Thanks for the ressurect, those are some good points in the new posts.
The state of world affairs was probably the biggest puzzler for me, but the Aussie take of things I’ve seen since (in other threads and boards) has helped make sense of that.
Which is…?
Oh, sorry…
That it wasn’t post apocalypse, yet. Just a devolving society. I had forgotten how much the energy crisis of the 70s scared everyone.
Took me a while to see that, but once everyone started pointing it out to me (even here in this thread), it made perfect sense.
Re: NightRider
His dialogue is something along the lines of, “it’s over, it’s all over.” I believe that he’s referring to the fact that he and his friends got away with whatever they wanted to but civilization (the Bronze as represented by Max) finally caught up with them and suddenly the party’s over. They sent their top guy after him, maybe not with the intent to kill, but suddenly, it’s not a game anymore. The bikers pushed the game too far and the brinksmanship caught up with them.
Thematically, this fits with the backstory (not apparent until RW, which is what Miller wanted to make in the first place, but needed the funding/support he’d get from MM) about war, getting along, etc.