Remember The Time Sedalia Got Nuked On TV?

Yep, if eighties TV movies had their way, we'd be toast. 

So Sedalia was destroyed in The Day After, a TV movie that first aired on November 20, 1983, on ABC. More than 100 million people watched the program during its initial broadcast. It is currently the highest-rated television film in history, according to Wikipedia, which never lies.

Basically what happened in the plot was that relations with the US and Russia got all messed up, and so they nuked Eastern Kansas and Kansas City, taking out all the little towns throughout with 'em.

HOLY CRAP. That trailer was scary! You can actually watch the whole movie on YouTube, or you can pick it up on DVD (it came out in 2004).

Anyway, our brush with fame was admittedly brief, and a little depressing:

Airman Billy McCoy: Where you going?
Man from Leeton: Holden.
Airman Billy McCoy: Oh, yeah? How come?
Man from Leeton: P-People there.
Airman Billy McCoy: How do you know?
Man from Leeton: Man with a C.B. back in Leeton.
Airman Billy McCoy: You from Leeton? How's Sedalia?
[the man doesn't respond]
Airman Billy McCoy: I said, how's Sedalia?
Man from Leeton: There ain't no Sedalia. No Green Ridge. No Windsor. No nothin'.

And that's it, we're toast. Nuclear toast. I guess at least the screenwriter took the time to be geographically accurate, at least. I don't think I watched it at the time, but then I was a four year old kid, so I bet my folks wouldn't have let me. The cast includes JoBeth Williams, Steve Guttenberg, John Cullum, Jason Robards, and John Lithgow, so pretty good 80's stock there. What do you think about The Day After? Do you remember our fictional destruction via TV?

Ducking and Covering,

Behka