I had a bit of The Fear. I saw only a few pieces of The Day After. I remember the special effects of all the peoples being vaporized. The British film Threads did a better job of scaring the poop out of me.

Not quite terrified, but it was in the back of my mind.

Movies like Wargames didn't help either. Hell, even Spies Like Us had me believing there were psycho generals out there just itching to vaporize most of the Northern Hemisphere.

There were, pedal.

There was an image in Threads of a little girl you had seen riding her bike in the street earlier, as a blackened corpse, welded to the bike, up in a tree.

Stays with you, that shit.

When I was a kid, I was supposed to die in the base gymnasium. In the event of nuclear, biological, or chemical attack on the way, the noncombatants on base (in West Germany) were supposed to go the base gymnasium under our own power. Where we were supposed to die, all in one spot.

They never told us about the dying part at the time, of course. We assumed it was just part of The Plan, which would somehow facilitate our being protected. I found out later, studying deterrence, that these kind of assembly points were devised not so that noncombatants could be protected or provided for. But so that the soldiers and airmen (theoretically still alive in their NBC gear) wouldn't suffer the negative morale effect of having to gather up the corpses of their loved ones after we suffered 100% casualties in attacks we were given no protection from. If we all walked our dead asses to the gym, then our fathers or husbands would be able to continue fighting, with our moldering cadavers neatly piled in one place.

Hey, neatness counts.

Supposedly that's why they tell you to crounch under a doorway or table in an earthquake, so they know where to find you.

quote:

Originally posted by colin:
I had a bit of The Fear. I saw only a few pieces of The Day After. I remember the special effects of all the peoples being vaporized. The British film Threads did a better job of scaring the poop out of me.

Not quite terrified, but it was in the back of my mind.

I was scared of nuclear war as a kid after I read Nuclear Winter.

Before that I just wanted to kill Russians like a good reagan-era capitalist.

quote:

Originally posted by colin:
There was an image in Threads of a little girl you had seen riding her bike in the street earlier, as a blackened corpse, welded to the bike, up in a tree.

Stays with you, that shit.

The film Testament is about as depressing as I have seen on the subject f nuclear war.

the book On the Beach is even more harrowing.

Malevil was pretty grim as well.

A Boy and His Dog --- mom brought this home from the video store when I was 8 or so, thinking by the title that it was a nice Old-Yeller-ish family film. All I remember about it is Don Johnson wandering through wastelands with his psychic dog, looking for tail. It added a nice silver lining to the mushroom cloud daydreams i had in the 80s.

The opening film-within-a-film of Strange Brew was a bit more palatable, too.

Rick Moranis navigates a postapocalyptic landscape in his brown van. Voiceover: "There was nothing to do, cos all the bowlin alleys had been destroyed."

I was scared of nuclear armageddon as a kid because of Reagan and because the crest of the Strategic Air Command was on the wall of my dad's study. Only later did I find out the context. It was some subliminal thing -- I had a phobia of radiation and was deathly afraid of xrays.

On the Beach is cheery.

quote:

Originally posted by theminx:
Supposedly that's why they tell you to crounch under a doorway or table in an earthquake, so they know where to find you.

That would be a tripping hazard.

A a kid I was ok with the nuclear war. I was more concerned with Zombies.
What is the probability that the LHC bring back the dead ?

I'm hell on zombies. I tell my wife that all the time.

quote:

What is the probability that the LHC bring back the dead ?

I wouldn't bet on it.

Ha! When I said I was hell on zombies, I exclude you Lester

Wham! Sup yo!

Hi, guys.

HI LESTER!!!!!