A Dream or A Dystopia : Application of The Theory of Dystopia on Modern Television Shows

Abstract

Realizing that the future may not always hold what people usually expect has driven a lot of writers into considering the future as a doomed dystopia. A dystopia is a corrupted post- apocalyptic world that is undesirable and frightening, considering the history of humankind, such a description does not seem far from the reality inflicted by wars and destructive technology. This study aims to compare between episodes from the series Black Mirror and episodes from the animated sitcom The Jetsons in order to figure out the hidden subliminal dystopian atmosphere in The Jetsons and analyze the dystopia of Black Mirror. It also verifies the notion that despite the negativity shown in the episodes it is mostly the negative outlook of the writers themselves and not necessarily based on facts, as they are sometimes influenced by the works of previous content creators that portrayed a similar depressing image. To the researcher’s knowledge a similar study has not yet been conducted and leaving this topic without discussion would result in the misconception that the future is unavoidably horrifying with all the technology that it may offer. The dissertation attempts a comparative analysis of dystopia in futuristic worlds through the selected television series in question, to understand the minds of the scriptwriters and their predictions on the misuse of coming advanced technology. A close textual analysis contrasting the ideas of the utopian world of Plato, is applied and focuses on the similarities and differences in the events and the characters of the two drastically diverse works. The findings and the conclusion of the study point at the fact that there is still hope for a better future because although many previous authors believed the future would be horrible it still did not turn out as bad or as messed up as they had expected.