In 2026, a prophecy began to unfold. Is the world on the cusp of the dystopia of Metropolis, which takes place precisely in 2026? The novel and the film depict an apocalyptic vision of humanity living in a city divided between the economically and technologically powerful who inhabit the surface and the enslaved workers who maintain their privileges, banished to the underground, until one day a robot… A century later, humanity would be living in a Metropolis in a distorted 6.0 evolution of the dual world, analog and digital, with artificial intelligence included, embryonic in Metropolis, because instead of being collaborative with humankind, cutting-edge technologies are manipulated to serve the few.

A flawed metamorphosis that reaches the present in a kind of metastasis, expanding its similarities, parallels, analogies, and concomitances born of authoritarianism and force through techno-feudalism, neo-feudalism, neo-imperialism, or neo-colonialism; not only in the technological sphere, but also in the political, geopolitical, social, entertainment, and even emotional spheres. This accelerates a shift in eras by undermining the rules of coexistence and accentuating discrimination, inequality, stratification, lack of solidarity, and lies with their post-truth narratives in the name of concepts like freedom or security.

This is the opinion of almost all the writers, thinkers, creators, and scientists whom WMagazín invited to reflect on how much of the dystopia of Metropolis has come to pass and what connection they find with this present, which faces profound changes and the erosion of democracy (Read the second part HERE).

Metropolis was a work written by Thea von Harbou, first serialized and then published as a novel in 1925. It was popularized and transformed into a cinematic classic and expressionist masterpiece by Fritz Lang in 1927, the first feature film designated a Memory of the World by UNESCO. It was set precisely in the period between two eras that changed the course of the world: the First and Second World Wars. The 1920s saw the acceleration of technology (the birth of radio and television, for example), and the emergence or consolidation of new political, economic, and social systems that formed the embryo of a dual world.

“This book is neither of today nor of the future. It does not speak of a place. It serves no cause, party, or class. It has a moral that stems from a fundamental truth: ‘Between brain and muscle, the heart must mediate”, wrote Thea von Harbou as an epigraph to her novel.

In the year 2026, the future took a shortcut. In the underground city, the candle flames flickered, emitting a faint, ghostly roar, and everything became distorted, swaying shadows. The wall vibrated.

“Up above, in the great Metropolis, the monster’s voice continued to howl. Red was the sky above the city’s ocean of stone. And that red sky saw, amidst the city’s ocean of stone, a current advancing, wide and endless. It was a current twelve men deep. They walked with a monotonous gait: men, men, men, all in the same uniform: dark blue cotton from neck to ankles, their hair tightly gathered under black caps, their feet shod in clunky boots. And they all had the same face: a savage face, with crazed eyes. And they all sang the same song, a song without melody that was an oath, a vow:

We have sentenced the machines!

We have condemned the machines to death!

The machines must die! To hell with them!

Death! Death! Death to the machines!”.

How much of this dystopia has come to pass? Twelve authors with their analytical voices create a portrait of the present in a bifurcation of the litany of those workers who sang the same song without melody in Metropolis, on the eve of trying to change their destiny.

The future echo of artificial intelligence resonates in this dystopia. It is the bifurcation of the world into the analog and the technological, which, in turn, unfolds into digital, cyberspace, and AI vanguards that also branch out into subworlds. And this is what artificial intelligence says about this novel and film, where its own germ is glimpsed in a loop:

“The film and the novel Metropolis are important as foundational works of dystopian science fiction, exploring class struggle, dehumanizing technology, and the social division between elites and workers, with a stunning expressionist aesthetic that has greatly influenced cinema and visual art, offering a timeless vision of power and inequality that remains relevant today. (…)

In short, both works are vital for understanding how early cinema and literature imagined the future, the dangers of industrialization, and the eternal struggle between capital and labor, all wrapped in a visually striking aesthetic.”

Having established the panoramic view of artificial intelligence in Metropolis, the preamble to the authors’ mosaic of analysis is the dissenting voice of a philosopher, standing in contrast to the majority, which connects with Thea von Harbou’s epigraph:

Javier Gomá (His books from 2025 were Filosofía mundana. Microensayos completos and Fuera de carta. Degustaciones filosóficas / Galaxia Gutenberg)

“I have argued, many times, that we live in the best moment in history in aspects such as material and moral development. The great difference between our current apogee and previous eras is that people who were contemporaries of that culminating moment felt fortunate to belong to it. Whereas the great novelty of our time is that, clearly, we are the best in every respect, but discontent is rampant”.

This collective portrait, connecting the past, present, and future of Metropolis, continues with the personal story, the impact of the novel, and a reflection from a Czech writer who was born in the place that gave rise to a key figure in this dystopia:

Monika Zgustova (her most recent book is The Intruder: An Intimate Portrait of Gala Dalí / Galaxia Gutenberg)

“From a young age, I grew up with the symbolism of the robot versus man. In my native Prague, where Karel Čapek coined the word ‘robot’ in his play R.U.R., derived from ‘robota’, which means forced labor in Czech, I began to take an interest in dystopias in literature and film. They all highlighted the control that technology exerts over human beings and the consequent loss of individuality, so dear to the early decades of the 20th century.

When I moved to the West, I discovered H.G. Wells, the great father of dystopia and science fiction, George Orwell and his novels about totalitarian forms of control, and Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World, where humans are drugged with soma to maintain social stability.

The film Metropolis, where the art deco aesthetic contrasts with human beings enslaved by the dominant minority, has always struck me as a refined prediction of the future we have already entered, in which human beings must lose their individuality to serve the egocentric ends of a few hiding behind large, anonymous corporations”.

An expansion of this invention of now common and recognized terms, as well as part of the genesis of this literature with its premonitory visions, is offered by a Spanish author and avid science fiction reader since childhood, who recalls how this is an ideal literary genre for reflecting reality:

Francisco Serrano (The Revolutionary Heart of the World / Tusquets)

“One must always be cautious when considering the prophetic virtues of science fiction.” William Gibson himself, who coined the term ‘cyberspace’, acknowledges that while his novel Neuromancer and Other Stories seems to predict the internet and the world of global connectivity, the absence of mobile phones makes the novel, when read today, seem to take place in an alternate world, with only a tenuous connection to our own. The predictive accuracy, therefore, may be merely circumstantial, anecdotal.

Despite its fundamental nature as speculative fiction, projected toward the future, the true interest of science fiction lies in how it speaks to us about the present in which it was conceived, what aspirations or anxieties it represents, what was considered possible both socially and technologically. From our perspective in the present, the future tells us about the past.

In the case of Metropolis, beyond striking coincidences (an AI appears, but this is an almost omnipresent theme in science fiction throughout the ages), what one can’t help but take away is the feeling that we haven’t overcome certain fundamental conflicts, intertwined at the very heart of capitalism and the class struggle. Thus, revisited now on its centenary, Metropolis doesn’t so much predict the present we find ourselves in, but rather informs us that we remain immersed in similar dynamics, in the same struggle. And that information is invaluable for understanding the world and our lives”.

This leads some authors to warn that humanity is increasingly entering the realm of Metropolis and expanding it disturbingly into new territories, as a Portuguese writer who has described some of these signs in his novels recounts:

Rui Couceiro (Baiõa Without a Death Date / Siruela)

“It seems that, unfortunately, as the years go by, we are approaching the dystopia of Metropolis. It is not surprising that the extreme industrial capitalism in that story finds a parallel in our time, and that workers are relegated to the underground, moreover, because no one keeps tools at home. On the other hand, when I think of Metropolis, I immediately recall the android Maria, an early example of an artificial intelligence that today facilitates, but also threatens, our lives.

The topic interests me enormously. In fact, my first novel, published in Spain in 2025, already addressed the silent power of algorithms, since the narrator is addicted to his mobile phone and endless scrolling through social media. The second, published In Portugal in 2024, this addiction takes even further. For me, it is imperative that algorithms—both those governing social media and most of those governing so-called artificial intelligence—be regulated, just as the amount of alcohol in drinks or nicotine in cigarettes is regulated. Therefore, not only because of the addiction they induce, but also because of their destructive potential. The internet, as a lawless territory, was a breeding ground for creatures that now seem to ignore international law and want to colonize other territories. Someday, we will all be enslaved again, serving madmen who bewitch the masses through algorithms. Or isn’t it already happening?”.

It seems it is. A Spanish writer and expert on cutting-edge technologies and power connects the era, the novel, and its current relevance:

Marta Peirano (Against the Future: Citizen Resistance Against Climate Feudalism / Debate)

“Thea von Harbou drew inspiration from the industrialization of the time, and from that scheme of an idle elite above ground and an exploited working class below, described by Marx and H. G. Wells, but who are seduced and hypnotized by the macabre and apocalyptic dance of the machine masquerading as a woman. It’s not hard to see ourselves reflected in that collective hypnosis before a machine that imitates us in order to devour us”.

A similar, but more political and critical, line of argument regarding the novelist and the filmmaker is followed by a Mexican writer who recalls that when the novel was published, Germany was in the democratic Weimar Republic and Nazism was beginning to gain momentum and stir up extremists. It was a time when some authors found themselves in a nebulous zone. And this is coming from someone whose latest collection of short stories explores science fiction, warning of alterations or collateral damage from artificial intelligence, portraying the impact of that future on everyday life, and placing feelings and emotions at the heart of human existence alongside the power of imagination.

Alberto Chimal (The Sick Machines / Páginas de Espuma)

“Thea von Harbou, the author of the original novel and the screenplay used by Lang, remained in Germany after Lang fled Hitler’s regime. The political vision of Metropolis thus occupies the same nebulous, uncomfortable space as that of other artists who, out of convenience, indifference, or sincere belief, refused to openly criticize Nazism, if not explicitly defend it. This makes it even more difficult to assess its conclusion. The conflict between the oligarchy and the workers, which almost leads to the city’s destruction, is condensed into a handful of much smaller confrontations: Rotwang, the scientist-sorcerer, against Joh Fredersen, the millionaire; Freder, Joh’s son, and the clairvoyant Maria against the frenzied mob of workers; the android Futura—disguised as Maria—fueling the general madness. Where is collective action? Nowhere: Harbou doesn’t recognize the political currents of her time, and rather It resorts to a romanticized, 19th-century vision of social struggle. Freder and Maria manage to get Joh and a labor leader (whose individual personality is not revealed in the narrative) to shake hands. ‘The mediator between brain and muscle’, both the screenplay and the novel say, ‘must be the heart’. No moment in the subsequent century has seen such an imagined reconciliation”.

Metropolis is a story that enriches the imagination, ranging from fable to metaphor, analogy, and the connotations popularized by the film adaptation of the novel, as the film critic for the Spanish newspaper El Mundo reminds us:

Luis Martínez

“Since its release, Metropolis has given rise to all sorts of contradictory interpretations that have continued to evolve. Unions accused the film of encouraging the most pragmatic and reactionary tenets of social democracy with its absurd reconciliation between rich and poor, employers and workers. H.G. Wells ridiculed this anachronistic and ridiculous vision of the future. In Italy and Turkey, for example, it was labeled Bolshevik, while critics like Siegfried Kracauer (as early as the 1940s) clearly saw it as an apologia for Nazism. The convoluted plot and the film’s fluctuating length, depending on the copy, don’t help matters. George Sadoul interpreted it as a premonition of the Holocaust and Thomas Pynchon embraced this thesis, adapting Lang’s film to his own narrative of a self-destructive, voracious, and absolute power. And the discussion continues with the arrival of new interpretations from gender studies. What, truly, is Maria’s liberating role compared to the false Maria as the epitome of the femme fatale?

In other words, Lang-Harbou’s dystopia always holds true because its structure—a blend of fable, fairy tale, tragedy, myth, and romance (all at once)—is adaptable to almost every interpretation.

Regarding our current reality, a century later, some aspects have ultimately vindicated H.G. Wells, and the film’s mechanized, analog universe seems both childish and incredibly innocent. Yet, at the same time, the power of the machine (or the algorithm, as some call it) over bodies and souls in a masculinized world buried under phallic iconography and led by privileged, ambitious, and visionary idiots remains. Nazism is back, transformed into a cool, even punkish, attitude (my God, where have we come to?), and the current state of Metropolis confirms the magnitude of the collective failure we are experiencing as a society. All this, while that same Metropolis, from the opposite perspective, encourages the possibility of an anti-patriarchal revolution led by Mary, transformed into a symbol and a source of hope. Amen”.

Further proof of its multiple interpretations and enduring relevance is expressed by one of the Spanish writers who has best addressed the reality of her country and its political, social, and labor inequalities, as well as what has been written about the dark side of someone anointed with power:

Clara Usón (Las fieras / Seix Barral)

“In the film, the millionaires of an imaginary 2026 live in luxury high above while the masses of workers toil tirelessly for them underground. I wouldn’t be surprised if one of these days experts propose building underground apartments to solve the housing shortage of the real year 2026, which we have just entered. The atrocious inequality portrayed in Lang’s dystopia has become a reality a hundred years later, as has the rule of the oligarchs over everyone else. However, the film’s saccharine and happy ending, in which the plutocrat becomes aware of his workers’ hardships and resolves to alleviate them, thanks to the mediation of his The idea of ​​a kind son is completely unthinkable today. Contemporary plutocrats pride themselves on their cruelty, declaring that ‘empathy is a sin’ and ‘a pernicious weakness of Western civilization’ (Musk said so), and the new prevailing morality is the law of the strongest. It makes you want to escape, but where to?”.

And it is there that technological enchantments and architectural and aesthetic spaces meet, making visible the thread between dystopia and the present, as explained by a PhD in Information Sciences, writer, and specialist in Communication and Public Affairs:

Ignacio Jiménez Soler (The New Disinformation: Twenty Short Essays Against Manipulation / UOC – Universitat Oberta de Catalunya)

“What Metropolis reflected finds its analogy today in contemporary cities, stratified by layers, although the best way to visualize them is by axes. As in Cartesian coordinate systems of ordinates and abscissas, there is a perceptual dimension and an experiential one. In the perceptual dimension, there is the photographed city, the one of iconic images that has a virtual life of its own. This is why historic centers are homogenized into a highly identifiable aesthetic around iconic locations; stores of similar brands and repetitive offerings that place the city in the category of ‘you can’t miss visiting’ or ‘you can’t miss sharing’ and ‘To photograph’. An axis that reveals a smooth, luminous surface, but not the reality of most of its inhabitants.

On the other axis lies the experiential aspect, the livability. An axis where the city’s layers are more reminiscent of what the film depicts: stratifications of several cities within one. A stratification in which the communities that inhabit it organize themselves into ‘residential echo chambers’, what in early 2006 was defined as cocooning: self-referential spaces and a mirage of self-protection.

In these communities, when interference occurs between them, it becomes a source of tension and mobilization. Today, these stratifications are maintained in a fragile equilibrium. The next episode in this fragile balance is difficult to predict, although it seems easy to foresee an intensification of the differences”.

Part of all this is condensed in the phrase:

“Human being, amazing creature, who are you?”.

This is what László Krasznahorkai (Hungary, 1954) asked himself in his acceptance speech for the 2025 Nobel Prize in Literature. A fable and a metaphor for the present of a world that seems to be cracking and where disenchantment and uncertainty are spreading in the face of the onslaught of the powerful who distort everything with their new ethics and morality. A speech that dealt with life in the face of the paths of a humanity lost in technology, wars, the creation of victims of all kinds, the cruelty against the marginalized and minorities, a world that does not respect human dignity and teeters on the brink of the abyss. In Metropolis, that man is Joh Fredersen.

László Krasznahorkai refers to a world in the hands of the powerful who present themselves as false savior angels:

“Our angels are these new ones, and, having lost their wings, they no longer possess those robes that drape sweetly around them. They walk among us in simple street clothes. We don’t know how many there are, but according to some obscure suggestion, their number remains unchanged. And, like the angels of old in the olden days, these new ones also appear in a disturbing way here and there. They appear before us in the same kinds of situations in our lives as the old ones did. And in fact, it is easy to recognize them if they want us to, if they don’t hide what they carry within. It is easy because it is as if they enter our existence with a different tempo, a different rhythm, a different melody than the one we walk to—we who strive and wander in the dust down here. Moreover, we cannot even be so sure that these new angels come from somewhere up there, because there doesn’t even seem to be a ‘Up there’ now, as if that too —along with the angels of old— had given way to the eternal SOMEWHERE where now only the insane structures of the Elon Musks of this world organize space and time, (…) suddenly I realize that these new angels not only have no wings, but they also have no message, none at all”.

Part Two: Politics and Concomitances of Metropolis in Other Areas of the Present Turbulent and Disconcerting. Read HERE.

• With translation assistance from Robert Lienhard.

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