I am enjoying the re-rums of UFO on TV at the moment.
I remember really liking the 'future' ideas for 1980, back in 1971 when it was shown - driving on the right, space travel as a routine, and the interesting fashion developments.
Of course, none of them happened!
I also never noticed the casul sexism, which wasn't invented then of course, and I didnt realise how bad Ed Bishop's wig was!!
I was in love with Gabrielle Drake and Dolores Mantez with their purple wigs.
great series huge fan watched it when I was a kid and also recently on Forces TV. The driving thing was because they thought that by that time we'd have changed over to match the rest of Europe! Interestingly in the flash back scenes they drive on the left! It was Wanda Ventham for me! here's one for you Andy, there was a strong connection with the Bond films how many can you name that were also in at least one Bond Film and name the film of course.
gromit: "I think the driving on the right was because it was made for US audiences, and nothing to do with Europe. " - wrong, you don't always have to default to contrarian mode.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0063962/trivia
TTT
IMBD doesn’t say the change was to be more European.
The car industry were the biggest cheer leaders for swapping our side of the road. In the late 1960s when the show was conceived, we had not been accepted by the EEC, and were a long way from joining.
https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/108049/if-the-shado-headquarters-are-in-england-why-do-cars-drive-on-the-right-hand-si/108065
"There was much talk in the British press in the early 1970s, not necessarily all serious, that the UK would have to change to driving on the right to satisfy the bureaucrats of Brussels.
This was considered to be another nail in the coffin of all things British. Along with the replacement of Pounds, Shillings and Pence with the decimal "New Penny" and the adoption of strange foreign units like litres and kilograms."
TTT,
Except UFO was pre-decimalisation, pre-EEC.
It debuted in 1970, but they had been working on it for at least 2 years previously.
They may have done some futurology, and they may have thought we would swap driving sides, but the thinking behind that was not to be part of an EEC entrance exam.