bradley Whitford) struggle bravely to overcome the death of their son. "Shock" is hardly the appropriate word to describe the couple's reaction when they meet another child who looks exactly like their own boy. It soon develops that Skye and Rick's son was the product of "Baby 2000," a top-secret -- and highly illegal -- cloning experiment conducted at a fertility clinic. Will the couple blow the whistle on the clinic's crooked activities, or will they be mollified into silence by being given an exact duplicate of the son they have lost?

I haven't seen it, but if ther'se not a lawquit in there, get outta town.



That's roughtly it. See you in 2009, when jettisoning Jason Vorhees into space won't be a meme anymore.

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