There's quietly a Revolution that's been happening behind-the-scenes of the television industry, which means that the new upcoming TV season and a lot of brand-new shows that South African viewers will be seeing, will all be about the future world of tomorrow.
With the success of the new TV drama Revolution (on M-Net Series, returning in America on 25 March and returning to M-Net Series for episode 11 on Thursday 4 April) TV channels and producers are working on the biggest number of futuristic TV dramas and science fiction shows depicting some form of "the world of tomorrow" that will start to roll out at the same time on general television later in 2013.
The big lesson of 2012 was, of course, that the Mayas were wrong. The other lesson (and because Hollywood loves to imitate success) is that viewers are in love with seeing utopian and dystopian visions of the future.
There is a whole crop of awesome looking films coming up in 2013 about future Earths (Oblivion (the image above), After Earth etc.) but it's going to be on television where the trend of futuristic versions of our planet is going to become an inescapable programming strand.
Of course existing shows with this theme there already are, such as Revolution, The Walking Dead, Falling Skies and Continuum which are all doing well, just as the little watched, yet critically acclaimed Fringe came to and end. But there's a whole lot of new ones underway.
A lot of pilot episodes are currently being shot, any number of which could become full new TV series. And a number of shows will already be guaranteed full first season series like Under the Dome and Defiance. Step back a moment, and look at the overall picture to see the important trend:
I already reported on the pilot episode being shot for The Last Ship in which a nuclear submarine and its crew become all that's left of humanity after a nuclear war as they embark on a voyage looking for a new home, since every single landmass they approach is enveloped by a dense radioactive cloud.
I've told you about The Hundred, a pilot episode for a new youth centered show set in a post-apocalyptic Earth which takes place a century after mankind has destroyed civilization. The first step to "colonize" Earth is to send 100 juvenile delinquents back to Earth in a spaceship and to a planet which has radically changed.
Oxygen which will be almost like the South African movie District 9, will revolve around a future Earth where a group of alien visitors are kept in isolation, because we don't know what they might really be up to.A group of alien boys are however integrated into a suburban high school, and then one of the aliens has a romance with a human girl.
Then there's The Selection, set 300 years in the future (and like the movie The Hunger Games) is about a hardworking young woman who is chosen by lottery to partake in a competition to become the nation's next queen.
Defiance anyone? Odds are that show is going to be huge, since it's launching worldwide with a full first season at the same time as a global online video game. It will be interesting to see which South African broadcaster on TV channel on DStv or TopTV bring this TV show to viewers while its hot.
Defiance is set - ta-da - in the future in what remains, or is now the transformed St. Louis where mankind and aliens live together (not peacefully) and fight bigger aliens after a devastating war destroyed much of what used to be civilization.
The Returned is going to look to replicate some of The Walking Dead magic. Yes, with the zombie drama doing exceptionally well worldwide, The Returned is about zombies who are able to live normal lives - but maybe not for long. In this TV drama about a future Earth, in this post-zombie world where the infected live normal lives, their retroviral drug is running out...
Another big one coming up in 2013 is S.H.I.E.L.D. Yep, this is an Avengers-themed TV effort hoping to bring some Marvel action heroes to television.
Stephen King's book Under the Dome is becoming a full already approved TV series as well this year - a small town is suddenly cut off from the rest of the world. Steven Spielberg and Dreamworks Television is in on this one as the residents trapped inside the invisible force field has to figure out what is going on and how to escape.
J.J. Abrams is working on a new as-yet-untitled drama for 2013 as well - yes, set in the future. In this futuristic cop drama, where all LAPD officers are partnered with highly evolved human-like androids.
Shonda Rhimes is working on robots and a future world too for 2013. She's already looking after Grey's Anatomy and Scandal (retitled as The Fixer in South Africa) but now she's going to produce an android science fiction thriller as her next new TV drama entitled MILA 2.0.
MILA 2.0 based on Debra Driza's book is about a young woman who discovers that she is a Mobile Intel Life-like Android or Mila - an experiment in artificial intelligence created by the U.S. government and her scientist mother, who kidnapped her when she was found to have human emotions.
Delirium is coming in 2013 as a pilot episode and possibly a TV series. That too is set in a futuristic dystopian world where love is illegal and gets eradicated with a ... special procedure. Just 95 days before her scheduled treatment, the lead character Lena Holoway falls in love.
And finally, who knows? Not that Disney bought George Lucas' LucasFilm Ltd and the Star Wars franchise in 2012, could Disney finally be making that long gestating live action Star Wars TV drama of which all the scripts have already been written but which required a big budget? Will it finally get the green light in 2013 to become a real TV show?
