Tonight at 8, the TV Land channel is showing the 1983 movie The Day After. Does anyone remember the movie? It was a somewhat cheesy account of the Cold War-turned-WW III. The Soviets may have “started” (by launching a nuclear missile). Can’t remember.
It was freaky. As people near ground zero were incinerated, for a split second they turned into skeletons. Those unfortunate enough to still be alive walked around in constantly falling ash, with radiation poisoning, no hair, and running sores on their faces. Gross.
Then there was the inevitable chaos and disorder. It was Thunderdome! Well, maybe not that bad. What made The Day After all the more eerie was the lack of commercials after the attack. A commercial-free second half. I was paranoid for weeks afterward. I think I’ll watch it again.
By the way, the post title comes from a line in another cheesy movie (which was a sequel to really good one). Can you name the movie?
Sources: Museum of Broadcast Communications and Wikipedia.
Unrelated Update: If you e-mailed me in the past week and I haven’t responded, I’m sorry.
I implemented a new e-mail policy several months ago. I don’t have time to answer every e-mail, but I try to answer most.
Update II (7/1): Commenters reminded me of Red Dawn, a classic. I was a mere teen in 1984, so I could relate to the teen characters defending their country from Communists. I didn’t like Reagan at the time, but I didn’t like the idea of foreign invaders, either.
Side note: Some of you may have noticed my present position in the Ecosystem. I thought there was something strange about it, so I did some detective work. Under the Top Posts category I noticed my RSS feeds are being counted as links, so the #4 rank is false. I’ve already e-mailed the Bear about it and asked him to fix the bug. I want to acquire links the old-fashioned way: by earning them. Thanks for linking and reading.
Update III (7/2): I’m supposed to be on vacation. Just wanted to say that N.Z. Bear fixed the problem at TTLB, and my true rank is #14. Now I’m on vacation.
Sheriffs in Georgia can’t seem to hold on to their thug prisoners.
Yesterday a reader sent a link to a story about Mexico’s newly issued postal stamps, which for some inexplicable reason depict black caricatures reminiscent of a bygone era in the United States.