Like any good character, their “computer creation” needed to have a proper backstory for their TV show. Who exactly was this character and what made him the way he was? The “Backstory” On Max Headroom Fewer created an extremely unique, and era-defining character, and if you watch his work, you’ll probably notice how Frewer looks to have influenced Jim Carrey, especially with his speaking style and physical mannerisms.īut the performance of Max headroom was just part of the equation. But despite being an artificial character, Max headroom needed to have quirks and a personality of his own.įrewer was the ideal choice to play this fictional robotic character that was jittery, stuttering, and cyborg-like but still emitted a sense of identity and expression–not just a robotic monotone delivery. Frewer was filled with wit and was able to convey that sense of self-importance and general arrogance. You may remember him as Russ Thomson Sr, the next-door neighbor from Honey I Shrunk the Kids. Matt Frewer was an American performer with a ton of improv ability. These are the foundations of Max Headroom.īut who could play such a unique, fictional, and manufactured character? What about an actual artificial character? American television presenters seemed robotic, maybe the character should just be a robot. But who would this character be? From the creator’s perspective, All of the networks seemed to have these artificial talking heads staring straight at us. This future was all ruled by the evil Network 23. Maybe they could create something similar–but it needed to be different and unique.Ī general concept was put together of a dystopian future where networks controlled everything and ratings were king. American airwaves were filled with these sterile, one-dimensional, insincere, and arrogant presenters that seemed to be on every channel. While trying to come up with an idea, the group noticed that in the US, TV presenters were much different from the UK. The intent was to create a unique character to introduce music videos for Channel 4 in the UK and hopefully spin it off into its own TV show. The latter two were part of an animation studio that created trendy commercials and ads.
Max Headroom was a group collaboration and was actually created in the UK by a few people, including George Stone, Annabel Jankel, and Rocky Morton. The 1980s gave us this big explosion of insincere and egotistical TV personalities and this created an idea that would develop into the character of Max Headroom. But with the growth of cable tv, entertainment programs, and news channels, there was more demand for perfectly manicured presenters to appear on TV. This was no different In the ‘80s–but there were just fewer platforms to appear on. Our networks are filled with talking heads and even in regular life, it seems as if everyone wants to be a star. Mix that with social media influencers and we are flooded with cookie-cutter personas bombarding us on all forms of media. We live in an age now with an endless amount of entertainment channel “personalities” that seem to be a dime a dozen. This was a creation that was equal parts performance art, ingenuity, creativity, commerce, prediction, and a lot of absurdity.īut what are the origins of this character, and how would he fit into the pop culture landscape during the 1980s? The Early Conception Of Max Headroom
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You may remember Max headroom from Coke commercials or Back to the Future 2, but the character was much more than that and actually had a full backstory, mythology, and even a TV show and movie. And you could make the case that this character–from a commercial standpoint–is the spokesperson for the entire decade. Max headroom was a fictional, artificial intelligence character considered to be the first computer-generated TV host. As long as you owned a TV during the 80s, flipped through a magazine, or looked up at a billboard, it was difficult to not see him. Acid wash jeans, perms, and ALF, these are just a few of those images you may be picturing. There are certain defining images from the 1980s that have gone on to represent the decade. This may sound like a description of Tron, 1984, or BladeRunner, but it is in fact a fabricated personality used to parody the changing world of television networks and warn us about the future while going on to become a defining part of the 1980s. The character? A cyborg–driven by artificial intelligence–challenging the corporations and systems, while at the same time, creating its own persona to influence the public. The time setting? Sometime in the near future/ The place: A dystopian world dominated by television and large corporations.
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