Essential Post-Apocalyptic Content

[u/JJShurte]

There's a wealth of great Post-Apocalyptic content out there, across all the different mediums, so much so that it might be a bit difficult for newbies to know where to start.

Let's get an *essentials* list going. It's not about our favorites, or our guilty pleasure "so-bad-it's-good" titles, it's about the core pieces of Post-Apocalyptic content that people need to consume to get up to speed. If you've got a title you think belongs on this list, or one you think doesn't, throw it down below and make your argument so we can all hash it out.

I'll update this initial post as time goes on and people bring new titles to the discussion.

Films -

A Boy and his Dog

Dawn of the Dead (Remake)

Mad Max

Mad Max 2

Mad Max Beyond Thunder Dome

Mad Max: Fury Road

Oblivion

Planet of the Apes

Snowpiercer

Terminator Salvation

The Book of Eli

The Day After

The Girl with all the Gifts

The Matrix

The Matrix Reloaded

The Matrix Revolutions

The Postman

The Road

The Rover

Threads

Waterworld

28 Days Later

28 Weeks Later

Television Shows -

Falling Skies

Into the Badlands

Jeremiah

Jericho

See

Silo

Snowpiercer

The Last Ship

The Walking Dead

The 100

Novels (Trad) -

A Canticle for Leibowitz

Alas, Babylon

Day of the Triffids

Deathlands

Earth Abides

Eternity Road

Lucifer's Hammer

Nature's End

On the Beach

Oryx and Crake

Seveneves

Station Eleven

Swan Song

The Girl with all the Gifts

The Gone-Away World

The Road

The Stand

War Day

Wool

World War Z

Novels (Indie) -

Video Games -

Dark Earth

Death Stranding

Endzone: A World Apart

Fallout

Fallout 2

Fallout: Tactics

Fallout 3

Fallout New Vegas

Fallout 4

Frostpunk

Gears of War

Gears of War 2

Gears of War 3

Gears Judgment

Gears of War 4

Gears 5

Gears of War Tactics

Horizon: Zero Dawn

Horizon: Forbidden West

Mad Max

Metro 2033

Metro Last Light

Metro: Exodus

Overland

Surviving the Aftermath

The Last of Us

The Last of Us Part II

Wasteland 1

Wasteland 2

Wasteland 3

TTRPG's -

Aftermath!

Gamma World

MÖRK BORG

Twilight: 2000

Rifts

Comics/Manga -

[u/Banjo-Oz]

It's great to find others who are as obsessed with post apocalypse media as I am.

I still maintain this when I find the time:

No Future: The Post-Apocalypse Movie List

I can't vouch for every single movie on the list, but I've seriously seen most of them and am happy to discuss any of them. I can also narrow that huge list down to "must-see" since there's also a lot of, well, crap in this genre! :)

You can go through that list for more movies, but the one big "surprised it's not on the list" for me is Romero's "Of the Dead" series. Especially the original and remake of Dawn of the Dead and No Blade of Grass.

For TV shows: Survivors (both the original and remake) and The Last Train (miniseries).

[u/JJShurte → u/Banjo-Oz]

I was going to put the remake of Dawn of the Dead, but there's been quite a bit of contention about it in recent years. I loved it at the time, however.

[u/[deleted]]

Novels—

Eternity Road by Jack McDevitt

Davy by Edgar Pangborn

On the Beach by Nevil Shute

The Long Tomorrow by Leigh Brackett

[u/JJShurte → u/[deleted]]

I've read Eternity Road, so I can vouch for that one. I've seen the film version of On the Beach, is it much different from the book?

[u/Banjo-Oz]

Video games missing:

• NEO Scavenger*****

• Endzone: A World Apart***

• Surviving The Aftermath****

• Frostpunk*****

• The Fall: Last Days of Gaia**(requires fan translation)

• Visions of Aftermath: The Boomtown****

• Dead State***(could have been so much more)

• 60 Seconds!~

• Fallout: Tactics**

• Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel*

• Fallout: Shelter*

• Manhunter: New York*****

• Manhunter 2: San Francisco****

• Falling Skies: The Game~(because it's effing broken!)

• Bad Blood**

• Life In Bunker*

• Burntime***

• Zafehouse***

• Zafehouse Diaries****

• Zafehouse Diaries 2***

• Don't Escape: 4 Days to Survive****

• Subterrain***

• I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream****

• Shardlight***

• The Organ Trail***

• The Flame in the Flood***

• Sheltered**

• Horizon: Zero Dawn***

• Horizon: Forbidden West~

• Overland**

• Generation Zero*

• RUST*

• 7 Days to Die*

(just the ones I own/have played)

I've put an asterisk "rating" next to the ones I've played, ranking them 1 (don't bother) to 5 (outstanding). Purely subjective, obviously. ~ means "not played".

[u/JJShurte → u/Banjo-Oz]

Awesome list of games - I'll go through them and grab the ones that people think are essential.

The Horizon games were solid, but Fallout BoS?

[u/DocMushroom]

Film: A Bog and His Dog. Could also include the book series by Harlan Ellison which was adapted into a comic too.

We’ve got Water World, so why not The Postman? (Also based on a novel)

Television: Jeremiah.

Books: Damnation Alley by Roger Zelazny.

Path to Savagery by Robert Edmond Alter is probably the first time we see survivors congregating in a mall. A damn fine read IMO, too.

Day of the Triffids by John Wyndham, and Lucifer’s Hammer by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournell. I haven’t read them yet, but I see them pretty consistently recommended.

What about pulps? Survivalist by Jerry Ahern and Deathlands by James Axler are probably the most well known.

Video Game: Wasteland

TTRPG: Definitely Gamma World by TSR, The Morrow Project by Timeline Ltd., and Twilight: 2000 by GDW.

Freeway Warrior is a like a combination CYOA and TTRPG. Four volumes. Easy to digest and play solo.

Aftermath! has quite a reputation, but I’m not sure it was ever popular enough to be considered essential.

[u/ageowns]

Movies

The Matrix

Terminator 1 & 2 show the future, but Terminator Salvation takes place there

Running Man is pretty brutal of a future

Ready Player One

Looper (however the time travel is more part of the narrative than the setting)

Planet of the Apes (mainly thinking of the original Charleton Heston version)

Idiocracy shows an absolute terrible future, but I don't think there was one civilization-ending event, it just got that way after 500 years

I see you left off Hunger Games, Maze Runner, Allegiant, etc. I'm pretty tired of those myself.

Interstellar

Do you also want movies about the end of the world approaching?
Deep Impact
War Games
Don't Look Up
Terminator 3

[u/Old-Cardiologist-730]

And old book (1977) by Larry niven and jerry pournelle called Lucifer's hammer in some countries or Hammerfall in others.. Based on an asteroid fall and the ensuing apocalypse.. Seems a bit like the movie deep impact but with the majority of the novel taking place after the fall instead of concentrating on the lead up. Loved it.

[u/JJShurte → u/Old-Cardiologist-730]

Yeah, I’ve read that and it’s up there. I loved the way different people adapted after the asteroid hit. Not all were good, not all were bad.

[u/dream-splorer]

Station Eleven should absolutely be on there for tv series.

Left 4 Dead and many other zombie games seem like a weird omission also.

[u/JJShurte → u/dream-splorer]

List them out then, I’ll get on it.

[u/[deleted]]

The "Rot and Ruin" series by Johnathan Mayberry is really good. Set 15 years after a zombie outbreak, its really goes in depth on zombie-fighting tactics, moreso than most iterations of a zombie apocalypse. One thing I love about those books is that many settlements will sell hand drawn trading cards featuring wasteland heroes, like an apocalyptic equivalent of kids in the '50s getting baseball cards from the local drugstore.

The Metro games are gas (you forgot Exodus though), but the books they're based off of make them look like the shitty 80s arcade shooters. The games leave out a lot of stuff, like a LOT. I've only read the first book so far, but it has a lot more mysticism, random encounters, and worldbuilding lore than the game. There's so much cool shit that happens after Artyom's visit to the Moscow Library that the game just cut out.

[u/JJShurte → u/[deleted]]

I loved the Metro books, although I thought the first one was best. And yeah, the games were more action focused, but they were good enough for what they were.

Never heard of Rot and Ruin though, sounds interesting.

[u/Banjo-Oz]

The 1970's tv show Survivors is a must for your TV show list! There was a remake in the 2000's to put on there too, but it's nowhere near as good.

The original Survivors is very "of its time" with uneven quality due to behind the scenes disputes, cast changes and staff changes, but overall it is one of the best (IMO) post apocalypse shows or movies made. My mum of all people used to talk about it when I was a kid (long before the internet) but it wasn't until I could import it on DVD from Amazon decades later I finally got to see it. It;s not exactly "action packed" but it knocks the likes of Jericho out of the park, IMO, especially in terms of realism and grim-ness. Particularly post COVID, the pilot episode is now absolutely harrowing to watch now!

The cast is constantly changing (literally nobody is safe), and many topics are covered. There are three seasons and each is wildly different (different showrunner for each), meaning that while not every episode is great, at least one season will likely be someone's favourite.

It was created by Terry Nation, of Dr Who and Blake's 7 fame, but like B7 it owes more to others on the creative team for being what it is. That said, Greg (one of the main characters) is very much "post apocalypse Avon". :)

P.S. The Walking Dead (the show version) very clearly was inspired by it at times, with several episodes (particularly the S2 one there they put a guy on trial and have to consider executing him; there's a Survivors episode with the same premise that is arguably the show's best hour).

[u/JJShurte → u/Banjo-Oz]

I saw season 1 of the remake back in 2008, but season 2 never made it to Australia. I remember it being pretty good, and I have vague memories of some kangaroo court where they're trying to decide whether or not to execute someone.

I should try to hunt down a digital copy of both series and check them out.

[u/Cornett_Fiction]

I'm happy to see two of my favorite post-apocalyptic movies on this list, Fury Road and 28 Days Later. I would suggest one of my own novels if it wasn't so sleazy. So let me recommend...

Black Summer on Netflix

For the TV category

Fast zombies and gritty survival stories

[u/Valianttheywere]

Is StarTrek First Contact is a Post Apocalyptic film? or just the bits with Zephram Cochrane getting drunk in the Bar?

[u/Bloggledoo]

Books; Station 11, Riddley Walker, The book of Dave.

[u/[deleted]]

Where is stalker?

[u/drjudgebot]

Consider Deathlands, it's a pretty long series of novels. Post-cold war, lots of guns.

[u/drjudgebot]

Check out Rifts for your TTRPG list. It's pretty gonzo magic and tech mashup. Even if one doesn't like the RPG mechanics, the art (especially in the first few books) is pretty good and there are a lot of cool concepts. If you ever wanted to run as a party with a dragon, cyborg, vampire, and dragon/cyborg/vampire, Rifts is your game.

[u/lakewood13]

I know it's got its flaws, like everything, but The 100 is great for what it is and gets done what it wants

[u/[deleted]]

Threads, The Day After. Movies.

[u/Darth_Enclave]

Roadside Picnic, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. games, and Project Zomboid.