# Corporate Sci-fi Books/Movie Suggestions



## Finnien (Apr 30, 2012)

I could use a little help brainstorming.  I'm currently working on an independent literary theory project at school, and my teacher is open-minded enough that he's perfectly happy to let it focus on science fiction.  Therefore, I'm writing on how science fiction provides a unique perspective for analyzing the alienating effects of modern society.  I'm using Lacan's psychoanalytic theory to analyze the interaction of corporations and alienated individuals in future societies.  It's really more an exercise in using what's familiar to me to explicate complicated theory than an attempt to really delve into society's unconscious, but the science fiction certainly makes the literary theory considerably more palatable.  Or, in simpler terms, I'm writing about how sci-fi deals with the damn scary idea of corporations in the future.

That being said, my main sources are Blade Runner, Gattaca, Ambient by Jack Womack, and The Space Merchants by Frederik Pohl and Cyril M. Kornbluth.  I plan on also including references to the Terminator franchise, Avatar, Richard Morgan's novel Market Forces, possibly The Running Man (novel more than movie)  or Soylent Green.  I could really use more references - not necessarily because the paper needs them, but because I want to round out my mental conception of the ways in which corporations are depicted in science fiction.  Ideally I'm looking for works that contain a more complex dynamic of interaction than just 'The corporation is evil and must be destroyed' such as the Umbrella Corp from Resident Evil.  However, I know there are dozens of books and movies that involve future megacorporations, and I've probably read a great many of them but just can't remember them off the top of my head.  So please, if anything springs to mind on the topic of corporation-influenced science fiction, let me know.


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## gully_foyle (Apr 30, 2012)

OCP - Omni Consumer Products


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## Moonbat (Apr 30, 2012)

OCP is Robocop is it not?

This would make a good quiz.

Weyland-Yutani/Weyland Corp - Alien
Massive Dynamic - Fringe
Lexcorp - Superman
Prmiatech - Heroes
Blue Sun - Firefly
Buy n Large Corporation - Wall-E
MNU - Multi-National United - District 9


I'm sure there are lots more that I haven't thought of.


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## Rodders (Apr 30, 2012)

Eve: The Empyrean Age focused very much on a corporate society.


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## Stephen Palmer (May 1, 2012)

William Gibson's Sprawl trilogy (_Neuromancer_ etc).


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## Finnien (May 1, 2012)

Good call on Gibson, I'd forgotten that corporations played a major role in his earlier stuff.  On the same note, I need to dig up some of Neal Stephenson's earlier stuff as well.  I believe the corporations in those have a more dynamic relationship with the characters than that of 'evil overlord corporation'.  Massive Dynamic would be another great one, but I'm at least a season and a half behind on Fringe, and can't afford to get sucked back in right now. =)


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## Stephen Palmer (May 1, 2012)

Stephenson's _Snow Crash_ for sure.


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## merritt (May 10, 2012)

R.U.R. Rossums Universal Robots
Capek

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R.U.R.

http://jerz.setonhill.edu/resources/RUR/

Classic! - ZG


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## Dave (May 10, 2012)

Add _Rollerball_.

I think the list so far is pretty good, but I'd add that _Westworld_ and _Jurassic Park_ seemed like profit was put before customer safety.


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## Jammill Khursheed (May 10, 2012)

The Czerka Corporation in Star Wars (circa the Old Republic) might be a good choice, especially if you're aiming at non sci-fi people when you hand in your project... They not only show current traits that anti-capitalists focus on, but stuff that people have complained about historically (slavery, stealing things from one culture to make profit selling them to another)...

But more importantly, everyone has heard of Star Wars when you make the reference...


Jammill


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