Mr. Robot Killed the Hollywood Hacker

For decades Hollywood has treated computers as magic boxes from which endless plot points could be conjured, in denial of all common sense. TV and movies depicted data centers accessible only through undersea intake valves, cryptography that can be cracked through a universal key, and e-mails whose text arrives one letter at a time, all in caps. "Hollywood hacker bullshit," as a character named Romero says in an early episode of Mr. Robot, now in its second season on the USA Network. "I've been in this game 27 years. Not once have I come across an animated singing virus."