Buster Friendly and Wilbur Mercer
Buster Friendly, the relentlessly cheerful television host whose show saturates Earth and the colony planets, systematically undermines the religious foundation of Mercerism through a carefully prepared exposé, revealing that the figure of Wilbur Mercer is a fraud—a bit actor on a painted sound stage—and thereby exposing the manufactured nature of the empathy experience that binds human society.
The Host and His Reach
Buster Friendly and His Friendly Friends is the dominant entertainment program of the post-war world, broadcast via satellite across Earth and beamed to the colony planets, including Mars. The show runs twenty-three hours a day, seven days a week, and its host is a figure of immense, almost supernatural ubiquity. John Isidore, a special who lives in a nearly abandoned apartment building, watches Buster every morning and again at night while eating dinner, and his TV set, though partly broken, picks up only the government channel, which frequently carries Buster's program. The show's guests, such as the actress Amanda Werner, appear with such regularity—as much as seventy hours a week—that Isidore marvels at how they never repeat themselves. Buster's voice booms into the Deckard household as well; Rick Deckard turns up the TV sound to fill the room during an argument with his wife Iran, and Buster's voice announces the day's fallout forecast. The host's influence is so pervasive that even the Salander 3, had it reached Proxima, would have found the Buster Friendly Show awaiting its passengers.
The Undermining of Mercerism
Despite his cheerful persona, Buster Friendly harbors a persistent hostility toward Mercerism. John Isidore notices that in subtle, almost inconspicuous ways, Buster ridicules the empathy boxes. During one broadcast, Buster jokes about climbing a mountain with bottles of beer, a clear parody of Mercer's ascent, and the studio audience laughs. Isidore feels baffled and impotent rage, and he later tells his boss Hannibal Sloat that Buster and Mercer are fighting for control of their psychic selves. Sloat agrees, adding grimly that Buster is winning. The tension between the two figures is not merely comedic; it represents a struggle for the minds of the populace, with Buster's relentless entertainment competing against the fusion experience of the empathy box.
The Exposé
Buster Friendly's campaign against Mercerism culminates in a carefully documented exposé that he has been teasing for hours. On the night of January 3, 1992, he finally reveals his findings. With the help of his research staff, led by Earl Parameter, Buster presents enlarged video images that show the gray backdrop of sky and daytime moon against which Mercer moves is not only not Terran—it is artificial. The moon is painted, with brushstrokes visible under magnification. The scraggly weeds, the sterile soil, and even the stones hurled at Mercer are equally faked; the stones are made of soft plastic, causing no authentic wounds. Buster announces that Wilbur Mercer is not suffering at all. His team has tracked down a former Hollywood special-effects man, Wade Cortot, who recognizes the stage as one used by a now-defunct minor moviemaker. They then locate an elderly bit player named Al Jarry, who made a series of short fifteen-minute video films for an employer he never met. The rocks were rubber-like plastic, the blood was catsup, and the only suffering Jarry underwent was going an entire day without a shot of whisky. Buster concludes, "Mercerism is a swindle!"
The Aftermath and Revelation of Buster's Nature
The exposé is heard by nearly every human in the system. In John Isidore's apartment, the three androids—Roy Baty, Irmgard Baty, and Pris Stratton—watch with satisfaction. Roy Baty declares that it is done, that the whole experience of empathy is a swindle. Pris then reveals that they have waited for months for this moment, and she adds that Buster Friendly is one of them: an android. Irmgard Baty confirms that no humans know this. The revelation that the most popular entertainer in the solar system is himself an android—a machine incapable of the empathy he has just debunked—adds a final, ironic layer to his attack on Mercerism. Buster's exposé, though factually accurate from a certain perspective, is itself a weapon wielded by the very beings who cannot participate in the fusion experience he has discredited.
