Veronica Mars (Kristen Bell) uses Planet Zowie, Dexter Morgan (Michael C. Hall) searches on Finder-Spyder and NetRangle, and Melinda (Jennifer Love-Hewitt) from The Ghost Whisperer does all her research on Penthius.
But regardless of which fictional Internet search engine is deployed by an intrepid hero (or anti-hero, as the case may be...), the fact remains that the information super-highway (as it was known in the 1990s) has infiltrated cult-television in recent years.
A vampire has been staked on YouTube in True Blood (2008 - ), and investigators have tracked serial killers of all stripes using the world wide web. In the 1970s, such research was usually accomplished at a library, but today the Internet is the go-to resource for learning the background of clients, prospective victims, or the ghosts of the deceased.
Chris Carter's The X-Files (1993 - 2002) was on the cutting edge of using the Internet as an important plot-point. In the third season episode "2Shy," -- which aired way back in 1995 -- a serial killer, Mr. Incanto (Timothy Carhart), lured victims to their deaths after meeting them on Internet chat rooms. He played those would-be victims perfectly, using Internet handles such as "Timid" or "2Shy," and using his knowledge of Italian romantic poetry so as to be perceived as "sensitive."
Chris Carter's Millennium (1996 - 1999) starring Lance Henriksen also explored the burgeoning Internet Age in its second season episode, "The Mikado." Here, a mysterious serial killer set up a live camera feed site featuring a woman strapped to a chair. When the site registered a certain number of "hits," the killer would murder this victim before the equivalent of a live audience, thus making all Internet surfers watching complicit in her death. It was up to Frank to find that room in the real world, before another life was lost...
Willow (Alyson Hannigan) on Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997 - 2003) also learned the hazards of Internet dating in a first season episode of that Joss Whedon program. In "I Robot, You Jane," she inadvertently ended up e-corresponding with a demon called Moloch, made flesh as a robot in a laboratory. The episode, like "2Shy" before it, was an acknowledgment that anyone can pretend to be a friend (or prospective romantic partner on the Net.)
The short-lived superhero program Nightman (1997 - 1999) featured a villain who, in "Ultraweb," created a replacement for the Internet which was actually, after a fashion, the gateway to Hell (or some Hell dimension).
From 2004 - 2007, Veronica Mars -- the modern day, high-tech equivalent of Nancy Drew played by Kristen Bell -- found that the Internet was a crucial part in her daily detective work.
In "The Wrath of Con," she investigated a variation of the Internet Nigerian scam, and in another "Like a Virgin," Veronica had to suss out who among her high-school colleagues had posted online a "purity test," ranking students by their sexual proclivities and activities.
One Veronica Mars episode, "M.A.D." (Mutually Assured Destruction") involved a vengeful boyfriend threatening to post on the Internet a sexy video of his girlfriend. Veronica's response was to rig a web-site that would humiliate the boy just as grievously.
She called this battle, not surprisingly, Mutually Assured Destruction.
Finder-Spyder shows up in a lot of TV shows. I found a fictional British search engine in an episode of "Scott and Bailey" called Net-Searcher. At least I think it's fictional. Sounds boring enough to be real.
ReplyDelete