Perish the Ensemble Teenage Paramilitary Genre?

Communists invade: where are teens to battle them?

Having been treated to a late-night viewing of The Rescue (1988) this weekend, one must reflect on the sad fact that our nation's children are no longer born to kill Commies. It would be an injustice to the epic glory of The Rescue to attempt a synopsis, but I'll try it anyway: when their Navy Seal fathers are captured by North Koreans, five army brats cross the DMZ and, with a good measure of pluck, rescue them. Now that I think about it, that was pretty bluntly summed up by the title.

As I watched these clean-cut Army teens machine gun hapless Communists, I realized that an entire sub-genre had gone extinct. The 1980's, birthplace of the rogue paramilitary action film (see Commando, First Blood, etc.), also spawned a teen version: think Rambo meets The Breakfast Club. The premier example is, of course, 1984's Reagan-esque Cold War fantasy, Red Dawn. Other examples of teens banding together to lead anti-communist insurgencies/begin world wars include Toy Soldiers, WarGames, and, for good measure, SpaceCamp and Flight of the Navigator. There must be more. Most of these films seem to have sub-Brat Pack casts, but a remarkable number feature Lea Thompson.

All this leads me to question why kids today cannot band together and emulate our "Greatest Generation," ditching high school to kill the enemies of America. Was the 1980s just a more innocent, idealistic time of vigilantism? Most likely it's the insidious influence of lefty secularists and moral relativists (aka the Democratic Party, ACLU and Sesame Street). Patrick Swayze, why has thou forsaken us?