MovieChat Forums > Ready Player One (2018) Discussion > Why would the kids of 2045 be interested...

Why would the kids of 2045 be interested in the pop culture of the '80s?


When was the last time you met a millennial, or someone younger, interested in the pop culture of the '50s? It seems the kids of today would rather jump out of a plane without a parachute than binge-watch "Gunsmoke," biblical epics, and "The Danny Thomas Show." Does the book explain why the kids of 2045 inexplicably find the '80s endearing? Or, is the fact that the author likely grew up in the '80s the reason why the kids of tomorrow find it so fascinating .... even though in reality they would probably rather study cartography than immerse themselves in a sixty-year-old decade?

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Theres plenty of interest in the 30s/40s music nowadays actually. For example Fallout videogames have significantly boosted the sales of that era music by utilizing it in their games (ironically, a lot of it being later covers actually).

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A few weeks back, our HR department were planning a Christmas Party and came on to the subject of costume themes. Someone said '80s' and a few people said a lot of employees would be too young to get many of the references.

However, when it was bounded around that it could be 90s or 00s, nobody could think of a damn thing anyone would dress as from either film or music. It segued into an interesting convo about what it is from the 80s that makes it so enduring. We kinda of came to the rough consensus that it was a very packaged, commercialised era, with lots of iconography from Culture Club to Karate Kid, slasher movies to Slush Puppies, so much merch stemmed from that decade that we're (still) drowning in it.

I only remember from about '86 onwards, but when I think back to the 90s, where I was at a far more alert age, even the defining films and music of that decade are hard to work into the same kind of commercial nostalgia. I mean, you could go to a costume party as Ghostface from Scream, or a Spice Girl, but what else had so much instant recognition it will be a costume idea for the next 40 years?

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This was a very expensive movie. No decision like this would be made because "it was in the book". It was probably a very calculated effort to target soccer moms who remember that culture as their own and will take their kids to see it and rent and buy it on DVD.

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a better question
Why would the kids of 2020 be interested in the pop culture of the '80s?
by 'kids' i mean cinema going demographic (15 to 30)

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In a bleak world such as the one represented in the film, I would imagine going back to when pop culture did peak would be something interesting.

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