In Meanwhile, back in the lab, the world is a strange, humming place where the past and future have conspired to create something deliciously uncanny. Here, the 1950s and 1960s collide with alternate realities — chrome and Bakelite panels blink alongside impossible circuitry, while calm-faced operators, odd assistants, and questionable test subjects carry on as if everything is perfectly normal. These scenes feel like lost stills from forgotten sci-fi serials or pulp horror magazines, hinting at experiments that are part genius, part madness.

Sometimes whimsical, sometimes unnerving, the images revel in a mid-century retro-futurism that’s been dipped in the surreal. There’s a playful nostalgia in the oversized consoles and dials, but also a whisper of unease in the cold precision of the machinery and the serene expressions of those tethered to it. The result is a world that is both familiar and alien — a visual love letter to the golden age of sci-fi cinema with a sly wink to its darker undercurrents.