History Main / TheFutureisNoir

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Renaissance}}'', a French CGI film about a TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture cop's search for a woman and her [[spoiler:immortality-granting]] MacGuffin. Aside from having a classic noir plotline at first, the film is composed almost entirely of pure black and pure white.

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* ''TabletopGame/Warhammer40000'', in which "grim darkness" doesn't just apply to the tone of the setting.
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* The 1997 ''VideoGame/BladeRunner'' videogame is set in the ''Film/BladeRunner'' universe, and in fact the very same city as the film. It's no wonder that it takes the aesthetic of its predecessor.

* ''VideoGame/Doom3'' was one of the first games with full-on dinamic, very limited lightning with sharp, very black shadows. It also had very little light sources, justified in-story by the TheLegionsOfHell trashing the place, although you do get an InfiniteFlashlight by way of compensation... Except you can't hold the torch and a gun both at once. It also made it standard to have monsters waiting for you in shadows, promoting very cautious gameplay. This was a strong deviation from traditional doom 1-2/quake 1-2 gameplay, which caused mixed reactions. The later BFG re-edition and the [[DuctTapeForEverything "Duct Tape"]] GameMod changed this to a more standard limited flashlight, cutting down on suspense.
* In ''VideoGame/MassEffect1'', lights on the ''Normandy'' are kept very low. Between this and the bright orange computer screens, humanity has evidently conquered eyestrain. On a battleship this is potentially justified in that it makes instruments easier to see. The living sections of the ship do seem to be a lot brighter than the deck level...
** It also explains why Cerberus is so much more advanced than the Alliance: their stations and vessels actually have adequate lighting! Ironically, this was meant to make them seem creepier, in a cold, sterile, medical sense.
* ''VideoGame/DeusExHumanRevolution'' uses this during cutscenes but looks normal during gameplay, making the swap between the two rather disconcerting.
* ''VideoGame/PerfectDark'' (fittingly, considering the title) has several dimly lit levels, including the Skedar attack ship.

** ''Film/{{Alien 3}}'': the entire setting. The surface of the penal planet was cold and dark, even when the sun shone, and the prison itself had black shadows everywhere. The look of the film has more in common with old German black-and-white films than with the preceding ''Alien'' franchise.
* ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' eventually went noir when the movies started rolling out. Sometime between "All Good Things..." and ''[[Film/StarTrekGenerations Generations]]'', someone apparently busted out half the lights on the Enterprise-D.

** ''Film/{{Immortal}}, though a little more brightly-lit than normal, still has all the fedora-wearing detectives, corrupt politicians, dingy cities and cool bars that are the norm for a Noir movie.

* ''Film/PitchBlack'' is hard-boiled fiction, with themes not unlike Film/BladeRunner or "Literature/TheSilenceOfTheLambs ''[[RecycledInSpace IN SPACE!]]''".

** ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'': The episode "Yesterday's Enterprise" features an alternate timeline where the Federation is at war with the Klingons. [[http://memory-alpha.org/wiki/File:Enterprise-d_bridge_alternate.jpg The bridge]] is very dimly lit. Interestingly, the DarkerAndEdgier alternate timeline has an opposite effect on [[GoodGuyBar Ten Forward]]: instead of being the usual mood-lit recreational area, it's a banal mess hall with white fluorescent lighting.

** Klingon and Romulan ships in ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'' were just as brightly colored inside as their Federation counterparts. Ever since the films, though, they seem to prefer seeing crewmates as dim, sinister-looking silhouettes

* For some reason interiors of [[Series/StargateUniverse Destiny]] are very dark.
** Justified in-universe because Destiny is always running on the stray edge of being out of power, is falling apart at the joints and hasn't had living-people maintenance of any kind in a million years. The fact that it has working lights at all is a minor miracle and considering that in many cases they were lacking power and parts for life support and basic functions, it's easy to justify leaving the lights down low and not repairing them all.

* A lot of the environments in the ''[[Franchise/TheChroniclesOfRiddick Riddick]]'' games (and Dark Fury) have very high-contrast lighting, with lots of shadows. The lead character can see in the dark. The first game (Butcher Bay) takes place in the universe's toughest prison, and Dark Fury and Dark Athena on spaceships run by bounty-hunting mercenaries. You'd think it'd be in their best interest to keep the lights on.

* The Brotherhood of Nod from ''VideoGame/CommandAndConquer'' have a fetish for using too few red lights in their bases.
** The GDI global stratospheric transports in ''Tiberium Twilight'', while not as dark as Nod's facilities earlier, are still not well lit.
* VideoGame/{{Doom 3}} was one of the first games with full-on dinamic, very limited lightning with sharp, very black shadows. It also had very little light sources, justified in-story by the TheLegionsOfHell trashing the place, although you do get an InfiniteFlashlight by way of compensation... Except you can't hold the torch and a gun both at once. It also made it standard to have monsters waiting for you in shadows, promoting very cautious gameplay. This was a strong deviation from traditional doom 1-2/quake 1-2 gameplay, which caused mixed reactions. The later BFG re-edition and the [[DuctTapeForEverything "Duct Tape"]] GameMod changed this to a more standard limited flashlight, cutting down on suspense.

** This tends to be done in ''Voyager'''s meeting room whenever the situation is supposed to be serious. The lights on the Bridge also dim whenever the ship goes on RedAlert.

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** ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'' tends to do this in their meeting room whenever the situation was supposed to be serious. The lights on the Bridge also dim whenever the ship goes on RedAlert.

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* ''TabletopGame/{{Warhammer 40000}}'', where "grim darkness" doesn't just apply to the tone of the setting.

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* ''VideoGame/{{Splatoon 2}}: Octo Expansion'' has the most technologically advanced setting in the franchise thus far. It is also the most dimly lit, moody setting in the franchise thus far. The central station, for instance, has only a single row of lights hanging from the ceiling, none of which are bright enough to liven up the place and some of which are broken, and the rest of the region is rarely much brighter than that. Of course, considering the Deepsea Metro is based on, well, [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin the deep sea]], it would make sense for everything to be dim.

** According to ''Fanfic/TiberiumWars'', [[spoiler:Kane does this because he loves hearing people whack their shins on tables.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Renaissance}}'', a French CGI film about a TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture cop's search for a woman and her [[spoiler:immortality-granting]] MacGuffin, takes this UpToEleven. Aside from having a classic noir plotline at first, the film is composed almost entirely of pure black and pure white.

* The ''ComicBook/JudgeDredd'' SpinOff ''ComicBook/TheSimpingDetective'', which follows undercover judge Jack Point.

[[StealthPun Contrast]] CrystalSpiresAndTogas, as well as EverythingIsAnIPodInTheFuture.

* ''Series/TheExpanse'' features this, Justified generally as a mix of exterior shots of space and powered down ships.

* Literature/AgentG by Creator/CTPhipps is a combination of thriller and cyberpunk with the protagonists being cold blooded assassins with morally ambiguous motivations against even worse megacorporations as well as mercenaries. Much is made of the BlackAndGrayMorality of the setting.

* ''Franchise/GhostInTheShell'', particularly the film. Although there are daytime scenes, they're usually cloudy and dim, and the majority of the action is set at night or in darkened buildings.

* In ''{{Series/Firefly}}'', the interior of ''Serenity'' is always depicted as fairly dark to contrast with the bright florescent lighting and CreepyCleanliness of Alliance ships (see ''StarWars'').

* Film/{{Immortal}}, though a little more brightly-lit than normal, still has all the fedora-wearing detectives, corrupt politicians, dingy cities and cool bars that are the norm for a Noir movie.
** Creator/EnkiBilal seems to love this. His two other movies (Bunker Palace Hotel and Tykho Moon) have a similar Noir-ish feel.
*** Bilal is better known as a graphic novel artist, at least in Europe, and his favourite colouring tool appears to be charcoal.

* ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'', at least compared to the cheery, fluorescent world of ''[[Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration The Next Generation]]''. This is explained that the Cardassians that built [=DS9=] prefer darker lighting than humans (it's even darker when you see it in the MirrorUniverse or under Cardassian administration; Garak pointed the latter out when [[FreakOut his brain went blooey]] and chewed out Bashir with several rants). In the conference room particularly, there is patchy lighting over everyone's faces, just like the venetian-blind-obscured lighting in much of FilmNoir.
** TNG had actually ''started'' with noir lighting. The production staff apparently hated this look, but for some strange reason waited until the third season before firing the initial lighting cameraman and bringing in someone who brightened things up.
** "Yesterday's Enterprise" featured an alternate timeline where the Federation was at war with the Klingons, [[http://memory-alpha.org/wiki/File:Enterprise-d_bridge_alternate.jpg the bridge]] was very dimly lit, and [[TakeThat there was a plausible reason to have]] [[ImprobableAge Wesley as a full ensign]]. Interestingly, the DarkerAndEdgier alternate timeline had an opposite effect on [[GoodGuyBar Ten Forward]]: instead of being the usual mood-lit recreational area, it's a banal mess hall with white fluorescent lighting (now, in the normal timeline, the lights ''do'' go up in there as needed, but you'd probably only notice if you're paying much attention to it).
** As noted on WebSite/SFDebris, ''[[Series/StarTrekVoyager Voyager]]'' tended to do this in their "magic meeting room" whenever the situation was supposed to be serious.
*** Whoever designed ''Voyager'' had a flair for the dramatic, as the lights on the Bridge would dim whenever the ship went on RedAlert.
** Klingon and Romulan ships in [[Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries TOS]] were just as brightly colored inside as their Federation counterparts (the show had a lot of bright colors so as to be a good demonstration of color TV). Ever since the films, though, they seem to prefer seeing crewmates as dim, sinister-looking silhouettes (along with the [[RubberForeheadAlien forehead ridges]] picked up at the same time, it is unclear whether this is supposed to be an actual change or whether it is simply ArtEvolution).
** ''[[Series/StarTrekDiscovery Discovery]]'' is now continuing the noir lighting, to the point that engineering makes the ''[[Franchise/StarWars Millennium Falcon]]'' look like the ''Enterprise''-D.

[[StealthPun Contrast]] CrystalSpiresAndTogas, as well as EverythingIsAnIpodInTheFuture.

* ''Doom 3'' was one of the first games with full-on dinamic, very limited lightning with sharp, very black shadows. It also had very little light sources, justified in-story by the TheLegionsOfHell trashing the place, although you do get an InfiniteFlashlight by way of compensation... Except you can't hold the torch and a gun both at once. It also made it standard to have monsters waiting for you in shadows, promoting very cautious gameplay. This was a strong deviation from traditional doom 1-2/quake 1-2 gameplay, which caused mixed reactions. The later BFG re-edition and the [[DuctTapeForEverything "Duct Tape"]] GameMod changed this to a more standard limited flashlight, cutting down on suspense.

* ''Doom 3'' was infamous for not giving you enough light, justified in-story by the TheLegionsOfHell trashing the place, although you do get an InfiniteFlashlight by way of compensation... Except you can't hold the torch and a gun both at once. The [[DuctTapeForEverything "Duct Tape"]] GameMod fixed this issue and made the game a lot more playable.

* ''StarWars'' has some settings like this, such as the Emperor's throne room and the interior of the ''Millennium Falcon''. By contrast, Imperial Star Destroyers are much more brightly lit. Princess Leia's corvette splits the difference by having both brightly lit sections and dimly lit industrial sections, such as the corridor she hides from long enough to give [=R2D2=] the [[MacGuffin stolen Death Star schematics.]]

** As noted on WebSite/SFDebris, [[Series/StarTrekVoyager Voyager]] tended to do this in their "magic meeting room" whenever the situation was supposed to be serious.
*** Whoever designed Voyager had a flair for the dramatic, as the lights on the Bridge would dim whenever the ship went on RedAlert.

** [[Series/StarTrekDiscovery Discovery]] is now continuing the noir lighting, to the point that engineering makes the [[Franchise/StarWars Millennium Falcon]] look like the Enterprise-D.

* ''Series/TheExpanse'' features this, generally in a mix of shots of space and powered down ships.

* ''StarWars'' has some settings like this, such as the Emperor's throne room and the interior of the ''Millennium Falcon''. By contrast, Imperial Star Destroyers are much more brightly lit. Princess Leia's corvette splits the difference by having both brightly lit sections and dimly lit industrial sections, such as the corridor she hides from long enough to give R2D2 the [[MacGuffin stolen Death Star schematics.]]

* ''StarWars'' has some settings like this, such as the Emperor's throne room and the interior of the ''Millennium Falcon''. By contrast, Imperial Star Destroyers are much more brightly lit.

** In ''Film/{{Alien}}'', note that the crew areas (easily identified by being mostly white) are brightly lit, and it's the cargo / maintenance / engineering areas that are poorly lit. As for ''Film/{{Aliens}}'', the colony on LV-426 had been shot to hell, everyone was dead, and much of the place had been blown up with 'seismic survey charges'.

* The aptly titled novel ''[[CyberPunk NOIR]]'' by K.W. Jeter, where a guy named [=McNihil=] is a retired [[PrivateDetective PI]] and had his eyes surgically altered to see the world in shades of grey, like noir films of the 30s.

Contrast CrystalSpiresAndTogas, as well as EverythingIsAnIpodInTheFuture.