Live and Direct

April 2, 2015 3:48 PM

The definitive oral history of Max Headroom
posted by figurant (53 comments total)

blipvert: Blank Reg is my hero.
posted by Catblack at 3:54 PM on April 2, 2015 [11 favorites]

"As a consequence of [Max Headroom], national car parks spent about 3 million [pounds] changing all their signage to "maximum height"."

Ahahahahahaha that's amazing.
posted by Aznable at 4:07 PM on April 2, 2015 [9 favorites]

I thought Metafilter banned blipverts on account of the explosions.
posted by ckape at 4:10 PM on April 2, 2015 [1 favorite]

As someone who was part of a livestreaming team during Occupy Oakland along w/ my "Control" Lexica, it's trippy how to MH presaged what streamers ended up being like.

And Anonymous resonates w/ the Blanks in a lot of ways.
posted by Pirate-Bartender-Zombie-Monkey at 4:14 PM on April 2, 2015 [1 favorite]

"What is a commercial holiday like in a world that makes a virtue of just rampant commercialism?" We came up with the holiday, "Xmas," in which everybody gathers around the TV and home shops. The person in the family or the community that home shops the most is the one who celebrates Xmas the best.

This show was way more prescient than I remember, need to pull out my box set and rewatch.
posted by fifteen schnitzengruben is my limit at 4:16 PM on April 2, 2015 [5 favorites]

No mention of the Art of Noise. *sigh*
posted by mykescipark at 4:16 PM on April 2, 2015 [6 favorites]

The name "Max Headroom" is right up there with "Ford Prefect" for jokes that funny to the British and inexplicable to Americans.
posted by octothorpe at 4:25 PM on April 2, 2015 [10 favorites]

Matt Frewer who played Max Headroom, more recently played Aldous Leekie on Orphan Black.
posted by Obscure Reference at 5:07 PM on April 2, 2015 [3 favorites]

I loved the ABC series. I idolized Bryce Lynch. He made me want to learn everything about computers. So I did. I started learning to program in '85 and I stuck with it through high school. I majored in computer science in college and earned a master's degree. After a few years in the real world I went back for a PhD and now I'm a professor of computer science. It's no great exaggeration to say that this show was a butterfly effect that changed the course of my life. It's the reason I'm a computer scientist instead of a...

... astronaut?

OH GODDAMNIT FUCKING TV.
posted by rlk at 5:09 PM on April 2, 2015 [29 favorites]

Don't you mean "the definitive or-or-or-or-oral history"?
posted by brundlefly at 5:09 PM on April 2, 2015 [16 favorites]

My 1980s-growing-up mind is still blown by the fact that it wasn't computer-generated.
posted by mynameisluka at 5:18 PM on April 2, 2015 [2 favorites]

Don't worry, rlk, I flagged your comment as fantastic, so maybe someone will shoot you into space yet!
posted by nevercalm at 5:19 PM on April 2, 2015

Morton and Jankel went on to further glory with the Super Mario Bros. movie.

Also, let's not forget Ron Headrest.
posted by brundlefly at 5:22 PM on April 2, 2015 [3 favorites]

One of the things in the show is that it was illegal to have an off switch for your TV.

I suspect Facebook, Google, et al., are kicking themselves for not doing the same for tracking cookies.
posted by fifteen schnitzengruben is my limit at 5:35 PM on April 2, 2015 [1 favorite]

One of the main characters in my comic was explicitly designed to be a Theora Jones to the main character's Edison Carter. Like, there are sketchbook pages with "Theora" (complete with quotes) full of initial designs for her.

Can't wait to get home and check out all the ancillary media on something better than my phone.
posted by egypturnash at 5:35 PM on April 2, 2015

I miss Max.
posted by theora55 at 5:40 PM on April 2, 2015 [2 favorites]

I almost got his signature at a book store in NYC. (It was just a line-printer sort of thing, and it was broken, but I still wanted it dammit)
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 5:46 PM on April 2, 2015

"We had a Christmas show, written by George R. R. Martin.."

wtf
posted by JoeZydeco at 5:47 PM on April 2, 2015 [2 favorites]

Oh and BTW that whole blipvert thing?

just a matter of time now
posted by JoeZydeco at 5:49 PM on April 2, 2015

I thought of blipverts the other day, when I heard of exploding head syndrome.

And I also love that Frewer is on Orphan Black, a show that, like Max Headroom, seems to be set "twenty minutes into the future."
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 6:18 PM on April 2, 2015

Isn't the technical/ medical term Asploding Head Syndrome?
posted by theora55 at 6:38 PM on April 2, 2015 [1 favorite]

I idolized Bryce Lynch. He made me want to learn everything about computers. So I did.

Oh my god, I thought I was the only one.

IIRC there's a bit in the first episode where Bryce is interrupted while he's taking a bath, so he just puts on a bathrobe and starts hacking away on the terminal that he just happens to have in his bathroom. Like you do. And about fifteen years later when I set up a wifi network in my home, the first thing I did was go to the bathroom with my laptop and email my brother: I am emailing you from my bathroom, just like Bryce Lynch.

I have very little shame.
posted by phooky at 7:19 PM on April 2, 2015 [11 favorites]

"Lacerated cornea."

Ow. Shit. That tells me all I need to know about the physical makeup that went into this, i.e., more than I thought.

Also, previously: Max Headroom as a broadcast TV hijacking. Relevant Youtube links seem to be dead. Here's one that's working.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 7:44 PM on April 2, 2015 [2 favorites]

Frewer's first film appearance was in the The Crimson Permanent Assurance sequence in Monty Python's Meaning of Life.

His career has never been less than fascinating.
posted by maxsparber at 8:06 PM on April 2, 2015 [12 favorites]

I was 11-12 when this happened. Amanda Pays is a great actress and... well, I spent a lot of time in my bunk, let say.

But the show made computers and geekery cool. And the super-subversive anti-authoritarianism was just what a young fan of RAH and REH could relate to. Looking back, I am stunned it ever made it on the air. TV didn't usually allow that kind of thing.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 8:09 PM on April 2, 2015 [2 favorites]

Wasn't he a shill for Coca-Cola at one point? Or Pepsi?
posted by ostranenie at 8:25 PM on April 2, 2015

Worse than that, it was New Coke.
posted by RobotHero at 8:46 PM on April 2, 2015 [3 favorites]

Wasn't he a shill for Coca-Cola at one point?

He entreated people to "catch the wave."
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 8:48 PM on April 2, 2015

The actor who played Bryce Lynch on the US series eventually became a 3D digital cinema production consultant. Yes, he still translates people into data.

Weirdly my favorite episodes from when I was a kid don't hold up, and the episodes I didn't like as much then I enjoy more now.
posted by infinitewindow at 9:09 PM on April 2, 2015 [1 favorite]

I'm not a fan, in general, of the 'oral history' encapsulation of an time or place or event. But this one, wow, it captures a zeitgeist pretty darn well. It conveys a sense of Max Headroom parlaying its techno-edginess, subversiveness, and unapologetic merchandizing into its own sort of excess. Sort of a Gordon Gecko for the more geeky side of the decade.

I mean, my 80's pop culture memories are more Dukes of Hazzard and classic WWF. I shutter to think where I'd be today without the quirk and idiosyncrasy of Max Headroom helping to balance that all out.

...reading the article, Max's co-creator Annabel Jankel, her name seemed familiar. [google search] Yep! Her brother is Chaz Jankel, whose musical brilliance rivals his sister's brilliance in TV production. This best of album from Chaz, gives a terrific sample of his work. Like his sister's creation, it doesn't feel obsolete after 30 years. (if you're sharp on 80s geekery you're likely familiar with Chaz's song "Number One", which held together the montage scene in Real Genius with Val Kilmer.)
posted by Theophrastus Johnson at 9:20 PM on April 2, 2015 [5 favorites]

Also, back in my days of teaching calculus, for our test on extrema I'd put an extra credit question: Who is Max Headroom? (Or, on version B of the test: Who is Minnie Minoso?) I don't recall anyone ever answering it correctly.
posted by Theophrastus Johnson at 9:25 PM on April 2, 2015

I've read a few similar histories about the show in the past; this article covers a lot of newer insight and is well worth it. Max Headroom is the last DVD set I bought (HMV markdown prior to closure in Vancouver). There are only a few shows left I want physical copies of and this one mostly holds up.

In the 80s, I always wanted to meet a girl named Theora. Now I'm thinking it'd be a fine name for a daughter, if I ever have one.
posted by myopicman at 9:36 PM on April 2, 2015 [1 favorite]

I did see a MAX HEADROOM sign in the US, about a dozen years late. According to streetview, it's been changed, but they kept with the UK theme and switched it to MAX HEIGHT instead of the more American CLEARANCE.
posted by ckape at 10:03 PM on April 2, 2015

Frewer's first film appearance was in the The Crimson Permanent Assurance sequence in Monty Python's Meaning of Life.

His career has never been less than fascinating.

He played a very closeted, very alcoholic, very tightly-wired misanthropic detective on Intelligence. And there was that one role as a mysterious researcher on ST:TNG. It was tough to unsee him as Max Headroom, but he manages to bring quirkiness without resorting to an easy caricature of a typecast.
posted by a lungful of dragon at 10:09 PM on April 2, 2015

Also, previously: Max Headroom as a broadcast TV hijacking. Relevant Youtube links seem to be dead. Here's one that's working.

I'm still wondering what my generations version of this will be. Hijacking the youtube live stream of the state of the union? I hope they make a reference to this, whatever they do.
posted by emptythought at 12:41 AM on April 3, 2015

I love Matt Frewer's voice. His portrayal of Trashcan Man was sublime (my life for you!)
posted by h00py at 12:47 AM on April 3, 2015

"There was alt.fan.max-headroom; it was reasonably populated and vibrant in the Usenet days."
posted by mikelieman at 1:14 AM on April 3, 2015

Max Headroom: 20 Minutes Into the Future (the UK one-hour movie) is a direct forerunner to Black Mirror in a lot of ways. Blew my tiny mind when it was first on - I knew from the trailer that this was something I had to video. So I've seen it hundreds of times (Channel 4 ran the U.S. series once very late at night, at a time when I was luckily not only up but also very, very stoned).

It's remarkable the way Roberts and Morton & Jankel manage to get almost a whole movie into less than an hour (the last couple of minutes are a bit rushed, but the chase through the Network 23 building is exemplary).
posted by Grangousier at 2:15 AM on April 3, 2015 [1 favorite]

Is it just me or does it seem like several of Jim Carey's characters/voices might be attributable to Max Headroom?
posted by readyfreddy at 4:02 AM on April 3, 2015 [1 favorite]

Is it just me or does it seem like several of Jim Carey's characters/voices might be attributable to Max Headroom?

Frewer actually voiced the Jim Carey character on the animated Dumb and Dumber.
posted by maxsparber at 6:59 AM on April 3, 2015 [1 favorite]

Tambor was the best on this show.
posted by Chrysostom at 7:44 AM on April 3, 2015 [2 favorites]

Don't reboot Max Headroom, just make him an HTML5 tag or something.
posted by Dr-Baa at 8:59 AM on April 3, 2015 [5 favorites]

I loved Tambor as a dramatic character actor in this. He spent so much time as Hank Kingsly on "Larry Sanders" playing the fool.
posted by Pirate-Bartender-Zombie-Monkey at 9:02 AM on April 3, 2015

There's an official DVD set out finally? I don't need to watch the poorly copied shows with the TechTV logo in the bottom right from the bootleg DVDs I was delighted to find? Looks like I'm not completely done buying DVDs.

Don't forget that Frewer also played the incredibly weird and charming Jim Taggart in Eureka. And he was weird for that show, which is saying something.
posted by Hactar at 9:53 AM on April 3, 2015 [1 favorite]

Waves at myopicman.
posted by theora55 at 10:14 AM on April 3, 2015 [1 favorite]

Man, I loved Max Headroom; it was my first instance of the heartbreak of premature cancellation. (But far from the last.) Sadly, I tried to rewatch it with some friends a few years ago and it foundered on the slow pacing and poor editing*.

But I still have great fondness for it and am enjoying the oral history, so thanks for posting the link!

* My friends, better versed in television production than me, explained that if you don't have much money you end up using a lot of film that would otherwise be cut: so a poorly-funded production can end up with a lot of bloated scenes of people entering rooms, closing car doors, and so forth.
posted by suelac at 10:24 AM on April 3, 2015

Don't reboot Max Headroom, just make him an HTML5 tag or something.

CSS property. Replace margin-top.

div { headroom: max; }
posted by brundlefly at 10:37 AM on April 3, 2015 [1 favorite]

I also remember Frewer being pretty good on generic medical sitcom Doctor, Doctor. And of course that one episode of ST:TNG.
posted by Chrysostom at 10:39 AM on April 3, 2015 [1 favorite]

here's an official DVD set out finally?

Yep--been out for years.
posted by MrGuilt at 11:05 AM on April 3, 2015

Youtube has the 20 Minutes Into The Future Channel 4 Special
posted by zarq at 11:10 PM on April 3, 2015 [1 favorite]

brundlefly: "Morton and Jankel went on to further glory with the Super Mario Bros. movie."

This explains a lot, I didn't know they were the same people. They complain in this article about how they were cut out of further Max Headroom deals, and it's kind of hard to understand why, but I've read that people familiar with the production of the Super Mario Bros. say the co-directors (that would be them) were totally impossible to work with, unprofessional, had no idea what they were doing but were incredibly cocky and arrogant, etc. If their attitudes around Max Headroom were similar, it's easier to see why they were cut out early.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 2:39 AM on April 4, 2015

My ears were burning.
posted by Edison Carter at 1:19 PM on April 6, 2015 [5 favorites]

I liked Max Headroom's cameo on Billy Idol's Cyberpunk album cover.
posted by Metro Gnome at 11:31 PM on April 6, 2015