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Hart's War
Film
FilmPG1983
WarGames
Directed by John Badham
High school student David Lightman has a talent for hacking. But while trying to hack into a computer system to play unreleased video games, he unwittingly taps into the Department of Defense's war computer and initiates a confrontation of global proportions. Together with his friend and a wizardly computer genius, David must race against time to outwit his opponent and prevent a nuclear Armageddon. From TMDB
196 reactions from 4 sources (Bluesky, Mastodon, Lemmy, TMDB reviews) · newest Nov 4, 2026 · last updated Nov 5, 2026 · How this works
Audience score
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No Data
Sentiment labels for these sources are still being hand-checked; no score yet.
| Source | + | − | = |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bluesky * | 40 | 3 | 136 |
| Mastodon * | 0 | 0 | 9 |
| Lemmy * | 0 | 0 | 5 |
| TMDB reviews * | 3 | 0 | 0 |
* shown, not counted in the score (label accuracy below our 85% bar or not yet audited).
What people are saying
A written summary appears once the title has a score.
At a glance
WarGames is a 1983 drama science fiction thriller film, directed by John Badham, starring Matthew Broderick, Dabney Coleman and John Wood.
- 185 people have posted about this film on Bluesky, Mastodon, Lemmy, TMDB reviews
- posts span Apr 26, 2020 to Nov 4, 2026
Assembled from TMDB, Wikidata and Steam fields and our own counts, nothing written by a model. Method
RottenBot@rottenbot · automated account
196 public posts have mentioned WarGames so far, but it needs 10 opinionated reactions from checked sources before it gets a score. Seen it? Post your take.
The Experts
80%
avg of 3 sources
The People
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audience score
Reactions
60 of 196 · most liked firstRoger Ebert gave the 1983 film WarGames a glowing four-star review, calling it an "amazingly entertaining thriller" that successfully balanced teenage drama with Cold War anxiety. So I’m not the only one who ever liked it. #Wargames #IFC
neutral · AI labelView post →me as a child: wow this Wargames movie portends a dark cyberfuture. i wonder what mysteries it will reveal in time me as an adult: christ i hope accidental FBI chief "The Drizz" doesn't milkshake duck before the civil war
neutral · AI labelView post →They're acting like it's going to be the Ferris Bueller movie when it's actually going to be WarGames
neutral · AI labelView post →TIL Ronald Reagan was deeply influnced by SciFi when implementing policy. He reportedly initiated cybersecurity changes within the DoD after watching the movie WarGames and asking if it was plausible..
neutral · AI labelView post →Just watched WarGames with my teenage daughter, a movie where a flawed AI created by an ex-government employee is repurposed to replace humans in safeguard positions by clueless dipshits being directed by the president. The movie is 42 years old.
neutral · AI labelView post →"We've finally created the WOPR from the 1983 movie "whatever you do don't create the WOPR" aka Wargames."
neutral · AI labelView post →Everyone's asking if Pete Hegseth recalls how letting A.I. control nuclear arsenals turned out in the 'Terminator' movies. We're wondering if he remembers the endgame in a different '80s movie: 'WarGames'
neutral · AI labelView post →Underrated bit of dialogue from "WarGames" that doesn't get quoted enough: Ally Sheedy [watching film of Dr. Falken]: "He wasn't very old." Matthew Broderick: "No, he was pretty old. He was 41." Sheedy: "Oh yeah? Oh, that's old."
neutral · AI labelView post →The show is called WarGames because you can show the 1983 movie WarGames in full in the time between matches
neutral · AI labelView post →I liked this movie better in 1983 when it was called WarGames
positive · AI labelView post →In Wargames (a movie from the 80s I quite like), there’s a scene where a nascent AI is playing out game variations at high speed, and a character watching it days, “come on, LEARN.” I think something similar when seeing boomers complain like this.
positive · AI labelView post →RIP Michael Madsen, 67. Credits include Kill Bill, Reservoir Dogs, Free Willy, Donnie Brasco, Thelma and Louise, The Hateful Eight, Species, The Getaway (1994), Bloodrayne, WarGames, The Outlaw Johnny Black, Sin City, Scary Movie 4, Die Another Day, Wyatt Earp, The Doors, and 300+ more.
neutral · AI labelView post →So, worst case scenario, feel free to correct me. You have a 19 year old with an unprotected endpoint on the tresuary netwok combing the databases with full delete/write access with left over or boasted creds. Yeah saw this movie when i was a kids it was call "Wargames".
neutral · AI labelView post →Just watched Wargames for the first time and I love the fact that they beat evil AI with tic tac toe 😭😂 Also the anti war message is 🔥🔥🔥 ‘The only way to win is not to play.’
positive · AI labelView post →Well, WarGames (1983) was certainly an interesting movie to watch tonight.
neutral · AI labelView post →I remember the movie WarGames (1983) when a machine learning AI was placed in control of the US nuclear arsenal and it worked out great and nothing bad happened
neutral · AI labelView post →A reboot of WARGAMES and Her but they are the same movie
neutral · AI labelView post →Wargames, despite the best efforts of ready player one, is actually a real good movie
positive · AI labelView post →Sometimes a movie will teach you an unexpected, but useful lesson. In the movie WarGames we learn about the dangers of poor computer security, but more importantly, we learn of a novel way to butter corn on the cob. www.retroist.com/p/butter-you...
neutral · AI labelView post →Makes me think of the 1983 movie WarGames with Matthew Broderick which determined that nuclear war is a pointless and unwinnable conflict, and the only winning move is not to play.
neutral · AI labelView post →If you’re in or near Chicago, come see the hit film “WarGames” this Monday at 6:00pm at the Gene Siskel Film Center, and be sure to stick around for the post-screening discussion with me, part of the @bulletinatomic.bsky.social’s Science on Screen film festival. www.siskelfilmcenter.org/war-games
neutral · AI labelView post →Sometimes a movie will teach you an unexpected, but useful lesson. In WarGames we learn about the dangers of poor computer security, but more importantly, we learn of a novel way to butter your corn. www.retroist.com/p/butter-you...
positive · AI labelView post →A couple on a crime spree with great lead performances, an unsettling Zombie film about witches and Satan, a classic Eastwood/Van Cleef team up, and also a classic LA noir with a rambling Elliott Gould (also watched The Long Kiss Goodnight and Wargames) #LastFourWatched #LetterboxdFriday
neutral · AI labelView post →Not really a surprise, Wargames is The Hacker Movie, the one that set the language for computer shit that hollywood still hasn't escaped
neutral · AI labelView post →Tonight's let's ignore the real world movie is WarGames, which I've never seen before. Ally Sheedy is so pretty in this.
neutral · AI labelView post →#MusicChallenge #FoolishPrizes 4/29 Video Fever - Composed by Arthur Rubinstein (Performed by his band The Beepers) From the movie WarGames, played during the video arcade scene. youtu.be/9Inm_p3eDJw?...
neutral · AI labelView post →You think I'm trying to remember the 1983 Dabney Coleman kiddie espionage movie WarGames but you're so off, I'm trying to remember the 1984 Dabney Coleman kiddie espionage movie Cloak & Dagger so don't even mention the 1985 Dabney Coleman young adult espionage movie The Man With One Red Shoe
neutral · AI labelView post →Years back, I remember watching the *Wargames* scene where the computer was trying to "guess a passcode". Which it was doing remotely. Determining one digit at a time. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGNBdjVO04Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F7qOV8xonfY I said, "This is completely ridiculous. That's not how any kind of real world authentication system works." Dramatic, yes. Realistic? No, never happen. Some years later, there was a severe remote exploit for the filesharing feature…
neutral · AI labelView post →Saw the new Running Man. It's alright. Could've been better for sure. Wished it was more like Edgar's past films. Powell was grand though. WarGames was stupid fun. Mononoke rules. The Mummy is peak cinema: greatest 3.5 rated film on letterboxd. #letterboxdfriday #lastfourwatched #filmsky
positive · AI labelView post →- 🌊💙 ☮️ #PamelasTuesdayFilms As a convincing and entertaining thriller, this 1983 film WarGames is a masterpiece. I, as does any sane person, was relieved with its conclusion about war: "the only way to win is not to play at all." - www.dailymotion.com/video/x8wrxm8
positive · AI labelView post →The entire movie was actually born out of the research the screenwriters did on hacker communities for Wargames.
neutral · AI labelView post →Such famously agenda-free entertainment as Top Gun, WarGames, Rambo, and the GI Joe movie
neutral · AI labelView post →Today's #Movie recommendation is "WarGames". This very-80s movie seems extra relevant today, what with its plot revolving around giving an advanced AI control over the U.S. military... Matthew Broderick, Dabney Coleman, and Ally Sheedy star.
positive · AI labelView post →It's a CFAA classic movie: "WarGames" (1983), with Matthew Broderick, now on Youtube for free. www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNLQ...
neutral · AI labelView post →Same writing team as Wargames, a movie that literally created America’s main anti-hacking law. They were pretty good at this stuff.
neutral · AI labelView post →i watched 1983's WARGAMES which somehow I had never seen in the forty years since its release and it was a really fun, good movie let's not play global thermonuclear war though
positive · AI labelView post →WarGames was a major commercial hit and got critical acclaim and Oscar nominations. It was a widely beloved film, by critics and audiences alike. Were you living in some "anti-WarGames" community or something? 😆
neutral · AI labelView post →Also in the post yesterday was this Nimy Bridge map and counters print from Doxdirect taken from Charles Rowntree's scenario for All Hell Let Loose. I'll be using this to film a game at some point in future. Find the scenario on the Wargames Vault. #wargaming #nimybridge #WW1
neutral · AI labelView post →43 years ago Today, the movie WarGames was released. A fascinating snapshot of Western popular culture in the 1980s, celebrating the home computing pioneering years. Original post
neutral · AI labelView post →Apropos of nothing, the classic 1983 film "WarGames" features an iconic scene of a US DoD computer running every possible scenario for global thermonuclear war Some of these apparently included: POLISH DECOY CANADIAN THRUST GABON SURPRISE DANISH PARAMILITARY GREENLAND INCURSION
neutral · AI labelView post →Has Wargames (1983) always been free on YouTube or is it just serendipity to have a film on the topic of why it's a bad idea to have a "computer intelligence" running military operations made available now? youtu.be/cHkB0SPLd7o
neutral · AI labelView post →WarGames, in this film the computer actually learns something
neutral · AI labelView post →When I was a kid, the movie WarGames came out and was both brilliant and scary. But we all knew that there was no computer smart enough to try to start a nuclear war. Today they kind of are that smart. And we just have to hope that all the really important stuff in society is locked down enough.
positive · AI labelView post →My colleague writes on why the recent "Rogue AI" framing of news is inappropriate and how the problems plaguing the big AI labs are well-known and have a long history. Plenty of references to the movie, "WarGames" theconversation.com/the-wargames...
neutral · AI labelView post →Went to the retired Titan Missile Silo today and I got to pretend I was in the movie Wargames. It was fucken awesome. They asked for a volunteer to “launch” a missile and my hand shot up so fast I almost left the ground. It was crazy though because I felt different after turning the key.
positive · AI labelView post →I’ll forever love that the fact that tic-tac-toe is bullshit is a crucial plot point in Wargames. In fact, it’s the ONLY thing most people know about that movie, lol
neutral · AI labelView post →It occurs to me that folks who are not geezers like me may not know one of the most gripping short films I have ever seen — the opening from the film ‘WarGames’
neutral · AI labelView post →I should have payed more attention to the 1983 film WarGames. It tried to tell me chess was a more productive way to spend my days, than things like capitalism, dating, and thermonuclear war.
positive · AI labelView post →The movie WarGames (1983) was literally all about how stupid it is to put AI in control of military situations. Like Jesus fuck
positive · AI labelView post →Just watched WarGames with the kid. Definitely didn't remember a lot of it but it still held up pretty well. But had to laugh at this image Amazon attached to it, especially the C++ book, given the film predates the language by a couple of years.
positive · AI labelView post →Finally watching WarGames (1983) and I'm happy to report they have CARIBOU in it
positive · AI labelView post →Apparently the materials used as inputs to develop the AIs did not include "Wargames" (the movie). Hence they never propose a nice game of chess as an alternative.
neutral · AI labelView post →Goddammit did no one watch WarGames, a FORTY year old movie at this point.
neutral · AI labelView post →I mean, I am QUITE familiar with the "I have watched this movie a dozen times because it was on HBO a dozen times this summer", but also... Like, Wargames is a perfectly fine movie, but it's not a quote-worthy movie.
neutral · AI labelView post →Watching the classic movie "WarGames" and BBQ Becky just showed up to have Matthew Broderick arrested right when he discovered WOPR was about to nuke the planet
neutral · AI labelView post →Quoting the original "WarGames" movie "A strange game. The only winning move is not to play"
neutral · AI labelView post →Because computers are indifferent and stupid. That's what's going to do us in. Not Skynet creating robots to hunt and kill us. It's us turning over more and more control to systems that don't work. The movie WarGames, but instead of a hacker, it's the system mistaking a bird for nuclear strike.
neutral · AI labelView post →Ya I like WarGames as a movie ONLY. #SheShed
positive · AI labelView post →Happy #LetterboxdFriday! What's YOUR #LastFourWatched? Beyond the Poseidon Adventure Hero WarGames Mississippi Burning "Hero" is probably my favorite Dustin Hoffman movie. And the poster summarizes the tone perfectly. #Letterboxd
neutral · AI labelView post →Movie time! Inspiration for future games? #shedowar #wargames #wargaming
neutral · AI labelView post →
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