Watch: Old Animated Short ‘There Will Come Soft Rains’ Set in 2026
by Alex Billington
January 2, 2026
Source: YouTube
“There will come soft rains & the smell of the ground, and swallows circling with their shimmering sound.” An eerie, ominous warning from the past about our techno-fascist future. This animated short film was created in 1984 and it has been rediscovered as a long-lost Soviet era animated classic. There Will Come Soft Rains, inspired by the Ray Bradbury short story about nuclear war, is a haunting 10-minute animated short film from Uzbekistan about a robot in the future. It just so happens to be set in the year 2026 – no longer the future, now the present. On the morning of December 31, 2026, the robot sets the table and calls for breakfast the whole family. None of them are already alive – after a global catastrophe, only a handful of ashes remain. However, the robot continues to function – it announces that it is time to go to work & school, and in the evening prepares a festive turkey and congratulates everyone on the new year 2027. The title and motif of the story comes from Sara Teasdale’s 1918 poem, “There Will Come Soft Rains”, which had a post-apocalyptic setting inspired by World War I and was re-interpreted for Bradbury’s version. The first video embedded below includes English subtitles – click on [cc]. The second is a cleaned up and colorized version.
Thanks to everyone on Reddit/Twitter for the tip on this short film. Original intro from Reddit: “Based on Ray Bradbury’s short story ‘There Will Come Soft Rains’ which was first published in the May 6, 1950 issue of Collier’s. Later that same year the story was included in Bradbury’s The Martian Chronicles (1950). The story begins introducing the reader to a computer-controlled house which cooks, cleans and takes care of virtually every need that a well-to-do United States family could be assumed to have. But… what about the inhabitants?” There Will Come Soft Rains is also known as Будет ласковый дождь originally in Russian – written and directed by Uzbek indie actor / filmmaker Nazim Tulyakhodzayev, who also later directed the films Veld, Maktub, Visol, and Oh, Salima, Salima! after making this. Adapted from the Ray Bradbury short story. Produced by Uzbekfilm. Featuring nusic by Feliks Yanov-Yanovsky. This originally debuted in 1984; a restored version later premiered at the 2007 Uzbekistan Film Festival and other fests. For more info on the film, visit RayBradbury.ru or this archive post on it. To watch more shorts, click here. Your thoughts?
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