It’s not just that Star Trek people loves them some mid-twentieth century culture (or 16th century) it’s that they have some weird minimalist take on everything. Look at their cabin decorations, or lack of cabin decorations. I think they are cosplaying Sparta.
When TOS Enterprise watches a special command performance of Hamlet, the cast used an approach that would have been considered too minimalist in 1602. The Space Hippie™ music is pretty minimalist. They could use some drums and a rhythm section. At least the Romans had three camera setups for their gladiatorial games. I bet their commercials were “similar” to then-current tv.
It all goes to my theory that too much was lost in the Eugenics Wars and especially WWIII. The 23rd and 24th century are more like the 31st in Futurama, in that they just don’t have accurate facts about the past, but they think they do. I bet what passes for gourmet food tastes as bland as shredded wheat because all flavor was destroyed during the war. Probably the tribunals that Q subjected Picard to eliminated anything like that.
The obvious here is that stories set in a science fiction setting are fairly commonly commenting on or satirizing some aspect of current culture, so duh, current culture is there with its veneer on.
Two though is that it is a big creative project to create a really novel single thing, let alone a set of novel things populating a new culture, and barring the above, those aspects are props to the stories, not the driver of them?
Yeah, the Expanse show is brilliant at this–even the music is a coherent new genre, IIRC.
The worst counterexample I can think of is in a series set ~500 years in the future in like the Earth Defense Force or something. It’s genial nonsense, but at some point a character references Leroy Jenkins. I’m like, really? A silly niche World of Warcraft meme is the cultural artifact you think is going to survive for five centuries?
Edit: okay, maybe the worst worst counterexample involves something the Joker said to the Thief in Battlestar Galactica.
That reminds me of one, where fictional pop culture actually became real.
In one of the Han Solo books, they have a scene in which they have droids fighting each other as entertainment. At the time, I thought that sounded stupid, but then shows like “Robot Wars” showed up, and damn, that shit is fun!
Babylon 5 had Penn and Teller guest as Rebo and Zooty the funniest comedians in the galaxy. But because you can’t actually be sure you are writing the funniest comedy ever…. we dont get to see any of their bits.
The first one that comes to mind is the ‘Squire of Gothos’ episode of Star Trek, where there is this exchange [bolding mine]:
Kirk: Trelane was probably doing things comparable to the mischievous pranks you played when you were a boy. Spock: ‘Mischievous pranks’, Captain? Kirk: Yes – dipping little girls’ curls in inkwells, stealing apples from the neighbors’ trees, tying cans on – forgive me…Mr. Spock. I should have known better. Spock: I shall be delighted, Captain.
OK, maybe even in the 23rd Century Iowa was still a bit behind the times; but inkwells? Even when Star Trek originally aired, schools didn’t have inkwells! (At least not that I noticed in historical documentaries like Leave It To Beaver.) And cans? Assuming stuff still came in cans in the future, what do they tie them to? Transporters?
I’d have to rewatch the film but I presume that the violence has to be in some way game-related; otherwise a game might consist of nothing but the two teams first trying to knock out or kill the opposing team before preceding with the scoring.
A number of science fiction novels and short stories from the classic era featured attempts at depicting future slang and music trends; they were uniformly pseudo-cool and clunky sounding.
Or for that matter, the episode of The Twilight Zone featuring a human boxer disguising himself as a android after humans have been banned from the sport.
I think the holodeck pushed humanity to a singularity where fiction was concerned. Either there are culturally imposed limits on how much and how far you use holodeck technology, or else we’d all end up like Lt. Barclay and withdraw into an illusionary dream world like the Talosians, just done with technology instead of telepathy.
Points 2 and 3 are obvious and well-known, so I got the naughty joke. I’ve never heard that the Cantina music was called ‘Jizz’ though, which is what was confusing me. But it’s been almost half a century since I read the book, so I don’t remember it being called that in the publication.