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Retrofuturism: Sandalpunk and Candlepunk
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<blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 7035708" data-attributes="member: 4937"><p>I looked at the entry on 'TV Tropes', and it appears to be a genera created by accidental anachronisms rather than intentional creation. That is to say, it's a genera created by extrapolating into the future and not understanding the near term implications of digital technology rather than by any attempt to consciously eschew digital invention or imagine a world without it. </p><p></p><p>An example that comes to mind for me is Alexi Panshin's 'Rite of Passage' where they travel between the stars in an extrapolated 1970's spaceship powered by nuclear explosions, but they still do math on a slide rule. That is, the author can imagine a star ship, but can't imagine a digital calculator. </p><p></p><p>The marker of this trope appears to be a future setting where cathrode ray tubes or cassette tapes exist. But while that might be a thing, I'm not sure it's a genera, and certainly I wouldn't agree that 'Babylon 5' is 'Formicapunk' despite being cited as an example (solely because budget constraints with the props!).</p><p></p><p>'Cassette Futurism' doesn't seem to be a deliberate genera creation, so much as the writer not understanding the immediate impact of the digital revolution going on at the time, or an accidental result of a prop artist trying to create a mock up of a futuristic set using only modern technology. 'Back to the Future' imagining the world of today filled with fax machines and not email, which is cited by the TV trope page as an example, is simply an example of a faulty future extrapolation rather than a conscious attempt to imagine a future without digital technology where analog technology replaces it. </p><p></p><p>One of the few examples I can think of that is intentional is the pre-cataclysm 'Fallout' universe, where the pre-cataclysm USA is parodied as people wanting bigger cars and analog devices because using the more expensive, bigger, less efficient technology is a status symbol and a form of social signaling. The transistor appears to exist in the Fallout universe (because it is denigrated as foreign un-American technology), but people preferred vacuum tubes and mechanical computers culturally. However, even that verges on being 'Diesel Punk', in that the vacuum tube dates to 1904 and was in wide use by the 1940's, and the culture being parodied in 'Fallout' is the 1950's, not the 1970's or 1980's. </p><p></p><p>The Trope Namer appears to be a single French comic, and I guess you'd have to add me to the list of people that think that the comic doesn't actually understand the fundamental assumptions of the genera. Instead, it seems to wrongly think that it's futurism simply with a certain retro-aesthetic.</p><p></p><p>And that's not even to get into the use of "Punk" as a generic genera suffix completely divorced from feelings of social alienation, anti-authortarianism, acting out, and fears about the future.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Celebrim, post: 7035708, member: 4937"] I looked at the entry on 'TV Tropes', and it appears to be a genera created by accidental anachronisms rather than intentional creation. That is to say, it's a genera created by extrapolating into the future and not understanding the near term implications of digital technology rather than by any attempt to consciously eschew digital invention or imagine a world without it. An example that comes to mind for me is Alexi Panshin's 'Rite of Passage' where they travel between the stars in an extrapolated 1970's spaceship powered by nuclear explosions, but they still do math on a slide rule. That is, the author can imagine a star ship, but can't imagine a digital calculator. The marker of this trope appears to be a future setting where cathrode ray tubes or cassette tapes exist. But while that might be a thing, I'm not sure it's a genera, and certainly I wouldn't agree that 'Babylon 5' is 'Formicapunk' despite being cited as an example (solely because budget constraints with the props!). 'Cassette Futurism' doesn't seem to be a deliberate genera creation, so much as the writer not understanding the immediate impact of the digital revolution going on at the time, or an accidental result of a prop artist trying to create a mock up of a futuristic set using only modern technology. 'Back to the Future' imagining the world of today filled with fax machines and not email, which is cited by the TV trope page as an example, is simply an example of a faulty future extrapolation rather than a conscious attempt to imagine a future without digital technology where analog technology replaces it. One of the few examples I can think of that is intentional is the pre-cataclysm 'Fallout' universe, where the pre-cataclysm USA is parodied as people wanting bigger cars and analog devices because using the more expensive, bigger, less efficient technology is a status symbol and a form of social signaling. The transistor appears to exist in the Fallout universe (because it is denigrated as foreign un-American technology), but people preferred vacuum tubes and mechanical computers culturally. However, even that verges on being 'Diesel Punk', in that the vacuum tube dates to 1904 and was in wide use by the 1940's, and the culture being parodied in 'Fallout' is the 1950's, not the 1970's or 1980's. The Trope Namer appears to be a single French comic, and I guess you'd have to add me to the list of people that think that the comic doesn't actually understand the fundamental assumptions of the genera. Instead, it seems to wrongly think that it's futurism simply with a certain retro-aesthetic. And that's not even to get into the use of "Punk" as a generic genera suffix completely divorced from feelings of social alienation, anti-authortarianism, acting out, and fears about the future. [/QUOTE]
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