Def-Con 4 is a 1985 Canadian post-apocalyptic film directed by Paul Donovan and starring Lenore Zann, Maury Chaykin, Kate Lynch, Kevin King, John Walsch, and Tim Choate. The plot revolves around a group of astronauts who survive World War III onboard a space station and return to Earth to find greatly changed circumstances.
Provides examples of the following tropes:
- After the End: Following the outbreak of World War III, large areas of Earth's surface are irradiated and cannibalistic mutants known as "terminals" terrorize the few survivors, who live in makeshift fortresses made out of junk.
- But What About the Astronauts?: The main premise of the film. After the End, the astronauts must return to Earth and then survive there.
- Centrifugal Gravity: The space station is bone-shaped, with living spaces located on either end, and rotates to generate artificial gravity.
- Covers Always Lie: A rather infamous example. While there is a Kill Sat in the film, it looks nothing like the one on the poster, and there are no skeletal corpses in space suits. And while the film does take place in a post-apocalyptic setting, it's not located in a desert but rather on the eastern coast of Canada.
- Crazy Survivalist: Vinny, a post-apocalyptic scavenger who has fortified his home with barbed wire and various booby traps.
- Defcon 5: The film incorrectly gives Defcon 4 as the highest state of alert rather than Defcon 1.
- Downer Ending: The unlaunched nuclear warhead in the space station's remains explodes and kills the whole cast.
- Foreign Rescore: When New World Pictures bought the movie, Christopher Young wrote a new score intended to make the film seem expansive than it actually was. New World later used some of Young's music in another one of their releases.
- Kill Sat: A case where it's a space station instead of an autonomous satellite, nevertheless, the film's main protagonists were stationed in one and ordered to launch the nuclear missiles if war broke out — which it did. One warhead that was not launched because of an apparent malfunction, but which remained armed and began counting down after the station crashed, is the film's biggest Diabolus ex Machina.
- Weaponized Car: Vinny has completely Mad Max-ed a front end loader with armor and uses it to drive around.
