Origins and peculiarities of Steampunk

Today, this cultural and artistic movement has evolved over time. In the 1980s, the cyberpunk style, born from literature, became popular. Steampunk, on the other hand, essentially emerged as an ironic take on this futuristic trend of the 1980s.

Literature was the first to coin this cultural movement, primarily centered on retrofuturism in the latter half of the 19th century during the second Industrial Revolution.

Both cinema and literature have showcased steampunk, gaining more enthusiasts through festivals and social media, where its striking aesthetic spreads rapidly.

Beginnings

The genre truly emerged in the 1970s when a substantial number of science fiction books with cyberpunk-like characteristics began to be published. This retro style already appeared in novels by H.G. Wells (The Time Machine) and even in the works of Jules Verne, one of the first authors to mention this retrofuturistic aesthetic, serving as inspiration for subsequent artists in creating the earliest steampunk stories.

However, it wasn't until 1979 that the term first appeared in a letter from writer KW. Jeter to Faren Miller. It aimed to categorize and define this peculiar style of historical novels that writers like Tim Powers (The Anubis Gates), James Blaylock (Homunculus), and Jeter himself in his story Morlock Night had developed.

All their stories shared common elements, primarily being set in 19th-century societies but featuring objects, weapons, and attire more suited to a distant future than the era itself.

Unlike cyberpunk, which often portrays dystopian worlds in decline, where humanity, power, capitalism, and technology play fundamental roles, steampunk is a critical yet somewhat more optimistic genre, looking to the future from the past.

The stories based on this movement tend to be more positive about the world around them, presenting technology as a key to the future. These narratives are often utopian and have a romantic air, even though they may touch on themes like class struggle, colonialism, or politics.

A subgenre that has emerged from this term is known as dark steampunk, offering a darker vision of the movement, discussing dystopian worlds with a more Victorian perspective on the stories it presents.

Steampunk in Film

While literature laid the foundation for this retrofuturistic movement, cinema has excellently conveyed its style to the screen. The aesthetics and narratives have given rise to many films that use this style to tell their stories, primarily within the realms of science fiction and action.

In the 1950s, we can already find early traces of what would later become steampunk in films like "Diabolical Invention" from 1958.

It was in the 1990s when the movement gained more prominence in cinema, and since then, numerous productions have chosen this aesthetic or suggested it to bring their stories to the screen.

One notable example is the action film starring Will Smith, Kenneth Branagh, Salma Hayek, and Kevin Kline from 1999, "Wild Wild West." It portrayed an alternative United States to present a purely steampunk action story. The costumes, aesthetics, and fantastical technological inventions featured in the narrative, which were implausible for the Wild West era, are essential elements of the story and one of the best examples of steampunk in cinema.

Following this, the movement gained momentum in the subsequent years, leading up to the present day, with notable productions such as "Vidocq" in 2001, "The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen" in 2003, Guy Ritchie's "Sherlock Holmes" in 2009, and more recent works like "Mortal Engines" in 2019. Also worth mentioning is the Amazon series "Carnival Row," which can be classified within the subgenre of dark steampunk.

Subgenres

Once the movement was defined, various subgenres have emerged over the years, revitalizing it as one of the most fascinating movements for literature and screen adaptations.

Among these subgenres, we can highlight SteamGoth, created by artist James Richardson-Brown, which leans more toward fantasy and horror. There's also Gaslamp fantasy, where there is less emphasis on technological elements, and Weir West, known as the "weird west," exemplified by the film "Wild Wild West," in which the Old West mixes with steampunk style to create the narrative.

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