MacGyver vs. Jack Bauer

Mike and I have been slowly working through MacGyver on DVD over the last year or so. My family enjoyed the show back when I was in high school. But then I went off to college and was too busy for tv. So I'm catching up on those later seasons now.

If I were taking "The Hero," a class studying the hero in different times and culture, I would write a paper comparing and contrasting MacGyver and Jack Bauer. (This will not be that paper because I don't have the time for proper research nor to spend much time on style and syntax. But hey, if you are needing a paper topic students, this would be a classic.)

My humanities interest has me forever interested in cultural patterns and MacGyver was a distinctly American hero figure, out solving the world's crises through his ingenuity. ALONE. Ditto Jack Bauer.

MacGyver got his start fighting the Cold War and running behind "The Iron Curtain" (a phrase that is now relegated to history books but had real meaning in the 1980s when I first watched the show) to rescue damsels in distress. The Wall fell and communism suffered its defeat during the show's run which seriously deflated Mac's sails and turned him into a rather boring, noble do-gooder fighting for the environment.

Likewise, Jack Bauer is also a man for his time, as he battles terrorists every couple of years for 24 hours at a time. During which time he doesn't eat, sleep, or use a bathroom (or is that what happens on commercial breaks?) But I diverge.

Both men are walking relational catastrophes. Women who fall for either one of them are doomed to face serious jeopardy and likely death. Or be spies. MacGyver has trouble with commitment. Settling down just doesn't appeal and most women don't want to marry a man who leaves the country without enough notice to call their travel agent. Bauer, on the other hand, is a one-woman man. He would like to be the family man; but his job got his wife killed, and a girlfriend captured and tortured by Chinese terrorists, and another turned out to be a spy. He has a tough love life. MacGyver is easy come, easy go. He goes camping when a girlfriend dies. Bauer stays on the couch, and drinks himself into oblivion for several years. (Counseling? I guess that's not an option for a hero.)

Both men approach their work in different ways too. MacGyver is an optimist. He is never suspicious, even of strange accents, and weird stories. Every guy is a good guy until he gets locked in a refrigeration unit, or someone sets a bomb that he has to diffuse. In his free time he befriends gang members and a Mafia hitman and sets them on a new course. He is a good friend and protects his friends at all costs. We think he is a good American but he isn't one to burst into "The Star Spangled Banner."

Bauer is a pessimist. He knows better than to trust anyone (well, after the girlfriend who was a spy tried to kill his family) and frequently has to render his friends unconscious so they don't interfere with his work. He pretty much whispers through the entire show, pretty certain someone is trying to listen who shouldn't. His loyalty to his country and to the greater good trumps individual loyalty to friends and colleagues. He really believes America is worth dying for and the person who always commands the most respect from him is the President.

MacGyver is handy with gum wrappers, coat hangers, and he is pretty good at dealing with nature. But he won't touch a gun. And even his quick action and knowledge of chemistry and physics wouldn't save him if he was thrown into Jack Bauer's world. The first couple of seasons were before the advent of cell phones. Very inconvenient. A lot of running into the nearest pay phone and hoping someone answers before you get killed. When cell phones did arrive on the scene, they were those giant looking things that won't fit into your back pocket and you have to leave in the car. Truly, how did he do it?

Bauer would be lost without a cell phone. Nor would he have a clue if he were dropped by parachute into the wilderness (as MacGyver is repeatedly) without a GPS. He wouldn't diffuse the bomb, he would point his gun at someone and make them do it. Or fly it into the desert.

Both men reflect their times. As liberal as MacGyver is, he reflects the exuberance, hopefulness and innocence of the Reagan years when our biggest enemy so far (Communism) was falling apart and we were emerging triumphant. With that behind us, it is time to take on saving the forests and ending gang violence.

Bauer would like to be a man of peace, but the stakes are too high. He operates with the knowledge that sometimes you have to choose between evil and greater evil, between taking a life or letting many others die, using the gun or having it used on you. He is much more conflicted than MacGyver; this season we see a man who knows that even if you still think what you did was the best thing, you still have to pay for what you did. Replace "Bauer" with "George W. Bush" and you can see why Bauer is a man for the time.

So where will Bauer go from here? We know what happened to MacGyver. He ran out of enemies to outwit and battles to fight. Eventually viewers grew bored as he tried to save the rainforest. But he remained a cultural icon and you can still hear a scientific problem-solver referred to as a "real MacGyver" today.

What does Jack Bauer do during the Obama years? Like Obama, he doesn't seem too sure. He knows torture isn't good; but in retrospect he isn't sure what choice he had. Will he retire to a quiet life in Texas? Or will he find once again that the world is full of evil and that you can only do what you can. But you must do that.