Max Headroom Episode 12: Neurostim

Episode Name: Neurostim

Premise: The Zik Zak Corporation is selling Neurostim bracelets, which are designed to stimulate the brain to experience a fantasy, but at the same time, stimulate people into buying Zik Zak products.

Themes explored: Consumption behaviors are what's mainly the focus of the episode. The Neurostim bracelet prompts people to keep buying products, with some people doing it to the point that they go into debt. It raises the issue about advertising tactics that prompt people to buy things that they might not necessarily need.

But a larger purpose of the Neurostim bracelet is to allow Zik Zak Corporation to advertise its products without the need to broadcast advertising or sponsor shows on Network 23 or other television outlets. And after Zik Zak pulls its advertising from Network 23, causing the network's stock to drop, Zik Zak is able to buy cheap shares and put a member of its company onto the Network 23 board.

That raises the question about what happens when a corporation acquires a media outlet and how can the media outlet be expected to stay impartial when what it intends to cover may conflict with other business interests the corporation has. Today's media environment is like that, with corporations or individuals who acquire media outlets and then attempt to control the message. How can a media outlet operate independently if a corporation acquires it and forces the outlet to bend to its will?

One might also see a parallel between how Neurostim allows a company to advertise its products in a new manner, as opposed to traditional methods of advertising. (Did someone mention how newspaper advertising declined with the rise of the Internet?) It illustrates how much of our media is dependent on advertising to stay in business, so what happens when that revenue stream dries up?

There is a subplot regarding how Edison Carter and Max Headroom clash over who should be dominating the airwaves -- Carter's investigative reporting is popular, but Max Headroom is just as popular and the two are put into conflict. It's only after they each learn to accept one another in terms of how they bring in an audience that they learn to co-exist again.

Max Headroom quotes:
"A quick thank you goes out to the real sponsors: you. Yes, you. You buy the products, you give them their profits, so you're sponsoring the game."
"You buy the burgers, you finance the game, and you have to go buy a ticket to watch it. It's that funny old world."
"As long as it's the truth, does it matter which of us tells it?"
"That makes a lot of sense. He yells, I apologize."

Personal observations: The episode primarily focuses on Zik Zak providing Carter with a bracelet that's designed to excessively stimulate his impulses to buy things and keep his investigative reporting from interfering with its business strategy. That means that plot's resolution tends to dominate, while the subplot of Zik Zak taking over Network 23 tends to be resolved too quickly -- Zik Zak gaining, then losing, a spot on the corporate board gets wrapped up in the final acts. So it's not as good of an episode as previous installments of the show were, but the themes touched upon are worth consideration.