On May 1, I was on Amazon Prime searching up a movie to watch that night. And I forget exactly how, but this B-movie called Moon Zero Two from 1969 came up in the list of search results. When I saw in the movie description that it took place in the year 2021, I knew I had to watch it.
About fifteen minutes into the movie, the viewer sees a date-and-time sign that says MAY 9 2021 hanging in the spaceport on the moon. This is legitimately one of the craziest coincidences of my life. Immediately, I knew that Moon Zero Two had to be commemorated. What else can you do when you watch a science fiction movie just 8 days before it’s supposed to take place? So I thought it would be cool if I compared the futuristic visions of this 52-year-old movie with the actual technology of today.
MOON COLONY: Not yet
The plot of Moon Zero Two revolves around the unimaginatively named Moon City, a city on the moon. Moon City consists of a bunch of colorful bubbles built into the side of a cliff on the Moon. In the year 2021, we haven’t launched a moon colony yet. In fact, we’re closer to getting a colony on Mars than on the Moon. So we haven’t lived up to this expectation of Moon Zero Two.
SPACE TOURISM: In progress
Many of the people on Moon City are tourists. Despite the fact that we don’t yet have a moon colony to attract tourist revenue, the people of 2021 are still interested in visiting outer space. Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin rocket company is planning to launch its first interstellar sightseeing trip on July 20, and for just $200,000 a tourist.
ARTIFICIAL GRAVITY: Nowhere close
Artificial gravity is a big part of the folks on Moon City’s lives. There’s artificial gravity in the spaceships, moon buggies (or “bugs,” as they are referred to in the movie), and even in the bars. Notably, there’s a scene in which the gravity in aforementioned bar is turned off, and everyone has a fistfight while floating around. In the real year 2021, we still haven’t launched any human-carrying projectile into outer space with any semblance of gravity.
MOON LANDERS: Definitely yes
In fact, the moon landers in Moon Zero Two look even older than the Eagle module used in the famous Apollo 11 moon mission, which took place the same year the movie was released. Take one look at a SpaceX capsule, and you’ll know that the folks in 2021 have surpassed that.
So, it’s hard to tell whether Moon Zero Two was an accurate prediction of 2021. On the one hand, we’ve far surpassed the movie with our moon landers; on the other hand, we still haven’t come up to scratch with artificial gravity, space tourism, moon colonies, and pretty much everything else in the movie. But although we’ve come up short of many aspects of Moon Zero Two, there is one aspect that we will never surpass nor fall behind on: crime. (Watch the movie and you’ll get what I’m saying.)
But also: Happy Moon Zero Two Day! The holiday lasts 3 days, in honor of the time span of the movie, so just have a good time! And maybe, if you can, have an antigravity fistfight!
Image Source: IMDB.com
