History Main / TurnOfTheMillennium

* ''Series/TheGlory'': 2022 web-series set mostly in the present, but the Past Arc takes place from 2004-2005.

* ''Film/SevenDaysInHell'': Takes place in the time leading up to the 2001 Wimbeldon.

* "VideoGame/ZenlessZoneZero": Whilst set in an alternate universe, the setting's aesthetic and world is clearly modelled during this era. If one were to guess, ZZZ's aesthetic was based somewhere during the transition era circa 2003-2005.

Media technology continued to evolve. The UsefulNotes/CompactDisc gave way to UsefulNotes/{{MP3}} in the music sphere. UsefulNotes/{{DVD}} gradually replaced VHS throughout the decade, only to have UsefulNotes/BluRay and HD-DVD, in a [[HistoryRepeats re-enactment]] of TheEighties VHS vs Betamax debate, battle it out over who got to replace DVD at the end of the decade. Blu-Ray won, but instead of replacing DVD the two instead co-existed, perhaps due to the economic downturn.

* HistoryRepeats: There were many similarities between this decade and TheRoaringTwenties (rampant hedonism and consumerism resulting in a credit crisis at the end of the decade), TheFifties (new media and entertainment from the Internet taking on the mainstream; [[UsefulNotes/ThreeDMovie 3D]] and {{epic movie}}s become popular), TheSeventies (politically, especially in the late 2000s with the worst economic recession, the gas crisis, and the fact that [[ArsonMurderandJaywalking the cartoons had a very steep decline in quality, especially compared to the 1990s cartoons]]), and in the entertainment industry, TheEighties (with more music genres and technology than ever before), and even TheNineties in a sociopolitical sense (A Bush waging war against UsefulNotes/SaddamHussein)

** AnimatedShockComedy: Athough the genre emerged in the late '90s, rude, crude, topical ''WesternAnimation/SouthPark''-inspired adult cartoons became incredibly popular and culturally dominant during this period. {{Web animation}}s done in MediaNotes/AdobeFlash also provided its own crude form of comedy that was hosted in sites like Website/{{Newgrounds}} and Albino Blacksheep.

Thanks in part by 9/11, escapism became big in movie entertainment and UsefulNotes/TheBlockbusterAgeOfHollywood reached previously ''inconceivable'' heights - every year had at least two movies that would gross over $750 million and, by the end of the decade, at least one each year would surpass the billion dollar mark. In 2002, for the first time, [[Film/SpiderMan1 a movie]] made more than $100 million just on its opening weekend. Thanks to new computer technology, most of these were incredibly expensive, ComputerGeneratedImages-packed extravaganzas, with superhero movies (like ''Film/SpiderMan1'' and ''Film/TheDarkKnight'') and fantasy epics (such as the ''Film/TheLordOfTheRings'' trilogy, the ''Film/HarryPotter'' series and the ''Franchise/PiratesOfTheCaribbean'' series) being the dominant genres in terms of box office success. Much of the reason why studios began to concentrate so hard on these types of movies was to keep drawing in an audience despite the [[DigitalPiracyIsEvil advent of digital piracy]] during this decade; if there was so much stuff on screen, the experience would be lost if it wasn't seen on a big screen. Pretty similar to how studios in TheFifties tried to keep audiences away from television with 3D and [[AspectRatio widescreen]], really. Thanks to the size and scope of these films, smaller-scale movies like comedies and romances lost their box office power, with some major figures in the movie world wondering if soon cinema would be entirely dominated by these colossal spectacles and people would lose interest in more down-to-earth movies. However, {{digital piracy|IsOkay}}, {{Creator/Netflix}}, and movie websites such as Website/RottenTomatoes have brought attention to indie movies and foreign films which many people wouldn't have previously discovered, even if this didn't help these movies make a profit in theaters. Well, with one major exception - the martial arts film ''Film/CrouchingTigerHiddenDragon'' became the first foreign-language movie to gross over $100 million in the United States.

This was the time in which TheInternet really became a part of society at large, instead of being limited to [[{{Geek}} computer geeks]] and UsefulNotes/{{Usenet}} groups. Everyone got connected, with many people owning media storage devices, having access to the internet, etc. If you didn't have a computer with internet access, you were left behind. Technology was always getting better and less expensive via Moore's Law, and you could walk into a department store and buy a computer which was at least a million times more powerful than the ones that put UsefulNotes/NeilArmstrong on UsefulNotes/TheMoon. {{Blog}}s became a popular pastime, with ordinary people discovering their online journals could gain a significant following; this paved the way for the rise of larger centralized social media sites such as Website/{{Facebook}}. {{Video games}} finally started to gain mainstream recognition, especially near the end of the decade, with the release of the UsefulNotes/{{Wii}}. Games became DarkerAndEdgier, with plots that were much more mature and realistic, although the extent to which is subject to debate (some see it as a repeat of UsefulNotes/TheDarkAgeOfComicBooks). Meanwhile, the sports gaming industry was effectively monopolized by Creator/ElectronicArts.

* AnimationOfThe2000s: With the Internet rising, a new medium, the WebAnimation, brought fourth in UsefulNotes/AdobeFlash, paved way for a new avenue and discourse in animation, while traditional film and television put computer graphics in a new, zany path. Animation tropes and genres in this decade included:

** AnimatedShockComedy: Athough the genre emerged in the late '90s, rude, crude, topical ''WesternAnimation/SouthPark''-inspired adult cartoons became incredibly popular and culturally dominant during this period. {{Web animation}}s done in UsefulNotes/AdobeFlash also provided its own crude form of comedy that was hosted in sites like Website/{{Newgrounds}} and Albino Blacksheep.

** WideOpenSandbox: Was one of the main genres of UsefulNotes/TheSixthGenerationOfConsoleVideoGames thanks to the popularity of ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoIII'' and its sequels.

* TheEighties: The decade of choice for much of this decade's nostalgia, characterized among late Gen-Xers and early Millennials reminiscing 8-bit era video games and MerchandiseDriven cartoons like ''Toys/{{Transformers}}'' given [Film/Transformers2007 a live action theatrical tretment]], and by Creator/VH1 making ''three'' introspective videos for the 1980s.

* TheEighties: The decade of choice for much of this decade's nostalgia.

* SixtiesHair: From around 2005 until around 2011, pouf hairstyles, characterized by a half-up half-down centerpart hair with a wide range of volume and occasional sidebangs, had been adopted by celebrities ranging from actresses from Creator/LindsayLohan and Creator/AshleyTisdale to reality show stars like Creator/ParisHilton and [[Series/JerseyShore Snooki]] to musicians like Music/{{Beyonce}} and Music/AmyWinehouse. Through infomercials, "Bumpits" became an added hair accessory without the need for hairspray.

* LiveActionAdaptation: ''Film/HowTheGrinchStoleChristmas'', ''Film/JosieAndThePussycats'', ''[[Film/ScoobyDoo2002 Scooby-Doo]]'', ''Film/TheCatInTheHat'', ''Film/FatAlbert'', ''Film/{{Garfield}}'', ''Film/AlvinAndTheChipmunks'', and ''Film/{{Transformers}}'', among many more.

** Following the all-metallic and furutistic motifs of the Y2K aesthetics that started of the late 1990s and ending in 2003, the tech aesthetics of the second half of the 2000s, characterized by skeuphormism, glassy and translucent textures, environmental motifs that involve blue skies, marine life, and green landscapes, and clear typefaces was retroactively called "Frutiger Aero", named after a combination of the designer Adrian Frutiger and the Windows Aero interface used in ''Vista'' and ''7''.

* EverythingIsAnIPodInTheFuture: The iPod came out in towards the beginning of this decade, and with it, a simple and smooth aesthetic for our handheld devices.

* ''Film/MadameWeb'': Made in 2024, main part of the film set in 2003.

* ''Film/LoneSurvivor'': Takes place in 2005.

* ''Film/MarginCall'': Takes place from 2007-2010.

* ''Film/SoulSurfer'': Set in 2003-2004.