Suspended animation in fiction
Suspended animation in fiction refers to the temporary cessation of life processes experienced by fictional characters, followed by their subsequent revival. This process is commonly employed as a plot device in science fiction narratives. It is frequently utilized to transport a character from the past to the future, a form of forward-only time travel, or to facilitate interstellar space travel, which necessitates an extended journey for months or years, referring to space travel in fiction. In addition to accomplishing the character's primary objective in the future, they often encounter the unfamiliarity of a new world, which may bear only faint resemblance to their previous surroundings. On occasion, a character is portrayed as possessing skills or abilities that have become lost to society during their period of suspension, enabling them to assume a heroic role in their new temporal setting.
Mechanisms
The methods employed for the suspension and subsequent revival of characters can vary greatly. In early stories, a general approach involves the use of magical enchantments that induce a prolonged slumber. In contrast, many modern narratives aim to present the concept as scientific suspended animation or cryonics, often simplifying and disregarding most of the intricacies involved. Within numerous science fiction settings, the challenges associated with contemporary cryonics are overcome prior to the development of faster-than-light travel, making it a viable means of interstellar transportation. In fictional renditions, the cells typically remain viable, and the revival process is depicted as straightforward or even spontaneous. Accidental freezing scenarios are prevalent in many stories, with technobabble utilized to rationalize how the characters managed to survive the process.Terms
Various terms are employed to describe the state of suspended animation, including cryosleep, hypersleep, hibernation, and soma.Corpsicle
The term "corpsicle" is utilized in science fiction to describe a deceased body that has been cryopreserved through cryonics. It is a combination of the words "corpse" and "popsicle." The earliest known printed usage of this term in its current form can be traced back to science fiction author Frederik Pohl's book The Age of the Pussyfoot in 1969, where a corpsicle is depicted as "a zombie frozen in Alaska." An earlier variation of the term, "corpse-sicle," also credited to Pohl, appeared in the essay "Immortality Through Freezing," published in the August 1966 issue of Worlds of Tomorrow. Author Larry Niven also employed the term in his 1971 short story "Rammer" and later expanded it into the novel A World Out of Time. In Niven's work, the protagonist awakens in a society that denies any legal rights to corpsicles. Ben Bova also incorporates the term in his 2001 novel The Precipice, where numerous subjects have been cryonically preserved, but upon revival, they have lost all their memories. In cinema, the term appears in Paul W. S. Anderson's film Event Horizon, although it is used to refer to frozen remains with no possibility of revival.Literature
Suspended animation often plays a role in stories about kings or heroes who are believed to be slumbering or kept alive until they are needed to confront great dangers. Examples include Holger Danske and King Arthur in mountain sleep tales.In the fairy tale of Sleeping Beauty, an evil fairy places a curse on a princess, causing her to sleep for 100 years until she is awakened by a king's son. To ensure that the princess does not wake up alone and frightened, the good fairy uses her wand to put everyone in the palace, including humans and animals, into a state of sleep.
Shakespeare's works, such as Romeo and Juliet and Cymbeline, incorporate plot devices involving a drug that induces a state of suspended animation resembling death.
In American fiction, one of the earliest stories involving suspended animation is "Rip Van Winkle," a short story written by American author Washington Irving in 1819. The tale revolves around a British individual in the American colonies who stumbles upon fairies in the Catskill Mountains and consumes their moonshine. As a result, he falls into a 20-year slumber and awakens to find his village and country dramatically transformed due to the passage of time. This story has since become a prototype for narratives exploring social displacement.
Mentions in science fiction literature
In the 19th century, a number of science fiction short stories featuring suspended animation, both deliberate and accidental, include Mary Shelley's "Rodger Dodsworth: The Reanimated Englishman", Edgar Allan Poe's "Some Words with a Mummy", and Lydia Maria Child's "Hilda Silfverling, A Fantasy". Edward Bellamy's "Looking Backward" and Jack London's "A Thousand Deaths" also explore the theme.Moving into the 20th century, science fiction stories featuring suspended animation include V. Mayakovsky's Klop, H.P. Lovecraft's "Cool Air", and Edgar Rice Burroughs's "The Resurrection of Jimber-Jaw".
The character of Buck Rogers was introduced in the August 1928 issue of Amazing Stories. In the novella Armageddon 2419 A.D., Buck Rogers, a World War I veteran, becomes trapped in a mine and is preserved for 500 years by mine gasses. This concept continued in the 1930s radio show Buck Rogers in the 25th Century and subsequent film and television adaptations.
John W. Campbell Jr.'s 1938 novella Who Goes There? features a malevolent alien creature that crashed into Earth's polar regions and was frozen for millennia. The creature is inadvertently revived by human explorers in the 20th century, leading to a suspenseful story that inspired the 1951 film The Thing From Another World and its remakes.
While many early stories depict unwilling subjects in suspended animation, Neil R. Jones' 1931 short story "The Jameson Satellite" explores deliberate cryopreservation after death, laying the groundwork for the concept of cryonics. Arthur C. Clarke incorporates suspended animation in works such as Childhood's End, The Songs of Distant Earth, and the Space Odyssey series to enable interstellar travel. In Clarke's 3001: The Final Odyssey, the character Frank Poole is cryopreserved in space and revived a thousand years later.
In 1964, Captain America, a comic book superhero popular in the 1940s, was reintroduced, explaining his absence by accidentally freezing in the Arctic ice pack.
Frederik Pohl's science fiction work The Age of the Pussyfoot tells the story of a man revived from cryopreservation in the year 2527, having died in a fire 500 years earlier.
The Ice People by René Barjavel is about the discovery of an advanced pre-historical civilization buried under the ice of Antarctica, with two representatives in suspended animation.
Although relatively few stories explore cryonics for medical time travel, "Some Words with a Mummy" includes a mummy, mentioning the use of mummification for time travel in Egyptian civilization.
James L. Halperin's national best-seller The First Immortal delves deeply into cryonics in a contemporary setting. Giles Milton's thriller The Perfect Corpse is set in a fictional cryonics laboratory and revolves around the resurrection of a perfectly frozen body found in the Greenland ice sheet.
In Greg Bear's War Dogs, in contrast to cryogenic sleep, a "Warm Sleep", in a greenish gel, is used to transport soldiers in an interstellar war.
Film
Movies featuring suspended animation include A Long Return, Late for Dinner, Forever Young, Demolition Man, Idiocracy, Realive, Sexmission, the Woody Allen comedy Sleeper, and Open Your Eyes , which was remade as Vanilla Sky.The 1939 movie serial Buck Rogers and its 1979 remake Buck Rogers in the 25th Century depict the title character entering suspended animation during the 20th century and awakening in a vastly different future. In the 1939 version, Buck Rogers and his sidekick Buddy Wade intentionally preserve themselves using experimental "Nirvano Gas" after their dirigible crashes over the North Pole. In the 1979 version, Buck Rogers, an astronaut, inadvertently enters suspended animation when his spacecraft encounters a space phenomenon, only to be discovered centuries later in 2491.
The 1984 film Iceman revolves around a prehistoric man who is revived after being frozen for 40,000 years, while the 1992 film Encino Man uses a comedic approach to the same concept. Both movies depict prehistoric individuals being naturally flash-frozen without any special preparation and thawing without lasting damage to their physical or mental abilities. In Iceman, scientists theorize that something in the caveman's diet acted as a natural antifreeze, preventing cell crystallization.
Suspended animation, referred to as "cryosleep", "hypersleep", or "hibernation", is used during space travel in films such as 2001: A Space Odyssey and its sequel 2010: The Year We Make Contact, Planet of the Apes, Alien and its sequels and prequels, Pitch Black, James Cameron's Avatar, Pandorum, Christopher Nolan's Interstellar, and Morten Tyldum's Passengers.
In The Empire Strikes Back, Han Solo is temporarily frozen to demonstrate the concept of suspension, which serves as a means of restraining prisoners for travel.
The Austin Powers films use suspended animation to transport Austin Powers, a 1960s spy character, and his arch villain, Dr. Evil, to the future, highlighting the contrast in their behavior and expectations.
In the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes undergo suspended animation. During World War II, Rogers is frozen in the Arctic after his plane crashes, while Barnes falls off a train during a mission. They are both presumed dead before being found, with Rogers awakening in the 21st century and joining the Avengers, while Barnes is found by the Hydra wing of the Soviet Union shortly after the fall and brainwashed, becoming the Winter Soldier. During the 20th century, Hydra uses the Winter Soldier as an assassin, with him surviving to the present day by being placed in suspended animation between missions; following Captain America: Civil War, Barnes is placed in suspended animation again in Wakanda until his recovery in Black Panther.
In the 1943 movie serial Batman, the character Prince Daka uses suspended animation on a corpse to receive a message from Emperor Hirohito, featured in the chapter titled "The Living Corpse".