Some shows manage to predict the future, whether through presaging future technological developments or just understanding the way people will organize their lives after the show airs. While life imitates art, these shows managed to imitate life and somehow also predict the turns it would take.
The Jetsons and Gadgets
This one might feel like a bit of a cop-out, given that The Jetsons is crammed full of wild and wacky futuristic technology. However, the show did get a few things almost exactly right. It showed flatscreen TVs, smart watches, and household robots decades before any of those things would become reality.
Scrubs’ Janitor Knew a Lot
The Janitor, played by Neil Flynn, was a beloved character on Scrubs. In a 2006 episode, “His Story IV,” The Janitor nonchalantly notes that the US government should be looking for Osama bin Laden in Pakistan instead of Afghanistan. This would, eerily, turn out to be exactly where the fugitive was hiding when he was discovered.
Friends Facebook Prediction
Interesting, in a 2003 episode of Friends (“The One With the Memorial Service”) Ross logs into a website that is used to connect college graduates. It’s instantly recognizable to anyone today as Facebook. Except, Mark Zuckerberg’s attention-devouring nightmare website wouldn’t go live until a year after this episode aired. Spooky!
30 Rock Blew the Whistle on Weinstein
People in Hollywood knew more about disgraced former producer Harvey Weinstein than people let on when he was outed at the start of the “Me Too” movement. One example of this can be seen in the sixth season of 30 Rock, in which Jenna Maroney claims that Weinstein has been harassing her—five years before his crimes became public. The show was also ahead of its time when it made a joke about Bill Cosby and sexual harassment in 2009, years before the actor’s trial.
And 30 Rock and Alec Baldwin’s Aim
In another grim prediction 30 Rock made during “100 Part 2”, Alec Baldwin’s character, Jack, accidentally shoots Michael Keaton’s character, Tom the Janitor. This would later prove to be an eerie echo of Baldwin’s real-world accidental shooting of Halyna Hutchins on the set of Rust in 2021.
Mr. Robot Predicts Ashley Madison Hack
Mr. Robot was way ahead of its time in a lot of ways. In one particularly prescient plot point, the first season finale details a large-scale hack that reveals the information of millions of people who are cheating on their wives. This directly mirrored the real-world Ashley Madison hack, which was happening simultaneously. This means the show’s writers had to have been ahead of the curve, as the show was airing concurrently with the real-world events.
Laugh-In’s News of the Future on the Berlin Wall
In a Laugh-In sketch in 1969, Dan Rowan and Dick Martin humorously report that, in 1989, the Berlin Wall will be demolished. Twenty years later this turned out to be completely true. In 1969, even the idea of the wall being demolished was played as a joke, but Laugh-In got it exactly right, down to the year.
Black Mirror and Technology
Black Mirror is a show about humanity’s relationship with technology. As such, it stands to reason that it would get a lot of its near-future predictions correct. Many of the technological advancements the show has theorized about have become reality, such as glasses that record everything you see and self-driving pizza delivery cars.
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The Simpsons Predicts Everything
You’ve probably seen the memes, but it’s true: The Simpsons has been on the air so long and covered so much ground that it’s impossible for it to have not predicted many future events at this point. In one particularly baffling instance, “Bart to the Future,” the show accurately predicted Donald Trump’s election and presidency.
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Star Trek Predicts (Or Influences) The Future
Star Trek is one of the most influential shows of all time. So influential, in fact, that the technology depicted in the show might have convinced real-world scientists to create actual analogues of the tech seen in the show, such as handheld communications devices and voice-activated computers.
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