Parks and Rec co-creator Michael Schur tells BuzzFeed how those snazzy gadgets — including Gryzzl — were brought to life. Plus, he talks Ron and Leslie, the last days on set, and who’s really behind those “We Didn’t Start the Fire” lyrics. Warning: Spoilers ahead.
The final season of Parks and Recreation — which takes place in the year 2017 — has been a whirlwind of campaigning, tiny ninjas, and calzones.
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This season has also introduced a handful of eye-catching technological inventions. So how did the creators come up with the slick designs of the not-too-distant future?
Comedy and forecasting ultimately dictated the gadgets' form, Parks co-creator Michael Schur told BuzzFeed in a phone interview. After looking three years into the past to see how rapidly our current electronics morphed, they decided to stick to one overarching rule: No hoverboards. "That was a shorthand of saying we're only going to 2017. This is not Bladerunner," he added.
So they focused on two big innovations: clear plexiglass and 3D images.
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"It was just extrapolating into the future and reading about Oculus Rift and stuff like that that seems to portend a three-dimensional future for all of us," Schur said.
The tablets and phones are a product of Gryzzl, a chill internet company that's bunking in Pawnee and is an amalgamation of Google, Amazon, and social media. And while their customized Gryzzlboxes may be comedic hyperbole, they're not too far from reality.
In one scene, Gryzzl's CEO, played by Workaholic star Blake Anderson, nonchalantly mentions that maybe Sweetums' cohort Jessica Wicks (Susan Yeagley) should shut her device off before going to sleep. "Every year that goes by, this stuff gets a little more creepy and a little more invasive, and we turn a little more of ourselves over to it," says Schur.
Except for Ron Swanson (Nick Offerman), of course, whose feelings on technology were perfectly encapsulated with one scene that featured him standing in a darkened threshold holding a battered drone.
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