In my opinion, Scala and Clojure aren't new "kings", they're hybrid languages: bridges from the old paradigm to the new one, the same way C++ was around 2 decad

In my opinion, Scala and Clojure aren't new "kings", they're hybrid languages: bridges from the old paradigm to the new one, the same way C++ was around 2 decades ago. That's why the "tail wags the dog" and sitting on top of the Java runtime (or .NET for the Microsoft world) is what matters first. That doesn't mean they won't have longevity and staying power (see: C++), but they aren't the "kings", the Java runtime is (the same way C is for C++). If you're looking for a new "king" you need to be looking for a language/platform that is as different from the JRE as the JRE is from C. I don't think we know what that would be yet (or why we'd invest the effort in that transition).