The whole “geek factor” has become the backbone of many leading crime dramas – CSI: Cyber drives this fact home even further, writes Debashine Thangevelo
TV HAS had a huge impact on influencing subculture and, as such, moulding perceptions, too. One evident trend over the years, especially where dramas – particularly of the procedural ilk – are concerned, has been the birth of the geek era, so to speak. They have become the backbone of hit shows like Criminal Minds, CSI, NCIS, The Blacklist, The Newsroom and The Fixer.
No longer is it a slur on your character to be a geek. In fact, the whole idea has morphed and, simply put, nerdy is the new sexy.
We have seen this trend manifested in a plethora of shows. If you want to talk about the perfect posterboy for the archetypal geek, it is Special Agent Dr Spencer Reid (played brilliantly by Matthew Gray Gubler) in Criminal Minds.
Someone with his disposition would be classed a social pariah. But that’s a rather antiquated view in this day and age, with smart being the new currency on TV and in real life.
With an IQ of 187 and an eidetic memory that puts Mike Ross (Suits) to shame, he is also a conduit of useful and useless information. He’s a sponge; he just soaks it all up.
What’s exciting, though, is that there isn’t a standard blueprint for geeky characters.
And Eric Beale from NCIS: LA is indicative of this personality polarity. His wardrobe is more surfer boy than the sanctioned suit and tie. In fact, anything formal leaves him claustrophobic. The only nerdish telltales are his glasses and genius with a computer. Like Kim Kardashian (or should I say, her skilful butt), he, too, can break the internet.
The Blacklist writers made things a little bit more interesting. They defiantly cast Amir Arison to play Aram Mojtabai, an FBI computer specialist. A Muslim who is a friend and not a foe? How shocking indeed!
This rise of the geeks has proved to be as huge a drawcard with audiences as the birth of female protagonists.
Naturally, a show like CSI: Cyber also comes to the party – after all, it does live in their playground. The spin-off series launches the career of Charley Koontz, as FBI Special Agent Charley “Krum” Koontz, a quick-witted introvert – and the best white-hat hacker in the world.
In being unintentionally blunt when he speaks, his honesty makes him refreshingly charming and amusing, too.
Koontz describes his character as, “A little bit of a social hang-up. He finds his confidence in the computer. That conflict between the sort of social anxiety and a full-on confident expertise has been sort of an emotional way for him (to cope), which has been really cool.”
In a world where audiences are saps for flawed characters, it looks like our TV geeks have found a home!
• CSI: Cyber, M-Net, Wednesday, 9.30pm.
Patricia Arquette chronicles a new medium
MAKE some noise – Patricia Arquette is the first female to helm a CSI franchise. Cast as Special Agent Avery Ryan in the third spin-off series, CSI Cyber, she trades in her psychic crime-solving antics that made her a hit in Medium (which ran for seven seasons and bagged her an Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series) to helm a cyber crime-fighting unit.
Yes, CSI’s Catherine Willow’s (played by Marg Helgenberger) held down the fort after Gil Grissom – but that was more by default than design.
This time, the Oscar-winner for Best Actress in a Supporting Role for Boyhood is a psychologist analysing the actions of the virtual criminal mind.
Through her successes and failures – a rite of passage for any actor – Arquette has dexterously manoeuvred herself into that elusive can-do-no-wrong-realm. In other words, she is critic-proof. For now.
While she sits on her hard-earned pedestal of success, it is clear that she has reached a new summit in her career. And she is owning it.
Ryan’s ability to get into the mind of virtual fugitives is unimpeachable – but it is fuelled by a dark past. When she was in private practice, a ruthless hacker exposed the files of all her patients, prompting one of them to commit suicide.
In a press conference, Arquette confirmed how this series is poles apart from other procedural dramas: “You know, we have seen a cop with a gun for decades. And we have known murder for decades. But there are other kinds of crimes. It’s really different and this is the crime today. This is what criminals are doing and we, as a public, don’t even know what they are capable of. It’s pretty chilling, exciting
and interesting.”
Unlike her other roles, which are anchored more in emotion, this one demands more cunning use of the mind.
This new chapter for Arquette is exciting and insightful; more so as she gets her head around all that technical jargon in processing this digital new age… along with those criminals! – Debashine Thangevelo