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One step beyond a [[Small Secluded World]], a community has been raised for generations [[Domed Hometown|inside of a bubble]] because of an [[Ancient Conspiracy]] and begins to think there ''is'' no outside world, that [[The City]] or [[Hidden Elf Village|The Village]] is the only remaining bastion of civilization. This will be disrupted when either an outsider comes into the community or one of the members of the community is required to leave it for some reason. This may cause the members of the shadowy government who know the truth to kill the interlopers, if they haven't gone native and/or died themselves.
Extremely common in the science fiction genre which [[Newer Than They Think|inspired it]], especially in [[Sliding Scale of Idealism vs. Cynicism|the more cynical age]] since the 70's when it was popularized by ''[[Logan's Run]]''. It nearly always takes place in a [[
Often run by an [[Emperor Scientist]] who likes to produce [[Designer Babies]] and force everyone to wear identical pajamas. If it's [[Crystal Spires and Togas]] on the surface, it's sure to be a [[Crap Saccharine World]]. If the outside world has improved after mankind abandoned it, it's also a [[Green Aesop]]. If the rest of mankind went on without them, it may be a [[Cruel Twist Ending]].
A frequent subtrope is the [[Generation Ships|Generation Ship]], a huge slower-than-light vessel designed for [[Exactly What It Says
Not to be confused with the Bottle City of Kandor, part of the [[Superman]] mythos: Kandor really is a literal city in a bottle (shrunken by an alien robot), but isn't part of this trope. For a community that knows about the outside, but just wants nothing to do with it, see [[Hidden Elf Village]].
Often a [[Domed Hometown]] with a [[The Wall Around the World|wall around it]] which may or may not be [[Doomed Hometown|doomed]] by its residents' [[Used Future|collapsing infrastructure]] and the [[Idiot Ball|idiocy]] and [[Future Imperfect|forgetfulness]] of [[Dying Like Animals|the sheeple]]. If the hero is banished for noting that the place is falling apart, compare [[Defector From Decadence]], [[Ignored Expert]]. If the food supply is [[Human Resources|
See also [[Escape From the Crazy Place]]. If you want to get ''really'' dark, the heroes may escape the [[Government Conspiracy]] only to find that the outside world really ''is'' barren and desolate.
Compare [[Hidden Elf Village]]; especially if the inhabitants are [[Perfect Pacifist People]], [[Space Amish]] and/or [[Space Elves]] of the [[Proud Scholar Race Guy|Proud Scholar Race]] sort. Compare [[Crap Saccharine World]]. See also [[Space Brasilia]].
{{examples}}▼
▲{{examples}}
== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==
* Jiiha village in ''[[Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann]]'', where Simon and Kamina hail from. Kamina steadfastly believes in the surface world, much to the dismay of the chief, who only believes its existence once Yoko and a Ganmen crash through the ceiling.
* Tokyo Jupiter in ''[[
* ''[[Megazone 23]]'' does this with what the inhabitants believe to be Tokyo during [[The Eighties]]; anyone who travels overseas is secretly brainwashed with memories of their "trip".
* Paradigm City in ''Big O''.
* The unnamed village from the [[Komi Naoshi]] oneshot, Island. Though this is merely a case of ignorance, and not evil. {{spoiler|The town fell victim to land subsidence, which was interpreted by the villagers at some point or another as the world being engulfed by the sea.}} This being Komi Naoshi, the ending is happy.
* Romdo in ''[[Ergo Proxy]]''.
* The city of [[Spell My Name
* Judoh in ''[[Heat Guy J]]''. People are not allowed to leave the city, and there is not even trade with other city-states. This is because people are mistrustful of other people because apparently humanity came close to nuking itself to death when it utilized the technology of the resident [[Superior Species]].
== [[Comic Books]] ==
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== [[Film]] ==
* ''[[
* ''[[The Village]]''
* ''[[
* ''[[Aeon Flux]]'' could almost be a remake of ''Logan's Run''.
* ''[[The Mole People]]'', about a subterranean albino Sumerian race who disbelieved in the surface world.
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* Turned on its head in the dystopian [[Sci Fi]] movie ''[[Dark City]]'' (1998). Everyone in the city is subtly programmed to ''believe'' that there is an "outside" to their [[City Noir|monstrous city]] (which is locked in everlasting [[Always Night|night time]]), the beautiful sun-lit Shell Beach. Everyone is utterly certain they know the way to Shell Beach, but if someone actually tries to find it, the only train that supposedly goes to Shell Beach never stops at any train station, all roads going there [[Closed Circle|simply go in circles]] or end in front of walls or canals, and in the end, {{spoiler|Shell Beach was only an illusion.}} In reality, {{spoiler|the city is all there is, a huge edifice drifting in the darkness of outer space, created and controlled by The Strangers, aliens who abducted humans from... some other place no-one can remember anymore, because The Strangers control their memories.}}
* [[Pleasantville]]. Here the people {{spoiler|in the TV show}} actually do know there are other people - it just never occured to them they can leave and see them...
* [[THX
* [[The City of Ember]], an underground city with tons of lights, which became a new home for civilization [[After the End]], and it turns out fine...until the power generators start to go out.
** If by "fine" you mean a flawed system where people are forced to pick a job at random, no matter what they aspire for, or are capable of. Oh, and also, {{spoiler|The city is run by a corrupt Bill Murray.}}
* The underground city of Topeka in ''A Boy and his Dog'' is one of these, sheltering its genetically and culturally inbred populace from a post-apocalyptic world.
* ''[[Pandorum]]'' is set on a [[Generation Ship]], primarily due to [[Space Madness]] and [[Laser-Guided Amnesia]].
* ''[[Dogville]]'' takes this idea and turns it into an emotional nightmare.
== [[Literature]] ==
* [[Arthur C. Clarke
** And it's original version, ''Against The Fall of Night''. Both have a remarkably utopian vision compared to most examples, however. Diaspar really has achieved a technological utopia, so why leave? And then, of course, we're {{spoiler|introduced to Lys, the ''other'' utopian vision...}}
* High Sacristan, location of the title Canticle Engine in Micah E. F. Martin's short story [[The Canticle]], is the last city on Earth. Everything visible from its walls is desolate, endless
* Again, ''[[Logan's Run]]''.
* The Community in ''[[The Giver]]''. An interesting example as it was intended for their own good, and the ones who Know The Truth carry the burden of knowing every memory ever held by mankind, including the bad and painful ones.
* The H.G. Wells story, ''The Country of the Blind'' is about a mountaineer who, while visiting Ecuador, stumbles upon a lost population of people living in a valley that has been cut off from the rest of the world. Thanks to a disease that rendered their citizens blind and unable to produce sighted children, the entire population is now sightless. They have no concept of how vision
* Maraposza Street, also known as "the dreaming street", in ''[[
* The planet Krikkit from ''[[The
** Worth noting that the Krikkiters' response when they ''did'' discover there was an outside universe was to decide, with chilling logic, that the truth must be restored by destroying it. [[Omnicidal Maniac|ALL OF IT]].
* The third book of the ''[[Gormenghast]]'' trilogy, Titus Alone.
* The inhabitants of Trantor from ''[[Foundation]]''. Their bottle however is not physical but psychological: Trantor, being the most populated planet of the galaxy, not only covered all the surface of the planet but also was excaved many kilometers in the underground. Because of this most trantorians are born and raised underground and generally never go to the surface, they even consider the surface uninteresting (as is just a grey city that disappear in the horizont)
* [[Terry Pratchett]]'s ''[[
** A recurring metaphor throughout the series is the [[Real Life]] bromeliad plant, which, to the frogs who live inside, is the entire world.
*** Indeed, ''Truckers'' and its sequels, ''Diggers'' and ''Wings'' are collectively known as ''The Bromeliad Trilogy''.
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* [[Nineteen Eighty-Four|Airstrip One]] is generally considered to be one of these. Opinions vary on what the rest of the world might hold.
* Elizabeth Bear's ''Dust'' plays with the "stranded generation ship" version.
* H. M. Hoover's ''This Time of Darkness'' tells of {{spoiler|a city several kilometers underground}} whose inhabitants don't realize that they're {{spoiler|basically a slave race whose labor is being used to keep the above-ground inhabitants in luxury}}. There's a strong contrast between the
** The basic premise is reused in an episode of ''[[Stargate SG-1]]'', with a planet in the middle of an ice age. The apparently pristine domed city on the planet's surface {{spoiler|is supported by the efforts of slave laborers in an underground complex, who have no idea that the city exists and believe themselves to be the last remnants of their civilization. Dissenters in the city are brainwashed and sent to be laborers}}.
* Nancy Farmer's ''[[The Ear, the Eye
* In Christopher Priest's novel ''[[The Inverted World]]'' the inhabitants of the mobile city are told that they, originally colonists from Earth, are bottled in because of the harsh environment of their alien planet. Only the elites are allowed to go outside and know the real truth.
* [[Robert A. Heinlein]]'s novel ''[[Orphans Of The Sky]]'' and the two short stories it's based on feature this trope. It is about a [[Generation Ships|multi-generational space craft]] where the inhabitants lost the knowledge that they were on a ship (along with most other knowledge) after a failed mutiny, so the current generation thinks the whole universe is just the ship.
** ''[[The Starlost]]'' was clearly influenced by this Heinlein novel, but differed from it in that the generation ship kept dozens if not hundreds of cultures preserved, separate from each other, in domes; many had of course forgotten that they were part of a sub-lightspeed colony ship. This was a key point in its pilot, when one of the [[Power Trio]] is briefly threatened with execution for "blasphemy"
** [[Brian Aldiss]]'s ''Non-Stop'' is also based on [[Generation Ships|this concept]], but with some gleefully British plot twists.
** As is [[Andrey Livadniy]]'s ''Ark'', where the protagonist turns out to be the last "pure" descendant of the human crew of the title Moon-sized (it's literally made out of the Moon) [[Generation Ship]], drifting in space for millennia, during which the alien inhabitants of the various biospheres (who mutinied against the humans long ago), as well as the other human descendants (who have their own Earth-like biosphere), have forgotten that they're on a ship and reverted to more primitive technology. After millennia of lack of maintenance, the ''Ark'' is beginning to fall apart at the seams, with more and more systems shutting down. The ship's AI is unable to affect repairs in most areas. This, however, is not the biggest [[The Twist|twist]] of the novel.
* The title escapes me, but one of the only (perhaps ''the'' only) novels based on the ''Earthdawn'' game used this trope. A kaer, built to withstand the centuries-long invasion of the Horrors, is supposed to let its inhabitants out when the threat is over. However, {{spoiler|thanks to a Horror that slipped inside before the kaer was sealed,}} something went wrong with the mechanism designed to tell the occupants it was time to leave, and the kaer's residents are slowly dying out in their needless confinement.
* 'The Allegory of the Cave' from Plato's ''[[The Republic (
* The D'ni, as seen in the [[Myst]] novel "The Book of Tiana", are a strange example. The central hub of D'ni culture is indeed located underground, tunelling deep and wide in all directions. But they also have access to special books which can transport them to a theoretically infinite number of Ages, many of which are outdoorsy. But when Aitrus and his team are building upwards through disused tunnels, they still encounter resistance from politicians who believe that, in their homeworld, the "Surface" is an impossibility!
* Saraksh from the [[Strugatsky Brothers]]' [[Noon Universe]] is a "planet in a bottle"
* [[Deltora Quest]] 2 features Lief, Barda and Jasmine attempting to collect three pieces of a magic pipe. One piece was being held on a literally bubble-enclosed island, citizens of said island banishing the part of their group who told the truth and acknowledged the past. What brings down the bubble is {{spoiler|Jasmine's insistence on telling the truth, rocking the faith of the one sorcerer still left alive on the island.}}
* The planktonic humans from the short story "Surface Tension"
* Michael Marshall Smith's ''Only Forwards'' has one of these - a 'neighbourhood' which long ago sealed itself in and indoctrinated its residents to believe that they live in the only surviving human settlement surrounded by a barren, irradiated wasteland (which always takes longer than the scientists thought to become safe again). Only the high-ups know that there's a perfectly viable world all around it. Worryingly, it's not the scariest Neighbourhood out there.
* In [[
** Not to mention the revolution that is kicked off by the revelatory tract {{spoiler|'What I Did On My Holidays', based on Twoflower's experiences in the first two Discworld books}}.
* Cowslip's warren in ''[[Watership Down]]''.
* The [[Ursula K. Le Guin]] short story "Paradises Lost" from the collection ''The Birthday of the World'' is the generation ship take on this, with the twist that the ship isn't stranded. Some of the people on the ship (by the end of the story, a large majority) believe that there's nothing outside the ship and "the journey is all". A minority remember the original purpose of the voyage, which is to explore and possibly colonize a far-flung planet.
* E.M. Forster's short story "The Machine Stops" features an underground city. There the inhabitants have forgotten what the surface world is like to the point of believing it is a lifeless, barren world. Believing their artificial environment is the only solace from a dead world, the protagonist of the story ends up finding otherwise with disastrous results.
* In ''[[The Forest of Hands and Teeth]]'', set generations after a [[Zombie Apocalypse]] kills most of humanity, Mary lives in a town that is fenced in to keep the Unconsecrated (or zombies) out. {{spoiler|It is revealed that pretty much all surviving towns are like this.}}
* In ''[[wikipedia:Across the Universe
* The home of the Neoterics in the classic SF story [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microcosmic_God "Microcosmic God"] by Theodore Sturgeon is another deliberately-created version.
== [[Live Action TV]] ==
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* Jim Henson's 1980s children's show ''[[Fraggle Rock]]'' featured small creatures living in a cave which exits to a mousehole in a tinker's shop (or a lighthouse, if you saw the UK version). One fraggle, "Uncle Traveling Matt," wanders the outside world, sending postcards which show great places of geography (and mundane, everyday objects) from an innocent's point of view.
** Another example are the Gorgs who live on the side of the cave opposite the tinker's shop. These three creatures are so enormous that they believe themselves to be the only sentient beings in the Universe, and labor under the delusion that they are the Universe's supreme rulers.
* ''[[Star Trek:
* Stargate has a small one where the SG-1 team is mind-swapped with some stored memories about working in a mine. Said mine was actually underneath a magnificent city and was used to keep said magnificent city running. But it was sold as a city in a bottle. They were told they kept it going or else the cold feezing air above the mine would kill them all. They thought that nothing else was above them. They thought that if they didn't work, they'd die, or at least, no longer get fed. It wasn't as bad as normal city in bottles, But it was pretty bad.
** They also once travelled to a planet where people believed they'd die if they left the city. Eventually, it turned out that leaving the city was the only way to stop some terrible thing from happening to them. I can't remember the title of this episode, but it was an example where the inhabitants of the city were ''aware'' that there was an outside, they just believed that it was too dangerous to go to.
*** There are two episodes that could be, in one they were in a dome created by a force-field and the atmosphere outside actually was toxic. The twist was that the computer controlling the dome was running out of power, and had to slowly shrink the dome and kill off some inhabitants (mind control through their neural links to make them walk outside) in order to save the rest. Eventually they were all evacuated to another planet. The other one involved a populace in a physical dome where they were all hooked up to a Matrix-like simulation to preserve them indefinitely while their planet repaired itself from an extreme industrial disaster. The computer/caretaker that was also in charge of helping repair and maintain the outside environment kept telling them that it wasn't safe to leave yet, as it believed that they would simply destroy the environment yet again if set loose in the real world.
* The 1973 Canadian production ''[[The Starlost]]'' featured a generation ship where disaster had killed the crew, while the passengers had lost the knowledge that they were indeed aboard a ship. Not to mention the disaster had altered the ship's course to collide with a star. The premise was interesting, but [[Harlan Ellison]] was disappointed enough with the end results to affix his Cordwainer Bird pseudonym to it.
* In one of the final episodes of Lost, Jacob and the Man in Black's mother tells the Man in Black that the island is all there is, and that nothing exists beyond the sea.
* The One State in ''[[
== [[Tabletop Games]] ==
* Hive Cities in ''[[Warhammer
* Alpha Complex in ''[[Paranoia (
** Unless you're rank Green of course.
* The early SF [[Role
* [http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=904 City in a Bottle] from [[Magic:
* In the early D&D module ''The Lost City'', the few residents of the underground city who aren't drugged out of their minds by the evil priesthood are still convinced there's nothing but desert on the surface, and nothing but unbeatable monsters in the surrounding tunnels.
** The shadow elves, when they finally found their way to the surface, found themselves in the midst of an uninhabitable wasteland (the Broken Lands). They concluded that the whole surface was like this, so returned to their underground realm, where they didn't learn
== [[Video Games]] ==
* Vault 101 in ''Fallout 3''. It and the other "Vaults" were constructed to shelter a human population safely underground in case of a nuclear holocaust. It worked, and as soon as the radiation had worn away enough all the Vaults were abandoned so the survivors could try to rebuild
** Vault 13 ''would'' have been this, but their [[MacGuffin]] broke, so they had to leave.
*** Actually, the ''Fallout'' series plays this trope
**** It isn't clear that the
* The majority of worlds in the ''[[Kingdom Hearts]]'' series, with most of the exceptions being worlds whose very purpose is linked to the multiplicity of worlds. At most, there's youth speculation about the existence of other worlds.
* The video game ''Terranigma''.
* In the underground world in ''[[Breath of Fire
* This is a perfectly legitimate strategy in ''[[
** Some players generate worlds with no surviving civilizations to embark with this trope invoked. Embarking to an isolated island a simpler method. In either case, after the first wave of immigrants, there will be no contact with the outside world, or evidence that it exists.
* The city of Palm Brinks in ''[[
* Koholint Island in ''[[The Legend of Zelda:
** ''[[The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
** Skyloft in ''[[The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword
* ''[[
* [[Might and Magic]] VII featured a bonus level in the form of a Temple in a Bottle.
* This is the background premise to the 8-bit era game ''Cholo'': the radiation from the nuclear holocaust has mostly died down, but you must take control of robots on the surface and crack the exit open from the outside before anyone can leave. (BTW, there's a free PC version available now!)
* In ''[[Super Robot Wars]] Alpha Gaiden'' the American Sunbelt region is similar to the Pleasantville example above. For some reason it never occured to any of these people to go visit the ''[[After War Gundam X
* A non-scifi example in [[Black Sigil]], where Bel Lenora voluntarily sealed itself off from the rest of the world then forgot that the rest of the world existed.
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20120512035835/http://twofoldsecret.com/games/sanctuary-17/ Sanctuary 17] is one of these.
== [[Web Comics]] ==
* A city in a beer bottle appears in [http://nonadventures.com/2008/03/01/bottle-of-the-planets/ this episode] of ''[[The Non
* The "Zoojacks" in ''[[
== [[Web Original]] ==
* [[
* In the ''[[
== [[Western Animation]] ==
* ''[[Aeon Flux]]'': the rulers of Bregna go to great lengths to prevent their citizens from learning that their city and its mortal enemy Monica were once the nation of Berognica, never mind anything about the world outside of the two walled cities.
* The underground hatch (and likely their old city of Beautopia) that Susan Strong and the Hyooman tribe live in starts out this way on ''[[
== [[Real Life]] ==
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** Same for Londoners. This particularly galls the rest of Britain since the media is almost entirely based in London.
** Ditto in France which is divided into two parts, namely Paris and the Province (as in outback).
** Then there's [https://web.archive.org/web/20131004160252/http://strangemaps.files.wordpress.com/2007/02/newyorker2.JPG this] famous cover of The New Yorker depicting the [[Flyover Country|city dweller's view of America]].
** Just like in France, Mexico is usuallly divided in Mexico City and 'Provincia' (Province); while this trope is true for most lower income Mexico City residents (some of them who have never gone outside the city limits), the view is mostly a stereotype seen by non-Mexico City residents.
* Most people have the stereotype that all of New York IS Manhattan and/or New York City, despite the fact that NYC being only a very small geographical portion of the state, and such different politics, economy, ecology, attitude, and most other aspects of life that many upstaters wish the two could become separate states.
* A lot of medieval villages would have existed in a state of almost complete isolation, with the only contact from the outside world being the occasional travelling merchant and representatives from the local lord.
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20050814232345/http://www.eco-sphere.com/ Own your own ecosystem!]
* The basis of the book 'Nothing to Envy' is showing the truth of this trope in North Korea, the name coming from the fact that they are conditioned to believe that North Korea is the most advanced and glorious nation on the planet... which leads to quite significant culture shock for those who actually defect.
* A ''[[Cracked.com]]'' article lists [http://www.cracked.com/article_19976_6-isolated-groups-who-had-no-idea-that-civilization-existed.html 6 isolated groups who had no idea that civilization existed].
{{reflist}}
[[Category:Settings]]
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[[Category:Solitary Tropes]]
[[Category:Speculative Fiction Tropes]]
[[Category:The City]]
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