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The date 2025 might sound more futuristic. Maybe it's the sound of the letter "f" in "five". But 2026 signifies one step beyond, and it's where we find ourselves, with each futuristic development – primarily the broad integration of artificial intelligence – appearing bleak, or perhaps even worse. (Doesn't it feel like in a proper dystopia, the mind-dulling corporate-backed anti-human technology might function a bit better?) Did no one warn us regarding this?

The answer, particularly concerning science fiction films from years ago (or occasionally recently) set in 2026, is a mixed bag. Some of these prophecies are broadly applicable (worldwide disaster) but specifically implausible (if humanity is inevitably decimated, we will most likely bring down the primate species with us). Others of them are prescient; others just look like bad green screen. But it's worth examining where different directors, ranging from masters to journeymen, believed we'd be positioned by now in our planet's development. So let's examine at some of the movies that have been depicted in 2026 throughout cinematic history and see if they have anything to teach us.

The Game 'Doom'

Well, this isn't promising. In the universe of the game-to-film translation *Doom*, whose 20th anniversary was noted by virtually no one, 2026 is the year that humanity finds a gateway to an long-lost metropolis on Mars, where the people of Earth are able to set up a research facility. Currently, the bad stuff – in terms of plot and concerning over-the-top film versions of a FPS video game – does not actually go down for two more decades in the future, so even if we find a portal to Mars this year, we might have a respite to avert catastrophe. Were we to uncover a passageway to an ancient Martian city, it's genuinely difficult to determine whether a certain tech billionaire would remain extremely excited to send everyone to Mars or would instantly become dejected that the portal wasn't something he personally paid for, allowing him to assert savior-like credit for mankind's journey into the stars. This precedes we even get to the collection of extraterrestrial genetics and subsequent transformations into monstrous beings. (Again, this is closer to 2046, distinct from the acclaimed director's film.) In general, *Doom* is (if nothing else) a good test case for the reasons we allow Mars become a long-term hope for mankind. Be it in the director's cheap-looking genre hybrid *Ghosts of Mars*, the more grounded science fiction of *Red Planet*, or the new-age spiritualism of *Mission to Mars*, our distant neighbor planet doesn't tend to act as a symbol of hope. Should someone wants to close that dubious red-planet property deal, maybe they should start with at least making the fantasy version appear appealing.

The Marvel Dregs

One of the goofiest quirks of the current Marvel Cinematic Universe is how to account for the various world-threatening cataclysms, encompassing a half-decade leap whose occurrences are mostly undepicted in the films themselves; the movies have turned into a clock radio constantly set a few minutes fast – only instead of minutes, it's annual increments. So there's a large assortment of MCU content that fan sites clarify to be taking place in 2026. The better entries, like *Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3* and the underrated adventure *The Marvels*, occur far away from Earth, and so feel pretty unmoored from our sense of time. But the poorer material is among the weakest Marvel has created: the nonsensically meandering TV show *Secret Invasion* and the remote-meeting debacle of *Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania*. Based on this stuff, we're facing a great deal of annoying stagnation in 2026, along with the related spin that actually, this nonsensical crap happening in front of us is essential to whatever happens next. Even worse, in the real world that claim will likely turn out to be correct.

Dawn of the Planet of the Apes

The majority of the original five-movie *Planet of the Apes* cycle is located in the more distant future of Earth, but the new trilogy that started with 2011’s *Rise of the Planet of the Apes* begins closer to home, initiating its chronology around 2016. So by the time a pathogen that devastates most of Earth’s human population has run its course, and simultaneously enhanced the cognitive abilities of apes, it’s only 2026, with further human indignities (and victories for apes) to come. The post-credits scene of *Rise*, illustrating how swiftly this contagion propagates around the world and taking place around 2019, appears downright eerie in the aftermath of the actual pandemic that would dawn in 2020. By comparison, the movie *Dawn* looks less literal; astonishingly, we’re already six years out from the spread of Covid-19, and society, though clearly impacted by the still-spreading virus, hasn't been wiped out, and technological infrastructure definitely hasn't been knocked out. But this bleakest of the quartet of modern *Apes* movies (at least so far!) still has a significant downer in store, implying that the fundamental nature of beings, however one defines either, will inevitably result in violent conflict, regardless of the efforts of the most well-meaning individuals. We’re at the mercy of those who exploit others’ worst instincts, although those drives are not held by the majority. Right now, it seems hard to argue with that, despite the fact that we ought to try.

Metropolis

Easily the most prominent portrayal of 2026 in film is from a movie close to celebrating its centennial. Fritz Lang’s iconic silent film *Metropolis* takes place in a futuristic city where wealthy industrialists preside over the towers as workers toil below the surface on the equipment that power the city. Rich surface resident Freder, son of the city’s ruler, has his perspective changed to these enormous social gaps when he falls for Maria, an underground organizer who advocates for a reconciliation of the separate strata of Metropolis. A scientist with more radical plans creates a automaton in her image, hoping to bring the entire Metropolis down in flames. In this narrative, a robot created to imitate a human isn't a tool of the ruling corporate class, but someone who desires to see them destroyed; it's one element inverted by the modern world in a vision of tomorrow that otherwise seems to be progressing. *Metropolis* also imagines a world where advanced machinery relies on traditional manual labor, which appears as a perfect fusion of conservative disdain for “the working class” and business zeal for an AI bubble. It hasn't yet come to pass, but it's simple to picture a somewhat less stylish-looking version of Lang’s city growing with the prospect of a resurgence to industrial production. The more complex, harder-to-imagine accomplishment is the ending of the film, where the gap between the haves and the have-nots is bridged with compassion; rather than with specific policies. Similar to *Dawn of the Planet of the Apes*, the movie pleads for peaceful cohabitation; in contrast to *Dawn*, it appears hopeful about the possibility