but the plastic helicopter jumping around the map of Utah was cheesy.

N/t

In the novelization of 2001, the ape/man is named Moonwatcher and the monolith inspires him to learn how to kill for food since his species is dying off from starvation.

After killing the other ape/man, Moonwatcher roars and throws his bone/weapon up into the sky. The director, Stanley Kubrick, then crossfades to a spacecraft circling Earth millions of years later (in our "near future" ). That spacecraft is actually also a weapon: It's a nuclear missile platform orbiting the Earth.

It was Kubrick's original intention that at the end of the film, when the Starchild returns to Earth, it was to destroy the platform by detonating it. However, Kubrick's previous film was Dr. Strangelove which ended with a nuclear explosion. The film studio strongly suggested (i.e., ordered) Kubrick that all of his movies couldn't end with nuclear explosions! So, no bombs going off at the end of 2001.

Here's another fun fact about the movie. Kubrick hired Alex North to compose the score for the movie which was recorded. But Kubrick felt that his "temp track" using the various classical pieces we hear in the film was a more effective soundtrack. North's music was lost for decades but was found and recorded about 10 years ago. One day I played the CD while watching the film with the sound off. It was kind of fun to try to figure out where the cues matched up with the film. All I can say is that North's music is terrific but Kubrick made the right choice!

What if we end up looking back on 2020 and thinking of it as the good old days?

But that is just too weird. Gotta be someone's idea of a joke, like a Big Foot sighting.