L.Q. Jones writes dialogue with such an irrepressibly likeable cynicism – Don Johnson’s first reaction to being told of his purpose in Topeka is to strip off his overalls and to announce to committee member Helen Winston: “You want me to knock off your broads? Line ‘em up. You first honey” – that it seems a genuine shame he subsequently returned to acting bit parts in B-pictures and never directed or wrote again. A very young Don Johnson, over a decade before tv’s Miami Vice (1984-9) and considerably larger ego, delivers a witty performance. The Vic/Blood relationship is played with a banter of sarcastic putdowns – “Bottom line – you’re a brain with an educated nose and there’s no other canine in your class” (a grudging bow to superiority). There’s an equally charming performance from Susanne Benton as Quilla June. (This is an actress one wishes had done other films). The rape scene is conducted with a surprisingly droll sense of humour – for all his ruttish raving about needing a woman, it is amusing to see Johnson with the tables turned and being seduced; and she is equally as amusing – no sooner has she seduced him than she is planning to set up house in Topeka – “and there can be a room for Blood too.”

Jones writes the two characters so damn good they almost seem real – Vic and Blood are two examples of characters that are unique and original creations to science-fiction, characters that are not merely transplanted from the real world. Jones succeeds in engendering genuine twinges of feeling as Blood argues with Johnson not to go down into Topeka and then their subsequent goodbye with the last lingering image of Blood sitting outside the bunker entrance.

The depiction of the actual holocaust is managed with remarkable economy – the film opens on solarized Bomb footage and the cheekily droll narration: “World War IV lasted five days/Politicians had finally solved the problems of urban blight.” Regrettably, the Topeka scenes come somewhat unglued – there’s a nice idea in parodying Norman Rockwell Americana, in having Middle America be the only civilization to survive the holocaust, but with its populace in white-out clown faces and Hayseed Yokel killer robots it’s all a little too farcical to work. There is a surprising degree of fidelity to Harlan Ellison’s novella, something which Ellison, who has been so vocal about his abuse by other media people, has only cause to be proud of.