Roll through the interactive graphic below to discover which spy frames are employed in popular TV shows and movies.
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WASHINGTON—In the mid-90s a female freshman at a college in Los Angeles was approached by the U.S. government and offered a job as an undercover agent for the CIA.
It was during the fall of my freshman year, a man approached me he told me that the U.S. government might be interested in talking to me about a job
When I asked, “Why me?” all he told me was that I fit a profile.
Seven years later her fiancé is assassinated after illegal telephone surveillance picks up a voicemail left by him saying that he’ll love her forever, regardless of her profession.
Why was I selected, what profile did I fit?
She asks herself these questions as she struggles to stay alive while discovering rampant terrorist activity and government corruption in the agency she thought was benefiting her country.
The this intelligence officer is the fictional Sidney Bristow in the television show Alias, (2001-2006), with its horrific conspiracy overtones and just the right amount of science-fiction color.
But while the story arc and many plot elements are fictionalized, they are not wholly rooted in fantasy. When the pilot episode aired on Sept. 30, 2001—just 19 days after the attack on the World Trade Center—the United States was in a heightened state of security, paranoia and patriotism. When the call from Bristow’s fiancé, Danny, is picked up, the surveillance is shown through a frightening montage of keyword recognition, satellite and radio receptor dishes, lackey’s sitting in a dark room and then finally the call to an agency superior who makes the decision to facilitate Danny’s murder.
Spying on American citizens? Outlandish.
Well actually, no.
Pre-cursor legislation for the PATRIOT Act, which gave U.S. intelligence and law enforcement agencies unprecedented abilities to spy on U.S. citizens without warrants, was likely under way during the first season of Alias, legislation that would legalize something not completely removed from the techniques used to intercept Danny’s voice message.
Fictionalized government conspiracy and corruption themes are nothing new to popular television shows and movies. The eight examples listed here from around 2001 villianize in some way real-life government agency and program counterparts.
And while these conspiracies may seem frighteningly real on the screen, often the extent of power and violation of human rights are blown out of proportion said Assistant Professor Micah Sherr of Georgetown University’s Department of Computer Science.
“Although I’m also not an expert on media or film, I do feel comfortable stating that Hollywood often misrepresents and/or sensationalizes science and technology,” Sherr said in an e-mail interview.
But sometimes, these outlandish plot devices are spurred by real reports of government misbehavior.
“Most of what a lot of people know about organizations like the CIA is what they see on fictionalized stories in films and on TV; often those representations have negative and conspiratorial elements. This situation may frame the way some people perceive these organizations and the security strategies they use, but it’s not only fictional programming at play here. The stories we hear on the news about these subjects also tend to air when irregularities are being reported,” said Professor Robert J. Thompson, director of the Bleier Center for Television and Popular Culture at Syracuse University.
If anything, taken with a grain of rationality, these television shows and movies can be viewed as an inflammatory crash course in government hierarchy and conspiracies.
Oh yea, they go great with popcorn too.
