Surely the dearth of optimistic futuristic science fiction is linked to the recent rise of the fantasy genre I noted Kristin Thompson talking about. Writers of imaginative genre fiction have abandoned the future as a source for wonder and are retreating to worlds created out of whole cloth instead.
Brainfart: This doesn’t bode well for Robert Rodriguez’s live-action Jetsons movie, does it? Unless you find out Spacely Sprockets are made out of people, that is.