Max Headroom

It was an accident that I stumbled upon the old episodes of Max Headroom when cleaning out the closet at work. I couldn’t resist the temptation to watch what looked to be like such an ancient sitcom. After I searched high and low for a VHS player, I popped in the cassette and anxiously awaited what I hoped to be an entertaining blast from the past.

Boy, was I disappointed. The first Max Headroom episode I viewed was a weak cry for entertainment. I found myself confused and not sure as to what exactly was taking place on the screen in front of me.

Although the plot was jumbled and hard to follow, the idea that the media industry was so power-hungry and profit driven that it would literally kill for ratings was mildly amusing. If a sitcom from over a decade ago predicted such a blood thirsty, rating driven industry, it is questionable as to what the media industry has in reality become.

Perhaps we would kill for ratings? Would there be a good TV station and a bad station fighting over ratings and the good of the world? Maybe we do live in a society completely driven by results. One thing is for certain, Max Headroom became victim to the same group of people that it depicted as villains. Our rating driven media industry would not let a sitcom like Max Headroom last more than one appearance.