History Main / TheFutureIsNoir

* ''VideoGame/AlienIsolation'': Sevastopol Station is a dark and dingy place born of disrepair. The station was already being decomissioned and there was only a small crew by the time the Xenomorph became a problem, the chaos of humans doing everything to try and survive the predatory alien on the prowl damaged a number of critical systems, and [[spoiler:Special Order 939 from [[BiggerBad Weyland-Yutani]] given to APOLLO, the station's main control computer,]] dictated to Sevastopol's androids that all tasks, including basic maintenance, are secondary to [[spoiler:guaranteeing the survival of the Xenomorph]].

* ''VideoGame/Splatoon2: 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. 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.

* ''VideoGame/Doom3'': The Mars City UAC base on Mars is a dingy place from power oscillations and difficulties with maintenance, reinforced by several audio logs and e-mails from UAC workers complaining about the base's poor lighting, and even the manual itself states that it's why every security personnel has to carry a flashlight. Then the infernal outbreak begins, hellspawn trash the entire base, and [[WhoForgotTheLights light becomes practically nonexistent]] other than the player's InfiniteFlashlight and the fireballs of demons. It doesn't help that the lighting engine renders sharp black shadows in such a way that increasing the screen's brightness is no help at all.

* Inverted by ''Film/THX1138'', ''Film/{{Gattaca}}'' and ''Film/TheIsland2005''. The future will be ''[[CreepyCleanliness white]]''.

* ''VideoGame/Doom3'': The Mars City UAC base on Mars is a dingy place -- some rooms in the less refined maintenance/engineering sectors seem to only have lights to show where the walls are --, even if you discount the power outages; this impression is reinforced by several audio logs from UAC workers complaining about the base's poor lighting. Then the infernal outbreak begins, hellspawn trash the entire base, and [[WhoForgotTheLights light becomes practically nonexistent]] other than the player's InfiniteFlashlight and the fireballs of demons. It doesn't help that the lighting engine renders sharp black shadows in such a way that increasing the screen's brightness is no help at all.

Commonly known as [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tech_noir Tech noir.]]

* ''Film/{{Gattaca}}'' isn't set very far in the future, nor are there any aliens to be seen, but the aesthetic is purest SF noir.

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

* ''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.

* Inverted by ''Film/THX1138'', ''Film/{{Gattaca}}'' and ''Film/TheIsland''. The future will be ''[[CreepyCleanliness white]]''.

* ''VideoGame/Splatoon2: 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.

* ''Manga/{{Akira}}'' seems to take place almost entirely during night.
* ''Anime/CowboyBebop'' often uses this trope during episodes related to the series' MythArc, as many buildings are darkened to fit the mood of the MythArc; especially during the GrandFinale.

* ''ComicBook/{{Elephantmen}}''.

** The ''Nostromo'' in ''Film/{{Alien}}'' is a downplayed example; areas like the crew quarters and the sickbay (easily identified by being mostly white) are brightly lit, and it's only the cargo hold and the engineering spaces that are normally unoccupied which play it straight. The ship's bridge is fairly dark, but that's a necessary concession to the fact that the pilot needs to be able to see out of the windows during takeoff and landing. 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 brief scene taking place before everything goes to hell is noticeably brighter, though still on the dim side of tolerable because [[MegaCorp Weyland-Yutani]] isn't the type of corporation to spend more than the bare minimum on the working environment for frontline staff.
** ''Film/Alien3'': 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 "[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS7E24AllGoodThings All Good Things...]]" and ''[[Film/StarTrekGenerations Generations]]'', someone apparently busted out half the lights on the Enterprise-D.
** The real-life explanation is that the E-D sets were not built to a high enough standard to look real on film using normal light. ''Generations'' used dim lighting to hide flaws in the sets. However, when a more high-tech ship was introduced in ''Film/StarTrekFirstContact'', the plot dictated that the ship be under permanent Red Alert, making the sets even ''darker''.
** ''Enterprise-E'' is a Sovereign class warship, of course. And you can't know that your ship is a warship and not a neighborhood with a warp drive unless everything's dim, right?
* Creator/EnkiBilal seems to love this:
** ''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.
** ''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.
* The French film ''Film/{{Alphaville}}'' (1965), making this OlderThanYouThink.
* Before that, of course, there's ''Film/{{Metropolis}}'' (1927), which actually predates noir, and was an influence on it.
* ''Film/BladeRunner'', the movie that first meshed Film Noir aesthetics and CyberPunk themes. And did it so [[UnbuiltTrope before]] CyberPunk was [[TropeCodifier Codified]].
** And by extension, ''Anime/BubblegumCrisis'' and ''Manga/SilentMobius,'' two anime series that took visual inspiration from ''Blade Runner.''
* ''Film/TheTerminator'', which even had a night club called "Tech Noir".
* Terry Gilliam's dystopian SciFi movie ''Film/{{Brazil}}''. Though this one is justified by the background, because given how inept Central Services (the red-tape bound bureaucracy that provides heating, cooling, water, power, and pretty much everything else) is, it's not surprising that everything not deemed ''utterly essential'' is permanently in a state of brownout.

* The aptly named ''Film/DarkCity''.

* ''Literature/AlteredCarbon''. Pretty much all of it.

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

Another explanation is that energy-efficient lightbulbs have become much more popular in the future...

Commonly known as [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tech_noir Tech noir]]

Compare CityNoir, CyberpunkWithAChanceOfRain, UnnaturallyBlueLighting and UsedFuture.