Removing Blade Runner

version

Well-known member
Social media is just one component in a broader cultural attempt to humanise the future. Depictions of the future throughout the 20th century were cold and austere, reflecting a fear that transhumanism was synomous with dehumanization. As the transhuman future’s become more impending however, there’s been an attempt to counteract this narrative by showing that rather than technology dehumanising humans, humans will humanise, and even infantilise, technology. Where Apple used the dystopian visual language of 1984 and Metropolis in their 1984 advertising campaign, Amazon’s Alexa is portrayed in domestic environments as being part of the family. Robot characters in films like ‘Her’ and ‘Big Hero 6’ are far more warm and personable than ostensibly human characters in films like Clockwork Orange and The Matrix. This humanised technology is apparent in the real world too with the likes of Siri and Russian social media ‘bots’.

I noticed this in Moon. I went through the whole thing expecting the robot to become the antagonist like in 2001 and it never did.
 

sadmanbarty

Well-known member
I noticed this in Moon. I went through the whole thing expecting the robot to become the antagonist like in 2001 and it never did.

gravity and martian are person-centred films about space exploration. compare that the 2001 that's all spectacle and very little humanity.
 

version

Well-known member
Social media is just one component in a broader cultural attempt to humanise the future. Depictions of the future throughout the 20th century were cold and austere, reflecting a fear that transhumanism was synomous with dehumanization. As the transhuman future’s become more impending however, there’s been an attempt to counteract this narrative by showing that rather than technology dehumanising humans, humans will humanise, and even infantilise, technology. Where Apple used the dystopian visual language of 1984 and Metropolis in their 1984 advertising campaign, Amazon’s Alexa is portrayed in domestic environments as being part of the family. Robot characters in films like ‘Her’ and ‘Big Hero 6’ are far more warm and personable than ostensibly human characters in films like Clockwork Orange and The Matrix. This humanised technology is apparent in the real world too with the likes of Siri and Russian social media ‘bots’.

You can see this happening over the course of the first two Terminator films as Arnie goes from a merciless killing machine to a surrogate father.
 
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