EPISODE 124 - Hackers

[Blast Hardcheese 636]

Could the entire movie be 12 year-old Dade's fantasy? Like, he's just some average, insignificant kid, and this is the world he dreams up for his older, teenage self?

[taylor anne photo 11311]

I have to point this out because it's driving me crazy and my fellow comedy nerd coworker is having to calm me down every time it happens.

 

There is another department in our office that's near mine but not really connected to us so we can hear their conversations but it's not really well laid out to contribute to them. And for the last 15 minutes I've had to hear them talk about Comedy Bang Bang but 1. Say Reggie Williams instead of Watts and 2. Not pronounce Aukerman correctly.

 

Someone save me from this hell I am currently in because it's actually my birthday and I don't deserve such torture.

[Cameron H. 23786]

I have to point this out because it's driving me crazy and my fellow comedy nerd coworker is having to calm me down every time it happens.

 

There is another department in our office that's near mine but not really connected to us so we can hear their conversations but it's not really well laid out to contribute to them. And for the last 15 minutes I've had to hear them talk about Comedy Bang Bang but 1. Say Reggie Williams instead of Watts and 2. Not pronounce Aukerman correctly.

 

Someone save me from this hell I am currently in because it's actually my birthday and I don't deserve such torture.

 

Oh, Fuuuuuuuuck! I'm on my way. In the meantime, here's what you have to do:

 

 

Happy Birthday!

[taylor anne photo 11311]

 

Oh, Fuuuuuuuuck! I'm on my way. In the meantime, here's what you have to do:

 

 

Happy Birthday!

I swear every time I watched that gif I straight up thought he was using his claws lol. Which would be more deserved than just a punching, honestly.

 

Thank you!

 

EDIT: They couldn't remember the title "Between Two Ferns"

 

This is my hell.

[FisterRoboto 7499]

I couldn't agree more. I never had any intention of watching it in the theaters, but was going to watch it when it came out on Amazon. Now--I'm not so sure I'm even going to do that. The whole thing just looks so doofy.

Honestly, the only thing that was keeping me mildly interested was to see Eisenberg's Luthor. I thought he was going to play it more like his Zuckerberg, so it's very disappointing to see him basically be pre-Riddler Jim Carrey from Batman Forever. Maybe Gal Gadot will at least be awesome.

 

Someone save me from this hell I am currently in because it's actually my birthday and I don't deserve such torture.

[taylor anne photo 11311]

Honestly, the only thing that was keeping me mildly interested was to see Eisenberg's Luthor. I thought he was going to play it more like his Zuckerberg, so it's very disappointing to see him basically be pre-Riddler Jim Carrey from Batman Forever. Maybe Gal Gadot will at least be awesome.

 

 

I'm actually happy that he isn't doing another Zuckerberg. It would feel like they just want to have him stay in his comfort zone but it would stick out with all of the fantastical things literally and metaphorically flying around. I'm still kinda meh about literally everything DC does theatrically but they'll still probably get my money because I can't /not/ see it.

 

Also, I give thanks.

[Cameron H. 23786]

Honestly, the only thing that was keeping me mildly interested was to see Eisenberg's Luthor. I thought he was going to play it more like his Zuckerberg, so it's very disappointing to see him basically be pre-Riddler Jim Carrey from Batman Forever. Maybe Gal Gadot will at least be awesome.

 

Yeah, I knew he said in interviews that he was going to do his own take, but damn, he went way off the reservation.

 

Also, isn't it weird that the trailer just kind of starts without any studio credits? I honestly thought I was watching a commercial for cologne or something when it first started. Also, thanks for pulling an anti-Force Awakens and give away a shit ton of the plot. I mean, I didn't expect to be shocked by anything, but they could have held a little bit back. I watch that trailer and I'm like, "Do I even need to see it now?" Batman and Superman's conflict doesn't even seem that interesting.

 

It's also funny how DC films try to stay grounded in reality, but look ridiculous, while Marvel is embracing all it's craziness and makes things like the fight between Cap, Iron Man, and the Winter Soldier at the end of the Civil War trailer look brutal as shit.

 

[wakefresh 689]

Oh man, I love that they did this crazy movie. I'll say just three things.

 

1) The casting for this movie is all of, save for Matthew Lillard. For the most part, hackers do not look like the lead or like Angelina Jolie at all. They look like Wayne Knight from Jurassic Park. I would say that character from Jurassic Park is the most realistic portrayal of a hacker -- a guy who looks like he his dumped upon that has a specialized knowledge that he will use to fuck you over with.

 

2) The "hacking" that is going on this movie is silly as shit and makes no fucking sense at all. Mr. Robot, another story about hackers, is very popular and I think a part of that reason is because it has a semi-realistic portrayal of hacking. It's using Linux command line. It's using pen-testing tools or pen-testing OS like Kali/Backtrace. It's very boring and uncinematic.

 

Movies have a language and they have yet to accurately capture this action in a way that is visually compelling. Mr. Robot comes close, but they don't really focus on the act itself and instead focus on the aftermath of getting the information or the aftermath of being denied the information.

 

3) Hacking does change your mind. As a programmer, I sit in front of the computer for long stretches writing code and the visualization of what is going on in Johnny Lee Miller's head is spot on. I, for one, see fast cuts of old TV shows like Sanford and Son, Martin, and In Living Color. You haven't lived until you see a "Fire Marshal Bill" sketch with an anonymous function pasted over all over Carey's face.

[JoelSchlosberg 352]

 

It's more a nod to the man who started and runs the magazine "2600: The Hacker's Quarterly." Though it is not his REAL name, he goes by the name "Emannuel Goldstein" which he took from the character in 1984. He is listed in the credits as one of the hacking consultants for the film.

 

-Piz

 

He also appears extensively in the Blu-ray's behind-the-scenes documentary. And a copy of 2600 magazine is visible in the movie.

[JoelSchlosberg 352]

It's also worth mentioning that the general premise of the film is based on reality. One could actually make free phone calls through pay phones by blowing a whistle from the Captain Crunch cereal box into the receiver. Incidentally, the man who discovered this, John Draper, was a friends with Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs.

 

Moreover, Wozniak and Jobs started out by selling devices to make free phone calls:

http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2012/10/steve-jobs-first-business-was-selling-blue-boxes-that-allowed-users-to-get-free-phone-service-illegally/

[JoelSchlosberg 352]

3. Angelina Jolie's "subway defense system" is a flare gun. Convenient to shoot security guards at mining companies, but HIGHLY inconvenient for the subway. Flare guns only have one shot. If someone attacks her on the train, given that she doesn't miss her ONE SHOT, the train is now full of smoke and fire, and you can't just leave a moving train.

 

In the Blu-ray extras, Emmanuel Goldstein (the editor of 2600 magazine, not the character in the movie) insists that it's part of the director's intent to get the hacker scene "completely accurate": "There are things like the flare gun incident. That was real. That really happened."

[JoelSchlosberg 352]

It turns out LOVE is a more popular password than you think. On a podcast called We Have Concerns, Episode entitled Past Word Passwords they discuss a Russian hacker who posted 32 million passwords from a company called Rockyou. The fifth most used password was "iloveyou."

 

When the movie lists the most common passwords, I was surprised that none of them turned out to be a simple multiword phrase, like the still-common "letmein".

[JoelSchlosberg 352]

I don't know that it accounts for him being credited so early, but Penn was probably better known than most of the cast (except Lorraine Bracco) at the time. He and Teller had been doing their shows for over a decade at that point. He was also well-known in computer geek circles for his monthly column in PC/Computing Magazine.

 

On the Blu-ray special features, one of the hacking consultants says that he met Penn Jillette after winning a contest where Penn challenged hackers who read his column to hack into his personal computer.

[JoelSchlosberg 352]

Re the guy visualizing movie clips, I took that it was supposed to suggest a free-association thinking style in line with hyperlinks and the nonlinear nature of computer multimedia, as opposed to the linear nature of traditional media.

[sethersmith 11]

Oh man, I love that they did this crazy movie. I'll say just three things.

 

1) The casting for this movie is all of, save for Matthew Lillard. For the most part, hackers do not look like the lead or like Angelina Jolie at all. They look like Wayne Knight from Jurassic Park. I would say that character from Jurassic Park is the most realistic portrayal of a hacker -- a guy who looks like he his dumped upon that has a specialized knowledge that he will use to fuck you over with.

 

2) The "hacking" that is going on this movie is silly as shit and makes no fucking sense at all. Mr. Robot, another story about hackers, is very popular and I think a part of that reason is because it has a semi-realistic portrayal of hacking. It's using Linux command line. It's using pen-testing tools or pen-testing OS like Kali/Backtrace. It's very boring and uncinematic.

 

Movies have a language and they have yet to accurately capture this action in a way that is visually compelling. Mr. Robot comes close, but they don't really focus on the act itself and instead focus on the aftermath of getting the information or the aftermath of being denied the information.

 

3) Hacking does change your mind. As a programmer, I sit in front of the computer for long stretches writing code and the visualization of what is going on in Johnny Lee Miller's head is spot on. I, for one, see fast cuts of old TV shows like Sanford and Son, Martin, and In Living Color. You haven't lived until you see a "Fire Marshal Bill" sketch with an anonymous function pasted over all over Carey's face.

 

Good points! And the main kind of "hacking" they do in this, or at least the one that gets them in trouble, is just logging in with someone username and guessing the password. This has got to be the easiest "hacking" of all, requiring no skill at all, and yet Joey "hacks" the gibson with this and everyone is "impressed."

[RyanSz 3140]

Since it's Thursday and we're all just really waiting for the mini-ep to come out, did anyone see the new Batman v Superman trailer yet? It's kind of awful.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fis-9Zqu2Ro

Guess I'm going to be in the minority on this but I'm excited for this movie, as it appears to be blending the best of a few great storylines together, albeit rushing some things together. The first part of the trailer very much came off like Luthor by Brian Azzarello where Superman was new to the world and Bruce Wayne had a Luthor-esque xenophobe mentatlity to him, the middle is Dark Knight Returns given the fights between the two with Luthor playing them off against each other, with the third mixing the Trinity stories and Doomsday. I wouldn't say DC grounded their movies in realism outside of the Nolan Batman films but I can understand why people are against the gritty tone the recent films have taken. Only recently Superman has been more about his mindset and how he deals with these godlike powers that he has, prior he was always the boyscout who wouldn't hurt a fly say some (ignoring many Superman stories where he DID kill).

 

That's not to say that I'm going in without hesitation, Eisenberg's Luthor gives me pause for concern though I'm suspecting the aloof version in the beginning of the trailer is an act to cover the more sinister side of himself. The problem now with movies of any fandom is the fandom itself I feel. The phrase "this is why we can't have nice things" comes to my mind as it basically becomes and us vs. them scenario where Marvel fanboys are attacking DC fanboys and vice versa so that in the end no one can really just go into a movie to enjoy it. I'm not saying that's what it is here but shit once a single trailer hits you become inundated with the pros and cons and it makes it not fun. I'll give any movie a shot, hell I saw Fantastic Four in theaters on the first day, and if it's a bag of shit I'll say so.

 

The recent run of The Walking Dead is another example, there were numerous articles where people were saying the show should lose half its audience because they didn't like ONE episode because it didn't live up to whatever expectations that they had. Others were saying they deserve better because they watch the show, which to me is like people here that used to complain about the show changed theme songs or skipped a week due to scheduling issues, and that the hosts need to do something about the free podcast that they are giving to us.

[EllenM 943]

Here are my Thursday discussion points:

 

In Rankin and Bass' holiday classic Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, Hermey the Elf tells his boss he doesn't want to make toys, but would rather be a dentist, at which point his boss flips his motherfucking shit. After some light psychological abuse, his boss then screams, "Now, listen, you. You're an elf and you make toys!" and then adds "Now finish the job, or your fired!" but... isn't that what Hermey wants? Is the concept of being fired different for elves? Are they going to literally set Hermey on fire? Guys! Are the elves going to straight up kill Hermey?!?!?

 

 

A couple other notes:

 

Apparently, between Christmases, the elves go through something called "elf improvement" in which they "practice" being elves. Am I the crazy one or does that sound insane? Does this make me a terrible person? Because I can say with certainty that I've never been to a single "Human lesson."

 

And finally, Santa is kind of a dick. The elves write and sing what is basically a laudatory psalm of praise for the big man in red and that motherfucker could not be bothered. Hey, dipshit, I know I may be risking a lump of coal here, but a simple "Thank you" goes a long way.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DbxcHVmdJos

 

(I just introduced my son to this movie. It's been on non-stop. I have no one else to blame but myself, but seriously...Help me.)

The Rankin and Bass special that is my favourite is Jack Frost. I had a huge crush on him. Also crushed hard on young, ginger Kris Kringle.

 

[JoelSchlosberg 352]

Angelina's fashion choice was clear - she's a hacker/nerd, so naturally, she'd cosplay as T'Pol from Star Trek: Enterprise a good decade before the show is even created.

 

 

I was getting flashbacks to a different Trek character:

 

 

[Geans 193]

I completely enjoyed this movie. Somehow I'd never seen it before. I paused it and downloaded the soundtrack at like 20 minutes in. I was in prime teenage years in 1995, so there was a nostalgia overload going on.

 

The oral history said that with the costuming, they were going for "what kids would be wearing 15 minutes from now," so in a way the rash guard top made sense because I had surfer-inspired clothes and wetsuit-material clothes (I was nowhere near a beach, but the mall had a Pac-Sun).

[Pizmeyre 12]

 

I love Steve Mann, I've been a fan of his since the early 90s when I first had heard about him on PBS, some computer show about him. he is amazing.

 

Yep. That would be Scientific American Frontiers, which is exactly where I first learned of him as well. lol

 

-Pizmeyre

 

Also, if anyone sees this, the emphasis is on Piz, not on meyre...

[Mr. Monster 20]

The thing with using a tape recorder to get free phone calls must have been a nod to John Draper AKA Captain Crunch.

[•keenan• 14]

No one seemed to notice Urban Dance Squad tearin' the roof off the mutha there near the end so here's that song in it's entirety:

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iDNNX-jZKyA

[PeterSheldon 49]

Forgot to post this in the forum

[LoriMoore 0]

[Reptarftw 27]

Anyone suggesting the writers of Hackers didn't know dick about the internet really needed to be listening to the GOP debate tonight. Holy shit, was the collective understanding of how the internet works well-rooted in the kinds of ideas that informed movies like this and The Net.