When the world went M.A.D.

When the world went M.A.D.

I've just been watching a couple of television movies from the nineteen eighties.  One of them I saw twenty years ago and the other I had only heard about.  Their titles are 'Threads' and 'The Day After'.

When 'The Day After' was shown on American television it had over 100 million viewers.  The sponsors did not want to buy advertising time after the nuclear explosion in the story.  This was unusual at the time because it meant that there was about one hour without a commercial break.  Also, so many people panicked when they watched it that ABC television set up a special telephone line for worried viewers to call if they needed calming down.

One year later in Britain 'Threads' shocked millions as well.  Unlike 'The Day After', 'Threads' had a narrator in some places so, although it was a drama, it was a partial documentary.  It was also more realistic.  There are no happy moments (the American one was done more in the style of a soap opera).

This was the background that I grew up with..  Many of us expected the world would end at any moment in a nuclear war.  The political idea behind it was called M.A.D, Mutually Assured Destruction.  Here's how it works:

Each side has enough nuclear bombs to destroy the other.  They will only use them if they are attacked.  If they do this, they will both be destroyed.  So each side says "If you attack me, I'll kill us both".

On a less serious note, cinema changed when the Cold War ended.  The James Bond films could have simple plots about preventing someone starting a nuclear war.  You just needed a runaway Russian agent with a stolen bomb and the rest of the script was simple.  Now that America and Russia are friends (or at least not threatening to destroy each other), it is harder to find other enemies who are a danger to everyone on the planet.

Glossary

a viewer                       telewidz

an explosion                wybuch

to panic                       przestraszyć

worried                        zmartwiony

to shock                       wstrząsnąć

a plot                           intryga

runaway                      zbiegły

to threaten                   zagrozić

Questions

1. What does M.A.D. stand for?
2. Why did the American television channel organise a special phone number?
3. How was the British drama different from the American one?
4. Why/How did the end of the Cold War change the James Bond films?

KEY

1. Mutually Assured Destruction.
2. Because people were so frightened and needed to be calmed down.
3. The British one had a narrator and was more realistic.
4. After the Cold War there was less chance of a world-wide nuclear was because Russia and America were friends, so the films needed new 'baddies'.

Complete the puzzle with the missing military words.

Clues:

Across

1. A type of sight on a gun that helps you to see when it is dark.

3. The place where the soldiers stay.

4. A machine for telling where enemy planes and ships are.

6. Another name for groups of soldiers.

7. Something that flies through the air with its own engine and explodes.

8. A place where you shelter from explosions etc.

Down

2. A boat that travels under water, also called a U-boat.

5. When the army runs towards their enemy or starts firing at them.

KEY

1. nightscope 3. barracks 4. radar 6. troops 7. missile 8. bunker

2. submarine 5. attack

'The Day After' and 'Threads' are TV movies.

Which of these words can also go with TV?

KEY  The ones that don't go with TV are current, board, pointer and mouse

Did you know?

After the collapse of Communism, the British government sold a lot of its nuclear shelters.  One of them is now a museum.  At the time it was a top secret.

The American government sold some of its silos (holes in the ground for missiles).  Some people now live in them.