As
Grant Morrison recently wrote, "it's 4:30 in the morning of the
21st century", and I guess some folks are
pining for their promised flying cars.
You've seen these people. Down the road comes a little, sporty, over-chromed car. The ground directly underneath the car is awash in some gaudily-colored (usually purple) neon light. These are often also the lowered cars with blacked out windows and thumping stereos.
Note to these people: your car still cannot fly. You are not a Jetson. There are no food pills.
It is kinda sad, though. We live in the future. For our entire lives, the year 2000 (and beyond) was the future. We walk around wanting our teleporters and our ray guns and our giant robots. Okay, maybe it's just me who wants the giant robots. Hell, what am I gonna do when the giant atomic monsters start smashing up Tokyo? And why the hell hasn't that happened yet?
And the future stuff we have is somehow less than exciting. We have palmtop computers. We have very small communication devices with web access. We're starting to have on-demand body modification. We're very close to having implantable electronic devices.
Something's missing. Is it just a matter of pure style? Do we need to start wearing mylar?
I think it's more basic. Very simply, people aren't the same. People have changed. The 1950s vision of the future was grafting high technology onto 50s culture (not that I'm lauding 50's culture). We, now, are incorporating futuristic technology into a culture that's still, in many ways, lost in the 1990s. We never figured out what the hell the 90's were, and now it's too late; we've got a shiny new century on our hands. It's not the 21st century's fault; it's ours.
I want my future.