Max Headroom
Whackets
TV Flash files “Whackets” as a desk essential hour — Max Headroom (1987–1988) on ABC, season 2, episode 5, aired 1987-10-16, 60 min.
From the desk
How this hour is filed
This leaf is S02E05: listed hour 11 of 14 in the Max Headroom guide, hour 5 of 8 in season 2. It aired 1987-10-16 (60 min). The listed hour before it is “Dream Thieves” (S02E04). Next is “Neurostim” (S02E06).
Essential hour: “Whackets”. Whackets is a made-up-product hour: Max sometimes outshone the show, the monopoly warning still the weirdest primetime accident.
Catalog log
Broadcast listing — not a TV Flash recap.
After witnessing survivors of a building collapse running into the wreckage to rescue their TV sets, all of which are tuned to the same game show, "Whackets", Carter investigates and learns that the show hooks its viewers, including Max, with an addictive subliminal signal. Guest Star: Bill Maher
Viewer FAQ
Where does Whackets sit in the Max Headroom guide?
S02E05 is listed hour 11 of 14 — hour 5 of 8 in season 2, season 2 episode 5.
When did Max Headroom S02E05 air?
Whackets aired 1987-10-16 and is listed at 60 minutes.
Is Max a real CGI character?
Stuttering computer-generated host as the 1980s sold it — Frewer in a dual role, chrome as aesthetic. The ads sometimes outshone the ABC series. The blipverts are the sting.
In the series
Why this series still plays
Twenty minutes into the future: stuttering computer-generated host, TV-news as authoritarian weather, and cyberpunk chrome on ABC of all places. Matt Frewer's Max became a Coke pitchman who sometimes outshone the series. Brief, glossy, and still the weirdest primetime warning about media monopolies America accidentally aired. The blipverts still sting.
Two seasons. Fourteen hours. ABC, 1987–1988, after Channel 4 U.K. origins: investigative reporter Edison Carter and his digital alter ego expose corporate media dystopia — twenty minutes into the future. That is the window, not a chrome souvenir. Max Headroom, from George Stone, Annabel Jankel, and Rocky Morton, put Matt Frewer in the dual role of Carter and the stuttering computer-generated host, with Amanda Pays and Chris Young. Cyberpunk visual language on American network primetime, however briefly. TV-news…
Filed against
- Matt Frewer as Edison Carter / Max Headroom
Matt Frewer stuttered the future as Edison Carter / Max Headroom on Max Headroom — twenty minutes into the future, computer-generated host, TV-news as authoritarian weather, cyberpunk chrome on ABC of all places. A Coke pitchman who…
- Amanda Pays as Theora Jones
Amanda Pays played Theora Jones on Max Headroom — cyberpunk chrome on ABC, TV-news as authoritarian weather, twenty minutes into the future. Matt Frewer’s stuttering host sometimes outshone the series; Pays is the control-room pulse…
- Chris Young as Bryce Lynch
Chris Young played Bryce Lynch on Max Headroom — twenty minutes into the future, a stuttering computer-generated host, TV-news as authoritarian weather, cyberpunk chrome on ABC of all places. Matt Frewer's Max sometimes outshone the…