Hello my survivor friends. 

Well, survivors, this is it.  I clutch your dirty little hands in mine as we watch the bunker burn.  We are leaving our apocalyptic home.  An exodus of the remaining few survivors out into the cancered landscape of the dead world. 

Lit from behind as our bastion burns and lends a hollow glow to the dust-filled skies we shuffle cinematically into a roiling, angry sunset.   

And we limp into a new world, a new horizon, turning away forever, leaving the old world behind.

Who knows what dangers, what adventures, what chaos awaits!

Anyhow…

That’s it! Season five is a wrap.

Now, before you go getting all weepy on me, (although my goal was to make everyone cry during this episode), I’m not shutting down the feed.  I’m going to write a few epilogue chapters in this storyline to put your minds at ease about the outcomes of the characters we care about and the world they are building. 

I am also collecting story submissions to read and produce for you, which I will continue to do. 

But, mostly I’m going to pivot to the completion and delivery of next 4 books in the series novelization. 

For you time travelers, it is June of 2025.  I’m also going to go back through the feed and see if I can’t clean it up for posterity. 

With that, let’s talk about what I’ve been digesting in my spare time besides beer and French fries. 

I have two pieces of content to review for you,

First, I watched Labyrinth. This is a 1986 film directed by Jim Henson, the man behind the Muppets.  This is entirely different from the 2006 Guillermo del Toro dark fantasy film Pan’s Labyrinth 

It’s an odd film.  On the one hand Labyrinth is a very creative fantasy story with a lot of unique ideas and visual elements.  If you were looking for a movie to watch high on mind-altering substances, this would be on top of the list. 

On the other hand, it has a Muppet movie feel to it that it never really shakes.  It’s a movie that can’t figure out what it wants to be.  Is it a dark fantasy?  Is it a Muppet movie?  Is it a dark comedy?  Is it a musical?  It feels like there were a lot of conflicting visions for the film, too many cooks in the kitchen.  Most notably Terry Jones from the Pythons wrote the first script treatment and George Lucas was one of the producers.

Famously the role of the Goblin King is played David Bowie, who is 1986 was at the top of his popularity.  Others considered for this role were Sting, Prince, Mick Jagger and Michael Jackson – making the alternate reality versions of this film mind boggling. 

The female lead is played by none other than a 14-year-old Jennifer Connely.  She beat out, among others, Yasmine Bleeth, Sarah Jessica Parker, Marisa Tomei, Laura Dern, Claudia Wells, and Ally Sheedy. 

It’s one of those movies that no one really knows what to do with, and that’s probably why you should watch it. 

Book-wise a finished reading some Plutarch.  In this case a Penguin Classic translation named Fall of the Roman Republic. 

OK, so I know you have questions, like “Why in the world would you read this ancient crap?” 

Well, I am quite interested in classical history and Plutarch is the source material for most of what we know about the end of the Republican period of Rome.  When Willy Shakespeare wrote “Et tu Brute” it was because he had been reading Plutarch. 

Another interesting and chilling thing is the parallels to another, modern republic, (that will go unnamed).  History may not repeat itself, but it sure does echo. 

Plutarch was a Greek ‘historian’ writing in the first century AD about events that had happened about 100 years before.  So it’s as close to a primary source as we are likely to get. 

I put ‘historian’ in air quotes because he is not what we would call a historian.  He is writing about history but his motivation is not historical accuracy or analysis.  His motivation is to derive morals from the lives of the actors like Ceasar and Pompey and Cicero. 

What impressed me was a couple of things.  First was how much like modern day politics it is.  As a society, we haven’t changed at all.  The second thing I noticed is how gossipy Plutarch is.  Like he’s writing blog posts in a tabloid.  My favorite aside was when Mithradates of Parthia makes fun of one of the Roman Equestrians he captured for having porn in his saddle bag. 

It’s not everyone’s cup of garum sauce, but if you enjoy classical Roman history you should read the source material.  So much of what we believe to be true narrative is random hearsay from Plutarch. 

He’ll say things like “It is said that…” and you’ll realize some Oxford fellow is using that same rumor as historical fact.

Anyhow, like I said, we’ll be keeping this feed alive and providing content of interest to you, so don’t hang up on my yet. 

It has been my pleasure to have you all along as co-conspirators in this 5-year journey.  If you haven’t yet, go buy a copy of the first book, “After the Apocalypse, Book One, The Old Man.” Available anywhere you find books.

Keep an eye out for the campfires of other survivors as we huddle and trudge through the trackless waste and continue to keep surviving.