Overview: A spaceship returns from deep space to find the Earth in The Aftermath of a nuclear and biological war.

Blu ray Verdict: The streets are filled with mutated survivors feeding off the weak and a Manson-like figure called Cutter, Sid Haig, The Devil's Rejects (2005), House of 1000 Corpses (2003), Jackie Brown (1997) is reigning terror down on all others.

Cutter and his gang of mercenary thugs are systematically murdering all the male survivors and enslaving women and children. Most of his targets are easy, but all that changes when Cutter confronts astronaut Newman (Steve Barkett, Empire of the Dark, Dinosaur Island, Dark Universe), and the woman Sarah (Lynn Margulies) he finds and falls in love with, and the young child Chris (Christopher Barkett, Empire of the Dark).

What follows is a cat and mouse game of violent and spectacular proportions with no less than Earth's survival in the balance.

After knowing it "inspired" DEFCON-4, I went in search for this film, since I'm addicted to PA (Post-Apocalyptic) movies. I don't care about budget and technical limitations. I'd rather focus on the feel and the honesty of the work. And in this field, 'The Aftermath' really shines. The history and characters easily overlook the obvious low budget restrictions and put to shame many higher budget counterparts.

The premise is that there are three astronauts come back to Earth after a long space mission, just to find it destroyed by nuclear war. One of them dies on the spaceship forced landing, and the other two must find their way through the new and haunting reality of a nuked world; facing radiation, mutants, marauders and the lack of hope for the future.

The dialog, acting and the action scenes are somewhat laughable, but no one can deny the fact that there's an obvious labor of love beneath each take. OTOH, inventive (altough simplistic) visual effects, a huge and loud soundtrack and the voice-over only adds to the bleak atmosphere.

There are effective sequences like the radioactive rain, the dead city landscapes and the corpses on the beach, but overall you get exactly what you paid your money for, trust me. Highly recommended, if not only for a young(er) Sid Haig, 'The Aftermath' is one of those movies that sat and watched today makes you smile and know that the world will be ok ... so long as the story never comes true, of course!

This is a Widescreen (1.78:1) Presentation enhanced for 16x9 TVs and this Blu-ray edition of 'The Aftermath' from VCI Entertainment was meticulously remastered in 2K high definition in 2017 from the original 35mm cut camera negative and was step frame copied one frame at a time for the ultimate in clarity and color values.