Security News > 2011 > April > Hacker Sitcom Breaking In Taps Espionage-Lite Trend

http://www.wired.com/underwire/2011/04/hacker-sitcom-breaking-in/ By Hugh Hart Underwire Wired.com April 6, 2011 The hackers in new comedy Breaking In look as though they spend more time at the gym than they do hunched over a computer. Hollywood-handsome, these sitcom tech wizards may not walk the awkward nerd walk, but they do get to work in an office anchored by Captain Kirk’s Star Trek chair. Debuting Wednesday, Breaking In centers on geeky high-tech consultants hired by clients to detect breaches in their security systems. In an era rife with institutional larceny, leaky intelligence and high-level buffoonery, it’s one of several TV shows that are in no mood to present espionage in an entirely serious light. NBC’s Chuck, for example, casts an everyday schlub as a key player in intelligence operations. CBS’ new dramedy Chaos, titled in homage to Maxwell Smart’s nemeses at KAOS, offers up operatives practiced in the craft of cynical asides. FX Network’s animated Archer showcases doofus spies, while USA Network’s Burn Notice equips its former CIA agents with expertise in pyrotechnics, surveillance and wisecracks. They all operate in the somber shadow of 24’s relentless antiterrorist Jack Bauer, the grim character whose exploits defined for nearly a decade the deadly earnest anxieties faced by Americans in the early post-9/11 years. But the strain of eternal vigilance took its toll by the time Fox’s action series ended its run last May. Now espionage programs lean on goofy, Get Smart-style attitude more than earnest patriotism. [...]

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