Cyber-punk is back, baby.
AMC Networks confirmed to EW that a reboot of 1980s drama series Max Headroom, featuring the “world’s first artificial intelligence TV personality,” is in the works.
Halt and Catch Fire co-creator Christopher Cantwell is developing the project and is set to serve as showrunner. Actor Matt Frewer, who played Max Headroom across several series and ads throughout the 1980s, is attached to reprise his role. Elijah Wood and Daniel Noah’s SpectreVision will produce.
For Cantwell, it’s a return to the world of computer innovation and the 1980s. He also confirmed the news of the reboot on Twitter, writing, “I interrupt this broadcast with a cyberpunk announcement of epic post-future proportions. I’m writing a new Max Headroom series for @AMC_TV. Starring Matt Frewer as Max Headroom. Produced by the mad minds of @elijahwood and Daniel Noah @_SpectreVision.”
The character of Max Headroom was first introduced in April 1985 in British TV movie Max Headroom: 20 Minutes Into the Future. It offered an origin story for the AI personality with journalist Edison Carter (Frewer) fleeing enemies in a parking garage via motorcycle and crashes through the structure’s warning sign that reads “Max. Headroom 2.3 metres.”
Edison is knocked unconscious as a result of the accident, and an AI program based on his mind is created, named Max Headroom. Max becomes a TV host who challenges the status quo and globalization through commentary and sarcasm.
Everett Collection
He next appeared in The Max Headroom Show, which featured the character as a TV show host who introduced music videos, commented on current events, and more. In 1987, he jumped from British television to the U.S. on ABC’s Max Headroom, a two-season drama series that returned to Max’s origin story and paired off Edison Carter and Max as allies fighting against the status quo of the cyberpunk world.
It is this ABC series that Cantwell and AMC are developing as a reboot.
Max Headroom has since become a pop culture touchstone, appearing in ads for New Coke and earning references throughout TV and music videos (see: Eminem’s “Rap God”) over the last several decades.
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