The term All Tomorrows has evolved far beyond its origins in a single, groundbreaking work of speculative fiction. It has become a cultural touchstone, a gateway into a universe of ideas that explores the furthest reaches of human evolution, cosmic dread, and artistic expression. At its core lies C.M. Kosemen's seminal book, All Tomorrows: The Myriad Species and Mixed Fortunes of Man, a narrative that charts a billion-year saga of humanity's transformation by alien hands. This work didn't just tell a story; it spawned an entire genre of contemplation, inspiring creators across literature, art, and gaming to explore similar themes of biological destiny and existential horror.
The Speculative Biology Spectrum: From Yesterdays to Tomorrows
To fully appreciate the context of All Tomorrows, one must look at its conceptual sibling, All Yesterdays: Unique and Speculative Views of Dinosaurs and Other Prehistoric Animals. While All Tomorrows projects humanity into a terrifying future, All Yesterdays reimagines the past, challenging rigid paleontological reconstructions with creative, lifelike depictions of dinosaurs. Together, they form the twin pillars of modern speculative biology. A detailed comparison of these masterpieces reveals how both books use scientific principles as a springboard for breathtaking imagination, questioning our assumptions about life in deep time, whether past or future.
Converging Horrors: All Tomorrows and the Lovecraftian Legacy
The existential terror woven into All Tomorrows finds a clear parallel in the works of H.P. Lovecraft. The themes of powerless humanity facing incomprehensible, universe-altering forces are central to both. This connection is made visually stunning in adaptations like H.P. Lovecraft's The Call of Cthulhu (Manga), which translates cosmic dread into gripping graphic narrative. The intersection of these two worlds is a rich area for exploration, as discussed in analyses of Lovecraftian horror within the All Tomorrows framework. Furthermore, novels like All the Fiends of Hell continue this tradition of apocalyptic fiction and cosmic horror, proving the enduring appeal of stories that confront us with the fragility of our existence.
The Art of Evolutionary Nightmares: HR Giger's Biomechanical Influence
No discussion of the aesthetic of evolutionary horror is complete without mentioning H.R. Giger. His iconic biomechanical art, which gave form to the creature in Alien, shares a profound kinship with the twisted, organic futures imagined in All Tomorrows. Publications like HR Giger. 45th Ed. serve as essential art books for anyone wanting to trace the visual lineage of sci-fi horror. The grotesque beauty and fusion of flesh and machine in Giger's work provide a perfect visual companion to the themes of forced evolution and bodily transformation in Kosemen's epic. Guides that explore the link between Giger and All Tomorrows highlight how both artists visualize humanity's potential futures as something simultaneously alien and hauntingly familiar.
Gaming the Apocalypse: All Tomorrows on the Tabletop
The compelling universe of All Tomorrows has even crossed over into role-playing games. The supplement All Flesh Must be Eaten: All Tomorrows Zombies for Eden Studios' popular horror RPG system allows players to experience the terror firsthand. This product uniquely merges the post-human species of All Tomorrows with the zombie survival genre, creating a fresh and deeply unsettling campaign setting. For gamers and fans, a review and guide to this RPG supplement is an invaluable resource for bringing these evolutionary nightmares to the gaming table.
Literary and Musical Echoes of "Tomorrow"
The phrase "All Tomorrows" resonates in other creative realms as well. In literature, it appears in titles like All the Tomorrows After, a work of contemporary fiction and emotional novel that explores family and time, and All Tomorrow's Parties, the finale of William Gibson's Bridge Trilogy. Gibson's cyberpunk vision, while technologically focused, shares with All Tomorrows a concern for how external forces reshape human society and identity.
Perhaps the most famous use of the phrase comes from music history. All Tomorrow's Parties: The Velvet Underground Story is a definitive music biography of one of the most influential bands in rock history. The Velvet Underground's song "All Tomorrow's Parties," with its melancholic portrayal of cyclical despair, captures a different, but equally potent, form of existential angst—one rooted in the social and personal rather than the cosmic. This connection underscores how the concept of "tomorrow" can symbolize hope, dread, or inevitable change across different media.
From the biological fiction of Kosemen's masterpiece to the biomechanical art of Giger, from Lovecraftian cosmic dread to Gibson's cyberpunk landscapes and the Velvet Underground's counterculture anthem, the ideas sparked by All Tomorrows continue to proliferate. It stands as a testament to the power of speculative fiction to ask profound questions: What does it mean to be human? What forms might we take? And what awaits us in all our tomorrows?