The promised planet: alliances and struggles of the gerontocracy in American television science fiction of the 1960s

Abstract

American science fiction television series of the 1960s dramatized the complex conflicts raging throughout society in simple, allegorical terms. The power struggle between the older and younger generations that pervaded many of the conflicts and social reform movements of this era was explored in the four most imaginative and acclaimed science fiction television series of the 1960s: The Twilight Zone (1959-1965), The Outer Limits (1963-1965), Star Trek (1966-1969) and Lost in Space (1965-1968). Each show presented the mature male as the bearer of culture, the holder of power and the keeper of the scientific mysteries, but instead of a standardized response to the problem of the 'generation gap' and the ever-increasing polarization of American society along generational lines, these dramas offered both pessimistic and optimistic views of the outcome of contemporary intergenerational social strife.

• GERONTOCRACY
• TELEVISION
• SCIENCE FICTION
• 1960S