Sky Art’s documentary-style series Wonderland returns to TV on the 3rd of April, with Science Fiction In The Atomic Age. The show features some incredible experts in the field including John Clute, Professor Farah Mendlesohn, multi-award winning Tade Thompson, and Professor Mark Bould. The show is written, narrated, produced and directed by Adrian Munsey, who we caught up with to find out a bit more about the show.
Has science fiction changed that much over the last 80 years?
It certainly has. Recently ideas about climate disaster, dystopia and the sense of an ending have come to the fore.
Have events like Worldcon and San Diego Comic Con really influenced the history of Science Fiction?
Incredibly influential, though as an outside observer I am not what you could call an insider.
What has been the greatest shift in the history of sci-fi?
For me it would be questions about what is outside and what is inside.
If I knew nothing about science fiction, what is the most important thing I would learn from this show?
The scale of human imagination and the various and differing ways it is expressed.
Does Science Fiction really predict the future, or is there just so much of it that some of it is bound to stick?
Definitely in so many ways – but I don’t want to give away the themes of the series! Though I would add that it may get things wrong as well.
What is the funniest moment in the show?
When we quote HG Wells’s epitaph – “I told you so – you fools!”
What can you tell us about your next forthcoming project?
It will either be about Partition in the Modern world or something called Does It Have to Be Like This?or perhaps something on Crime Fiction.
Episode One, Mary Shelley To Issac Asimov airs on Sky Arts . You can find out more about the channel here.
