Quote:
Originally Posted by 500grains
I don't know what I just watched.
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Since the world’s locked down and I want to see how cunty the anticipatory text de-corrector really is I’ll tell you the very short history of Max Headroom hopefully in three or less sentences. Quick note the actor the CGI is based on and who provided the voice was the star of the CBS show Doctor, Doctor and played the redhead’s dad in the 2004 version of DAWN OF THE DEAD that Ving Rhames put down with a shotgun. I don’t know his name and since I’m not sufficiently interested I’m not looking it up.
In the 80s the BBC made a dramatic TV movie in which a reporter discovered a subliminal advertising plot and got himself perished. To cover up the murder and prove Max Headroom is still alive the network (I never saw the original show, nobody did) created this unconvincing CGI version of him. The story was lame, the CGI lamer and the original concept was dropped. Audiences loved the quirky personality of the character. Remember this was the age of the album LIVING IN THE AGE OF PLASTIC, fucked up movies like THE TIN DRUM and BRAZIL, surreal was IN. Also Diane Feinstein had only recently destroyed the porn chic phenomenon, porn had almost gone mainstream and broken as free of organized crime as ‘legitimate’ Hollywood productions but it wasn’t clear yet that her censoring, gun grabbing ass had won. Weird and unusual entertainment was wanted.
The Max Headroom character was repurposed as a talk show host broadcast on Showtime IIRC and appeared on a TV set on stage interviewing real celebrity guests with his glitchy quirks. He also hosted/appeared in music videos and that is what you just watched.
He is likely to the point of almost certainty inspiration for the running commentary on music videos the gurus Beavis and Butthead supplied less than a decade later.