History Recap / TheTwilightZone1985S2E9

Alonzo, his brother Greg, and their girlfriends Adrienne and Deena (Rob Knepper, Brooke [=McCarter=], Heidi Kozak, and Tamara Mark) are four enthusastic teens who aim to enjoy a late night of fun. They soon lock eyes on the stylish classic car owned by the late Charlie Taylor, breaking into it and hotwiring it for a joy ride. As he's driving the car, Alonzo suddenly becomes aware of facts regarding the car that he and the others can't possibly know, and the surroundings outside of the car change to resemble unrecognizable streets in the 1950s. A policeman pulls the car over to inform the teens that a nearby store was robbed, which prompts the now-crazed Alonzo to shoot the officer and gun it, turning what was meant to be a harmless joy ride into a high-speed pursuit.

* {{Foreshadowing}}: Alonzo is introduced pretending to mug Greg and Adrienne with a starter pistol. As he's gradually posessed by Charlie's spirit, he finds his ''real'' gun under the driver's seat, using it to murder a police officer who questions him about the Chadway's robbery.

Gun shop owner and survivalist Harry Dobbs (Creator/JoeMantegna) has constructed a state-of-the-art fallout shelter in preparation for nucelar war, as well as spending many hours training his young son how to use a gun. While his wife and children are away, a drunken Harry gives his employee and friend Nick Gatlin (Creator/JonGries) a tour of the shelter, and admits that he's looking forward to nuclear war in the hopes that all the degenerates on Earth can be killed and he and his son can start over in a newly "purified" world. After watching an emergency news broadcast, a massive explosion rocks the shelter, trapping Harry and Nick inside. Weeks soon pass, leading the shelter's power supply to run out and Harry to go mad in his struggle to surive what he thinks is the end of the world. But unknown to Harry, the situation may not be what exactly he thinks it is.

* FleeingForTheFalloutShelter: Harry believes that his shelter will allow him and his family to survive the inevitable nuclear war, even though his obsession ends up driving his wife away. After seeing a news report that suggests World War III is imminent, Harry goes upstairs to call his wife, though she dismisses the call as him CryingWolf. In that moment, a nuclear detonation lights up the town. Harry immediately runs back downstairs, frantically counting down his remaining time aloud as the furniture bursts into flames around him, and though the blast wave knocks him over, he's able to get himself and his friend Nick into the shelter without sustaining injury. [[spoiler: Unfortunately for Harry, it ''wasn't'' a nuclear war, just an accident at the local Air Force base that levelled the town and spread no further. Doubly unfortunately, the ruins are encased in a concrete dome to prevent the radiation from spreading, leaving Harry and Nick effectively buried alive.]]
* {{Foreshadowing}}: A few minutes after seeing a news report about an incident regarding Libya, a nuke seemingly goes off and destroys Dunston without any warning. [[spoiler: This is because, instead of a war, there was a Broken Arrow incident at the nearby airbase.]]

* PoliticallyIncorrectVillain: Harry at one point says Sally is trying to turn Jason into a mama's boy "or worse," implying he's homophobic. He also hired workers from out of state to dig his fallout shelter under the pretense that it was for a wine cellar. Nick is confused, since Harry doesn't drink, but he dismisses them with "they were illegals, whatta they know?"

* ARealManIsAKiller: Harry owns a gun shop, so he believes this very firmly. He's even introduced teaching his 7-year-old son to fire a weapon at a target, and advises him not to let his cousin push him around before he leaves.

* StrawMisogynist: Harry verbally and emotionally abuses his wife on a daily basis and clearly doesn't care about his daughter Diedre, to the point where his response to her saying goodbye as she's off to Wendy's house is a distant "Yeah."

* HeWhoFightsMonsters: Mr. Williams lost his wife and daughter in a negligence-induced plane crash. He tries to avenge them by blowing up the plane Keith is on, but the boy puts his headphones in his ears to let him hear the other passengers' thoughts about his plot, causing him to realize that he'll be ruining tons of peoples' lives in the same way his was ruined. This causes him to break down weeping and turn himself in.

* StockFootage: The external shots of the plane are all taken from ''Film/TwilightZoneTheMovie''.

* SpiritualSuccessor: To the original series episode "You Drive".

* AndThereWasMuchRejoicing: Sally ends the episode smiling after learning that her abusive husband Harry has been buried alive when their hometown of Dunston was destroyed by the accidental detonation of a nuclear cruise missile, she and the children now being free of his oppressive survivalism and misogyny.
* ApocalypseNot: As it turns out, there was no nuclear war. Dunston was destroyed in a Broken Arrow incident from the nearby airbase, and the town's destruction led the rest of the world to step back from the brink of war and declare peace.
* AsYouKnow: The ending twist is spelled out by an announcer at a memorial service for Dunston's victims.
* BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor: Harry's last words to Sally were a warning to her not to tell anyone about his fallout shelter. As a result of this (and as an act of karma for his abuse), Sally holds onto that promise, refusing to let rescuers surveying the ruins of Dunston dig Harry and Nick up.

* CrazySurvivalist: Harry is thoroughly convinced that nuclear war is imminent. As his hometown of Dunston is only a few miles away from Wakefield Air Force Base, a likely target, he has a fallout shelter built in his basement. It has a lead lined door, four-foot thick concrete walls, and outside temperature and radiation gauges. Harry has kept it a secret from his neighbors and warns Sally not to reveal it to her sister Wendy. However, he later tells his friend and employee Nick about it as he considers him to be practically part of the family. When the base is destroyed by a nuclear blast, the two of them take refuge in the shelter and wait to see whether the radiation will die down so that they can go outside again. In the final scene, it's revealed that the base was ''not'' destroyed by an attack during World War III, but by an American cruise missile which accidentally detonated aboard a B-1 bomber. Dunston was destroyed, but the horror and the loss of life pulled the world back from the brink of nuclear war. A radiation proof dome, which has come to be known as the Peace Dome, was constructed to contain the fallout, which Harry has been left buried under.
* CruelAndUnusualDeath: Nick dies of radiation poisoning after leaving the shelter, and Harry refuses to let him back in to prevent himself from being contaminated.

* EarnYourHappyEnding: By doing as Harry told her and ''not'' telling anyone about his fallout shelter, Sally and her kids are freed from his abuse, bigotry, and obsessive survivalism.

* FalloutShelterFail: Harry builds a state-of-the-art fallout shelter under his house in preparation for World War III, complete with radiation gauges and a communication antenna. When the war apparently arrives, he and his friend Nick think themselves to be safe there, but because they didn't retract the antenna before the blast, their communication equipment is useless, and Harry's too suspicious of violent scavengers to call for help when he hears voices upstairs. Also, the gauges are somehow still reporting lethal radiation levels weeks after the radioactivity should have dropped to safe levels. It turns out that the apocalypse never happened: a nuclear accident at the nearby Air Force base leveled Dunston, forcing the US Government to erect a concrete dome over the ruins to contain the radiation. The "scavengers" Harry heard were a survey team looking for survivors to evacuate before the dome was built. Because he didn't call out to them, nobody knows he's down there, and without the antenna, no one ever will. For all intents and purposes, Harry ends the episode BuriedAlive in his impromptu tomb.
* FleeingForTheFalloutShelter: Harry believes that his shelter will allow him and his family to survive the inevitable nuclear war, even though his obsession ends up driving his wife away. After seeing a news report that suggests World War III is imminent, Harry goes upstairs to call his wife, though she dismisses the call as him CryingWolf. In that moment, a nuclear detonation lights up the town. Harry immediately runs back downstairs, frantically counting down his remaining time aloud as the furniture bursts into flames around him, and though the blast wave knocks him over, he's able to get himself and his friend Nick into the shelter without sustaining injury. Unfortunately for Harry, it ''wasn't'' a nuclear war, just an accident at the local Air Force base that levelled the town and spread no further. Doubly unfortunately, the ruins are encased in a concrete dome to prevent the radiation from spreading, leaving Harry and Nick effectively buried alive.

* LaserGuidedKarma: Harry, the CrazySurvivalist who believed that the world was a degenerate pit, is left entombed in the shelter he had built, which is now housed under the radiation-proof Peace Dome when the world moved away from war.

* MortonsFork: Harry's situation is unable to end on any positive note, as he's doomed to either starve to death, kill himself out of despair, or brave the desolate wasteland in search of supplies, no doubt contaminating himself with the radiation.
* TheNightThatNeverEnds: When Nick tries to return to the shelter, he tells Harry that there's no daylight anymore.
* NukeEm: A cruise missile housed in the nearby airbase accidentally detonates and levels Harry's hometown of Dunston, Kansas, forcing him and Nick to take shelter.

* WhamShot: Near the end of the episode, the camera leaves Harry's shelter and pans over the destruction and rubble among a darkened landscape, before coming across a curved wall. The camera moves past this wall to reveal... a bright, sunny day, with people out and about in a park, where we also see that the curved wall was part of the Peace Dome, which was erected over the ruins of Dunston after an accidental missile detonation levelled it to contain the radiation, effectively leaving Harry buried alive.
* WorldWarIII: Harry and Nick see and hear reports about an escalating crisis in the Middle East, and that the US is preparing to take any means necessary to defend itself. Harry witnesses an immense explosion and concludes that the nearby Wakefield Air Force Base has been destroyed, and as a result, World War III has begun. They enter the fallout shelter in Harry's basement to protect themselves from the high levels of radiation. In the end, it turns out that World War III never happened. A nuclear cruise missile housed in a B-1 bomber that was preparing to take off from the base accidentally exploded, destroying much of the surrounding area. The outbreak of nuclear war was avoided, as the destruction of Dunston illustrated the folly of war to the entire world, which worked to seal the ruined town under a massive dome and declare peace.

As he jams to the tunes on his Kawazu-940 portable radio and rhythmically drums on everything with his drumsticks, teenage rocker Keith Barnes (Scott Coffey) moves through the airport to catch a flight. Once he's on board, Keith annoys his fellow passengers with his constant drumming and his refusal to turn his radio off. As he goes to the bathroom, Keith accidentally drops his casette player in the sink, just as the plane is struck by lightning. As a result, Keith discovers that the radio now has the ability to tune into other peoples' minds, letting Keith hear their thoughts. When he hears that a disgruntled passenger is plotting to blow up the plane, Keith tries to use his newly-enhanced radio to save the day.

* StrawMisogynist: Harry verbally and emotionally abuses his wife on a daily basis and clearly doesn't care about his daugher Diedre, to the point where his response to her saying goodbye as she's off to Wendy's house is a distant "Yeah."

* MisanthropeSupreme: Harry despises the populace of the world, which he considers pimps, pornographers, bureaucrats, rock stars, and hairdressers, and often prays that nuclear war happens so they can all be eradicated and he can start over in a purified world with his son.

* TheNightThatNeverEnds: [[spoiler: When Nick tries to return to the shelter, he tells Harry that there's no daylight anymore.]]

As he jams to the tunes on his Kawazu-940 portable radio and rhythmically drums on everything with his drumsticks, teenage rocker Keith Barnes (Scott Coffey) moves through the airport to catch a flight. Once he's on board, Keith annoys his passengers with his constant drumming and his refusal to turn his radio off. As he goes to the bathroom, Keith accidentally drops his casette player in the sink, just as the plane is struck by lightning. As a result, Keith discovers that the radio now has the ability to tune into other peoples' minds, letting Keith hear their thoughts. When he hears that a disgruntled passenger is plotting to blow up the plane, Keith tries to use his newly-enhanced radio to save the day.

* TheExtremistWasRight: While Harry's a crazed survivalist who terrorizes his family with his rampant jingoism, he turns out to be right in building his shelter when a nuke goes off at a local air base and the shelter protects him and Nick. [[spoiler: It's later subverted, since while they're both certain the world has been destroyed, the world was actually pulled back from the brink of war after seeing the explosion, and they had the Peace Dome built to seal off the radioactive ruins of Dunston, which has since become an enduring symbol of peace.]]

* FleeingForTheFalloutShelter: Harry believes that his shelter will allow him and his family to survive the inevitable nuclear war, even though his obsession ends up driving his wife away. After seeing a news report that suggests World War III is imminent, Harry goes upstairs to call his wife, though she dismisses the call as him Crying Wolf. In that moment, a nuclear detonation lights up the town. Harry immediately runs back downstairs, frantically counting down his remaining time aloud as the furniture bursts into flames around him, and though the blast wave knocks him over, he's able to get himself and his friend Nick into the shelter without sustaining injury. Unfortunately for Harry, it ''wasn't'' a nuclear war, just an accident at the local Air Force base that levelled the town and spread no further. Doubly unfortunately, the ruins are encased in a concrete dome to prevent the radiation from spreading, leaving Harry and Nick effectively buried alive.

* BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor: Harry's last words to Sally were a warning to her not to tell anyone about his fallout shelter. As a result of this (and as an act of karma for his abuse), Sally holds onto that promise, refusing to let rescuers survering the ruins of Dunston dig Harry and Nick up.

Alonzo, his brother Greg, and their girlfriends Adrienne and Deena are four enthusastic teens who aim to enjoy a late night of fun. They soon lock eyes on the stylish classic car owned by the late Charlie Taylor, breaking into it and hotwiring it for a joy ride. As he's driving the car, Alonzo suddenly becomes aware of facts regarding the car that he and the others can't possibly know, and the surroundings outside of the car change to resemble unrecognizable streets in the 1950s. A policeman pulls the car over to inform the teens that a nearby store was robbed, which prompts the now-crazed Alonzo to shoot the officer and gun it, turning what was meant to be a harmless joy ride into a high-speed pursuit.

Gun shop owner and survivalist Harry Dobbs has constructed a state-of-the-art fallout shelter in preparation for nucelar war, as well as spending many hours training his young son how to use a gun. While his wife and children are away, a drunken Harry gives his employee and friend Nick Gatlin a tour of the shelter, and admits that he's looking forward to nuclear war in the hopes that all the degenerates on Earth can be killed and he and his son can start over in a newly "purified" world. After watching an emergency news broadcast, a massive explosion rocks the shelter, trapping Harry and Nick inside. Weeks soon pass, leading the shelter's power supply to run out and Harry to go mad in his struggle to surive what he thinks is the end of the world. But unknown to Harry, the situation may not be what exactly he thinks it is.

As he jams to the tunes on his Kawazu-940 portable radio and rhythmically drums on everything with his drumsticks, teenage rocker Keith Barnes moves through the airport to catch a flight. Once he's on board, Keith annoys his passengers with his constant drumming and his refusal to turn his radio off. As he goes to the bathroom, Keith accidentally drops his casette player in the sink, just as the plane is struck by lightning. As a result, Keith discovers that the radio now has the ability to tune into other peoples' minds, letting Keith hear their thoughts. When he hears that a disgruntled passenger is plotting to blow up the plane, Keith tries to use his newly-enhanced radio to save the day.

* TheAllegedCar: Charlie's old car is a variation. It isn't broken or shoddy, but it's possessed by his spirit, who forces Alonzo and the others to relive his robbery of the Five & Dime and his murder of the police officer.

* KarmaHoudiniWarranty: Charlie robbed the Five & Dime and killed a police officer in 1957, which he kept secret until the day he died. His spirit possesses Alonzo as he drives his old car as a way of making a posthumous confession.
* OldShame: Charlie's robbery of Chadaway's and his murder of that police officer weighed heavy on him even 30 years after the crime, possessing his old car so he can finally confess to the police who attempt to rescue the teens.

* AndThereWasMuchRejoicing: Sally ends the episode smiling after learning that her abusive husband Harry has been buried alive when their home town of Dunston was destroyed by the accidental detonation of a nuclear cruise missile, she and the children now being free of his oppressive survivalism and misogyny.

* AsYouKnow: The ending twist is spelled out by a representative at a memorial service for Dunston's victims.
* CrazyPrepared: Harry's shelter is thoroughly sealed to protect against all forms of radiation, and was secretly built while he was having a pool put in so as to not tip off the neighbors. It also has an antenna system designed to push up through a ton of debris. Unfortunately, [[spoiler: it's left up when the nuke at the air base goes off, leaving them unable to contact the outside world, as the shelter even blocks radio waves.]]

* EmergencyBroadcast: Harry and Nick watch a news report about an escalating crisis in the Middle East. According to the report, the President and First Lady have left the White House by military helicopter, and Russian cities are being evacuated. They later hear a radio bulletin stating that the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz is in position in the Gulf of Sidra, the Armed Forces have been placed on red alert and an emergency cabinet meeting is taking place at an unknown location. It's also reported that the President has issued a statement saying that he wouldn't hesitate to use force to prevent the situation in the Middle East from escalating.

* FalloutShelterFail: Harry builds a state-of-the-art fallout shelter under his house in preparation for World War III, complete with radiation gauges and a communication antenna. When the war apparently arrives, he and his friend Nick think themselves to be safe there, but because they didn't retract the antenna before the blast, their communication equipment is useless, and Harry's too suspicious of violent scavengers to call for help when he hears voices upstairs. Also, the gauges are somehow still reporting lethal radiation levels weeks after the radioactivity should have dropped to safe levels. It turns out that the apocalypse never happened: a nuclear accident at the nearby Air Force base leveled Dunston, forcing the US Government to erect a concrete dome over the ruins to contain the radiation. The "scavengers" Harry heard were a survey team looking for survivors to evacuate before the dome was built, and because he didn't call out to them, nobody knows he's down there, and without the antenna, no one ever will. For all intents and purposes, Harry ends the episode BuriedAlive in his impromptu tomb.

** At one point, Harry and Nick hear people milling around above the shelter. Harry believes them to be scavengers looking for supplies, [[spoiler: but it turns out they're workers moving the ruins of town into a smaller area for the Peace Dome to be erected.]]

* ItIsBeyondSaving: Harry believes that the world has been overrun by pimps, bureaucrats, hairdressers, rock stars, and pornographers. He tells Nick that he sometimes wishes that World War III ''will'' happen, so the "scum of the Earth" will be destroyed, and people like him can build a better world.
* {{Jerkass}}: Harry is an angry, paranoid, bigoted survivalist who is just ''gushing'' with toxic masculinity. He's obsessed with surviving the apocalypse mainly because it means all the people he hates will be gone, and he and his son Jason can start over in a "purified" world. The only factors that keep him from being a full-on HateSink is that he genuinely loves Jason and his best friend Nick.

** The news broadcasts reporting a tense situation in the Middle East, the aircraft carrier Nimitz being positioned in the Gulf of Sidra, and the President, the First Lady, and his cabinet have been evacuated by military planes, are likely references to ''Film/CountdownToLookingGlass'', a Canadian made-for-TV movie detailing a gradual escalation into World War III via news reports that was released three years before the episode.

As he jams to the tunes on his Walkman and rhythmically drums on everything with his drumsticks, teenage rocker Keith Barnes moves through the airport to catch a flight. Once he's on board, Keith annoys his passengers with his constant drumming and his refusal to turn his Walkman off. As he goes to the bathroom, Keith accidentally drops his casette player in the sink, just as the plane is struck by lightning. As a result, Keith discovers that the player now has the ability to tune in to other peoples' minds, letting Keith hear their thoughts. When he hears that a disgruntled passenger is plotting to blow up the plane, Keith tries to use his newly-enhanced Walkman to save the day.

* CassandraTruth: The obnoxious Keith gains the ability to read minds with his Walkman after his flight is struck by lightning. He soon discovers that one of the passengers, Mr. Williams, intends to blow up the plane to avenge his wife and daughter. Keith tries to warn Gloria the stewardess, but she thinks that he's making a sick joke and tells him that he could be arrested for doing so. She is also not inclined to believe him because they had an earlier run-in where he rudely refused to turn off his Walkman.
* ConvenientlyCoherentThoughts: Keith is able to read Mr. Williams' mind using his lightning-enhanced Walkman and learns that he intends to blow up the plane because the airline company negligently caused a crash in which his wife and daughter were killed.
* CrusadingWidow: Mr. Williams plans to blow up his and Keith's plane because his wife and daughter were killed in a plane crash that was caused by the negligence of the airline.
* EpisodeOnAPlane: From his telepathic Walkman, Keith learns that Mr. Williams plans to blow up the plane they're both flying on.
* HeWhoFightsMonsters: Mr. Williams lost his wife and daughter in a negligence-induced plane crash. He tries to avenge them by blowing up the plane, but Keith puts his Walkman headphones in his ears to let him hear the other passengers' thoughts about his plot, causing him to realize that he'll be ruining tons of peoples' lives in the same way his was ruined. This causes him to break down weeping and turn himself in.
* JerkWithAHeartOfGold: Keith is an obnoxious rock fan who noisily drums on whatever he sees, refuses to turn his Walkman off, and often makes witty, smartass remarks to the flight crew. When he discovers Mr. Williams' plot through his Walkman, he decides to stop him by placing the Walkman's headphones in his ears, letting him hear the terrified thoughts of everyone around him.
* MyGodWhatHaveIDone: When announting his plans to blow up the plane, Mr. Williams is overcome with remorse when he hears the passengers' thoughts through Keith's Walkman. One passenger's thoughts about his young daughter Jenny strike a chord with Williams, as he was motivated by a negligent plane crash that killed his own wife and daughter, who was much the same age as Jenny.
* NamedAfterSomebodyFamous: Given his rock motif and his frequent drumming, Keith is likely named after Music/TheWho drummer Keith Moon and Music/CannibalCorpse vocalist Chris Barnes.
* PercussiveMaintenance: Keith is known to do this for recreation instead of fixing something, spending his whole walk to the plane and his being seated drumming a pair of drumsticks on everything.

* SuperPowersForADay: Keith's Walkman is affected by an electrical discharge after lightning strikes his plane. He soon discovers that not only does it allow him to read minds, but that the passenger in the seat beside him, Mr. Williams, is wearing a homemade bomb vest and plans to blow up the plane. Keith tries in vain to convince the flight attendants about Williams' plan and Williams himself not to go through with it. After Williams reveals to everyone present that he has a bomb, Keith places the Walkman's headphones in his ears so that he can hear the frightened thoughts of the passengers and crew. Keith watches as Williams breaks down sobbing and is led away by security, after which he crushes the Walkman under his foot to avoid the same experience again.

** Months after the explosion, the radiation outside never drops. [[spoiler: That's because they're inside the Peace Dome, which was designed to contain the ruins of Dunston.]]

* {{Jerkass}}: Harry is an angry, paranoid, bigoted survivalist who is just ''gushing'' with toxic masculinity. He's obsessed with surviving the apocalypse mainly because it means all the people he hates will be gone, and he can start over in a "purified" world. The only factors that keep him from being a full-on HateSink is that he genuinely loves his son Jason and his best friend Nick.

* MisanthropeSupreme: Harry despises the populace of the world, which he considers pimps, pornographers, bureaucrats, rock stars, and hairdressers, and often prays that nuclear war happens so they can all be eradicated and he can start over in a purified world.

* ParentalFavorism / ParentalNeglect: Harry openly favors his son Jason over his daughter Deidre. While he spends a great deal of time with Jason in his attempts to turn him into a man, he barely even acknowledges Deidre's existence. When he thinks that nuclear war is about to break out, he calls his wife Sally and demands that she send Jason home so that he can survive in his new fallout shelter, making no mention of Deidre at all.

** The news broadcasts reporting a tense situation in the Middle East, the aircraft carrier Nimitz being positioned in the Gulf of Sidra, and the President, the First Lady, and his cabinet have been evacuated by military planes, are likely references to ''Film/CountdownToLookingGlass'', a Canadian made-for-TV movie detailing the gradual escalation of World War III via news reports that was released three years before the episode.

* VillainProtagonist: Harry, who is ''hardly'' what one could call a decent person.
* WhamShot: Near the end of the episode, the camera leaves Harry's shelter and pans over the destruction and rubble among a darkened landscape, before coming across a curved wall. The camera moves past this wall to reveal... a bright, sunny day, with people out and about in a park, where we also see that the curved wall was part of the Peace Dome, which was erected over the ruins of Dunston after an accidental missile detonation leveled it to contain the radiation, effectively leaving Harry buried alive.

Gun shop owner and survivalist Harry Dobbs has constructed a state-of-the-art fallout shelter in preparation for nucelar war, as well as spending many hours training his young son how to use a gun. While his wife and children are away, a drunken Harry gives his employee and friend Nick Gatlin a tour of the shelter, and admits that he's looking forward to nuclear war in the hopes that all the degenerates on Earth can be killed and he and his son can start over in a newly "purified" world. After watching an emergency news broadcast, a massive explosion rocks the shelter, trapping Harry and Nick inside. Weeks soon pass, leading the shelter's power supply to run out and Harry to go mad in his struggle to surive what he thinks is the end of the world. But unknown to Harry, the situation may not be as dire as he believes.

Four friends steal a car, but the one driving becomes possessed by the original owner. / A survivalist and his friend hide in his bomb shelter after a nuclear explosion. / On an airplane, a teen discovers his walkman lets him read minds.

!!Joy Ride

!!Shelter Skelter
* ApocalypseNot: [[spoiler: Turns out, there was no nuclear war. Dunston was destroyed in a broken arrow incident and the rest of the world is doing better than ever.]]
* CrazyPrepared: Harry's shelter is thoroughly sealed and protects against all forms of radiation, and was secretly built while he was having a pool put in so as to not tip off his neighbors. It even has an antennae system designed to push up through a ton of debris. Unfortunately, [[spoiler: it's up when the nukes goes off, leaving them unable to contact the outside, as the shelter even blocks radio waves.]]
* CrazySurvivalist: Harry, full-stop. As Sally says, anytime there's a minor international incident, he wants the family to hole up in the shelter.
* CruelAndUnusualDeath: [[spoiler: Nick dies of radiation poisoning after leaving the shelter, and Harry refuses to let him in due to fear of them both becoming contaminated.]]
* DeathWorld: The radiation gauge in the shelter reads that surface levels never drop, despite Harry's suggestion that it would take a month for them to do so. He concludes that the nuclear powers cut loose and the world above has become a microwave oven. [[spoiler: When Nick leaves the shelter, the outside is a desolate charred hellscape with no sunlight. All of which is because a dome was erected over the radioactive ruins of town.]]
* DespairEventHorizon: Nick doesn't share his friend's survivalist ideals and was only in the shelter by chance. He doesn't see a point to surviving in a dead and barren world, especially not when stuck with someone like Harry, [[spoiler: and decides to leave the shelter after ten months. This ultimately gets him killed via radiation exposure, leaving Harry alone.]]
* TheExtremistWasRight: While Harry's a crazed survivalist who terrorizes his family, he turns out to be right when a nuke goes off and his shelter protects him and his friend Nick. [[spoiler: Later subverted. While they're both certain the world has been destroyed, they're actually inside a dome and everything outside is just fine. In fact, because of the explosion, the wold was pulled back from the brink of war and the dome built to seal off the radioactive ruins of the town has become an enduring symbol of peace.]]
* {{Foreshadowing}}: Just a few minutes after seeing a news report about an incident regarding Libya, a nuke goes off and destroys Dunston without any warning. [[spoiler: This is because, instead of a war, there was a broken arrow incident at the nearby airbase.]]
** At one point, Harry and Nick hear people milling around above the shelter, whom Harry believes are scavengers looking for supplies. [[spoiler: Turns out they were workers moving the ruins of town into a smaller area for the dome to be erected.]]
** Even after months, the radiation outside still never drops. [[spoiler: They're inside a sealed dome designed to contain the compacted ruins.]]
* InVinoVeritas: While he'd his wife and kids sworn not to tell anyone outside the family, Harry reveals his shelter to his best friend Nick while both of them are drinking.
* {{Jerkass}}: Harry is angry, paranoid, bigoted and dripping with toxic masculinity. He's obsessed with surviving the apocalypse mainly because it means the people he hates will be gone, and he and his son can start over in a purified world.
* LaserGuidedKarma: [[spoiler: Harry, the CrazySurvivalist who believed the world was a degenerate pit, is left entombed in his shelter under a radiation-proof dome as the world moves away from war.]]

* NukeEm: What happens to Harry's hometown of Dunston, Kansas, forcing him and his friend Nick to take shelter.
* ParentalNeglect: Harry puts all the focus on his son and barely even seems to notice he has a daughter at all.
* VillainProtagonist: Harry is hardly what one could call a decent person.

!!Private Channel

* CrazyPrepared: Harry's shelter is thoroughly sealed and protects against all forms of radiation, and was secretly built while he was having a pool put in so as to not tip off his neighbors. It even has a

* DeathWorld: The radiation gauge in the shelter reads that surface levels never drop, despite Harry's suggestion that it would take a month for them to do so. He concludes that the nuclear powers cut loose and the world above has become a microwave oven. [[spoiler: When Nick leaves the shelter, the outside is a