Living in the wasteland : character, worldbuilding and humanism in the Mad Max series

The long-running Mad Max series is a seminal entry in the contemporary western science fiction canon, particularly within the post-apocalyptic subgenre. This thesis argues that a major reason for the series’ enduring success is that it is a fundamentally humanist text. It further argues that Mad Max’s humanism is identifiable and trackable through the construction of its characters and the world they inhabit across the four films in the series. Subjects of analysis include the films themselves, as well as several books written on and about them.