Breaking the Autistic Coded: Simon Lynch from Mercury Rising (1998)

Disclaimer: I am not a licensed medical professional and this series is not about diagnosing the character(s) with Autism Spectrum Disorder. This series is a personal examination of the film/TV show's plot, the character's traits and personality and how they relate to me as an Autistic woman. I will also examine canonically Autistic Characters, so take my personal opinions as just that, a personal opinion. I would encourage my readers to seek out different perspectives on disability representation especially from BIPOC disabled creators who are often ignored in the disability discourse. I will also try to avoid giving away any spoilers for those who have not seen the film/TV show but if I have to give context for my arguments, this will be a likely occurrence so please be forewarned.

When I wrote about the film, Come Play, I knew that it probably won’t be as popular as my Carrie article. Don’t get me wrong I am grateful to the people who have subscribed to me so far. I realize that I took a different approach to Come Play compared to Carrie or even Matilda. I did this because there would be no point in me theorizing about a character's traits when they are confirmed to be Autistic. I want to give those characters the same attention because representation is just as important for canonically Autistic characters as it is for those with the traits but no diagnosis. If we don’t critically examine films with under-represented groups then society is doomed to treat those same groups as less than human since many people use films as a main reference point when interacting with others.

Mercury Rising is an action thriller that was released in 1998 and was pretty much roasted by critics, and rightfully so; the film was pretty dull when I watched it for this article, but grossed $93 million in the box office. The film was adapted from one of a series of books called “Simple Simon” by a man called Ryne Douglas Pearson, when I tried to look up this author by going to his website, it constantly timed out on me. Any search that I did on the author came up that he also wrote the film called “Knowing” which was also met with mixed reviews from critics.

How Was the Character Treated Throughout the film?

We don’t see Simon Lynch until 10 minutes into the film, and when we first see him he is memorizing the route to his home via reading a map on the wall of his classroom. The doctor gives Simon a puzzle book, and he is told to join the class. When Simon joins the class, he is told by his teacher to give her eye contact. Now, I did mention this in my Come Play article about eye contact and it should be reiterated here: Eye contact is not universal. Last I checked, we do not talk to people with our eyeballs. I also don’t recall eye contact being completely necessary when sending out smoke signals to each other. With recent technological developments including texting and other alternative communication, one would assume that eye contact is not needed in order to communicate. I know that I am judging a 23 year old film through a “modern” lens but consider the fact that I was 6 years old when this film was released. Yet, Autistic people are the ones with the “strange obsessions.” Considering how "eye contact" and other neurotypical expectations are still forced on Autistic youth it is important to push even further for Autistic people to be included in all aspects of society.

Predictably, Simon is treated like an inconvenient plot device instead of a person with their own thoughts and feelings on the whole traumatic matter of his parents being dead. Artie, played by Bruce WIllis, Tommy, and the other good guys in the film barely acknowledge him unless it is to move the plot along. Artie, when he first meets Simon, tries to empathize with him by ordering the medics to remove the binds and to turn off the ambulance siren. Simon is, understandably, distraught and traumatized by not only his parents not being present but taken by total strangers. Later in the film, when Artie is sent an encrypted email by one of the cryptographers, he calls on Simon for help, because of course that is his only purpose throughout the film, and Artie finds out where to meet the cryptographer and gains more information about Mercury, the “unbreakable” code that is supposed to protect undercover government agents.

All of this was because Simon solved a puzzle that was placed by the cryptographers of the NSA thinking that no one would solve it since it is supposed to be very complicated code. With no surprise from me, Simon solves it and is now considered a threat to national security by the United States government. Not through his own fault, mind you, since he wasn’t the one that put the code in the book. Kudrow, the head of the NSA, never seems to take that into consideration when this was reported to him through the same guys that put the code in the book, in the first place. How the hell is a 9 year-old supposed to know that the code he saw in a book was top-secret government information?

It was great to at least see SOME characters correcting misconceptions, even though those corrections were also steeped in stereotypes like calling Simon a “savant” at one point, but it is extremely hypocritical considering how the audience doesn’t even get a glimpse into Simon’s inner world. The only reason that he is treated with any kind of importance is because he solved a code in a puzzle book and is considered a threat by the NSA because of this. (Need I remind the audience that it was the cryptographers that put the code there.)

The villain, Kudrow, at one point goes on a rant about what a threat Simon is to the United States and the thousands of other people who were supposed to be protected by this oh-so-unbreakable code. He keeps going about being a “patriot” and how Simon is “Nature’s mistake.” I was confused because isn’t Simon also an American? Or is it because Simon cannot serve some sort of purpose to the government that he is just some throw-away? Artie doesn’t even challenge the whole rant but he is supposed to be the hero. He is supposed to protect Simon, at the very least also include Simon’s HUMANITY.

Was the Autistic community consulted during the production of this film?

The most obvious, and short, answer is “no.”

The long answer “Absolutely not.” *

So, how did the actor do?

Miko Huges did very well in the film, of course, he did not have very great material to begin with so I will cut him some slack for his acting/portrayal of autism since he was quite young when this film was released. I was not expecting some Oscar-worthy performance in a formulaic action film but I was still extremely disappointed in how the writers went about portraying Simon’s experiences with Autism.

Simon can only speak a few phrases, and does repetitive actions including rocking back and forth, spinning wheels on a truck. Some of these actions would not be considered unusual for an Autistic child. For example, Simon rings doorbells even though the person is visibly standing at the door waiting for him. Simon also carefully steps over the doorway when entering a room, elopes, and lacks any sense of danger. He is not very trusting of strangers, which left me confused since he is supposed to be “Simple”, and is very sensitive to loud noises which is contradicted by one scene where he approaches a moving train that is blaring their horn at him. During the scene where Simon solves the puzzle, there is a “scanning” sound in the background like Simon’s brain is a computer because that makes sense. If my brain were a computer it would be Windows ‘98.

Simon also helped Artie at the end of the film by passing the gun to him, Simon barely gets any recognition for risking his life in order to stop the man that tried to kill him. Simon is also treated to the same ableist trope of being forced to look at Artie’s eyeballs during the “touching” moment of the film. Simon acknowledged your existence when he took the book from you, you are also his closest friend. Did you, Artie, need eye contact from him to even confirm that?

To conclude, I did not approach this film thinking that the Autism representation would be revolutionary. I was still perturbed at how Simon was treated by everyone in the film and how uninteresting the writing was for the film. Hollywood has always, and will always, have issues with representation when marginalized groups are not consulted. Too many autistic youth and adults have been exposed to discrimination and abuse and inaccurate portrayals of their condition which does not help advance society’s understanding of Autism and the experiences of Autistic people.

*Correction to my statement. Autistic children were consulted during production of this film. The article is here.