Oscars are this weekend, and unfortunately The King's Speech is going to win Best Picture; mainly since David Fincher alienates Academy members much like Mark Zuckerberg alienates everyone. Then you've got Mr. Darcy, who's going to win an Academy Award for doing his best Simple Jack impression. If Jesse Eisenberg stuttered during Social Network, it's because he can't keep up with Aaron Sorkin's banter, not because he's trying to exaggerate historical inaccuracies for the sake of Oscar gold.
The Social Network was by far my favorite movie of the year, possibly decade (depending on whether the decade starts with year one or zero. Jack Black and Michael Cera say that it's year one, so I'm going to trust them on this.) I left the theater bruised and battered. I couldn't tell what I felt. Firstly, it's a fantastic movie. Secondably, I was demoralized since I a) didn't go to Harvard, b) come from money or c) am not good at math, which are the three keys to success, as per Sorkin.
Critics have said that the subject matter is too simple. It's a boy and his website, opting for simple storytelling and pushing the true conflict until the last ten minutes. It relies on dialogue rather than plot developments.
So how do you up the ante? How do you make this story into a gripping film that transcends genre-specific boundaries? Simple.
Every time they say "Facebook," insert "SkyNet."
"If you guys were really the inventors of Skynet, then you would have invented Skynet"
"Everyone on campus was using it. 'Skynet me' was a common expression."
"Drop the 'The.' Just "Skynet." It's cleaner."
"The rest of my attention is back at the offices of Skynet, where my colleagues and I are doing things that no one in this room are intellectually capable of doing."
"Let me tell you the difference between Skynet and everyone else. We don't crash. EVER!"
When viewed through this lens, Social Network is a beat-for-beat, chatty, walky and talky, pitch perfect prequel to the Terminator series. It's the story of a socially awkward outcast who creates a website. A website that brings the whole world together, linking people across continents. It is a giant, technologically brilliant creation that eventually overtakes the globe, rendering humanity dazed and dumb. It keeps spreading and growing, hunting down those who aren't a part of the system.
And Zuckerberg is left without any friends. That is, of course, until a Terminator arrives, sent by a future version of Zuckerberg to shut down his creation.
Intentionally or not, The Social Network was yet another entry in a long series of movies about the dangers of technology. We've seen enough movies about killer robots that take over society. The Matrix. Terminator. War Games. Battlestar Galactica. I, Robot. Short Circuit. 2001: A Space Odyssey. Neuromancer. Ghost in the Shell. Blade Runner. Hell, any drug-induced diatribe that Phillip K. Dick ever put onto paper. There are literally thousands of cautionary tales about what happens when mankind places too much faith and power into the hands of technology. And there has never been a scenario where it works out for the best.
So what does IBM do? They CREATE the damn robot that is destined to destroy the universe.
The first question they should have asked Watson was: You're in a desert, walking in the sand, when all of a sudden you look down and see a tortoise. He lays on its back, its belly baking in the hot son. And you're not helping it. Why?
And if that doesn't cause Watson to overheat and lash out in anger, here's your second question: How about putting TCU in the national title game?
Let me make one thing clear: Watson was never the underdog. IBM tried to pitch this competition as "Can we build a computer that can compete with the greatest human minds?" OF COURSE IT CAN! Wait. I'm sorry, "What is" OF COURSE IT CAN! Imagine if you have every encyclopedia in your memory banks and a mechanism that instantly buzz in? Watson doesn't have strong categories or weak categories. It's not as though his specialty is Beatles B-sides and he knows nothing about Constitutional philosophy leading up to the Civil War. He knows all and sees all. Not only did he hit all but one of the Daily Doubles, he undermined the sanctity of wagering with his inane "algorithm-based" wagers of $1,284.
Trivia is sacred, Watson. Go back to chess. Chess playing robot? Who cares. No one plays chess apart from men in their fifties and at risk youth in the projects.
Jennings should have snapped and knocked Watson's circuits out and prevented that menace from making a mockery of trivial pursuits.
Even though Watson was a humorless prick with no personality, he was still more likable than Brad Rutter (donating your winnings to your hometown library? Honestly?) or any of the Aspergers-lite mouth breathers on the Teen Tournament. In the final round, you have five weird foreign kids who have memorized their atlas and encyclopedia. You have the weird black power guy. The young Liz Lemon who fakes not knowing each answer. "Oh my god! How did I know that! PHEW! Boy was that tricky. Oh, Justin Timberlake for $400, please!"
The Battlestar Galactica finale (SPOILER ALERT, it sucked ass. SPOILER ALERT #2): ends with the crew destroying every last piece of technology by flying the Galactica into the sun. A truly awful way to end a show, but if it means that you're free of jackass computers like Watson? I might consider taking a page from Chief Tyrol and living alone in the highlands like a gruff, Cylon hermit.
Comments