The 80's --How do you feel?

[Bobtheduck]

'80s style has been coming back in the emo / scene movements, and... It should have stayed dead, but in any case... There is only one good thing that came out of the '80s.







Me, of course.

[Sakaki Onsei]

80's. Great music, the best years of my life.

I wish I paid more attention to the music and less to my classmates at the time. It would have been for the better.

[ShiroiHikari]

I wish I'd have been a little bit older in the 80s so I'd have a clearer perspective of the decade. Not a huge fan of the music in general, but I love 80s toys and commercials and movies. I agree that the clothes and hair can stay dead, though.

[EricTheFred]

And come to think of it, folks, the 80's gave the US Anime!

For real. The first forays of fansubbed anime into the geek world of the US were mostly in the early 80's (when I was into it the first time around, when it started showing up at Star Trek and Comic Book conventions, the ancestors of the modern Con, which I attended religiously.) And frankly, Cosplay in the US started in the 80s, although it was just referred as 'Going in Costume', since the word wasn't around yet. I had the cast iron gall to throw a towel over my shoulder and claim I was going as a Hitchhiker, if you can believe it.

And the nutcase dorks who were watching those fansubs and going in costume to cons in the eighties went on to found most of the American distribution companies in the early 90s. Wish I'd been a little smarter, so I could have been one of them. Oh well.

[KhakiBlueSocks]

I wish I'd have been a little bit older in the 80s so I'd have a clearer perspective of the decade. Not a huge fan of the music in general, but I love 80s toys and commercials and movies. I agree that the clothes and hair can stay dead, though.

Quoted for absolute truth. I was born in 1985, so I don't remember a whole lot of the 80's, which is a shame. But, thanks to sites like retrojunk and YouTube, I can fill in the blanks. I love looking at pictures of malls and arcades from that era. It was so campy and blocky, but just so cool. And of course, the 80's gave birth to the one, the only, the oxygen-depriving...



Nintendo Entertainment System.

[shooraijin]

80's. Great music, the best years of my life.

I wish I paid more attention to the music and less to my classmates at the time. It would have been for the better.

A lamentably timeless sentiment.

[Galant]

There was something really cool about the 80's which I fine hard to define - something related to honesty, innocence and imagination. That's not to say there weren't awful things about the 80's just that I think there was a sentiment at the time which was genuinely good.

I think it shows up well in some of what it produced. Particularly kid's adventure movies - there were tons of them!

And I think it can be proven there was something great about those movies in that their appeal is lasting. There are so many movies today that just won't cut it in a few years, if they even cut it when released or six months afterwards, but there was a real magic about some of those movies, the stories and characters, that captures something brilliant.

Those of you younger than 25 have some serious movie catching up to do. If you want a summer to remember this year, set aside a movie a week, get together with friends and watch some of these, you wont regret it:

The Goonies
Flight of the Navigator
The Explorers
Short Circuit
The Karate Kid
Batteries Not Included
Cocoon
The Boy Who Could Fly
Innerspace
Back To The Future
K-9

Honourable mentions - Still worth watching:

Vice Versa
The Wizard (for the gamers!)


Oh and hey - this being an Anime forum - surely it has to be said that those of us who were young during the 80's surely got our introduction to anime via the French/Japanese collaborations that made their rise at the time? I could go on a rant about how 'rad' 80's cartoons were but keeping it to the anime - these were the cartoons that subtly introduced anime to me before I knew what anime was!:

Mysterious Cities of Gold
Ulysses 31
Jayce and the Wheeled Warriors
Dogtanian and the Three Muskehounds
Gobots
Centurions
and I just managed to catch a little of Battle of the Planets - the imagery of bird helmets and fighters really stayed with me.

So I suppose those of us who are products of the 80's were fed anime and Japan all the way through - it's incredible how many cartoons of that time had Japanese influence! (Yup - even Thundercats!)

[KhakiBlueSocks]

And I think it can be proven there was something great about those movies in that their appeal is lasting. There are some many movies today that just wont cut it in a few years, if they even cut it when released or six months afterwards, but there was a real magic about some of those movies, the stories and characters that captures something brilliant.

Those of you younger than 25 have some serious movie catching up to do. If you want a summer to remember this year, set aside a movie a week, get together with friends and watch some of these, you wont regret it:

The Goonies
Flight of the Navigator
The Explorers
Short Circuit
The Karate Kid
Batteries Not Included
Cocoon
The Boy Who Could Fly
Innerspace
Back To The Future
K-9

My good sir...

[color=seagreen]WIN.[/color]

[ShiroiHikari]

There was something really cool about the 80's which I fine hard to define - something related to honesty, innocence and imagination. That's not to say there weren't awful things about the 80's just that I think there was a sentiment at the time which was genuinely good.

I think I agree with this for the most part. Things seemed so sincere back then. Maybe that's just because I look back through the rosy lenses of nostalgia. I know there were some bad things going on in the 80s-- bad economy, Cold War, etc. --but it seems like despite that, there was a certain optimism that permeated many things, unlike today, where, from my perspective, everything seems to be much more doom and gloom. Or something, I don't know.

[Cap'n Nick]

Now you know. And knowing is half the battle!

Cobra can Google, too.

There really was more optimism back then. Perhaps not all of it unfounded.

[GundamFan]

Well one thing I used to really miss from 80's was the Dukes of Hazzard but I have since gotten several seasons of the show on dvd.

[Roy Mustang]

Since my childhood was right in the middle of the 80's.

I give you my view about the 80's, it was the best of times, it was the worst of times!


[font="Book Antiqua"][color="Red"]Col. Roy Mustang[/color][/font]

[Galant]

My good sir...

[color=seagreen]WIN.[/color]

Well, thank you!

[ashfire]

Lets see. It took 26 years for me to get there and 19 years to get away from them for me.
Got the job I have now and will retire from in a year if all goes right.
Had a girlfriend for most of the 80s.
I begin to get more into anime watching Starblazers on TV. So many other things I can think of about the 80s

[EricTheFred]

and 19 years to get away from them...

No. You can never escape the 80s. You're doomed.

[ShiroiHikari]

No. You can never escape the 80s. You're doomed.

That's absolutely right. Bwahaha!

[Corkyspaniel]

[color="DarkOrchid"] I'm actually a huge fan of the 80s. Music was awesome and had substance. Great shows existed like those described here. No one has mentioned "The Breakfast Club" yet. o.o I really like that movie, and The Karate Kid movies were really good first starting out. The big hair can stay, but the pop culture of that decade were amazing. That being said, I do wish I was there in the 80s to form an opinion. [/color]

[Kkun]

I regret that I only got to experience a little over three years of the 80s. The fashion may have sucked, but times were more positive and children's cartoons were better f'sho.

[animaniac]

i love 80s music but modern rock killed 80s glam metal. CURSE YOU MODERN MUSIC!!!!!!