Thank you Faith Roswell for this article! We invite you on a little throwback ride to all of the most popular post-apocalyptic baddies.

  

If the apocalypse was really to hit, we’d probably all be living in our jeans and raiding army surplus stores for jackets with a hundred pockets but that’s not as fun as the alternative, where characters get to look badass and occasionally (okay, usually) impractical. Enjoy some style icons of the apocalypse! Spoilers ahead- you have been warned.

 

Viper (Doomsday)

The character gets just one line and a few minutes of screen time (and she’s dead for many of those minutes), yet she’s front and centre on the posters while the main character is placed off to the side! Lead character Eden Sinclair gets some badass scenes and a hi-tech prosthetic eye but it’s Viper with her face paint, porcupine quill hairstyle and leather outfit that steals the show. Honourable mention to her insane boyfriend Sol with his biohazard symbol back tattoo.

 

The Wives (Mad Max Fury Road)

In the hands of other directors and costume designers, Immortan Joe’s wives could have been an interchangeable line-up of hot women but Angharad, Toast, the Dag, Capable, and Cheedo each have a clear personality and style. There’s only so much they could take with them in their escape and so there they are in the desert, in outfits completely unsuited to the environment. The actresses were each given the exact same basic piece of fabric and met with costume designer Jenny Beavan (a style icon on her own) to decide how their character would customise it.

 

Max (Mad Max)

Need I say more? Max’s iconic evolving leather outfit is one of the defining postapocalyptic images! Even people who haven’t seen the movie recognise Max. The first movie had so little budget that Max’s jacket was the only leather one while all the other jackets were vinyl!

 

Alice (Resident Evil Extinction)

Alice’s outfit changes with each Resident Evil movie and honestly, each one of them is badass, but while the first two movies are about the start of the apocalypse on a smaller scale (barely contained in Raccoon City), the entire world hasn’t truly collapsed until the third movie- and here’s where Alice appears in an outfit more practical than you might expect! She has goggles, headscarves and a long coat to protect her from the sand storms- and she’s repurposed her shirt sleeves into tied-off garters under her shorts.

 

Auntie Entity (Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome)

If you’ve ever held an outfit made of aluminium soda tabs at a postapocalyptic event, you might think Auntie Entity’s outfit might be nicely lightweight… but it weighed 121 pounds (55kg!) It’s chainmail over coat hangers, dog muzzles and chicken wire. Most promotional pictures show her from the waist up, showing only half the outfit- there are garters, leggings and the heels too. And there seems to be an accidental tradition of Mad Max’s female stars shaving their heads- Tina Turner did it for the wig fitting! This is probably the least practical outfit in this list just for the high heels alone.

 

Ebony (The Tribe)

The Tribe was an early 2000s teen TV show set in a New Zealand, where a mysterious virus has wiped out everyone over the age of eighteen, leaving the world in the hands of isolated groups of feral kids. So far, so Lord of the Flies. It gets pretty dark involving gaming addiction, death (and lots of it), religious cults and the usual teen drama unplanned pregnancies and love triangles… but against a postapocalyptic setting with eternally burning fires and no adults. Everyone has an evolving ‘look’ with face paint and customised outfitsand some are more successful than others! Ebony begins the series as a joint villain with her ‘schoolboy Marilyn Manson’ boyfriend and becomes more relatable throughout- and though her look changes a little season by season (as they all do), her ‘flame’ forehead stencil, braided hair and black and red ‘battle jackets’ are a constant.

 

The Deacon (Waterworld)

‘Mad Max at sea.’ Critically panned? Yes. Costume design? Still excellent. The characters have salvaged everything they wear from the sea- so it’s fishing nets, ‘fish leather’ and plastic, woven and stitched into something that actually looks good! The Deacon, with his hat, eyepatch and strangely intact bottle of Jack Daniels might be (according to some critics) wasting the talents of respected actor Dennis Hopper, but he got the best costume out of it!

 

Tank Girl (Tank Girl)

Everyone wanted to be Tank Girl (even Spice Girls Victoria Beckham and Emma Bunton met at a Tank Girl audition) but not everyone was willing to shave their head, kiss a prosthetic kangaroo-man and channel the level of ‘unhinged’ that was needed. Lori Petty was, and she got the role. Tank Girl started out as a comic and the cult movie channels her punk-meets-90s-riot-grrl style, with ripped logo shirts, combat boots and bright colours splashed over military gear. She appears in over twenty different outfits but it’s the ‘missile bra’ that steals the show!

 

Cherry Darling (Planet Terror)

Weapons surely still count as a style when they’re literally grafted onto your body! Cherry Darling’s look went above and beyond… Planet Terror takes place at the start of a zombie apocalypse and as Cherry loses her leg to zombies fairly early, she gets plenty of time to level up throughout the movie- from limping on a ridiculous table leg at the beginning, to an assault rifle which she grows comfortable with using, and finally at the very end we see her cross into an idyllic beach landscape and get a glimpse of her new leg- a machine gun.

 

The ‘badass jacket trio’ (Daryl, Negan and Beta- The Walking Dead)

Many of these post apocalyptic costume icons have asked you to forget practicality but The Walking Dead has what is probably the most realistic outfit styling when it comes to what people would really be wearing at the end of the world… to an extent. Daryl’s leather angel wing motorcycle jacket has stayed with him for most of the series run. It’s as much a part of the character as his crossbow and motorcycle. Negan’s entrance is one of the game changing moments in the series and the styling has launched a thousand cosplays. Good leather jackets are made to last, and as Negan’s is a last gift from his wife, he’s been treasuring it. As the walkers become a part of life in the Walking Dead universe and the characters have all the time to indulge being utterly nuts, along comes Beta, with his towering height, human skin mask and long trench coat which completes the look… and actor Ryan Hurst has mentioned (cryptically) that there are hidden references to other characters in his outfit, which he had a part in designing.

 

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