What is it with 80s nostalgia

[Deleted]

80s >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> 90s >>> 60s > 70s >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> 00s>>>>>>>>>>> Now

[iank]

The 60s over the 70s? Really? I'd have to quibble with that.

[rushy]

The 60s have more glamour and artistry. Bond is a great example. You go from On Her Majesty's Secret Service to Diamonds Are Forever. I love Diamonds, but it's definitely on the trashier side of Bond.

[Deleted]

I enjoy both decades, but I prefer the 60s because I think the music and fashion is much better. I also prefer 60s Who to 70s Who although I'm still unsure which is the better Bond decade. The 60s ones had so much elegance (as Rushy points out), but the 70s were more vibrant and fun.

[burrunjor]

I prefer the 70s in some respects. Bond, Doctor Who and Batman all went through their absolute peaks in the 70s. The development of Batman and Doctor Who are strikingly similar in that decade. It's quite fascinating actually. Well to me anyway LOL. Burrunjor is the guy who puts the B in bore.

Overall however the 60s I think objectively has to stand as the better decade for art, fashion, television, film and music. Like it or hate it, the 60s represented a renaissance period. It started so many things that are still going to this day, from Star Trek, DW, Marvel, to Bond itself. Really it's the type of decade that I don't think we'll see in a long while.

[iank]

I don't see where the 60s had better TV or movies than the 70s... Not at all, actually.

[burrunjor]

Nov 22, 2023 22:45:06 GMT iank said:

I don't see where the 60s had better TV or movies than the 70s... Not at all, actually.

Classic Who, Star Trek TOS, Lost in Space, The Prisoner, The Avengers, The Twilight Zone, The Outer Limits, these shows alone all really helped to shape modern sci fi and adventure tv. 

As we've been over LIS was the first sci fi and fantasy comedy. Red Dwarf, Futurama, and even Rick and Morty, hell you could make an argument for the zany aspects of Xena (that in turn inspired the zany aspects in Buffy) all grew out of Lost in Space. Xena's creators were big LIS fans and there are a lot of references to it.

Star Trek TOS, whilst being overrated by its elitist snobby fans like that dick David Gerrold LOL, still really perfected the space opera, pushed the idea of the future working out for us, there being a federation of planets, and humans and aliens existing together like a United Nations in space which was the template for many, many shows in the decades after. The likes of Blake's 7 and Babylon 5 even though they may have been inversions or new takes on it, still grew out of Star Trek 100 percent.. 

Classic Who, well does it need said here LOL. The longest running and most successful genre show of all time, with the widest influence due to the sheer range of genres it began. In the 60s alone however, it pioneered concepts like alien empires (The Daleks) alien races being a metaphor for rival political nations (the Daleks) machines overrunning humanity, or cybernetics infecting humanity (Cybermen), even the idea of the mundane being mixed with fantasy in the first story An Unearthly Child was novel at the time. Unlike the crew of the USS enterprise, the Robinson family, or Quatermass, Ian and Barbara are just ordinary people who stumble through a police box, an ordinary object into something weird. 

Meanwhile the Prisoner was a strange mix of a Kafkaesque political, psychological thriller and a James Bondesque spy, espionage thriller that again has become the template for almost too many shows to mention. 

The Twilight Zone meanwhile perfected the anthology format and much like DW has inspired so much due to its huge range. 

The Avengers meanwhile pioneered that kind of light, breezy, imaginative, campy adventure show, with Emma Peel being a pioneering role for women in the genre, and the whole will they, won't they dynamic between Steed and Mrs Peel again is something we see emulated for decades to come.

It's no exaggeration to say that between them, these shows really helped shape most aspects of adventure and genre tv for the next 50 years. That's not to say shows in other decades didn't help shape them either, like Blake's 7 and Buffy and Angel and Xena, but I don't think any has quite as many as the 60s. Also the 60s has them on both sides of the atlantic too. 

As for music, well most other decades will have one of two big movements that help to define them. 90s was all about grunge and Britpop, as we've been over the 00s were the crazy female singers I love, the 70s meanwhile had a few like punk, glam rock, reggae etc. 

However with the 60s there are almost too many to mention LOL. I mean there is the British invasion with the Beatles, the Kinks, the Rolling Stones,  who combined elements of soul and pop music, then there are the African American soul singers like Aretha Franklin, Marvin Gaye at their peak, country and western with Bobbie Gentry, Johnny Cash, guitarists like Jimi Hendrix, Peter Green, Eric Clapton, American pop with the likes of the Monkees, the psychadelic, surreal music like the Doors, Jefferson Airplane, American girl groups like The Ronnettes, etc. 

Finally the 60s was also the height of the British film industry too, and therefore meant from a western perspective it saw a healthy stream of classics from both sides of the Atlantic, unlike later decades where Hollywood tends to dominate, and it was the hey day or beginning for many British classics from Hammer to Bond. 

Again this isn't my personal favourite decade. I'm not sure if I have one? For tv it's probably the 90/00s, for old franchises being reinvented the 70s, for music the 00s, films I'm kind of all over the place, Britcoms the 80s, 

However like I said objectively more begins in the 60s. It really was just a culmination of a lot of things that had been building up and brewing for decades, mixed in with the right social changes to allow people on the outside like The Beatles and even the people who made Classic Who to get a chance. Sadly we won't see it's like for a long while. 

[Deleted]

My top two films are from the 80s: Die Hard and Back to the Future Part II

My top two favourite DW stories are from the 80s: Remembrance of the Daleks and The Curse of Fenric

My top two favourite albums are from the 80s: Please and Actually by the Pet Shop Boys

My favourite show (other than TruWho) started in the 80s: Red Dwarf

I don't purposely like things because they're from the 80s, I just end up enjoying things the most from that period.

[iank]

That's because it's the best period, period.

[Deleted]

Feb 21, 2022 20:52:22 GMT iank said:

The 90s are at that weird spot for me now when they're starting to look disturbingly old for the first time, but not old enough yet to be shivery nostalgic about. It'll probably get there though.
I've been weirdly nostalgic for the early 2000s of late (TV anyway). Didn't realise how good we had it!

The 90s were the greatest time for me. I mean, I lived for nine months in 1999 and everyone thought I was a cutie. Ahh, those were the days 

[Bernard Marx]

Feb 19, 2022 16:31:58 GMT burrunjor said:

To me all the decades from the 60s on have their high points and low points, and you could make a case for any of them being the best. (Before the 60s however, not so much. I don't think anyone is going to list the 1910s as the best decade for instance LOL.) 

I think Intolerance (1916), Nosferatu (1922), The Gold Rush (1925), One AM (1916), Faust (1926), Sherlock Jr (1924), The General (1926), Battleship Potemkin (1927), Napoleon (1927), Metropolis (1927), The Passion of Joan of Arc (1930- a difficult watch but a worthy inclusion), La Belle et la Béte (1946), All Quiet on the Western Front (1930), the classic Laurel and Hardy films, Dr Mabuse (all of them), The 39 Steps (1935), The Wizard of Oz (1939), The Great Dictator (1940), City Lights (1931), Modern Times (1936), The Maltese Falcon (1940), Citizen Kane (1941), Casablanca (1942), Double Indemnity (1944), The Big Sleep (1946), Les Enfants Du Paradis (1945), Great Expectations (1947), It’s a Wonderful Life (1947), Bicycle Thieves (1948), Letter from an Unknown Woman (1949), Orpheus (1950), La Strada (1954), The Night of the Hunter (1955), The Killing (1956), Paths of Glory (1957), The Human Condition Trilogy (1958-61), The Seventh Seal (1957), Rope (1948), Rear Window (1954) and Vertigo (1958) all elevate their respective decades culturally, and that's only accounting for cinema. 

[burrunjor]

Jan 12, 2024 15:39:51 GMT Bernard Marx said:

Feb 19, 2022 16:31:58 GMT burrunjor said:

To me all the decades from the 60s on have their high points and low points, and you could make a case for any of them being the best. (Before the 60s however, not so much. I don't think anyone is going to list the 1910s as the best decade for instance LOL.) 

I think Intolerance (1916), Nosferatu (1922), The Gold Rush (1925), One AM (1916), Faust (1926), Sherlock Jr (1924), The General (1926), Battleship Potemkin (1927), Napoleon (1927), Metropolis (1927), The Passion of Joan of Arc (1930- a difficult watch but a worthy inclusion), La Belle et la Béte (1946), All Quiet on the Western Front (1930), the classic Laurel and Hardy films, Dr Mabuse (all of them), The 39 Steps (1935), The Wizard of Oz (1939), The Great Dictator (1940), City Lights (1931), Modern Times (1936), The Maltese Falcon (1940), Citizen Kane (1941), Casablanca (1942), Double Indemnity (1944), The Big Sleep (1946), Les Enfants Du Paradis (1945), Great Expectations (1947), It’s a Wonderful Life (1947), Bicycle Thieves (1948), Letter from an Unknown Woman (1949), Orpheus (1950), La Strada (1954), The Night of the Hunter (1955), The Killing (1956), Paths of Glory (1957), The Human Condition Trilogy (1958-61), The Seventh Seal (1957), Rope (1948), Rear Window (1954) and Vertigo (1958) all elevate their respective decades culturally, and that's only accounting for cinema. 

Yeah but two world wars, a recession, the holocaust and an influenza pandemic that strangely never gets mentioned and killed more people than the first world war kind of cancel that out. Of course the other decades had their wars, atrocities etc, but that's the point even with the great cinema and music, nobody who grew up in those decades will even be lulled into thinking that they were the best of times the way we sometimes can with the others. 

[Deleted]

Jan 12, 2024 15:39:51 GMT Bernard Marx said:

Feb 19, 2022 16:31:58 GMT burrunjor said:

To me all the decades from the 60s on have their high points and low points, and you could make a case for any of them being the best. (Before the 60s however, not so much. I don't think anyone is going to list the 1910s as the best decade for instance LOL.) 

I think Intolerance (1916), Nosferatu (1922), The Gold Rush (1925), One AM (1916), Faust (1926), Sherlock Jr (1924), The General (1926), Battleship Potemkin (1927), Napoleon (1927), Metropolis (1927), The Passion of Joan of Arc (1930- a difficult watch but a worthy inclusion), La Belle et la Béte (1946), All Quiet on the Western Front (1930), the classic Laurel and Hardy films, Dr Mabuse (all of them), The 39 Steps (1935), The Wizard of Oz (1939), The Great Dictator (1940), City Lights (1931), Modern Times (1936), The Maltese Falcon (1940), Citizen Kane (1941), Casablanca (1942), Double Indemnity (1944), The Big Sleep (1946), Les Enfants Du Paradis (1945), Great Expectations (1947), It’s a Wonderful Life (1947), Bicycle Thieves (1948), Letter from an Unknown Woman (1949), Orpheus (1950), La Strada (1954), The Night of the Hunter (1955), The Killing (1956), Paths of Glory (1957), The Human Condition Trilogy (1958-61), The Seventh Seal (1957), Rope (1948), Rear Window (1954) and Vertigo (1958) all elevate their respective decades culturally, and that's only accounting for cinema. 

Some truly superb films in there. Metropolis is probably the pick of the bunch for me because of the sense of scale and iconography. I'm also incredibly fond of The Wizard of Oz, the ultimate fantasy film of the first half of the 20th century. I'd chuck North by Northwest in there as well.

[burrunjor]

I will say one thing we can blame the 80s for is the ruination of comic books. Mind you this took root more in the 90s, but it was definitely there in the 80s.

That's when the generation of saddo, wanker, edge lord, I have to deconstruct things, because my creative writing class told me, generation of writers like Neil Gaiman, Alan Moore, Grant Morrison, and Mark Millar took over. These guys were the epitome of self loathing fanboys who wanted to write comics and sci fi and fantasy, but couldn't stand being seen as writers for silly, childish genres and mediums like comics and so they filled their shit full of nasty, perverted trash just to look adult from Snow White raping her dad and Prince Charming being a necropheliac rapist, in Neil Gaiman's version of Snow White, to Alan Moore doing a story that reimagines many fairy tale female characters from Wendy to Alice as victims of pedophilia, to Grant Morrison having the Mekon rape Dan Dare and him kill himself afterwards. Sadly these wankers would influence the industry for the next several decades, with the Fitzroy Crowd more or less growing out of them via the edge lord virgin new adventures. Also much like the Fitzroy Crowd their influence at least has hung around like a bad smell, hence why James Gunn, a similar edge lord who sticks in random scenes of Elliot Page raping Rainn Wilson into his comedies is now being put in charge of DC and is adapting a f*cking Grant Morrison story. Lord save us.

It's a shame because some of these guys did have talent, like Alan Moore. I'd be lying if I said he didn't write some great stuff like Killing Joke, but honestly most of the time you wouldn't know as he's too busy trying to deconstruct something, or again filling it full of perverted crap to avoid looking childish to tell a f*cking story. I'd say that 70 percent of his work is absolute f*cking wank as a result. League of Extraordinary Gentlemen is probably the best example. It's a good idea, and would have made a great excuse for a barmy, imaginative adventure in another writers hands, but dear god is it one of the worst comics ever written because again it's full of needless scenes of rape, turns the Invisible Man into a pedophile, who molests other famous literary characters, and is all about deconstructing these characters like making James Bond a rapist, Harry Potter a villain etc that there is no enjoyment to be had in something that could have had Dracula fight Martians! The film though not a masterpiece is vastly superior to it in every way to be honest, and it made me laugh how pissy Alan Moore and his snobbish fanboy twats got at how unfaithful it was to his masterpiece. Yeah because turning the Invisible Man into a pedo rapist who lifts up girls skirts and hangs around in girls schools is really what HG Wells would have wanted, you wanker.

If you think I'm being too hard on Moore, look at this quote that shows what a nasty piece of work he is. 




 Jesus Christ you'd think he'd written f*cking War and Peace with that ego. Not a shitty, overrated, teenage, pretentious shit fest like Watchmen. The day these wankers are seen for what they are, the better the medium and genre will be. Bring back the Terry Nation's and Terrance Dicks who just wanted to tell good stories and not show off how f*cking adult and edgy they were. 

[Deleted]

Couldn't have been all bad. Frank Miller emerged during that time and he's one of the best comic book writers ever.