Its time I start making some journals again! So lets discuss a decade that many people seem to adore and feel like was one of the greatest decade of them. Are they right? Um....

Well there's no real right answer here. It all really has to do with nostalgia, which is a powerful thing but also one that makes us, if anything, ignorant. I'm a 90s kid and used to view it as this wonderful time free from the fears of post 9/11, full of great classic shows and films that may never be rivalled. Now however, looking back, its not really the case. The same will apply to the 80s and pretty much any decade or even century. That doesn't mean to say there wasn't anything good from any of those decades, there's plenty.
In this look-back it'll be focused on the media of the 80s, that is the movies, the music and the television, though sadly not the fashion because I'm no expert on that or any of the politics because that would take way too long.

Also note I won't be looking at video games, because a lot of other people have already done that and would do a much better job of it.

Also please be aware I may not be too detailed with this journal, I'm mostly focusing on things I'm familiar with. If you know something about the 80s that's not here, please feel free to add and discuss in the comments below.

One thing I have noticed from many of these decades, not all, but many, is that they seem to reach a pinnacle and then start to slow down and become unmemorable. This is what  Valeyard noticed when he looked at the year 1986 in music. A lot of the ground-breaking things and all time classics like Duran-Duran's Rio, Take on Me by Aha, Thriller by Michael Jackson and so on were released in the first half of the 80s from 1980 to 1985 (with 1982 being considered one of the greatest years for music), while the years 1986 and 87 were kind of dull. Not horrendously bad, just a lot of boring songs, interspersed with the occasional gem here and there and also the occasional overtly loud, blaring synth songs like You Spin Me Right Round or Never Going to Give You Up (yes that one) which became synonymous with the 90s.
1988 and 89 saw a few interesting songs here and there, like Nothing Compares 2 U by Sinead O'Conner, but at this point it was really getting kind of tired, after the electrifying new wave in the early 80s. So while there are a lot of great 80s songs, many seem rather bunched up in the middle half, while the next half was mostly a desert. And listening to the abundance of synth at the time was

Lets go on with the movies and again it is kind of a similar situation with the music. The early 80s saw a huge influx of all manner of movies, there was;
-The continuation of the original Star Wars trilogy, with Empire Strikes back in 1980 and being the best of the Star Wars movies and Return of the Jedi in 1983 which may be the weakest of the originals, but its still a lot of fun.
-The Indiana Jones Trilogy kicks off in 1981 with Raiders of the Lost Ark, Temple of Doom in 1984 and Last Crusade in 1989
-Back to the Future in 1985, always a fun movie to watch and extremely quotable
-Blade Runner in 1982, sadly a misunderstood movie on release, it looks brilliant and inspired many sci-fi movies later on
-Aliens in 1986, which probably inspired a tonne of video games
-ET in 1982 (which I honestly despise but everyone seems to adore)
-The Shining in 1981
-Gremlins in 1984
-Batman in 1989

And loads of others.
The 80s was also a great time for family movies, with beloved classics which still get a lot of fans to this day such as the Goonies, Flight of the Navigator, Explorers, Karate Kid and Return to Oz. Most of these movies come from the middle part of the decade, which for some reason harboured a lot of these live action family movies (we'll get to the animation soon, don't worry)
It was also a rich time for Fantasy movies, bolstered by the success of Star Wars, Dungeons and Dragons and the resurgence in popularity for Lord of the Rings. There are many that do have strong followings and are regarded as classics such as the Neverending Story, Labyrinth, the Dark Crystal (my personal favourite of the 80s fantasy films) and Legend, but tragically there's also a lot that didn't make much of an impact and were forgotten, like Ladyhawke and Dragonslayer. Sadly most these films kind of just kept fantasy films to a niche audience and it wouldn't be until the Lird of the Rings films that we would get fantasy films accepted by mainstream audiences. Most of these fantasy movies were again made and released in the early half of the 80s, the latter half being pretty devoid of fantasy films, or at least any that made impact.
In animated movies the 80s was kind of a turbulent period. Disney was crippled for the most part and apart from the Fox and the Hound which was more a carried on production from the 70s, barely made anything in the first five years of the 80s, while Don Bluth left the company and started making some spectacular movies in the 80s such as Secret of NIMH and The Land Before Time.
Disney finally made a new film in 1985, the Black Cauldron, and boy was it a mess. It bombed at the box office, almost closed down Disney's animation department and even to this day is looked as the dark horse of Disney movies. Later Disney would pick itself up from the dust and would make more films, reaching a pinnacle in 1988 and 1989 with Who Framed Roger Rabbit and the Little Mermaid.
Elsewhere Studio Ghibli formed and created some amazing anime movies and there was an influx in 'adult' (or more likely they feel like they were written by a horny angsty teen with inconsistent writing and a lot of focus on women's, *ahem*) animation such as Heavy Metal and Ice and Fire (both of which didn't make much of an impact then, but gained a following later on.)
There were also a bunch of 'commercial' movies such as a My Little Pony movie, a Transformers movie, a G.I Joe movie and a Rainbow Brite movie (for those who don't know, Rainbow Brite is a long extinct cartoon about colours and stuff), Aside from the Transformers movie which brutally massacres many of the beloved characters to make new toys, none of these made much of an impact and were pretty much relegated to that VHS you would pop on to keep your kids quiet.

So in a whole, the movies of the 80s were a range of films in almost every genre. There was plenty of cheese, kitsch and corniness on offer too, but its the sort that people love, so no harm there.

Onto television now.
Cartoon wise there was quite a lot happening; there was a lot of anime imports such as Gundam and Ulysses 31, some anime inspired shows such as Transformers, BraveStarr and Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers, Disney's television series like Duck Tales, which at the time were outshining its animated movies. And of course there was Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, which arguably is even more popular today than ever before...plus its got Triceratops aliens! There were also a fair few shows that unfairly portray the 80s as a backwards time of nothing but shallow commercialisation, like My Little Pony, He-Man and the Wuzzles, which is far from the truth. These shows still have fans, but most are pretty unwatchable today, with some exceptions, and 1986 was not a pleasant year for many of them since a majority of them ended, along with a tonne of short lived cartoons.
Cartoons aside, there was a huge resurgence in comedy soaps and dramas, which....eh? Yes I know I'm being harsh, but honestly I couldn't really get into many of them. There was a boom in game shows in the UK which would carry on into the 90s, especially with Knightmare which drew inspiration from many video games released at the time such as Final Fantasy and Legend of Zelda.
Sci-fi shows kind of suffered a bit. Sure Star Trek the Next Generation was a huge success and it looks amazing, but there were several steps backwards. There were bad cheesy short lived series and some series that never got off the ground because of producers. The biggest blow was Doctor Who, which had been suffering through the 80s because of producers tampering with it and people sniffing down at it for not having flashy special effects. At the end of the 80s, although it was beginning to get on its feet again, Doctor Who was killed and never saw the 90s, a shame really.

In conclusion; the 80s was a time of change and advancement, but could be stale at times, but then again what decade isn't?
Does it deserve to be looked back on fondly? I'd say, yes. There were a lot of great things in the 80s and advancements in film techniques. There were also lots of strange surreal fashion choices and some great music.
Though with every bit of nostalgia, a grain of salt must be taken also. No decade is without flaws or problems. There was still a lot of strife in the 80s and the fear of the Cold War still hung over most of the 80s and you had Reagan being...himself. Its strange though looking back on decades were all you know are childhood memories and discover what was going outside your small world.

So what do you people think of the 80s? Good? Bad? Boring? Extreme? Feel free to comment and I will see you again soon I hope.