SMELLS LIKE GEN X BLOG
Explore the written archive for 70s nostalgia, 80s nostalgia, and 90s nostalgia across music, movies, TV shows, toys, fads, commercials, trends, and the weird pop-culture debris that never fully left your brain.
Use this page as the main written gateway into Smells Like Gen X: start with a decade hub, follow a topic lane, search the archive, or jump straight into the latest post.
Looking for a specific year, song list, movie countdown, TV ranking, toy post, fad archive, commercial rewind, or category lane? Search the archive directly instead of scrolling the whole feed.
The blog works best when you use the decade hubs as your map. Start with the 70s, jump into the flagship 80s hub, or head into the expanding 90s archive.
Start here for 70s songs, movies, TV, toys, and the slower, stranger, more analog version of Gen X memory.
Big hooks, bigger movies, iconic toy aisles, prime-time TV, mall culture, and now the full 1980–1989 fads archive in one decade hub.
Alt-rock, sitcom empires, CDs, snack-branding overload, holiday toy panic, and the polished late-era Gen X archive.
These topic lanes route into the main category hubs, so visitors can browse the archive by what they actually care about.
Start here for year-end countdowns, chart rewinds, radio nostalgia, and the songs that permanently colonized your brain.
Dive into year-by-year movie countdowns, box office rewinds, poster-wall nostalgia, and video-store-era comfort watches.
Network giants, sitcom empires, Nielsen-era countdowns, forgotten shows, and the TV memories that still feel weirdly personal.
Holiday toy panic, weird products, year-by-year toy posts, and the kind of childhood plastic that still lives in your head rent-free.
Schoolyard crazes, mall fads, bad hair decisions, logo flexes, and the short-lived obsessions that defined everyday Gen X life.
Dive into classic commercial rewinds, catchphrases, mascots, cola wars, beer ads, Super Bowl spots, and the campaigns that completely colonized Gen X memory.
These are the strongest written entry points into the current Smells Like Gen X archive.
The strongest decade page on the site right now, with clear paths into songs, movies, TV, toys, fads, commercials, and broader 80s nostalgia.
One of the most distinctive lanes on the site now that the full 1980s fad run is live. Great for fast nostalgia hits and everyday-memory weirdness.
Classic ad campaigns, mascots, cola wars, beer slogans, and the TV spots that got so big they stopped feeling like ads.
Fresh nostalgia, deep cuts, countdowns, weird trends, and beautifully unnecessary rewinds across the Gen X archive.
The top TV shows of 1976 capture a major turning point in prime time, where social sitcoms still ruled, ABC surged with glossy action hits, and event television plus prestige miniseries pushed the decade in a bigger, flashier direction.
Read more →The top TV shows of 1975 show the mid-70s TV machine in full swing, with CBS dominating prime time through sharper sitcoms, ensemble comedy, family drama, and urban TV that finally looked like the decade it was living in.
Read more →The top TV shows of 1974 show the 70s fully in control: sharper sitcoms, prestige ensemble comedy, big family drama, slick crime series, and a CBS lineup that practically owned prime time.
Read more →The top TV shows of 1973 prove the 70s TV revolution was fully underway, with socially sharper sitcoms, urban crime drama, event programming, and a much more modern prime-time lineup than just a few years earlier.
Read more →The top TV shows of 1972 are where the decade really starts looking like itself — sharper, louder, more urban, and a lot less interested in pretending the old TV order still ran the whole room.
Read more →The top TV shows of 1971 reveal a prime-time lineup getting more recognizably 70s — with medical dramas, cop shows, star variety, and network movie events taking over the dial.
Read more →The top TV shows of 1970 capture a television world still ruled by westerns, variety giants, family comfort, and old-school star power—right before the 1970s fully changed the channel.
Read more →From Kramer vs. Kramer and The Amityville Horror to Rocky II, Alien, Apocalypse Now, and The Muppet Movie, these were the biggest box office hits of 1979 ranked by North American gross for films first released that year.
Read more →From Grease and Superman to Animal House, Heaven Can Wait, and Halloween, these were the biggest box office hits of 1978 ranked by North American gross for films first released that year.
Read more →From Star Wars and Smokey and the Bandit to Close Encounters, Saturday Night Fever, and Annie Hall, these were the biggest box office hits of 1977 ranked by North American gross for films first released that year.
Read more →From Rocky and King Kong to The Omen, All the President’s Men, and Silver Streak, these were the biggest box office hits of 1976 ranked by North American gross for films first released that year.
Read more →From Jaws and One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest to Dog Day Afternoon, Shampoo, and The Rocky Horror Picture Show, these were the biggest box office hits of 1975 ranked by North American gross for films first released that year.
Read more →DON’T MISS THE REWIND
Countdowns, forgotten media, weird rabbit holes, and peak Gen X nostalgia across every category.