Customer Reviews

Pictures at Eleven

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When this was written in 1995, many of the ideas used by author Spinrad may have seemed controversial and/or enlightening, but so much has happened with terrorism, the media and the government, that all of PICTURES AT 11 seems tired and redundant. And Spinrad's book is much too long to keep you really involved; it's one of those books you read in spurts, and to his credit, Spinrad does make you wonder how it will all turn out. Suffice to say, he stacks the deck in favor of the ecoterrorists who take over a small tv station in LA and make ridiculous demands on the US, and hold the newsteam hostage. There is way too much dead time, debates over our misuse of mother Earth and the usual governmental villains. The hostages are held for 8 days and t.v. is used as a medium to advance the goals of the Green Army Commandos, and the careers of some of the news team. It feels like an 8 day read as well. I just find it hard to feel sympathy towards people who insist that everyone in the world should feel the way they do and if they don't, then it's okay to kidnap people and threaten them "in the cause of the future." That's just me folks...

A lot of deja vu in the book! What year was Waco? Waco and Branch Davidians kept running through my mind with the Govt response to the takeover. Its copywritten in '94 but that doesn't necessarily mean anything.

Also, anyone remember when that LA station was taken over? I think they just had the anchor read a statement on air but it was cut off by the network, so it only aired locally.

I have to admit this was the best of Spinrad's stuff that I have read so far.

More Deja Vu with the CIA threatenting to blow up the building and blame it on the terrorists themsleves if they do not surrender. It reminded me of the many 911 consipiracy theories flaoting about.

Again, deja vu with instapoll and our recent elections Exit Poll! I think the instapoll is a bit of unattainable tech. Instantaneous public response to events. Unless the public is Borg and they have implants, there is always going to be a time lag between a person deciding their opinion, dialing and getting through. The media and public response through some form of instapoll has been in two books of his I've read (Pink and Blue War).

A really enjoyable read! I was put off when the terrorists responded so readily to the attraction and offers of powerful media and I couldn't believe that they were really on the air all the way to the end. Carl's paranoia of all the CIA plants- I figured they had cut the transmission and had the Network manager playing along and how would they know the movie agent was real? Regardless, just suspend disbelief and enjoy the read.