The Offworld Agenda: "Oblivion," Elysium," And Hawking's Warning

Running Man: Cruise in "Oblivion"

I've written several times on this blog that the big "theme" to be pushed through pop-culture and the media for the years to come will be that of "offworld" colonization (a.k.a. "Starseeds").

The latest confluence of news and entertainment mirroring the same message was this week, when physicist Stephen Hawking declared that that humanity was essentially "doomed" unless they get off the Earth and colonize space. From a recent Mother Nature News article:

Discussing the Earth's most troubling concerns in an email interview with The Canadian Press, Hawking described space exploration as humankind's most urgent mission. Predicting a planet soon made uninhabitable, he says that our only chance of long-term survival as a species is to “spread out into space.”

"Our population and our use of the finite resources of planet Earth are growing exponentially, along with our technical ability to change the environment for good or ill. But our genetic code still carries the selfish and aggressive instincts that were of survival advantage in the past. It will be difficult enough to avoid disaster in the next hundred years, let alone the next thousand or million,” he wrote.

By some great coincidence, this week also marked increased hype for two science-fiction movies about off-world space colonization by humans, "Oblivion" and "Elysium." The former will be released next Friday, and the latter, in August.

Elysium: Hawking's utopia?

"Oblivion," which I've covered a bit already, concerns a humanity who has supposedly left Earth for Saturn's moon Titan. A rag-tag band of humans remain on Earth: "The Resistance."

"Oblivion": the human, Earthbound Resistance

"Oblivion": the cold, offworld Elites

"Elysium" concerns an increasingly awful, overpopulated Earth, and the Utopian "cloud world" built in space where the rich flee and live in comfort. While not about colonizing a specific planet -- Elysium is essentially an orbiting space station -- the same message is there. GET OFFWORLD.

"Elysium": the human, Earthbound Resistance

"Elysium": the cold, offworld Elites

But as the plots for "Oblivion" and "Elysium" indicate, acting on Hawking's warning may not have the same benefit for the elite as it will have for the masses. Will humanity as a whole go offworld as the Earth continues to decline -- or only those rich enough to score a valuable place on the theoretical space stations and colonized planets?

But the clone workers of "Oblivion" bring up another possible dystopian development -- that of corporations using human "drones" or "clones" to "harvest" and terraform these planets. On one hand, this might create more jobs. On the other, this could be very dangerous, potentially health-damaging (radiation?) work -- taken up by the unemployed, desperate masses.

The expendable, offworld worker drone of "Moon"

We see this scenario play out quite clearly in the movie "Moon," in which Sam Rockwell is essentially an expandable "drone" sent to Earth's satellite; his employers having him work there while knowing he is doomed.

While it has been said that it's "impossible to own the moon" -- I believe that is is quite damn possible. If the future of humanity is offworld, this "offworld" will most likely be bought and sold; our future being less the egalitarianism of "Star Trek," and more a carbon copy of the colonization of Earth through the many centuries.