TV Shows Set in the 80s

Classic perm? Check. Bright lipstick to go with big hair? Check. Black Mirror's "San Junipero", set in 1987 is instantly recognizable for many reasons, but it's iconic late 80s color and excess truly defines this Emmy-award winning episode.

The neon pink pussy bow blouse Olivia Nita, playing Jane, is wearing screams '80s in Amazon's series Comrade Detective.

Athlesiure is a fashion buzzword now that's got many a company rich by selling vaguely "spiritual" ideas with stretchy pants but the truth is, people walked the streets like they'd just left the gym in the 80s too. Tennis fashion, rocked here on Comrade Detective, is part of the lasting imagery of the Regan era -- made made iconic by Yuppies who layered Lacoste polos and wore sweatbands while driving their convertible Beemers.

Alison Brie, as Ruth from Netflix's GLOW, is the obvious center of this frame, in which the star is wearing quintessentially 80s high-waisted jeans and patterned blouse. But note how the kids are also giving subtle clues to the era: sweatband, sleeveless shirt, and Levis. They're in costume too!

The ladies of Netflix's GLOW -- still auditioning for a wrestling league that hasn't taken off in this scene -- look like exactly like a woman from the 1980s would've looked. This is the era of Richard Simmons and Jane Fonda-style fitness, that put an emphasis on colorful, body positive shapewear intended to help give confidence. Slouchy socks, high tops and, oh yes, those side ponytails transport us back in time.

What could be more '80s than a group of entrepreneurs helping to bring personal computing to the mainstream on AMC's Halt and Catch Fire?

Donna Clark (Kerry Bishe) is an engineer and businesswoman on Halt and Catch Fire, and you know by looking at her clothing she's a powerful woman. She's wearing red -- the color of power, fire, blood and war -- and a jacket that's not the oversized, exaggerated kind we know of the era that's a little cartoonish. Simple pearls and an impressive leather band watch convey she's wealthy and tasteful, which in turn suggests she displays sound, strategic judgement.

Honestly, Josh Charles' windowpane double-breasted suit, worn here in Law & Order's Menendez story set in 1989, could pass for something someone would wear today, but it's his hair that lets us know we're back in olden times. Costume designers often work with hair and makeup departments to coordinate and complete a look.

The pleated pants and quiet, quality outerwear Lyle and Eric Menendez (Miles Gaston Villanueva and Gus Halper) are wearing here suggest these people are wealthy and have restrained, non-flashy taste.

Netflix's Narcos includes character Valeria Velez -- a newswoman based on real-life Columbian Virginia Vallejo García journalist Virginia Vallejo García. As a talking head of her time would, Valeria steps out in professional pumps and tailored suits that are a show of force when dealing with powerful men.

Paul Reiser rocks a spot-on 80s interpretation of what affluent men of the 1980s would wear to play tennis at a country club in Amazon's Red Oaks.

What does this scene from Amazon's Red Oaks tell us? For starters, the gals wearing short, acid wash bottoms and easily removable tube and terry cloth tops aren't headed to bible study. But Nash (Ennis Esmer) -- wearing a kind of 80s summer leisure suit and a gold chain -- doesn't exactly project holiness either.

Red Oaks' Skye (Alexandra Socha) is wearing the holy trinity of the 80s: neon, spandex and denim.

Snowfall, FX's series about the crack epidemic in 1980s Los Angeles, zeroes in on what young people of the time and place would wear -- giving lead Franklin Saint (Damson Idris) the same type of baseball shirt and blase blue jeans that a South Central teen would wear and could afford. His friend looks innocent but slightly flirty in a terry cloth sort set in yellow: the color of vibrancy and fertility.

Another reason Netflix's Stranger Things is literally magic: very few of the things the boys are wearing in this photo are explicitly 1980s; save for the trucker hat on Gaten Matarazzo, pretty much everything they're wearing could be bought in a store today. But it's the stew of patterns and shapes that announce the time, place and their socioeconomic status -- especially all that corduroy.

Patterned polos, Nike Cortez and LeSportsac -- yup, we are definitely in the 80s here.

Barb (Shannon Purser)'s ruffled blouse and chunky eyeglasses were not the height of fashion, even in 1983 Indiana, which is part of the reason the Stranger Things character became so instantly endearing. Barb is, in a glance, a sweet and kind doe type, which intensifies the sorrow and anger we feel when she is...well, you know.

The Americans' Laurie Holden wears yet another of the season's interpretation of a workout look in FX's drama about KGB spies living in America in the 1980s. Clearly, costume designers rely on this leotard-cutoff shirt combo a lot to quickly drop viewers into time and place.

Philip (Matthew Rhys) and Elizabeth Jennings (Keri Russell) wear a lot of disguises on The Americans, but not all of them are overtly on-the-nose '80s. Upper middle class and wealthy people typically see clothing as an investment, meaning they purchase and wear clothing with lasting, timeless silhouettes colors and patterns as opposed to spending money on fleeting trends. What are Philip and Elizabeth saying with their clothing here? Stability.

Here, Keri Russell's glasses and pastel windbreaker (combined with that shaggy Carol Brady do) make her a vision straight out of a precious JC Penney catalogue.

As the ever-transforming Elizabeth Jennings, The Americans' Keri Russell wears a number of hats -- or more accurately, skins, like this cosmopolitan look of the era defined by an eye-popping lipstick and top with geometric prints.

The Goldbergs might have the hardest working '80s costume department on TV, having to keep its players in period pieces like Barry's (Tony Gentile) faded ruby top. Here's where set design and props help; a simple T-shirt and jeans don't announce much on their own but, with the right backdrop, the clues viewers need to understand the setting and people in it are much clearer.

Beverly Goldberg (Wendi McLendon-Covey) is TV's reigning queen of the imaginary 1980s -- with a penchant for loud printed blouses and accessories that are...shall we say assertive? The riot of colors and prints she wears says so much about her taste, her station in life and how she views herself. That's a lot for a purple studded belt, huh?

No '80s team uniform is complete without matching tube socks!

Barry's headband, T-shirt with piping and striped tube socks are so quintessentially retro that American Apparel built a whole business around recreating the look for years.

Beverly's love for era-appropriate Mom jeans will not be stopped -- even if she's not wearing denim but wispy-fabric trousers in an infamous Mom cut.

Those vintage New Kids on the Block tees and sweatshirt either cost a grip on Etsy or somebody in costume invested some time in making those replicas. They're spot on.

It's easy to look at Jack (Milo Ventimiglia) and Rebecca (Mandy Moore) here and think you're not seeing anything other than a "normal" American couple in the kitchen. But a closer read reveals so much: Jack is a working professional -- one you can almost tell is deeply uncomfortable in his tie and slacks. Rebecca meanwhile, sings that she's a little free spirit, a little doting mom in her denim skirt on This Is Us.

It's saying something that Jack is wearing not a full suit, but a slightly boxy double-breasted jacket, and that statement very well could be, "This isn't really who I am." Viewers know Jack would much rather be making things with his hands (or, let's be honest, drinking) than putting a noose around his neck to sit at a desk. Whereas a more invested businessman would be wearing a more complete. put-together ensemble, Jack looks like he's phoning it in.

One of the looks that started the obsession with This Is Us is this: Jack's all-denim outfit and plaid shirt he wore the night Rebecca gave birth. Subconsciously, we glean ideas about masculinity, money and Jack's emotional state just from these garments, evoking cultural cues like the Marlboro Man, Westerns and other Americana.

True, you could get Jack's T-shirt -- or something like it -- from Urban Outfitters or some such but it's Rebecca's top and denim here that coveys comfort, practicality and joy in a typical '80s household.

Wet Hot American Summer parodied '80s kid/camp classics, using simple, sometimes ill-fitting basics like tube socks and overalls to let viewers know they shouldn't take anything happening here too seriously.

For some ungodly reason, geometric shapes were a source of inspiration for many a garment in the late 1980s, especially when accented by wild and crazy zigzag lines! It was totally radical! Here, Victor Kulak is cold killing the game in parachute pants that recall the trend.

As Mary, Zoe Perry wears a distinctly Southern interpretation of 80s chic on Young Sheldon: plaid and a leather belt paired with her high-waisted skirt and modest blouse suggest she's stylish but resists being sexualized in a way inappropriate for a Christian mom.

In a rare bow tie-less moment, Sheldon Cooper (Iain Armitage) is dressed just like a good Southern boy of the 1980s would be: by his mom in a respectable, buttoned up shirt that presents him as a young man instead of a boy.