Gameshow Jukebox

I like to start playlists with an atmospheric song, and Planet Earth does a really good job of setting the scene of an Earth devoid of humans after the Roboid invasion. Lines like ‘Is there anybody out their trying to get through?’ and ‘Can you hear me now?’ always remind me of Caleb’s series 1 opening broadcast, which is a common theme in this playlist.

This song was mainly chosen for aesthetic reasons. It’s a song about an apocalypse, and it has a very playful tone that I think matches Caleb’s energy. Also the line ‘a tournament, a tournament, a tournament of lies’ makes a good gameshow allusion.

‘Is there anybody alive out there?’ This song reminds me so much of Caleb’s opening broadcasts. Especially with the other mechanical imagery such as drones and satellites.

This song was chosen to represent five years Caleb spent hiding from the Roboidz in their own headquarters, even as they actively hunted him down. It’s again very playful and cocky, and definitely mimics the way he likes to taunt the Roboidz. Also the song's spoken lines feel very Neuros, especially with the ‘Perhaps there's a part of me in all of you’. It reminds me of the part in series 2 where she tries to convince Caleb he’s just as inhuman as she is.

I really wanted a song to represent Caleb’s amnesia, as it’s a big part of his character. So I chose one by one of my favourite artists. Don't worry, it's justified! It talks about actively trying to get the memory back, which Caleb does. There’s medical imagery, and his amnesia was caused by his illness. And while 2012 isn’t quite 2110… It’s close enough, right?

This is my default gameshow song and therefore ends up on most of my gameshow playlists. To me, it’s a song about kids forced to save the world when the adults failed, a song about working as a team and never giving up. I couldn’t not include it.
‘They left us alone, the kids in the dark, to burn out forever or light up a spark. We come together, state of the art. We’ll never surrender, the kids in the dark.’

This is another aesthetic one. There’s yet more radio imagery to match his broadcasts, and this song works well with Caleb’s self-given role of resistance leader. ‘For the life that's been deleted’ is a very robot-y line as well.

‘Is there anybody out there? Just like everybody out there. Just one somebody out there just like me?’ Another broadcast song. This one gets extra points because it’s partially sung to the narrator’s mother, and Caleb’s relationships with both Cybele and Neuros – the two halves of his mother - are very important to his character.

We’re moving on to cyborg angst songs now. ‘I'm half human and half machine’ is obviously Caleb, but the imagery of raw organs attached to machinery reminds me more of Neuros’ brain-in-a-biorod self. The songs also talks a lot about games, which works well for a gameshow. It also mentions players coming from miles away, and while it wasn’t exactly distance, the recruits certainly travelled a long way.

There are lots of little lyrics snippets that work well with Caleb here. ‘I know exactly why I walk and talk like a machine’ is more cyborg angst. ‘Maybe it is all a test’ is very gameshow-y. ‘If you are not very careful, your possessions will possess you’ pretty much sums up the Roboid rebellion. There’s also a heavy theme of destiny and having to succeed because there’s no other option, which works well with Caleb being the last human. ‘I feel like I'm the worst so I always act like I'm the best’ can be used to represent how he always seems upbeat and confident, an unshakable leader, with the recruits while struggling with his identity, humanity and guilt in private.

I couldn’t have a playlist about a robot adjacent character without including a song from the singing musical automatons themselves. They obviously have quite a few songs about being a robot, but this one fit the best. ‘Mecto Amore’ is too happy. ‘Automaton Electronic Harmonics’ is too hopeful. ‘Brass Goggles’ is too specific to SPG. ‘Only Human’ feels more like a song for the Roboidz. ‘Electricity is in my Soul’ has the right level of angst, but the song is more about someone else not understanding their cybernetics rather than the self-loathing Caleb feels. So it had to be Wired Wrong.

The singer also notes that they aren’t actually wired wrong, they just feel that way, which works really well with Caleb because there isn’t actually anything sinister about his cybernetics. They’re literally just medical aids. The angst comes from the fact he doesn’t know that and jumped straight to the idea he was a rejected Roboid experiment.

Also Laura Gant is very 2000's neurodivergent coded (Source: trust me) and this song is a mood.

I think this song really matches Caleb’s emotions at the end of series 2. There’s heavy apocalypse imagery. ‘My bitter heart is pumping oil into my veins’ reminds me of Caleb’s concern that he doesn’t "know what [he's] got inside [his] chest – a heart or a fuel pump". And ‘I’m nothing but a tin man, don’t feel any pain’ is pure cyborg angst.

Another song that links well to the heart or fuel pump quote: 'A lost little boy who's lost his heart, fear's not enough they have to tеar him apart'. Especially as Stuart Goldsmith deliberately played into how child-like Caleb is. 'Follow the scent of iron sinking deeper into corpsеs rotting' is a remarkably fitting description of the Shades. The iron in the song refers to blood, but for Mission: 2110 this is often true for metal iron. Finally 'And the hound is humming you a lie, a lullaby' refers to Cybele, who constantly lies to Caleb for her own comfort.

This song for me perfectly sums up Caleb and Laura/Neuros/Cybele’s relationship. ‘I was soaring ever higher but I flew too high’ reflects Laura Gant’s hubris when it came to creating the Roboidz. ‘Though my mind could think, I still was a mad man’ works really well for Neuros as the brain in the jar who lost her humanity. ‘Masquerading as a man with a reason’ feeds into Caleb’s insecurities about being human enough. ‘If I claim to be a wise man, well, it surely means that I don't know’represents every time Cybele has poised herself as a guide for Caleb, yet claimed not to have information that she does in order to control him. Unrelated to Caleb and Cybele, Futuregate being a series of cargo ships fits well with ‘Tossed about, I'm like a ship on the ocean’.

But most importantly, Cybele to Caleb: ‘Carry on, my wayward son. There'll be peace when you are done’. Because she knows that only he can undo her mistakes to save the world.

While I was creating this playlist, I came across a debate on whether a character playlist should be songs that remind the creator of a character or songs that the character would actually listen to. This playlist is firmly in former camp, but I did stop to think for a second about the music Caleb would listen to. And I’m sorry, but this was the first song that came to mind. I know it’s two minutes of just construction sounds, but he would listen to it, wouldn’t he. He canonically doesn't even know what music is! It’s perfect for him. I’m not wrong.

I like to start playlists with an atmospheric song, and Secret Worlds has a fantasy-esque sound to it that reminds me of Raven. The song itself is a dialogue between childhood friends and, modern elements aside, could work for Princess Erina and Raven (of Old).

There are many references to trees as being both important and magical, with 'Didn’t the trees tell us their stories? Yeah but we, we called them all liars' and then later 'Yeah but we, we though you were mental, you were talking to trees' (which could work as a reference to Haryad). And magical trees, such as the Great Oak and the Wisdom Tree, are both common and hold lots of lore relevance in the world of Raven.

There are a couple more line of relevance, with 'Over hedges we’d headlong and on ledges we’d land, and from every height I’d fall, I call, I reach out for your hand' and 'We climbed so high, high into the night' both reminding me of the challenges the warriors complete. 'We hear our legends, we hear them, they call' is one of the more fantastical lines of the song and reminds me of ‘The Call’ that summons the warriors to the tournaments.

As well as the fitting name, the song describes magical warriors standing against the forces of darkness, how they need to be strong, brave and never give up, and with the triumphant belief that 'We’re gonna win in the end'. If I had to select more fitting quotes, I would be forced to select the whole song. Despite being written for another show, it’s very Raven.

If you think I chose this song for Raven (of old) because it’s the credit song for Highlander, an 80’s film about an immortal Scottish warrior, you wouldn’t be entirely wrong. I do have some more lyrical evidence to support it.

There is the generic, I’m a badass fantasy warrior of great power protecting against the forces of evil lines: 'I am immortal, I have inside me blood of kings, I have no rival, no man can be my equal' and 'Fighting to survive in a war with the darkest powers' and 'I'm a man that will go far, find the moon and reach for the stars, with my sword and head held high'. The following line 'Gonna pass the test first time' reminds me of the challenges of the tournaments.

And perhaps the most literally fitting line: 'Watch this man fly!'

Also with a strong fantasy aesthetic, the song is from a parent to a child, but I like to apply it to the mentoring relationship between Raven of Old and Raven (of New). The first verse works as his perspective of her as a warrior, competing in and winning her tournament with the lines 'You were a wanderer, back when you were young' and 'You learned to fall, and balance on your own two feet'.

The second verse can be applied to him encouraging her to take up the mantle of the raven. 'Take the world by storm, muster all your strength. Embrace the forces that surround you, bend gravity and space'. I particularly like 'Open all the doors around you. Use your power in your lungs' as the first part can be applied to Raven (of Old)’s little used, less explained ability to pass through locked doors and the second referring to one of my favourite artistic decisions of the reboot, the modulation put on both Raven’s voices when they invoke their power.

And finally, the sentiment is most clear with the chorus line 'I could only lead you so far. I believe in who you are.'

Similarly to Warriors, this songs is full of fantasybabble about a brave, kind and powerful warrior queen, all of which can be applied to Raven (of New). While I could quote the whole song, there are a few I want to draw attention to.
Firstly, the incredibly fitting 'Got raven hair, as dark as night' describing the warriors appearance. Then there’s 'Looking out she calls… who will conquer all' referencing both the call that summons the warriors, and the tournament. The chorus line of 'Her name is, She, Queen of the Kings' works with her taking over from Raven of Old, the ‘queen’ with the power of the ‘king’. The fact a name isn’t actually given for the warrior is also oddly fitting, as Raven (of New) was given a warrior name at one point in production, but it didn’t end up being used as they thought it would take away from her being Raven.

Then there’s 'Nothing in this world can stop the spread of her wings' which works because, y’know, Bird. Again with 'Run the game, run the game' because she literally runs the game.

And on a more meta level 'Can’t stay the same in this world of change' to reflect the way the production team chose to give a role played by a white man to a woman of colour, a new Raven representing the diversity a the new generation.

This is my default gameshow song and therefore ends up on most of my gameshow playlists. To me, it’s a song about kids forced to save the world when the adults failed, a song about working as a team and never giving up. I couldn’t not include it.

‘They left us alone, the kids in the dark, to burn out forever or light up a spark. We come together, state of the art. We’ll never surrender, the kids in the dark.’

It may be the opening song from the 2024 Cbeebies pantomime, but it had to be included somehow because it’s technically James Mackenzie singing in character as Raven. Well, I guess it depends on whether you think ‘Snow Raven’ counts as Raven. In my eyes he’s definitely intended to be, which leads to some fascinating implications for the series canon, but I digress. The song is generic Scottish fantasy imagery so if you ignore its origin it doesn’t seem too out of place on this playlist.

‘There’s mist upon the glen, there’s snow upon the glade, where the tales are told, where the legends are made. I’ve travelled from the north, crossed mountains from the east, with my stories of old, that will never cease. Of wonder and dreams, of beauty and the beast.’

This song always reminds me of Wiley Sneak. 'Voice in my head will soon be fed, by the vultures that circle round the dead' describes his role as the one who lures in and captures the Unfortunates for the Voice to play with, and there are literally vultures circling the tower.
The chorus leads with 'In a crooked little town, they were lost and never found', which has a fairytale-esque cadence that fits the aesthetics of the show, while the Unfortunates that don’t manage to escape the tower would be considered lost and never found.
There are also lines that remind me of the sabotage and betrayal aspects of the show - 'I never once thought I’d ever be caught' and 'I left my best friends or did they just leave me'

While I know this song is about lesbians, the repeated lines of 'All the things she said, running through my head' do remind me a lot of the Voice. The various lines about it driving the singer mad/making them lose their minds, definitely remind me of Wiley Sneak, the Caretaker and the other tower residents.

'Everyone’s a bad guy, and there’s no way, no way of knowing who’s the worst.' A song about relative morality is perfect for Trapped! with its constant and necessary betrayal and the need for each player to put their self first.
'Which wolf wins, I guess it really depends… which one’s appetite’s the biggest?' matches with the fairytale aesthetic, especially with the many (were)wolves that can found within the tower – The Whinging Werewolf, the Moonhowler and one beneath Scarlet’s bed in The Wolf and The Nut. It also can be linked back to the competition of the show, as there is one way out and there can only be one winner.
'The devil sitting on my shoulder' sort of describes the Voice, as She offers malicious guidance, whispering right in your ear.
The line that reminds me the most of Wiley Sneak is 'Turns out I’m living in a horror film, where I’m both the killer and the final girl' as Wiley is both a villain, the one who captures the Unfortunates, and a victim as an Unfortunate himself.

This is very aesthetically Trapped!. A group of gremlins and ghouls gather together to go through a list of alphabetical names and describe how they died, in a very gruesome nursery rhyme. Even though the Unfortunates are trapped, instead of killed, it’s tonally fitting

The vulture imagery is mainly what earned this song its place on the playlist, although the pre-chorus line of 'Got a guilty conscience' does fit with the betrayal.