“Space 1999” was a little off in having the Boston Red Sox win the World Series in 1998
“Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea” had a flying submarine
“Time Tunnel” both the 1966 series and unsold 2004 pilot had time travel two years away (not to mention moon base, manned flight to Mars in 2000). Other series like “Star Trek” had more extensive space travel, not to mention suspended animation and a third world war in the 1980s (aren’t we close to a DS9 episode predicting some kind of mass unemployment with people put into camps for not having jobs?).
“Space 1999” had a couple episodes where they used the computer for a key decision…like who would go back to earth with Christopher Lee and his fellow very tall aliens
On the other hand, maybe the sentient car KITT actually did exist. The company that designed it is finally selling off the tech to the car companies, but only a little bit at a time. First, auto parking. Then lane centering. Soon, full auto drive.
This gives people a chance to get used to it. Slowly integrated, and along with tech like Siri and Alexa, now the world is almost ready. People won’t get scared when their cars back talk them.
“What happened to the automated fire suppression system?”
“That’s the console that is on fire.”
My addition:
“Aw jeez”
“That’s why we still have fire drills. And why we need trained professionals to staff our starships.”
“Ugh. Khan could fly one by himself”
Bortas:“Was not that one the one that crashed into San Francisco, after a firefight with a heavily damaged, less technologically sophisticated space vessel?”
And, not only do we not have anatomically correct, sexually permissive automatons, I don’t hear any signs of people working on gay and lesbian versions, a la 2004 remake. What, we just assume no one wants those versions? Contemporary sexual progressiveness? Not likely yet.
Listening to NPR the other day and they were talking about someone the current presidential administration has brought in. He used to work for Fox ( shocking I know) on moment to moment ratings. What stories kept viewers, etc.
I actually told my dog, there was nobody else around at the moment, “that’s Max Headroom, not how to run the fucking country”.
The thing about tunic technology, of course its available now. Two things are needed however:
Complete environmental control, even in “outside” mall-like spaces, so that tunic is comfortable. They wore tunics in the NextGen episode “Justice” aka Planet of the Frolicking Space Bunnies, but they probably had the god-alien-spacecraft driving the weather.
Also, you need the figure of a 23 year old Jenny Agrutter. Heck, even Michael York wore a bathrobe.
If you want to be somewhat old-fashioned about it, they’d be gynoids, as they’re robots made in imitation of women, not men, but the word gynoid has, happily, dropped off the face of the Earth.
And modern androids aren’t bug-busted because we haven’t allowed Cronenberg to design any yet.
Saw Jerry Seinfeld do standup, back in the day, and he did a schtick on “When are we going to start dressing alike? I’ve seen the future, all those movies, and at some point, someone says ‘Ok, enough fashion. from now on, it’s the grey tunic with the silver sash, and grey pants tucked into silver boots. For everyone.’”
The future episode where Lisa Simpson got married? the future was in the far off date of 2010. They didn’t put firm dates in most of the other future episodes.
You’re right of course, but a running joke amongst friends when someone points that out is “Have you been to downtown L.A. lately? On a drizzly evening, except for the flying cars it’s EXACTLY like Blade Runner!”
“Cross now, Cross now…”
It’s awesome that the Bradbury is just down the street, BTW.