Hacking is Magic!
I’ve been trying to put my finger on what bothers me about Agents of SHIELD.
Well, that’s not entirely true. I feel profound irritation every time they dismiss the existence of powers like telekinesis, telepathy, E.S.P. and other psychic phenomena. This show is supposed to take place in the Marvel Universe, a place chock full of psychic powers, not some kind of X-Files show-me universe.
I try to give them slack for that, though, assuming that the audience is being set up for a shocking revelation that all these things are real!*
But there’s been something else bugging me about it, and I think it comes down to the super-hacker character, who can slice into anything, anytime, anywhere. S.H.I.E.L.D. has no hackers than can begin to compare to her. Heck, from what we’ve seen on screen, S.H.I.E.L.D. doesn’t have any hackers, apart from her.
That realization pointed me to the answer: hacking is magic.
She never has to deal with signal issues, or download bottlenecks. Not so much as a dropped packet could hold her back.
It hardly seems like technology at all, the way it works out on the screen. Look at the scientists on the show for comparison. They develop new toys, and need time and iterations to make these new toys work right.
But the hacker? She can give someone else a flash drive to plug into a USB port that will download hundreds, maybe thousands of files from a variety of directories (without prior access to their file organization system) in seconds. She faces no limitations or obstacles except those that the plot requires to keep her from solving all the problems in the first five minutes of the show.
And I don’t think this is only true for Agents of SHIELD. Most modern shows have some character who is an eccentric outsider who speaks the arcane language of technology, who can wave a keyboard and conjure forth occult secrets from the aether.
Now, there has been a realism gap in computing on screen as long as movies and television have been portraying programming and hacking. But that makes sense. Why should its portrayal be any more accurate than the way the screen portrays the military, law enforcement, the legal professions, the medical professions, or fiction writing?
I’m not saying they should. These are dramatic portrayals, and no one wants to watch, say, the way an actual criminal trial would play out, or the reams of paperwork that make up most policemen’s work days.
Actual hacking would be boring to watch.
But here’s the thing: these shows have several lawyers or police officers or doctors or forensic scientists. Yet they tend to have one hacker / tech expert. This person, unlike the others, does not struggle past problems intrinsic to his/her profession. That is not that character’s role. That person is there to provide answers, to perform miracles.
In fantasy that character would be a wizard. But in a contemporary or SF show?
Hackers are wizards.
What do you think? Am I on to something here, or do you see it another way?
*No. I don’t really believe it will happen. But it would work.
