
Dead Sea Squirrels
Some 2,000-year-old squirrels offer some great lessons about both the Bible and life in this clever new Minno series.
When you think of the future, what do you imagine?
Maybe it’s a Star Trek-esque utopia where technology allows us to push the limits of what we can achieve. Maybe it’s a Hunger Games-esque dystopia where the world has fallen into pieces.
Or maybe it’s like Tomorrow and I, where the future is…confusing.
This Thai anthology series explores the intersection of culture, technology and human nature across four futuristic stories. An astronaut’s husband attempts to bring her back to life with revolutionary cloning technology. A CEO tries to introduce intelligent sex robots into Thailand’s conservative culture. A Buddhist monk laments the downfall of his faith to an AI-generated religion. Two young girls attempt to survive a pandemic ravaging their slum while the government hoards life-saving medicine.
If you think that sounds complicated, depressing and downright strange, then you’d be right. But such is Tomorrow and I’s vision of the future – complicated, depressing and strange.
In 1949, George Orwell published a little book called 1984. The novel paints a grim picture of a future dominated by censorship, propaganda and oppressive dictators, and its message is clear: a government with too much power is very bad.
Agree or disagree with Orwell, it’s hard to deny that the novel has a point. The same case is difficult to make for Tomorrow and I. Is it critiquing Thailand’s conservative social expectations? Is it celebrating the possibilities of technology, or is it warning of its dangers? The series jumps at the opportunity to incorporate all the hallmarks of dystopia, but it shies away from using them to say anything at all.
Not that any of that matters much, since Tomorrow and I is nearly unwatchable to begin with. Because each episode tells a different story, each episode varies in terms of content issues. Perhaps the episode with the most glaring problems is “Paradistopia,” in which a woman starts a company that sells intelligent, highly realistic sex robots (you did, unfortunately, read that right). If this episode is any indication, there are no lines that Tomorrow and I won’t cross.
Nudity is nearly constant. Graphic encounters, both between human couples and human-and-robot couples, border on pornographic. Explicit dialogue leaves little to the imagination, and the threat of sexual violence and pedophilia will have viewers squirming in their seats.
You won’t find many revolutionary Orwellian statements in this anthology series—in fact, you’d likely struggle to find any statements at all. What you will find is strong sexuality, a misuse of religious themes and content to make even the most desensitized viewer cringe. Hopefully, the future seen in Tomorrow and I stays very, very far in the future.
(Editor’s Note: Plugged In is rarely able to watch every episode of a given series for review. As such, there’s always a chance that you might see a problem that we didn’t. If you notice content that you feel should be included in our review, send us an email at [email protected], or contact us via Facebook or Instagram, and be sure to let us know the episode number, title and season so that we can check it out. )
Jessica Hearthighhill, CEO of Paradise X, introduces a new product to Thailand: a line of intelligent sex robots that are indistinguishable from humans. While some rally to Jessica’s attempts to destigmatize sexuality, others take strong objection, and a culture war is ignited in Thailand’s highly conservative society.
To detail every instance of objectionable content in this episode would be a monumental undertaking. Suffice it to say that multiple sexual encounters are shown in disturbing detail, including those between humans and lifelike robots. Several of the robots appear fully nude, and they are shown in a variety of compromising positions as the designers at Paradise X attempt to make “improvements.” Human sex workers train the robots by mimicking various sexual acts and making graphic and exaggerated noises. A man masturbates while playing a virtual reality game featuring a topless woman. In a commercial for Paradise X, several customers describe how the product has been “beneficial” for them: a closeted gay man is able to indulge his secret desires, a woman interested in BDSM is able to explore without consequence, a sex addict can live freely without judgement. Protestors of Paradise X take to calling the robots “whore-bots.”
In a non-explicit yet disturbing scene, a businessman attempts to force Jessica into sexual favors in exchange for a business license. Nothing is shown, but the situation is tense and threatening. Similarly, in a flashback we learn that Jessica’s mother, a prostitute, forced her to engage with her clients when she was a child. While we don’t see anything occur, it’s clear what is happening and that the trauma has a profound effect on Jessica in her adulthood.
Jessica has a large painting in her home showing her with a metallic baby in the style of Mary and Jesus. At the opening of Paradise X, when she’s mocked and ridiculed by a group of protestors, she holds out her arms in a Christ-like position and is carried away through the crowd. A recurring flashback shows a young Jess praying at an altar to the Virgin Mary. Jessica refers to sexual intimacy as “heaven.”
Jessica has a dream in which the skin falls off her bones, showing a robot skeleton underneath: The imagery is odd and disturbing, though not entirely realistic.
Jessica’s boyfriend, Witt, drinks from a flask while on TV, and they drink wine socially together. The f-word is heard four times and the s-word is heard three. “B—ch” is said seven times, while “d–n” is used four times, “d–ck” three, and “h-ll” twice.
Lauren Cook is serving as a 2021 summer intern for the Parenting and Youth department at Focus on the Family. She is studying film and screenwriting at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts. You can get her talking for hours about anything from Star Wars to her family to how Inception was the best movie of the 2010s. But more than anything, she’s passionate about showing how every form of art in some way reflects the Gospel. Coffee is a close second.
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