Though, the second Predator movie suggests a less serious crime war, seeing how in that movie, the LAPD uses conventional squad cars, while in the 1996 of Demolition Man, they drive Humvees.
- The crime war became less serious due to Simon Phoenix being locked up. However, John Spartan may have been the one to deal with the Predator instead.
In fact, it's altogether possible that Cocteau or one of his followers could've acted as an unknown mastermind for Simon Phoenix himself in 1996, long before outright being his benefactor in 2032.
- Cocteau may not have just engineered the entire bus hostage situation with the intent of getting Spartan out of the way. If Cocteau was a Ra's al-Ghul type, he probably had followers planted throughout Los Angeles society to ensure a swift descent into the anarchy of the 1996 opening sequence, and then staged events like the failed hostage rescue to get people to make people want to turn to his utopian ideals.
- Specifically, it's set in the Macro Zone Alpha, where the judges are ultra polite.
What do you expect of a society that has everything spoon fed to it? It's going to degenerate, and fast.
- Or it's an alternate future, considering the fact that Spartan is intent on making a less restrictive future at the end of the film.
- Well, maybe the compromises could go a bit wonky...
- A couple problems with this. First, Idiocracy takes place in a 2005 that's not radically different from the "real" one. If there were indeed cryo-prisons by 1996, then why would the army's cryo-experiment even be needed? Secondly, cursing seems to be not only legal in Idiocracy, but it's on their money.
In Back to the Future Part II, Biff Tannen got his hands on a Gray's Sports Almanac in 2015, and gave it to himself in 1955. His younger self subsequently used the results of the almanac to win by betting on horse races, which led to a turn of events in which Hill Valley became a hellhole to live in: criminals running rampantly, homeless people and biker gangs in the town square, etc. Perhaps the behaviors shown in Hill Valley in 1985-A were not just limited to Hill Valley, but eventually spread to Los Angeles and points south, resulting in the LA of 1996-A shown in the movie that John Spartan lives in.
- The whole "Nixon seeks fifth term" reference in an article of the Hill Valley Telegraph already confirms the part about "not just limited to Hill Valley". Perhaps Biff lobbied for the 61st amendment and financed Schwarzenegger's Presidential campaign after Nixon did something even Biff couldn't fix.
Just as in Brave New World, the government's ability to control the population would be much more plausible if some sort of substance were involved. My own guess would be that their equivalent of soma would be a drug that targeted depression and aggressiveness, and encouraged calmness and compliant attitudes. This drug is delivered via processed food, or perhaps via the three seashells.
The drug is not universally effective: some people are naturally resistant, and Edgar Friendly and his allies are the result. Cocteau's plan could be part of a continual effort to deprive the ranks of the resistant of critical mass and leadership; or, alternatively, Edgar Friendly might be coming unwittingly close to discovering the truth about the drug, and Cocteau has to get rid of him before he uncovers the real facts and a revolution results.
Huxley had done a research paper on John Spartan, the best remembered items tend to be at the very beginning where they're trying to catch your attention, and at the end, where some big event brought the story to a close. She knew his over 2000 arrests on "Authentic Criminals" and therefore already knew John Spartan had been the one to arrest Simon Phoenix in the 20th century, but she couldn't be the one to suggest needing to thaw him out, as the idea would be tossed purely on the basis of her obsession with the 20th century, so instead, she asked the man who flew Spartan to the place where Phoenix was arrested, someone who had knowledge of Spartan that would be taken seriously when he suggested that Spartan be defrosted.
- Except for the fact that the cops specifically state "Request advice" as in "tell me what I should do."
- With 2023(who knows how this will go in another decade) this could be seen as compensating for a lack of training in certain areas. Officiers not used to dealing with mental health crisis for example. Especially in a world where everything is monitored including what you say in public.