“I want you to form a team of the most brilliant minds in network television.”
“Well now, isn’t that a contradiction in terms?”
Max Headroom is the spirit of TV, and he lives in a world in which ratings rule everything, and the public follows whoever has the most exciting programs. A world where everyone is born next to a TV feed and raised in a network’s light before the child ever sees its parents, where it is illegal to have an off switch on your television, and, in one episode, the authorities came to shut down an educational program that did not have any sponsorship, because it is illegal to learn without advertising embedded in the curriculum. Max floats in and out all over the television landscape of this world, and on his journey he has to learn what he is and how humanity relates to him in what he ultimately sees as an illogical way. It is a TV show critiquing its own medium, by embodying the medium as a central character.
The star of the show, however, is Max’s human counterpart Edison Carter. When you connect with a television show, it becomes a reflection of yourself and you apply its archetypes to your life. Max is the reflection of Edison Carter, examining himself as a reflection and influencing the programming of the networks rather than letting it influence him (with a few exceptions due to manipulative forces which are overcome by the end of their respective episodes). Rather than condemning the medium, the show points its finger at the networks and the executives that chase ratings. I do not trust TV shows that tell me to stop watching TV shows, but the writers of Max Headroom did not seem to be saying that at all. In fact, they seemed to be saying that there was an ultimate good to be found in TV, it just requires viewership to take conscious control of how they are reflecting onto the programming.
“Today the term addicted to TV took on a new and sinster meaning as the prospect of global video addiction became a frightening reality.”
“But if dreaming is all your subconscious desires coming out, why do people wait until they’re asleep to do it?”
“This is Edison Carter, live and direct. I’ll show you something rare. This was a dream house, years ago, people came here for their pictures, to share dreams and adventures together. These were the days when people sat in groups and watched a single ‘movie’ sometimes hundreds of people at one time. It must’ve been a weird experience, people watching the same screen and the same program.”
I like the way they portray cameras as destructive weapons on this show.
“Since when has news been entertainment?”
“Since it was invented?”
“I find myself regretting all the things I’ll now never experience: I’ll never complete my collection of the original He-Man and the Masters of the Universe accessories.”
You know that feeling when a show just gets you?
“Just because he lives in a TV, he thinks everything is TV.”
