The Max Headroom Incident

One Sunday night in November 1987, something very odd happened in
the middle of the WGN nine o’clock news in Chicago. Sportscaster
Dan Roan had been talking about the Chicago Bears, when the screen
suddenly went black. Then a person appeared, dancing back and forth
in front of a moving striped background, and wearing a mask. The
mask was the face of a fictional character from 1985 named Max
Headroom, who was supposed to be the world’s first computer
generated TV host. He supposedly came from our “not so distant
future”—a future where the world is run by TV executives. The
interruption lasted about 30 seconds. And then, two hours later it
happened again on a different channel—WTTW—during a broadcast of
Dr. Who. As one television viewer said, it felt like someone threw
“a brick through your window.” A little boy said it was “very, very
funny.” We speak with Dan Roan, Larry Ocker, Al Skierkiewicz, Jim
Higgins, and Matt Frewer. Say hello on Twitter, Facebook and
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iTunes.com/CriminalShow. We also make This is Love and Phoebe Reads
a Mystery. Artwork by Julienne Alexander. Check out our online
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