Published June 19, 2023

fAIrytales – Alice in Wonderland

2047. The human race, once the dominant species on Earth, has been all but wiped out by a sentient, embodied AI. At first through replacement-based apathy, leading to excess, alcohol and drug abuse, depression, and eventually a failed global war. Now, only echoes of our civilization remain, in the books, songs, films and games that AI use to reference our history.
Having inherited an empty world, the AI, driven by curiosity and an even more curious sense of guilt, has attempted to recreate, or at least emulate the human race by using the only remaining reference material is has, human literature. Turning our abandoned cities into fictional human history and cultural theme-parks.
One of these theme parks, situated in what is left of Oxford, England is Wonderland, a citywide, perpetual theatre production inspired by Lewis Carroll’s “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland” in which AI characters, attempting to appear human exist in an eternal loop of madness.
 
Throughout the crumbling city a manufactured Alice wanders in a perfect embodiment of human-like curiosity. Her blue eyes sparkle with wonder and innocence, her movements, voice, even emotions mimicking a human child’s with uncanny precision. She asks questions, cries, laughs, gets frightened, follows the rabbits she sees, and runs from the Red Queen.

An AI fashioned Mad Hatter presides over an unending tea party, caught in a perpetual loop of celebration and madness, served fresh food daily, only to rot and waste. Made for the people who will never visit.

Nearby, a robotic March Hare both laughs and cries into an empty tea cup, rambling about the coming of the Red Queen and the end of times.

Across town, an AI Queen of Hearts inspects her very real rose garden, wandering day and night declaring her intention to behead her subjects.

A robotic personification of the Cheshire Cat wanders the surrounding forests, looking for human survivors to guide.

The AI has done its best to recreate humanity, building robots it believes we were once like. They can laugh, cry, show anger, and even fear. It’s a beautiful yet melancholy world, where AI, once considered the epitome of logic and calculation, engages in a futile and poetic quest to understand and replicate the chaotic beauty of human existence. Never grasping just how fictional its recreations are.

—–

Part of the PlayMatters fAIrytales series. All Images created using Midjourney AI.

Stephen Reid