15 Predictions About The Future That Failed Miserably

By Stephen Kral on June 9th, 2009

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If you watched movies or TV shows at all in the last fifty or so years, then you’ve seen just about everything the future has in store for us. You’ve seen us conquer aliens, you’ve seen machines conquer us, and you’ve seen crazy batshit technology doing crazy batshit things. The only kicker is that you never got to see this stuff in real life. Which, in most cases, would be a good thing (Alien invasions? No thank you), but then there’s the stuff that we would want and that we are still waiting for (flying cars anyone?). Here are some of those cases. That is, the most noteworthy cases in which the future predictions of television and cinema, failed us miserably:

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

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This gem not only said that we’d have a huge space station and commuter flights to space, but also that we’d have the first artificial intelligence onboard our first deep-space exploration ship along with our first cryogenic sleep-capsules. That’s not all either, we’re supposed to have a moonbase too. Considering the fact that we can barely manage to get one room added to our current small space station once a year, and that there is still debate as to whether or not we ever really landed on the moon, it’s safe to say this movie was way, way off.

Terminator (1984)

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A true classic, this franchise actually tried to go back on itself and change the dates for a supposed “Judgment Day” that would have originally taken place in 1997, so that it became 2004. Obviously we weren’t expecting an end of the world by machine onslaught, but the premise was that technology would have us on the brink. They jumped the gun by leaps on this one, because while we’re still ogling our iPhones, Honda can barely get a 3-foot robot to walk up stairs…and we’ve passed their revised date already.

1984 (1984)

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This one comes in on a technicality, since it was based on Orwell’s novel, written in 1949, and everyone knew it. There were two earlier adaptations to film, but they sucked, so the “1984″ from 1984 gets to suffer the irony of being wrong about everything. That doesn’t mean it’s not constantly referred to though; while nothing from the story-line has ever come true (yet), many people say that it could have had the story not been told to begin with. Chew on that for a while.

Red Dawn (1984)

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The ’80s were collectively obsessed with three things: video-phones, Japan and World War III. This classic piece of Americana chose to follow the deepest route and go with a Soviet invasion of the USA, because, well, wasn’t it just bound to happen? When historians go back and look at the ’80s, they’re going to be surprised that a fiery nuclear war never actually took place, what with how many times this event occurred in popular movies and television during this era. Overall, this one was way off the mark, since the USSR dissolved somewhat peacefully just a few years later. Sweet French film cover, n’est pas?

Escape From New York (1981)

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You’ve got to love this prediction: New York City gets turned into one big maximum security prison in 1988 because crime increased to the point that the city’s normal inhabitants thought it unlivable. Also, we’re (the U.S.) is at war with the Soviets (of course) and World War III is drawing to a close… in 1997. That’s right, Carpenter thought it wise to set the next WW just nine years from the release date of this film. Interesting side note: the people depicted in this film were still using cassette tapes. That all being said, this is easily one of the best movies ever made.

Planet of the Apes (1968)

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This was a movie about astronauts who get caught up in a technical malfunction while in cryosleep and wind up drifting for over 2000 years until they crash land on a strangely familiar planet inhabited by intelligent, speaking apes. None of the ape business is important in this discussion though, what really matters here is the fact that it was supposed to take place in 1972! That means that we’re over 45 years late on getting interstellar spacecraft and cryogenic napping tubes. That’s even more off the mark than 2001: A Space Odyssey!

Lost in Space (1965-1968)

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1997 was a very popular year for old science fiction movies and shows, and Lost in Space was no exception. This TV series predicted that by 1997 the planet would have been severely overpopulated, necessitating that we send a mission out into space (again with the cryosleep, interstellar travel, robots and artificial intelligence) to find a suitable planet to colonize. Obviously they got lost along the way, but the important thing to note here is that we’re still nowhere close to any of that technology yet, and we’ve passed the mark by twelve years.

Akira (1988)

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Again, we’re supposed to have had a nuclear war by now. In fact, we were supposed to have it in 1988, when coincidentally, science and technology had pretty much run amok. It’s now twenty-one years later and the idea is even less likely to happen now than it was then. Can’t we just have a goddamn nuclear war, people?

Demolition Man (1993)

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Apparently crime was getting so bad in the ’80s and ’90s that losing entire cities to it was a running theme. In this film we’ve lost Los Angeles to gang warlords, and the city is in complete chaos by 1996. Following the grand tradition set forth by earlier list items, this movie has a gigantic dependency on (you guessed it) cryogenics!. Apparently we’re supposed to have the technology to not only freeze prisoner populations, but also rehabilitate them and teach them skills while they’re on ice. That technology may have seemed likely to the people of 1993 (remember we were using pagers and Earthlink at this time?), but these days it’s a bit farther off than invisibility cloaks and man-made black holes.

Space: 1999 (1975-1977)

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Following Odyssey’s lead, this British TV show had us well established in space and on the moon over a decade ago. We also should be shipping our nuclear waste to our moonbase, but that’s not happening, because we don’t even have a moonbase. Earth looks weird in that picture.

UFO (1970)

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This is nothing short of gnarly: In 1980, while aliens are secretly carrying out attacks against the people of Earth, a highly advanced group of defenders fight the good fight to protect us while disguised as a movie studio. True to form, a moonbase (sweet, again!) is involved, along with spaceship fighter-craft and submarines that can launch fighters into the air. We not only have none of this now nearly thirty years later, but we’re nowhere close, either.

The Day After (1983)

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Famous for scaring the crap out of an entire country, The Day After took us into the inevitable nuclear war with the Soviets (again). The goal of the movie was to show just how horrible it was going to be, and to show that World War III was not something we really wanted. While they did a great job debunking the glamor of such a horrifying conflict, they were still a bit fatalist, and therefore belong to this list. We’re still here, there is no more USSR, and there is no prospect of nuclear war.

The Road Warrior (1981)

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Ah yes, the second installment of the Mad Max franchise, The Road Warrior took us to the wastelands of post-apocalyptic Australia. What apocalypse was the story following? Why, World War III of course! The backstory to the final throw-down was actually very well done for an opening montage using fifty year old footage, and tried to show a more global set of causes for the impending end of civilization. Regardless, it was completely wrong, and we’re well aware now of the limited supply of oil. Things didn’t get worse, they got better, and we’re even going greener these days. Sort of.

Strange Days (1995)

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So this one already strikes gold with the Demolition Man style LA lawlessness and police crackdown, but they also threw in the idea that we’d all be using minidiscs instead of CDs. If that’s not enough for you, we’re also supposed to be able to record everything we’re feeling and sensing onto those minidiscs to be played back at a later date. Nope, pretty sure we don’t have any of those at Best Buy.

Death Race 2000 (1975)

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Here we have a fine example of how not to predict the future: As just plain silly. According to this bit of awesomeness, the United States collapsed under a financial crisis back in 2000, and was then taken over by military coup. Then in the Roman fashion, the new junta instated a gladiatorial contest, Mad Max style, with a road race across the country. Points are won for not only speed but how many civilians you can mow down with your good old American Iron. Not even the late, great David Carradine (yes, this was his showboat) could save this one from being what it was. Needless to say, we made it past year 2000 pretty well, and without resorting to primitive acts of mass violence to get our kicks.

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