Science Fiction TV Turns Toward Biology

Rather than the coldness of computers, imaginative organic science has been popular in scifi TV recently, the prevalence of machinery giving way to a more biological interpretation of the mysteries of the universe. To put it bluntly, spores, trees and fungi infect our perception of the future.

Imagining Future Science

What will science allow humanity to do in the future? That is the core of science fiction. For many years the focus was on projecting a version of current technology. Yet recently it feels like a more imaginative interpretation is happening.

Plants and organisms, even if they're made of light and data rather than solid matter, are everywhere. Has the way we think about what is possible, changed?

Contrary to popular belief, science isn't linear. It experiences trends. One recurrent theme has been time, or the manipulation of time, and that has bled into our entertainment, bringing with it an almost spiritual aspect.

Below are some popular television shows that include an organic element (for want of a better term). Perhaps organisms are the ultimate storytelling metaphor for life and a sense of mortality. Maybe, like time, they are symbolic of the boundaries that fascinate humanity the most.

12 Monkeys

The red forest is an integral part of this show's mythology.

12 Monkeys is a beautifully written series. Time travel is a twisting concept and it can be difficult to maintain a narrative hold. The show begins with the character of Cole being sent back in time to stop a plague that wipes out humanity. He partners with the virologist Cassie, and they encounter resistance from a group called The 12 Monkeys.

The 12 Monkeys are revealed to be fanatics dedicated to bringing The Red Forest into existence. The red forest exists beyond time. At certain points characters drink tea made from leaves sourced in the red forest, and experience visions.

The scenes in the red forest are eerie and compelling. They tie in with science but seem to speak to a primal part of the mind.

Star Trek Discovery

A recent addition to the Star Trek television universe, Discovery moves beyond the standard ways of navigating through space that have been created by Star Trek over the years, and introduces the Spore Drive.

You'll see a lot of debate online regarding the plausibility of this tech. The Spore Drive takes the ship from one place to another in an instance. Basically the idea is the technology utilizes a network of spores to move across the galaxy.

Rather than arguing the logistics or potentiality, my interest is focused on the fact it is a spore-driven concept: modeled on an organic idea. That at the heart (or should that be seed) of Star Trek's greatest engineering technology, are spores.

 The OA

An alternate reality thriller, The OA follows a lead character that inadvertently travelled across dimensions, a journey kick started by a series of body motions that need to be carried out by a group.

The recent season introduced the idea of a giant tree network that spreads across dimensions. The tree communicated with our lead. Seeds and branches are utilized as a way of explaining a complex multiverse reality. The tree also represents a continuing thematic thread for the show: that community is essential to survival.

The OA is at heart a series about alternate realities but it uses this exploration of a possible corner of science to also explore the concept of self. The OA appears to blend science and the spiritual, but it's interesting that a large reveal in regards to interdimensionality takes science to an organic place.

The Expanse

A brilliant example of science fiction TV, one of the story cornerstones to kick start the show is Detective Miller's hunt for a missing woman. By the end of the first season we see that she has been taken over by a seemingly sentient organism.

The Expanse includes a lot of political drama. Conspiracies abound, thanks to a book series that provides fantastic fodder in terms of complex narrative. But it was the futuristic organism (I've seen it referenced online as protomolecule) transforming people that cements an organic element within a series that prides itself on scientific accuracy.

Aliens are behind the infectious construct. The plot is quite complex and becomes more so when it's revealed humanity has begun its own experiments using the protomolecule. But a protomolecule that manipulates biomass, with references to seeds and infections, makes it a great example of an organic representation of futuristic science.

In conclusion…

What messages are currently echoing across small screens in the science fiction genre?

Perhaps that everything in the universe is interconnected. That our minds relate to plants and living organisms as representations of life and death, themes that are always a human preoccupation even when we're travelling the stars.

It's interesting to see where our cultural imagination takes us. Here's to constantly intriguing unfolding scifi stories on the small screen.

Scifi TV: Where Science Meets Spirit.

If I had to describe a recurring theme across a number of current science fiction TV shows in three words, it would be: ALONE, TOO ALONE.

Questions and issues facing humanity (and hence, the screenwriter) are at the core of a lot of science fiction television. Sci-fi as a genre is often as fascinated with the human spirit, and the spiritual, as much as science. Emotionally, one recurring thematic thread in recent times is the desire for, or loss of, a sense of community.

On the technical front, the further we reach toward science beyond our present understanding, the more concepts begin to take on an element of mysticism. That’s human nature: our perception can only stretch so far.

I like giving wild concepts the benefit of the doubt. Who can guess the future? And the art of a lot of sci-fi is to meld present day concerns with unexpected possibilities: strange, vivid, often left-of-field ideas.

Perhaps because of technology, and the inherent disconnect that seems to have taken place in society, a lot of recent science fiction television offerings focus on human connectivity. And, you could argue, empathy: the lack, and the need. The pain of isolation is everywhere on TV.

The OA 

The most prominent example would be The OA, about a blind missing person who returns years later—with her sight. The first season aligns us with the lead character’s perspective. The fact she may be lying, or more accurately, lying to herself about certain aspects of her experiences, isn’t surprising; sci-fi has long had a passionate relationship with the unreliable narrator.

Underlying the science (which more informed minds have covered in other blogs) is a celebration of the power of community. The physical captives she left behind, and the psychological captives of suburban life she’s gathered.

Influencing it all is the mystical presence she envisions as a woman, beyond the everyday world.

The Creator, the Other, the Universe, the Unknown Entity… Some form of empowered consciousness—even if it’s just the universe itself—is scattered through a lot of science fiction.

The series Frequency explores the idea of communication between two time periods. By utilizing a father and daughter cop combo, both investigating the same serial killer at different points in history, the audience is reassured by the inference that somehow The Universe is interested in both karma, and closure.

Frequency

The plot plays with The Butterfly Effect, but at heart the story puts forth the idea that via a kind of science seemingly miraculous to our heroes, lives can be saved. What our heroine is really trying to save, is her own community: most notably a lover and mother. Without them she feels… alone.

Stranger Things

By being set in a small, insular community, from episode one Stranger Things highlights the idea of The Other versus those who belong. Most of the people in the town, courtesy of their everyday lives, already feel like The Other—long before another being shows up to take that niche. The series includes futuristic science so far ahead it communicates to the characters as mystical, or supernatural.

Killjoys

Killjoys is set in a space-faring future and follows three bounty hunters whose primary goal is survival. They form their own community (in a sense) and try to keep the past from interfering with the future. It’s a cutthroat dystopian world (well, worlds) with little celebration of human connection; trust is sparse, so the community they’ve created is of growing importance to them.

Sense8 focuses less on the science aspect of science fiction, and more on the human connection present in the story. Individuals around the globe experience each other’s lives through an unexpected mental connection, the surreality of which quickly builds bonds.

Sense8

A shadowy group hunt the connected, but the real focus is on the sense of community the linked “sensates” create despite being from very different cultures (and separated physically at the outset of the show). In some sense, each character gives the impression of being alone, or feeling isolated because of their perspective, experiences, or society’s perception of them.

Westworld showcases a faux community in the Wild West using androids for entertainment. One of the reasons for creating pseudo-people is to deny them basic rights, thereby providing an outlet for darker human impulses, without repercussion.

Westworld

The question is, of course, who are the androids, who are the people and which of these is showing the most “humanity”? A human creator provides the mystical, elusive character/persona here. The role of memory is a dominant theme too: if you don't remember an experience, or the people you're told/programmed to love, or hate, does that make you less human?

Humans

The show Humans also focuses on beings of artificial intelligence, this time designed as a stopgap for problematic areas of society. A dominant plot issue is that when human characters fill a duel role, i.e. work and home, replacing them with an android in one of these environments threatens their perceived place in a particular community. AI’s in this future are used, not integrated: the ultimate outsiders.

The Expanse

The Expanse is incredibly technically accurate, from a scientific perspective. Alongside politics and intrigues, the rejection, adoption and valuing of communities, some separated by space, is paramount to the plot. A ragged band of outsiders—survivors of a conspiracy that killed their crew—are forced to become a community, and peel back the layers of duplicity to figure out WTH is really going on.

Not a series, but a movie made for Netflix, iBoy is an interesting exploration of early (accidental) transhumanism. A teen is beaten and a part of his mobile embeds in his head. After the sexual assault of a friend, he takes on a local gang with his new “powers” i.e. the ability to interact with wireless technology via his mind.

It could be argued the lead’s most extreme state of information connectivity created a self-deception of empowerment and personal connectivity; when in reality, the character was at his saddest, and most isolated.

iBoy

The people in the flats he calls home in are the focal point; they’re his community, the ones he wants most to both protect, and punish. Yet when his actions lean more to revenge than empathy, a temporary disconnect from loved ones occurs. He feels—despite the flow of info available to his mind—alone.

 Sci-fi flavored entertainment can reflect the current cultural clime, and it’s clear that as we move forward the quality of human connection remains a contentious and worrying issue. 

Whether flying through space, traveling through time, or deciding who qualifies as human, feeling emotionally isolated and unable to connect with, or rely on a sense of community, is a persistent concern.