As Bitcoin becomes more and more socially relevant, mainstream media coverage has grown. Popular CBS show NCIS Los Angeles, starring LL Cool J and Chris O’Donnell, will air an episode on Sunay, 22 April at 9pm (ET/PT) in which Bitcoin is the co-star. In the episode “Outside the Lines”, a mining farm is robbed and Naval Criminal Investigative Service agents are assigned the case.
NCIS LA is a military/police procedural drama in its 9th season with an average of about ten million viewers. The show tends to focus on counter-terrorism plotlines and other military ops. The inclusion of Bitcoin in a popular TV series is almost, in a strange way, a form of adoption, as TV writers seek to give the public what they want to see and try to stay on top of current trends.
LL Cool J is best known for his 80s hip hop career with hits like “Rock The Bells” and “Mama Said Knock You Out”, but has also starred in dozens of movies and TV shows throughout the years, while Chris O’Donnell is most widely known for his roles in Scent of a Woman and for playing Robin in Batman Forever.
Bitcoin On The Big Screen
NCIS LA isn’t the first show to bring Bitcoin to the big screen – Ellen Degeneres recently explained Bitcoin to over three million viewers, in a segment that mostly poked fun at the complex nature of the cryptocurrency. While Degeneres wasn’t exacttly advocating Bitcoin, that kind of publicity benefits the space and informs newcomers.
John Oliver also did a segment on his show Last Week Tonight, going into detail about Bitcoin and other projects like EOS. The Big Bang Theory even ran a whole episode on the classic tale of mining Bitcoin in the early days and losing track of the currency over time.
Television publicity is one of the many ways that Bitcoin will enter mainstream consciousness, and NCIS LA is the latest show to incorporate it into their plot. Can LL Cool J solve the case of the missing Bitcoin? Whether you’re a fan of the show or not, it’s interesting to see Bitcoin take the spotlight, and the highly-rated show could well set a trend for other dramas to follow.
