Screen Burn by Charlie Brooker Page A

tinkerings of Madonna’s ‘Erotica’ promo (as arousing as watching Metal Mickey being jerked off by a calculator). Yawn, yawn, yawn – most ‘shocking’ videos are more irksome than upsetting, akin to teenage Marilyn Manson fans who like to think they’re undermining us all by getting their eyelids pierced. Incidentally, someone should tell them they’ve picked the wrong idol: Manson pops up tonight, like a ghost-train skeleton, but by far the most disturbing sight of the evening is the contemporary footage of Shane MacGowan, who looks like he’s accidentally banged his face against a tree 657 times in a row.

    Immediately after the X-rated Top Ten , there’s a look at another corrupting influence on our youth, and one that coloured my teenage years more than music ever did. Thumb Candy (C4) may be billed as an exploration of ‘the history of video games’, but it’s far from comprehensive, concentrating heavily on the early years of arcade gaming at the expense of latter-day amusements – PlayStations barely warrant a mention, Doom and Quake don’t figure at all, and Sega have been airbrushed out completely. In fact, this feels more like the opening salvo of a potentially superb three-part series rather than a one-off; my guess is the makers had a lengthier run in mind. Still, until someone comes along to give gaming the full Nazis: A Warning From History treatment, this will do.
    Thumb Candy won’t tell unashamed games dweebos anything they don’t already know, but they’ll find it hard not to get a kick out of seeing the creator of ‘Pac-Man’ recounting the game’s genesis. And while it may not cover everything, what is there has been admirably researched: they’ve even managed to track down Matthew Smith, author of legendary Spectrum titles ‘Manic Miner’ and ‘Jet Set Willy’. Smith made a fortune overnight, blew it almost as quickly, then went a bit funny and ran away to live in a commune in Holland.
    As a gawky teen I was so astounded by the brilliance of ‘Manic Miner’, I used to sit and watch the demo-mode loop over for hours on end, pausing only to go to the toilet or stare at the ceiling and sigh hopelessly about the girls in my class, most of whom were out having fun with older boys who didn’t waste their evenings watching a pixilated miner leap over a thistle. Smith may have wrecked my adolescent love life, but for introducing Miner Willy to the world, he deserves to be immortalised on Trafalgar Square’s spare plinth. The campaign starts here.

Come Out With Your Hands Up     [7 April]
     
    The first thing that hits you about Meet the Popstars (ITV) is the screaming. It’s truly hysterical: either the audience really lovesHear’Say or a man has just chased them into the studio with a hammer.
    Yes, you thought you’d seen the last of Popstars , but it seems The Man ain’t through with us yet. Welcome to a watered-down cross between This Is Your Life and
Summertime Special
, hosted by Davina McCall, a woman who’s become omnipresent to the point where you no longer notice she’s actually there, like a clock on the mantelpiece that your ear filters out after two weeks of constant tick-tocking. She really is ubiquitous: last week I glanced in a mirror and was astounded to discover she wasn’t hosting my reflection.
    Not long ago, Davina was easy to warm to: she was dry, clever, strong. Now she just stomps about shouting about how great everything is. It’s as though her brain’s been spooned out and replaced with a rotating glitterball. Come on, McCall – we know you’re in there. Come out with your hands up.
    Anyway, back to the show in question, and Hear’Say in particular. Reviewing the first edition of Popstars back in January, I wrote, ‘The final line-up is likely to consist of five fresh-faced interchangeables called Sarah, Sandra, Lorraine, Simon and Tom, and it’s going to be [hard] to get wound up by them, in the same way that getting annoyed by S Club 7