WaPo | On Sunday the National Geographic Channel aired a film purporting
to show what might happen if the U.S. suffered a 10-day blackout due to
a devastating cyberattack. Shot Cloverfield-style
from the perspective of characters in the action, "American Blackout"
told the story of a bunch of college kids stuck in an elevator for days,
a "prepper" family with a secret bunker in Colorado, and a pair of
privileged city-slickers on the 46th floor of an apartment building.
Switch writers Brian Fung and Andrea Peterson watched the film at a
recent screening -- here's what they thought.
Andrea: I was disappointed by the lack of any sort
of information about what sort of cyberattack may have caused it. I
didn't really expect them to go into any sort of technical details, but
it would've been nice if it was more than just newscasters exclaiming,
"we have been struck by a devastating cyberattack!"
Brian: Well, once the attack had happened it kind of
stopped mattering, I thought. Like, maybe they'll do a sequel where
they show the engineers trying to figure it out, but for the moment it
was just interesting to see how the filmmakers thought everything would
unfold — and importantly, in what order. I was kind of surprised that
water didn't start becoming an issue until the 6th or 7th day (I could
be remembering this wrong).
Andrea: I think you're remembering it right --
except for the people trapped in the elevator. It became a problem for
them quickly. ... I just didn't buy their story as much as the other
narrative arcs, honestly. It was maybe compelling, but also completely
unrealistic. More realistic? Them giving up and jumping off the roof of
the building out of desperation, if they had even gotten that far. Maybe
a little too dark there.
Brian: Let's talk about the kid who wandered around
on the streets at night with his camera. I forget his name. The one
whose mom was a nurse?
Andrea: Yeah, that kid was annoying, too. But it was
interesting how they used him to paint a really dark picture of a
powerless America.
Brian: I think the part where he just goes home because he isn't sure where else to go is probably how a lot of people would react.
Andrea: I agree. They went to where they would feel
safest, which is often the place they know best. We saw that happen a
bit with Katrina to some negative affect — stories of people unwilling
to abandon their safe havens.
Brian: But as we saw with a lot of different
vignettes, that was probably the worst decision any of them could have
made. There wasn't enough food or water in those places to sustain them
long enough for the power to come on. Though I suppose in terms of
safety, some of those places — like the apartment on the 46th floor —
would have been good places to hide out.
Andrea: In their defense, I don't think it was ever
clear just how long the outage was going to go on. Early on, many were
just assuming it would be a day or so.
Brian: Right. I think that would be the scariest part — not knowing how long you'd have to plan for.
Andrea: And I do think that was fairly realistic.
Brian: Like, do you grab the birdseed from the
supermarket because you don't know if the outage will last for longer
than human food supplies will? I was actually thinking about this
yesterday at Safeway. What would happen if the outage happened right
then and there?
Andrea: Did you grab the birdseed?
Brian: …No?
Andrea: Because if you didn't, clearly the movie didn't scare you enough.
Brian: You're right. I should've just left without paying. Because who knows? A cyberattack could knock out our credit card network!
Andrea: I personally keep probably enough food to
get me through roughly a 10-day period if I was careful with rationing.
But that's just because I tend to buy in bulk for budgetary reasons, and
that's really a luxury many Americans cannot afford.
Brian: When the blackout hits, I'm heading to your house first.
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