Background
The Force Writers Room (FWR) offers a new way to frame and solve future-centered Department of Defense problems, and prepare warfighters to develop appropriate defensive systems. Protecting the United States is a profoundly complex task. Not only must military and homeland security defend against known threats, they must also prepare for a vast array of “unknowns.” They must visualize how advancements in technology, biology and social dynamics will impact warfare and where threats may come from, as well as identify Achilles heels that are ripe to be compromised in unknown ways.
FWR brings multi-disciplinary expertise, Hollywood creativity, and proven “TV writers room” techniques to visualize the future, enabling warfighters to examine “unknowns” within a highly imaginative narrative framework. FWR is co-led by Dava Casoni, ICT’s Contracts & Compliance Advisor, who worked as an actor in Hollywood, and also served in the U.S. Army Reserve and Captain Ric Arthur, TV writer (NCIS as Richard C. Arthur; The Last Ship, Hawaii Five-O) and Naval officer who originated and piloted the FWR process.
Objectives
The FWR mission is to envision and articulate, via engaging narrative, the role of emerging technologies, concepts and geopolitical conditions on DOD operations, thereby providing decision-makers, warfighters, engineers, and scientists with a tangible look and feel of the future. FWR develops plausible narratives and use cases, delivering a context within which application of emerging technologies can be sandboxed. From graphic novels, prototypes, interactive immersive experiences/spaces, video games, simulations, and full-scale movies, our output is storydriven and impactful, uniquely tailored to target audiences.
The Force Writers Room convenes a multidisciplinary team of world-class creatives, including TV and film writers, producers, cinematographers, graphic designers, game designers, futurists, analysts, warfighters, and strategists. Once in place, the creatives use a tried and tested “writers room” process to ideate, in the same way that Hollywood makes blockbuster TV shows and movies. The team brings unique perspectives and “devil’s advocate” insights to conceptualize and deliver a vision of the future that academics, research scientists, engineers, and military leaders can build toward over the next decade.
Results
FWR has produced a range of products to enable DoD decision-makers to future-proof R&D investments including:
- SEA STRIKE 2043: an 11-minute film depicting future technology, weapons and human-machine interfaces
operating in a high-stakes sea battle in 2043, commissioned by Naval Air Warfare Center Weapons Division
and Naval Information Warfare Center Pacific. - SEA STRIKE is a graphic novel series that explores how emerging technologies will interact with U.S. defense
strategies in a war with a peer adversary in the 2040s. - Force 2045 concept art to bring to life prototypes including LCAS airframes, new unmanned platforms, missiles
airframes, command center spaces, user interfaces of the future, and command-processes. - L.A. & DoD Collaboration Network: FWR enlisted a hundred subject matter experts to envision how the U.S.
Navy will fight in the 2040s. Besides the projects it produces, the FWR effort changes the way each one of
these engineers, warfighters, and policy-analysts think about the future.
Next Steps
FWR is currently working with OPNAV N7, developing concept art and prototypes for future battlescapes for Force
Design 2045.
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