'15 Million Merits' theoretical approach; Googan, Baudrillard and Kane.

'Capitalism has reinforced its control over the masses through the transformation of culture as a whole into a commodity- something to be bought and sold. Thus the spectacle is not so much a set of particular culture or media events and images,- like say the X factor final-but characterizes the entire social world today as an illusion, a separation form, or masking of, real life.' - Mick Googan.
This theory can be applied to 15 Million Merits as all characters within the series have no understanding of reality, they all live in a place that is very different from real life, everything that they know is that they have to ride bikes to earn merits, which they spend on advertising, food and other consuming products, the outside world to them is an illusion, but to the audiences, the world they live in is an illusion, everything they do and know is to earn merits. With the talent competition 'Hot Shot', it is a ticket out of ridding the bikes, and as an audience we feel that they will be able to go back into the 'real world' but at the end, we see that Bing, the main character has only become part of the system and what he sees is only a simulation of the real world. This links in with my next theorist, Baudrillard, who said that 'We live in a world where there is more and more information, and less and less meaning' this applies to the program as the characters lives have become insignificant to everyone around them, they are absorbed in the hyperreal and simulated world that they live in, that they do not realise that everything that they consume has more meaning than their lives do. Baudrillard also came up with the theories of 'hyperreality' and 'simulacra' in 15 Million Merits these two theories become apparent within the first couple of minutes. They live in a simulated world as everything they consume is not for them, but for the 'avatars' they create to represent themselves, they can improve these avatars by changing their style, and what they look like, for example, the oriental girl in 15 Million merits,  makes her avatar look different to what she actually looks like in reality, by giving it piercings and blue streaks in its hair, even though she does not resemble that in the slightest. 15MM is also very hyperreal, as the reality we live in as consumers is very different to what they perceive the world as. Everything is very futuristic and hyperreal, something we haven't encountered or experienced yet. Examples of the hyperreality aspects are that they can control what they want to watch, and do everything like showering, eating food and watching what they want through technology. 


'The reality television phenomenon is a collective expression of our panoptic transition, and in being so offers a glimpse into the different potential futures that postmodernism can take. What is reality television then, and what makes it so appealing? Reality television occurs when Regular Joe people like you or me, play themselves on TV. Of course this alone would be boring. So reality television consists of putting ordinary people into extraordinary and unexpected situations. Why is this interesting to others? I believe this is interesting to others because the watcher of reality television performs an immediate reflexivity in which the watcher becomes, in their own mind, the watched.' - Joshua Kane. 
This theory strongly relates to 15MM as they are constantly being watched on their actions, what they are doing or if they are doing something wrong, a good example of this is when Bing is in his room and because he does not want to watch something he covers his eyes, but due to the fact that people/someone is watching him, they pause it until he stops, and is forced to carry on. Another example of Panoptic is when Bing and Abbie are waiting for the audition at 'Hot Shot' but she gets pushed forward as they like the look of her and can see her, it isn't down to her potential talent, it is because she fits in with the society and can be used somewhere else within this simulated world, for 'better use'. 


Looking through all three quotes, I agree that 15 million merits is extremely hyperreal and has many aspects to it that make it a postmodern media text. The use of simulacra and hyperreality give it a unique image but as well as this we have seen it before, in films such as Star Wars and The Minority Report. It also has an underlying story line of 'girl likes boy, boy likes somebody else' which is used in nearly all films and TV series'. So 15 million merits is a post modern text in many ways.