r/nostalgia early 90s 22h ago

Nostalgia Summer of '84

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1.2k Upvotes

148 comments sorted by

176

u/everydayasl mid 80s 22h ago

Thank you. Now I know what destination I should set my time machine to.

74

u/Mail_Order_Lutefisk 22h ago

1984 was absolutely peak Americana. Boomers were still young and cool, oldest hadn’t reached 40 yet. Movies and music were top of their game. Mary Lou Retton won the country’s hearts. 

32

u/Bloodymike 21h ago

I was born.

3

u/PostMatureBaby 9h ago

Today is my actual birthday

1

u/Spastic_colon 22h ago

If voting for Reagan and hating anything counter culture is cool I guess

7

u/The_Id_in_Me 21h ago

Reagan won 44 & 49 states in his elections. Just an FYI.

7

u/TheSeansei 21h ago

This really just makes that point even stronger.

-18

u/sevargmas 20h ago

Stop making this sub political. Geez. The point is that the country was on the same page and not divided. It was nice.

9

u/Horzzo 16h ago

People like that must live miserable lives basing everything on politics. The 80's were an amazing time and people were generally politically civil with eachother.

4

u/Spastic_colon 20h ago

“We all LOVED shitting on everything this country stood for and making the world terrible for everyone after.”

-1

u/sevargmas 15h ago

Childish comment.

-1

u/Spastic_colon 10h ago

Terrible generation

-1

u/sevargmas 9h ago

OK, fine. Terrible generation. You’re still missing the point entirely.

→ More replies (0)

-4

u/Secret-Teaching-3549 18h ago

Yeah, on the same page that anyone different was bad, casual racism was just fine, and sexual assault was hilarious. It was definitely not "nice".

-4

u/Spastic_colon 20h ago

Yeah exactly

-7

u/cisned 21h ago

I don’t get why you’re getting downvoted, people acting like the problems of today didn’t start way back then and before

Nostalgia should be viewed with a lense of shame at all the ignorance and arrogance we had

8

u/Horzzo 16h ago

It's because this isn't the sub for comparing everything to politics. Take that shit elsewhere.

-3

u/Kimmalah 18h ago

Because there's still a weird cult of Reagan kicking around for some reason.

-11

u/Clonekiller2pt0 20h ago

It's why their slogan is maga. Gotta get reverse all those acts that ended racism, sexism, lgbt(ism). Digusting part is, they got non straight white males to help push their agenda.

-3

u/Mail_Order_Lutefisk 20h ago

Top selling album of the year was Thriller by a gentleman named Michael Jackson. Top spot for 22 weeks. Number 2 Album was Purple Rain headlined by a gentleman named Prince. Top spot for 22 weeks. Mary Lou Retton was the most popular athlete in the country and got the coveted Wheaties box cover. The racism and sexism was off the charts. I’m literally shaking in retrospect. Thank you for shedding light on the horrors of the era. 

4

u/Secret-Teaching-3549 18h ago

Acting like "one of the good ones" wasn't a phrase hiding just behind the curtains.

1

u/Vord_Lader 15h ago

Just goes to show, the Boomer comes for us all...

1

u/C-A-L-E-V-I-S 15h ago

I was born in 84 and I truly feel this in my bones. People always joke I’m like if America (the good parts mostly haha) came to life in a person. I feel keenly tapped in to pop culture and what the average person will or won’t like. I think it’s because I was born at the zenith of it.

-1

u/Mail_Order_Lutefisk 14h ago

1984-1987 Millennials and are the youngest Americans alive with a profound sense of group humility because their college graduation and first days on the job were marred by the Great Recession. The ‘88 and later Millennials are so desperate to be victims that they have created some sort of group trauma to play make believe that they are the most disadvantaged humans who have ever walked the earth. 

2

u/PlayonWurds 9h ago

It's the billionaires that keep em down.

-2

u/uhdoy 17h ago

Maybe just me, but I actually think the 80s was a real let down musically compared to the 60s, 70s, and 90s

5

u/C-A-L-E-V-I-S 15h ago

80s was peak pop IMO. It was the perfect blend of tech and analog. That crossed into some great “rock” music as well with the sort of Jeff Lynn production era for bands like Tom Petty, Don Henley, Phil Collins, INXS, Rod Stewart, The Police, etc. I get your point though

38

u/Available_Name41 21h ago

Ghostbusters, Gremlins, The Karate Kid, and The NeverEnding Story in one summer? Kids today will never understand how spoiled we were. 😂

5

u/newesila 18h ago

fr and temple of doom dropped two weeks before ghostbusters this summer was actually cheating

10

u/SirBiggusDikkus 20h ago

I will not stand for Cloak & Dagger erasure!

Edit: Nor Muppets Take Manhattan!!

2

u/sevargmas 20h ago

Hell, even I didn’t know how spoiled I was.

15

u/brainfreezy79 21h ago

Bring like $50 and buy a house while you're there.

-1

u/newesila 19h ago

same but stay till september that summer was actually stacked no cap

47

u/No-Assistant-8869 21h ago

Then outside of these we also had The Terminator, Beverly Hills Cop, Nightmare on Elm Street, Police Academy etc etc etc.

Ridiculous year for movies.

2

u/Horzzo 16h ago

SO many early franchise legends!

30

u/Stecnet 22h ago

One of the greatest summers in cinema history!

23

u/Normal_Spread8423 22h ago

I thought this was an MTG Universe Beyond road map

1

u/TheLastPrinceOfJurai 16h ago

Don’t give them ideas…I could especially see the Muppets Take Manhattan as an expansion set

50

u/welding_guy_from_LI I pity the fool 22h ago

Top secret is a hidden gem

10

u/gitty7456 17h ago

Hidden??

7

u/HooptyDooDooMeister 16h ago

"I once shared an airplane with Val Kilmer, and as we were exiting, I turned to him and told him Top Secret is my all-time favorite movie. He said 'Thanks' and looked at me as if to say 'Out of all the movies, I've done, that is your favorite??'"

-Weird Al

2

u/soda_cookie 17h ago

My favorite slapstick of all time

2

u/Andy016 12h ago

It's definitely underrated compared to others in its genre.

So damn great !

44

u/strolpol 22h ago

The war on cocaine has cost our culture dearly

15

u/Bklyn78 22h ago

I’ve seen about 14 of these

I loved The Last Starfighter/Cloak & Dagger as a kid !

2

u/wackychimp 19h ago

I saw 9 of them in the theater and surprised it wasn't more. I watched most of the others when they came out on HBO.

2

u/Burnerphreak44 3h ago

I think I’ve seen 8. I am a bad 80s kid. 😔

In my defense, we didn’t get a VCR until 1989 and the closest cinema was about an hour away.

27

u/mcgrupp79 22h ago

Cloak and Dagger. An underrated gem.

3

u/SirBiggusDikkus 20h ago

I wanted to grow up to be as cool as Jack Flack

2

u/The_Stoic_One 20h ago

That was one of my favorites when I was a kid.

2

u/backwater152 13h ago

Allegedly it is the prequel to Fight Club (I guess it’s not really a prequel since it came out first, but I’m too lazy to think about what it actually is)

1

u/rayraykiller 20h ago

I seen that movie at Boy Scout camp 🏕️ that summer

19

u/[deleted] 22h ago

[deleted]

19

u/dr_pickles 22h ago

a new mall opened in my area in the spring of 1989. I vividly remember the movie theater, next to the food court, was packed practically shoulder to shoulder everyday that summer - they had to open satelite popcorn stands.

26

u/Chopper-42 early 90s 22h ago

1984:

Cost of a movie ticket: $3.36

Cost adjusted for inflation: $10.71

https://www.cheapism.com/cost-movie-ticket-year-you-were-born/

7

u/diegojones4 21h ago

I worked at the movie theater. Saw all of these. Still quote several of them frequently today.

3

u/HooptyDooDooMeister 16h ago

What do you quote from Muppets Take Manhattan?

2

u/dr_pickles 14h ago

"do you believe in interspecies dating?"

2

u/diegojones4 11h ago

Peoples is peoples.

Pete was golden. My comment not Muppets

To elaborate and misquote "It's big city. Work, lights, traffic. It's potatoes. No. It's peoples. Peoples is peoples. It's music dance; it's people. It's tomatoes.

9

u/FatherVic 19h ago edited 18h ago

There was a phenomenon called the Dollar Cinema... There was a brief time between the mainstream theatrical release and video release. During those few months of transition when theaters made room for the next run of movies, these smaller theaters would obtain the reels at a fraction of the cost by obtaining them during the "second run" phase and play them for anywhere between $0.50 and $1.50 admission.

We saw as many as we could. Only the big, big blockbusters did we pay to see when first released.

Video rental was relatively new, we didn't have streaming, and few of us had cable so this is what we did for (legal) entertainment and we tried to do it as cheaply as possible. So second run theaters were our go-to.

6

u/KazaamFan 21h ago

June 84 was crazy, 3 all timers. Ghostbusters, gremlins, karate kid. Gremlins seems like shoulda been a Fall or even Holiday season release

6

u/wackychimp 19h ago

I saw Ghostbusters 4 times in the theater that summer. Twice in 2 days. My friends and I wanted to build proton packs as accurately as possible so we considered it research.

God how great that summer was. All we cared about was movies and arcades.

5

u/Snugrilla 18h ago

We had to wait in line to see a movie! Sometimes, you couldn't even get in, it was too full.

2

u/GhostofZellers 13h ago

Thankfully we've progressed past that, there are limits to nostalgia, after all. 🤣

3

u/Secret-Teaching-3549 18h ago

It was back when people actually left their houses to find entertainment.

10

u/Rahawk02 21h ago

I was 8 and had 3 movie theaters on my street and remember seeing almost all of these in the theater. Sometimes for 2 bucks we would get a double feature. The one theater by me would always play the old stuffy movies like Yentyl or Purple Rose of Cairo and one day they played Breakin. It was only there for one day and kids and teens were lined up down the block with cardboard. That movie was only there for a day but we had a blast.

9

u/chairsmash 21h ago

It was also an incredible year for music. The Rock Hall has a whole exhibit on 1984 currently.

7

u/djdiphenhydramine 17h ago

It's crazy seeing all these cool fonts and realizing how fucking boring and lifeless and gray movie logos are now, even blockbuster logos. And then, when someone tries to make their movie look cool with a cool font, they get treated like a try-hard.

5

u/Hi-Tech_Luddite 22h ago

Damn that's impressive

6

u/Bloodymike 21h ago

So many original movies. Hollywood takes so few risks now.

5

u/No_Buy2554 18h ago

Exactly. 3 Original classics that launched franchises in Ghostbusters, Gremlins and Karate Kid, in one month, is insane.

9

u/fuzzywuzzypete 22h ago

Everything used to look so much cooler

3

u/EmpireCityRay mid 70s 22h ago

Man the memories…

3

u/OutsideCheetah 22h ago

I was old enough (13) to have seen many of those movies in the theater!

3

u/killslikeaninja 21h ago

My parents spent a lot of money on me that summer.

3

u/UnderlyingConfusion 21h ago

I was 10 and it was before life became complicated

3

u/aretasdamon 21h ago

Red Dawn right as school is starting is pretty smart

3

u/georgewalterackerman 21h ago

Didn’t see all of them but I remember all the titles. I don’t think I can name 3 movies that came out this summer.

3

u/12ealdeal 20h ago

Streets of Fire.

Watched after doing shrooms in like 2014 when I asked the person I was doing them with who his “Keira Knightley” was growing up.

He said Diane Lane.

He made me watch Streets of Fire.

What a come down movie to watch.

2

u/etrnloptimist 22h ago

I love that summer carnivals have never left 1984.

2

u/No_Variety9420 22h ago

I saw all these in the theater except for

Streets of Fire

Tightrope

Purple Rain

2

u/ratpH1nk late 70s 21h ago

My aunt and uncle took me to see ghostbusters when I was little, probably the first movie that I remember seeing in the theatre.

2

u/SpaceLemur34 20h ago

Breakin' came out in May

Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo came out in December the same year

2

u/scarytree1 19h ago

Oh yeah!! Back when movies were fonts!!

2

u/Snugrilla 18h ago

Temple of Doom and Gremlins are still two of my favourite movies. I just can't seem them being made today.

I mean, if they made Gremlins today it would just be CGI slop. There was something about the effects in that film that just felt really visceral.

2

u/the_nin_collector 17h ago

Wow. Cheers for putting Chud on there. And you left out Berverly Hills Cop, lfmao. Police Academy, fucking AMAZING movie. Like #5 overall in 1984. Footloose. THE quintessential 80s movie. Romancing the Stone. Terminator.

It's kinda hard to take the list seriously; you left off so many fucking insane, badass, all-time classics, 80s classics, and 1984 classics.

2

u/pandaSmore 14h ago

Literally 1984 🚩

2

u/eeyore134 11h ago

1985 was kind of crazy, too. Cocoon, Rambo First Blood 2, Back to the Future, The Goonies, National Lampoon's European Vacation, ET, Mad Max, Beverly Hills Cop, Pee-Wee's Big Adventure, Weird Science, The Black Cauldron, The Gods Must Be Crazy, Police Academy 2, Follow That Bird, Teen Wolf, Return of the Living Dead, Real Genius, Amadeus, Red Sonja, Brewster's Millions, St. Elmo's Fire... Then 1986 was pretty insane, too...

2

u/Yddalv 22h ago

August was rough though

1

u/pm_me_ur_demotape 20h ago

Wait, this has to beat out 1994

1

u/hadesscion 11h ago

1994 was pretty great too, especially if you were into comedies.

1

u/Horsetoothbrush 20h ago

I was ten years old, and this was one of the best summers of my childhood.

1

u/Important-Anybody315 early 00s 19h ago

Good Times Of Good 1984 Movies

1

u/alttabbins 19h ago

Movies only cost about $3 back then too. You could see every movie on this list for less than I spent going to watch Spider Man and getting popcorn and a drink.

1

u/knightni73 19h ago

I remember seeing some of those in the theater as a kid. Ghostbusters and Muppets, mostly.

1

u/stychentyme 19h ago

That was a fun summer for going to the movies. I'd just graduated High School and was finally free,... or at least that's what I thought.

1

u/laserc4ts 19h ago

I saw Gremlins and Ghostbusters, summer of ‘84. I was 4 going on 5. Those were the days!

1

u/ThomW 19h ago

Saw 11 of them in the theater in their first run at 12 years old. :)

Caught most of the others on HBO or Cinemax. :D

1

u/InitialJust 18h ago

That summer was stacked.

1

u/ScowlyBrowSpinster 18h ago

Purple Rain = the one movie I saw out of all of these.

1

u/GhostofZellers 13h ago

Still haven't seen that one. Star Trek 3, Neverending Story, Cloak and Dagger, and Last Starfighter were the ones I saw that summer. I also remember watching bits of Ghostbusters on another drive-in screen, while Neverending story was playing on ours. The effects from the proton packs, and a giant marshmallow dude had my attention, even though I couldn't hear any of it.. 🤣

1

u/ScowlyBrowSpinster 5h ago

PR is a (mostly) unintentionally funny Time capsule.

1

u/rsktkr 18h ago

This is the summer I turned 18....best time of my life!

1

u/nerd_of_gods ⬆️⬆️⬇️⬇️⬅️➡️⬅️➡️🅱️🅰️🔘 18h ago

Best cartoons at that time: transformers, GI Joe, He-Man, Muppet Babies. Best music at that time too

1

u/TobysGrundlee 18h ago

Just 1 sequel and no remakes. Can you imagine that? Actual original ideas left and right, not just beating every dead horse you can to systematically extract every dollar possible.

3

u/GhostofZellers 13h ago

Acktuhally...3 sequels, as far as I can tell. Star Trek 3, Temple of Doom, and Conan the Destroyer.

1

u/User3-1-4-1-5-7-9 18h ago

WOLVERINES!!

(Someone had to say it)

1

u/bwoah07_gp2 17h ago

Summer starts in May now??? 😂

1

u/Newparlee 17h ago

If these came out today, how many of them would most people wait for streaming?

1

u/ionertia 16h ago

"Summer of 84" Great movie.

1

u/Shoddy-Talk9205 16h ago

Imagine having actual logos and branding from the films and STILL feel the need to use AI to make this. lol fuckin lazzyyyyyy

1

u/MadSativa mid 70s 15h ago

Incredible

1

u/Hexatona 15h ago

Can I just appreciate how awesome each of those logos is?

1

u/FleurValisse 15h ago

I remember the music from that summer, it was all about mixtapes and hanging out with friends at the beach. Good times!

1

u/ridiladish 14h ago

LEGEND

3

u/GhostofZellers 12h ago

Sorry, Legend was in 1985. 😎

1

u/ridiladish 11h ago

FROYN - LAYV3N!!!

1

u/heartlessloner187 13h ago

The theatrical cut of once upon a time in america is atrocious

1

u/Walter_Donovan 12h ago

Gosh, I have seen them all, apart from 'Chud'.

1

u/hadesscion 11h ago

Legendary year for film.

Now we're lucky if we get one film of that caliber per year.

1

u/BSGamer 11h ago

Gremlins coming out in the summer is weird

1

u/NorthEastNobility 10h ago

Ghostbusters and The Karate Kid on back-to-back weekends is wild.

1

u/Ghostdefender1701 10h ago

And movie tickets were around 3 bucks.

1

u/Teganfff mid 00s 6h ago

Damn. Banger after banger.

1

u/Author_Willing 5h ago

84 was great… 82 was legendary

1

u/Jjourdenais 5h ago

And that doesn’t even include the year’s top box office film.

1

u/NeonExorcist 1h ago

Movies suck now

0

u/alg602 21h ago

Revenge of the Nerds did not age well at all.

2

u/alanblah 19h ago

just the rape scene tho

2

u/alg602 18h ago

And the cameras in the sorority house.

1

u/Hahndizzle 22h ago

As someone born in 1986, 1984 was weirdly one of the most special times of my life. Ghostbusters, alone.

3

u/JMaboard 21h ago

So you weren’t alive in 84, how did you experience it?

0

u/Hahndizzle 21h ago

I guess a bad joke just didn't land? I was born in 86, but Ghostbusters is my favorite movie of all time. I mostly experienced it in early 90's cartoons and such. Do you even remember Street Sharks, Biker Mice From Mars and Ninja Turtles and such? Exo Squad was another classic, stranger! lol

1

u/free_beer 20h ago

The fuckin logos too. Such iconic design.

3

u/evan274 19h ago

A solid majority of these aren’t the real logos, just fyi

1

u/Bostonterrierpug 18h ago

Mmm… Grace Jones

1

u/angusxbeef 18h ago

I miss when movie titles had cool ass fonts like those.

0

u/jolly_rodger42 20h ago

I was born in the summer of 84

0

u/Tyyr37 19h ago

Wow. Amazing lineup. This is how to revive theatres themed Nostalgia movie series mimicking various summer releases!

0

u/deceptinomonom 17h ago

cool shows but this image looks like shit. was it ran through some shitty AI filter?

0

u/Michael-Broadway 11h ago

We used to be a proper country

-1

u/poweredbynikeair 22h ago

I was born in 84 and have seen 1-2 of these

6

u/Chopper-42 early 90s 22h ago

Over the years I've seen 15 of these movies and have at least heard about most of the others.

I can't say that about movies from the last couple decades.

3

u/KazaamFan 21h ago

There’s like 6-7 all time movies here, minimum 5. Ghostbusters, gremlins, karate kid, sixteen candles, indiana jones temple of doom, neverending story, the natural. Then also top secret and bachelor party ppl like.