2000 AD Online Forum

If you put John Wagner, John Smith, Peter Milligan and Alan Moore in a room together and force-fed them dangerous quantities of drugs, could they come up with anything as mental as the "King of Pop"?

God he really is Wacko isn't

Clever doc that, you start off feeling sorry for him - beaten as a child and his obviously just a bit eccentric, then you start wavering - that hotel room full of strange dummies, then the doubts really start - the multi-million shopping trip, before horror at how he treats 'his' kids and how he laps up the fan worship and complete revulsion when you see how he treats other people's children...

It's a real gothic horror story...

And how come all his kids seem to be white?

Michael Jackson was black. He said the mothers of his kids were black (in a vague kind of way). His kids are white.

It's a miracle!

He really is Christ!

Hmmm... to be honest the whole documentary was kind of a set up, he was a bit like a po-faced Louis Theroux.  All the while gathering as much material as he could to make Jacko look like a fruitcake at the end, which lets face it isn't hard.  So he sucked up to him till the end when he knew he could have a pop, cos he wasn't going to be given another interview.

At least half of Jacksons weird things are weird things that lots of celebrities have done or anyone with two much money.  Admittedly they probably don't do as many weird things as Jackson, or to the same lengths...

E.g. Jackson collects memorabilia - ooh lets film it from a bizarre angle and make it look really sinister...

Jackson lives largely in his fabulous home and grounds...

Had kids via a surrogate parent

Had large amounts of plastic surgery

Altered their skin pigmentation.

Met Uri Geller

Dressed their children strangely.

Anyway the interview told us he was weird.  Okay, phew, thank the lord we found out!  Perhaps if he'd showed us some normal things Jacko did (if any) it might have had more point to it.

So far he's made his money by explotiing miserable princesses, capitalising on their death, the death of people by swimming pool, and the years of abuse of a that led to a young pop star growing up strange.  Is there nothing he'll do?  Why, he's worse than Hitler.

Anywayone want to have a guess at who he'll interview next?

George Bush?
"Dubya is a semi-literate fundamentalist looney" shock!

I think it showed Wacko for who/what he is...

>E.g. Jackson collects memorabilia - ooh lets film it from a bizarre angle and make it look really sinister...

You don't think have several life sizes weird models of people in a hotel room is'nt sinister

>Jackson lives largely in his fabulous home and
grounds...

Granted, I'm sure a lot of stars do that... but see below

>Had kids via a surrogate parent

Yeah, but he was very evasive/lied about it

>Had large amounts of plastic surgery

Err I think he's the most extreme case of surgery addiction among celebs.

>Altered their skin pigmentation.

Not many do it to his extent

>Met Uri Geller

Ah not just met but a friend of... and that's not mentioned in the film

>Dressed their children strangely.

Er putting masks on them in public but allowing them to be mobbed by photographers

>Perhaps if he'd showed us some normal things Jacko did (if any) it might have had more point to it.

I think the point was nothing was normal about his life

I think he gave Jackson more than enough rope to hang himself... nothing wrong with sleeping the same room/bed as a 12 year old boy? Come on, Wacko get some better PR advice.

Who's he gonna interview next, gotta be Townsend or Kelly

"At least half of Jacksons weird things are weird things that lots of celebrities have done or anyone with two much money. Admittedly they probably don't do as many weird things as Jackson, or to the same lengths..."

I did say that there Gary.  For example, I bet there's LOTS of famous people who have weird crap in their hotel rooms, do you really doubt that?

Yes, I added uri geller, I assumed it had been mentioned in the documentary.  Missed out there Bashir!  Ho-ho you're losing it my son.

Wouldn't disagree about the kids.  But then I'm not saying he isn't weird, he obviously is, and we didn't need the documentary to find that out.  

Not only white skin, but blond hair. How unlikely is that, even with mixed race parents (which he denies)?

The waxwork dummies remind me of a program about the nature of evil yesterday which told us of a British serial killer in the 70s who kept his corpses sitting round on chairs in the living room for when he got home from work. As a personality, the detective described him as "a bit of a bore".

ADE

Have to say when he said his missus gave him kids as a present i realised he truly lives up to the name wacko jacko.
Did anyone out there cringe when he spent all those millions on crap?
You could see the shop assistant rubbing his hands as jacko bought half the shop.
 

Yeah, I remember Dennis Nielsen being caught. There's a real fascination with insanity when the rock gets lifted, and what's squirming beneath is caught in the glare of a billion flashbulbs. The common symptoms are isolation, total charisma bypass, and everyone gawping when you're found out.

In fairness, Jackson's just a rich idiot. A man who really is his public persona, a product of lifelong scrutiny, na?ve enough to think that indulging his fantasies will be understood and appreciated blah blah blah. Yet his behaviour is just the same as what might be going on anonymously in isolation at the end of YOUR street. Only the proximity somehow deems it banal and ordinary. In Tinseltown, it's a joke. Meanwhile, out in the suburbs it's left to fester into something extreme.

Substituting real people for inanimate objects, kids. Don't do it!

But Paul, there's weird/eccentric due to having too much money, which many celebs 'suffer' from up to a point, and then there's THAT.

Surely such wackiness becomes much more concerning when the nut in question is paying to have kids as toys/gifts/accesories. Is he really what you'd consider a fit parent?

I thought the doc. did a good job of highlighting what we already know about Jackson, which it had to do for a bit of entertainment, and then showing some of the more worrying stuff which until this point was only tabloid hearsay.

mat

"Is he really what you'd consider a fit parent?"

You misunderstand me Mat, I don't believe anything of the sort.  Then again there are much worse parents in the world.  For all we know, despite Jacksons eccentricities (not that I count sleeping with other peoples kids an eccentricity, more something worthy of a police investigation)  those kids may grow up to be perfectly (or relatively) normal.  Well, we can hope.

As far as I know Jodie Foster paid to have a surrogate father (this is just of course tabloid crap I've heard, I don't really know) and they won't be the first pop start actor/who have had kids like that, or in fact many 'normal' people, and they do it for various, possibly selfish reasons.

It was just a freak show, which of course is always entertaining, because we feel more normal for it. I'm not defending the bloke, and I'm no fan, but almost all of his behaviour is present in other rich and famous people.

bizarre trully bizarre but saying that john smith wrote revere 3 when he was drugs did he not?

but anyway yes i officially state that the name wacko jacko seems to be more true than ever

Oh yeah I'm saying that there are others who have enough money to allow themselves to live in a fantasy land... it's just in Jackson's case it's so extreme.

I'm sure many people have strange things in their bedrooms (in my case lots of books and comics) but if I had a documentary crew coming round I would at least tidy up a bit.

Jackson has spent his life isolated by money, surrounded by yes men, hounded by the press and adoring fans after a some-what traumatic childhood. It's not really a surprise he's as mad as a hatter. And that many others with similar life styles and similar backgrounds are similarly mad.

Apprently Uri set up the interview so I assume that's why he was not mentioned.

I think the main thing that Bashir exposed was that even after the previous court case Jackson seems to have learnt nothing.

 Waht I found more disturbing than his eccentricity was the way he told fairly huge lies and expected to be believed, prticularly I had only 2 operations anfd they were to help me breathe, my blonde babies mother was black.I got the impression that his money has bought him the right in his mind to shape reality to his own tastes, and I found that very disturbing.

Yeah exactly... he seemed to say "I'm not gonna die" with a strange amount of conviction as well.

He does indeed seem to have constructed, both physically and mentally, a fantasy world that he does/can not let reality intrude into.

I suppose many people do this but Jackos hudge wealth and fame has allowed his mental pathologies to be constructed in the real world casuing a feedback loop that reinforces his warped self-image... hence Peter Pan has his own Neverland, a cartoon unaging face and his 'lost' boys...

I couldn't bring myself to watch a show about a guy who once delivered one of pops greatest albums(Off The Wall) and what he is today.

He's been a joke for years, and I find it a little disturbing that he still provides entertainment for some of the record buying public.

Some say he's all white now though.

Ed

Link: http://www.dotmusic.com/specials/brits2001/britmoments.asp

ooh! Its on ITV2 again tonight at 9!

Fair enough the lad obviously has problems,but I thought it was a highly manipulative piece of television and Martin Bashir should be ashamed of himself.I thought of two things when I saw it:
1 Howard Hughes
2 That Dredd story from the early 500s where "Jaxon Prince" the 20th century pop star is awakened from botched cryogenic process.Its so funny.
Rilluuuhh...Rilluuuuhh...

Martin Bashir is trying to lign up John Lesley for his next interview.  What a media slag.