2010-06-04

A single-panel SMBC comic. Two men sit side by side watching an off-panel screen. The man on the left, with reddish hair and round glasses, wipes tears and looks devastated, saying, "I don't get it. It's just a guy staring at a computer for twenty seconds." The man on the right, dark-haired and in a suit jacket, explains, "That's a time-lapse video of two weeks." The first man, overcome, replies, "My... God..." Caption beneath: "There is a reason movies never portray hacking realistically." The joke: real hacking is so boring that a realistic depiction would have to compress two weeks into twenty seconds. Votey aftercomic (black-and-white sketch, framed like the video still they're watching): a disheveled person with sunglasses slumps at a desk before a large blank monitor, mouth hanging open, clutching an enormous soda cup labeled "ULTRA GULP" — the unglamorous reality of the supposed hacker.