In the year 2002, humanity has achieved a monumental engineering feat: the Marine Express, a trans-Pacific undersea super train connecting Los Angeles and Tokyo via a network of transparent tubes on the ocean floor. This world is defined by high-speed global connectivity and a reliance on automated, self-repairing infrastructure. While ostensibly a utopia of efficient travel, the world is physically divided between the gleaming technological marvels and the fragile marine ecosystems they traverse.

Societal dynamics are characterized by a tension between industrial expansion and radical environmentalism. The film depicts a global society where multi-national financial backers and industrial rivals compete for control over vital transit arteries. This future Earth possesses advanced robotics, as seen in the character Adam, a robot capable of integrating directly with train computer systems. However, the divergence from our actual timeline is sharp; the film’s 2002 assumes a level of undersea construction and sentient artificial intelligence that remains speculative even decades later. Earth serves as a backdrop of industrial ambition, though the plot eventually uncovers a hidden history involving the ancient Mu Empire, suggesting a world where modern technology is unknowingly built upon the ruins of a pre-cataclysmic civilization.

The film’s primary prediction is the Pan-Pacific Undersea Super Train, a concept mirroring modern proposals for hyperloops or vacuum tube transport, though it remains unbuilt due to the immense ecological and engineering hurdles the film itself warns about. Another specific technological forecast includes instantaneous computer-brain interfacing for both medical surgery and systems control. While ecological destruction is a central theme, the film specifically predicts that environmental groups might resort to automated sabotage (via robotics) to prevent industrial overreach. Real-world comparisons show that while we have high-speed rail and trans-oceanic cables, the vision of mass undersea passenger transit in transparent tubes remains a firmly 20th-century retro-future aesthetic.