Malevolent televisions in film and TV

[Stumpy Pepys]

I thought there'd be lots of these, but I can only think of:

• Videodrome
• Poltergeist
• Ringu
• Halloween III
• Willow the Wisp (i.e. Evil Edna)

Any more examples of this?

[Toby Gymshorts]

Close Encounters?

[Ginger Yellow]

Metaphorically:
Network
The Man Who Fell To Earth

[3 Colours Red]

At a stretch, maybe the robot form of Cain in Robocop 2?

[Snake Plissken]

Life on Mars and Ashes to Ashes

[Jah Womble]

1984
Condominium
Threads (at a push)

(Non-malevolent TVs in Film and TV:
The Teletubbies)

[Patrick Thistle]

That scene in Clockwork Orange

[Various Artist]

Evil Edna haunted my childhood.

[Benjm]

Barry, Terry and other underemployed residents of Brookside Close were kept in a docile and compliant state by the heavy cathode ray manners of The Magic Rabbits.

[Patrick Thistle]

Just remembered one of the first David Tennant Dr Who episodes where Maureen Lipman was a malevolent TV / wifi entity. People who watched the show had their faces erased IIRC.

[Jah Womble]

Evil Edna haunted my childhood.

I can see that as a headline on the cover of one of those gossip magazines. Alongside a photograph of Joe Pasquale.

[Ginger Yellow]

Just remembered one of the first David Tennant Dr Who episodes where Maureen Lipman was a malevolent TV / wifi entity. People who watched the show had their faces erased IIRC.

Relatedly, Batman Forever.

[sw2borshch]

The telly that introduced 'The Thirteen Floor' in 'Scream' comic.

[ian.64]

The telly that sucked in a pre-Simpsons Nancy Cartwright and had her gobbled up by a cartoon alligator in Twilight Zone: The Movie (It'd be easier if you just saw the film instead of me just sounding like a pranny in describing it).

[3 Colours Red]

At a stretch, maybe the robot form of Cain in Robocop 2?

At an equally big stretch, Zudo the defective Telebug... now there's a show that's never gonna get another home release.

[pebblethefish]

Threads (at a push)

The only TV I can remember in that is the one that they show "Words and Pictures" on. It's not really malevolent as such.

[treibeis]

Tommy

[Snake Plissken]

Nightmare on Elm Street 3

[Lang Spoon]

The telly that introduced 'The Thirteen Floor' in 'Scream' comic.

Blimey, Scream comic. Some great artwork on there for a morbid 7-8 year old bairn. Like it was getting you ready for 2000AD.

Did they have some Just Seventeen style photo story, but with a guy in a rubber mask?

[Satchmo Distel]

Was the theme of malevolent technology inspired by by the success of Kubrick's '2001' (which has recently turned 50)?

[Jah Womble]

The only TV I can remember in that is the one that they show "Words and Pictures" on. It's not really malevolent as such.

Hence my expression 'at a push'. (Although I'll concede that even then, I'm stretching things.)

[Fussbudget]

The X-Files episode Blood included at least one evil telly among the various appliances turning innocent passers-by into crazed murderers through rubbish LED messages.

[Various Artist]

Just remembered one of the first David Tennant Dr Who episodes where Maureen Lipman was a malevolent TV / wifi entity. People who watched the show had their faces erased IIRC.

Good call PT. 'The Idiot's Lantern' is the one, set at the time of the Queen's coronation. Not an episode I've ever had the slightest desire to revisit, I confess.

Evil Edna haunted my childhood.

I can see that as a headline on the cover of one of those gossip magazines. Alongside a photograph of Joe Pasquale.

Hahah, I love it. Even as I wrote that previous post, I felt I really ought to add something else to it; yet felt that, no, the power and pathos of that line was enough to stand alone. It does tug at the heartstrings, doesn't it? Perhaps I should contact one of those magazines, the dreadful ones with everything in pink-and-yellow writing on their covers.

In all seriousness, she did genuinely haunt at least my younger brother's dreams. I feel I must've mentioned somewhere on OTF before how he once had one aged about 7, which we both* still remember with amusing clarity: Evil Edna had kidnapped our parents and was holding them captive in a cave accessed underneath the metal staging in our greenhouse, so the two of us obviously had to charge down the garden with our swords to rescue them.

(*He described it to me at the time, I didn't have a hotline to his dreamscape.)

[Lang Spoon]

That’s the third season of Stranger Things sketched out right there. She was pure evil looking but. Can remember nothing else of Terrahawks but the rough looking Bonnie Tyler villain, well scarier than Edna for me. But i did run screaming at any appearance of green man Hulk in the 70s tv show.

[Snake Plissken]

I always had Zelda down as Jo Whiley on a bad day.

A key plot point in Serenity revolves around a TV signal.

Oh fuck! How could I have missed They Live!