Post apocalyptic 80's

[Banten]

Hello everyone and welcome to another worldbuilding thread by Banten.

I would like some help from you guys with coming up with some post-apocalyptic societies. The world in question has diverted away from ours somewhere in the early 80's and remained in a form of stasis until the apocalypse in question. The exact cause of the apocalypse is purposefully left unclear, but most destruction was caused by a mysterious metal falling from the sky all over the world. This metal causes different mutations depending on the specific metal. Furthermore this world was destroyed to the point that society has to fully rebuild, similar to Canticle for Leibowitz and the Fallout series.

Western Europe, Italy, the balkans and scandinavia have been largely divided into various greater societies, but the rest of the world is still left open. I am currently mostly focused on creating some interesting societies in Eastern Europe. Hopefully this thread can be useful for others as well.

 

[Brithel]

Since the world is 80's inspired you would obviously have the Eastern Bloc in a state of turmoil as people use the apocalypse to break free from communism and the USSR's attempts to maintain it's territory. Or you could remove the communism from the picture entirely as it is entirely possibly the Soviet Union could have collapsed under the strain of apocolypse. EIther way you'd have groups of nationalists fighting against each other to form their own nations (E.g. Polish nationalist desire for the Poland of old Crown of the Kingdom of Poland - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia )

You may also wish to include various Islamic Fundamentalist groups or nations out in the Middle East as the 80's is during a big surge of Islamic Fundamentalsim (E.g. Iranian Revolution in 79 and the Mujahadeen in Afghanistan). I don't know much about Islam itself but there is probably a lot you could do with that if your setting is in dire need of harrowing ethno-religous conflict/turmoil.

 

[Penpilot]

You should check out some classic '80s post apocalyptic movies like the Road Warrior Series, Cherry 2000, Escape from New York, Steel Dawn, etc., and see what you can "borrow" from them.

Also someone did a homage to those '80s post apocalyptic movies last year and made a movie in that vein and apparently it's really good. It's called Turbo Kid.

 

[Miskatonic]

I'll second watching Escape from New York.

 

[CupofJoe]

I'd also add Liquid Sky to that list of post-something films of the early 80s.
It isn't really "post-apocalypse" but I don't think any film captures the strangeness that was around in the early 80s.
Yeah... Strange... That's the word I'd use... Strange.

 

[Banten]

Thank you guys. It might sound a little weird, but I completely forgot that some of the most iconic post-apocalyptic works were made in the 80's.

Thanks for reminding me.

 

[psychotick]

Hi,

Just to add, you might go noir as well. The French were really into that and you might want to check out "Delicatessen". It is very funny in a black comedy sort of way. Also someone said Mad Max and while it's Australian rather than European it still gives an interesting picture of societial breakdown - especially the first two.

Cheers, Greg.

 

[K.S. Crooks]

Decadence, propaganda, scapegoating, governments that play both sides and try to hide the truth about matter of importance could be the start. Establish new boarders between all the new countries/city states based on geographical features, ideologies or ethnicity. On a side note for a true apocalypse of the 80s the only music that survives should be power ballads from bands named after an animal- White Snake, Def Leopard, White Tiger, Pet Shop Boys, etc.