How Crypto Made Its Way to TV, From The Good Wife to The Simpsons

Most people associate the term “crypto” with complex graphs and obscure digital wallets. However, an increasing number of TV shows have been incorporating cryptocurrency concepts into mainstream discourse through their plots and stories in an easy, more natural way. On screen, we’ve seen things like legal dramas debating whether digital money is real, hacker thrillers using Bitcoin as a plot device, and animated sitcoms turning tokens and NFTs into jokes (and lessons).

These moments have helped to shape how we all think about crypto networks and digital assets, even if we’re not actively investing. In a way, television has been an unexpected classroom for “what crypto is,” and what it might become.

Let’s explore some unforgettable moments where pop culture met crypto.

The Good Wife

It’s interesting (and fascinating) to note that one of the first mainstream depictions of cryptocurrency on TV occurred on a legal-drama show and not on a technical one. Given this fact, it’s even more fascinating that many of the audience members watched this storyline long before they ever heard the word “Bitcoin.” The Good Wife was produced by Robert and Michelle King and debuted in 2009 as a legal/political drama.

In Season 3, Episode 13 (“Bitcoin for Dummies,” aired in 2012), the show exposed millions of viewers to Bitcoin before it became a significant player in the market. The episode includes a brief educational video about what Bitcoin is and how it works. However, the whole storyline focuses on Alicia Florrick as she defends another lawyer, whose anonymous client is suspected of inventing Bitcoin. The US government indicated that creating any new currency that competes with the US Dollar is illegal.

https://youtu.be/dlAgPjqcRF0?si=BYjsery753_wdIJz&embedable=true

The script references several of the debates on Bitcoin happening back then: Is Bitcoin a real currency? Who's controlling it? Will governments be able to regulate a decentralized system like this? The fact that they could buy one entire BTC for a few dollars tells us a lot about the time.

Also covered was the anonymity element surrounding the person behind Bitcoin, the overall mystery of who that is, and the conflict between innovating and regulating. While some of the content in the episode is not 100% correct, for many who see it for the first time, this would be an introduction to cryptocurrency well before it became a household term.

Mr. Robot

People expected awesome visuals of hacking from Mr. Robot, but didn't realize how accurately crypto terminology fit into the storylines of the show. From stealthily hidden bitcoin addresses, to technically accurate wallet discussions, and even a fictitious corporate cryptocurrency? The writers portrayed crypto as a significant part of the digital world, not just a novelty.

Mr. Robot was created by Sam Esmail and released in 2015. It follows Elliot Alderson, a cybersecurity engineer caught up in the world of anarchist hackers trying to bring down corporatism. This story provided a perfect opportunity for writers to incorporate concerns about financial uncertainty and digital privacy issues related to cryptocurrency.

https://youtu.be/gHOAKWzDH-Q?si=FhJBBSWxoAOnRuXL&embedable=true

Over the course of the series, we see the use of Bitcoin as an underground currency by hackers, activists, and criminal organizations. In the second season, there's a remarkable moment when a systems administrator complains about how attackers “keep emptying the Bitcoin wallets,”  thus requiring them to re-evaluate their hot-versus-cold storage method (a real-world security concern). Another episode shows Easter-egg wallet addresses hidden in code. Fans scanned them and discovered they were functional.

Bitcoin is often used in contrast to the fictional digital coin (“E-Coin”) created by a corporation, which the company uses as a tool for maintaining control over its customers. The struggle between __decentralized and centralized__technology also becomes a theme throughout the entire series. For a mainstream audience, Mr. Robot offered one of TV’s most nuanced portrayals of crypto’s ideological battlefield.

The Simpsons

Few shows can turn something as technical as Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) into a joke sung by Jim Parsons, and somehow make it accurate. That’s the genius behind The Simpsons: It uses a combination of absurd fun and complexity to entertain viewers while still providing them with useful education at the same time.

Originally conceived by Matt Groening, The Simpsons began its run in 1989. Since then, it's been able to provide its viewers with insight into just about every cultural movement from the last thirty years and has certainly followed along as cryptocurrency became a more prominent form of payment.

In Season 31, Episode 13 ("Frinkcoin"), which aired in 2020, Professor Frink created his own version of cryptocurrency. He used it to become the richest person in Springfield, at least temporarily. One of the highlights of that particular episode was a cameo by Jim Parsons (known for his role as Sheldon Cooper), who provided an explanation of the concept of blockchain in an easy way: a ledger of every transaction, added to a chain of previous ledgers. It was essentially a cartoon-friendly version of a real DLT tutorial.

https://youtu.be/SsbLJVMC9nI?si=icI5HsTBzPTJuVec&embedable=true

“Treehouse of Horror XXXIV” in 2023 brought back crypto through the segment titled “Wild Barts Can’t Be Token.” Here, we follow Bart on his journey as a Non-Fungible Token (NFT) while Marge navigates through the chaotic digital art world to save him. This episode highlights NFT ‘hype cycles,” the speculative pricing of digital assets, and the perception that something once deemed priceless can become valueless in a matter of minutes. It’s a thought that many investors who entered the space in 2021 will surely relate to.

https://youtu.be/coez0bUX9i4?si=nmzD3P4ne7FCsYdv&embedable=true

Other Crypto Cameos

Crypto is appearing in an increasing number of non-technical shows. Cameos like that are evidence of how digital assets are now being recognized in many forms of pop culture.

This is especially true with tech satire-based shows, such as Silicon Valley (2014). During its later seasons, the show was well-known for its parodies of Initial Coin Offering (ICO) mania, token launches, and startup hype. The tone was never as serious as Mr. Robot; however, it still captured some of the absurdities of the technology startup founders, all trying to invent some form of token just because everyone else was doing so.

https://youtu.be/zF87k5opi0U?si=r60LoXXtIGp6DlKJ&embedable=true

Crime and detective series sometimes use the word Bitcoin as shorthand for illegal payments, ransomware demands, or digital trails left by criminals. While all of these portrayals are generally found to be overly simplified examples of how crypto is used for crime, these types of representations have normalized the concept that digital finance is just another aspect of the modern financial system and the way that it works in conjunction with other forms of money.

Even some sitcoms have made references to investing in some type of coins and having an NFT. These moments matter more than they seem: they signal that crypto vocabulary has crossed into casual conversation, the same way “email” or “apps” once did.

What Pop Culture Gets Right —and What It Gets Wrong

The most interesting thing about crypto in pop culture is how the portrayals work together: some serious, some satirical, some wildly exaggerated. Each version shapes audience understanding, whether by teaching, warning, or just making people laugh.

Shows like The Good Wife and Mr. Robot get closest to the technical truth, exploring legality, decentralization, and wallet security. There are some concepts they didn’t fully understand themselves, though. In The Good Wife, for instance, they didn’t even mention the open-source nature of Bitcoin. For them, Bitcoin had to be developed by a company. Besides, unlike their assumptions, anyone can send messages through crypto transactions, not only the Bitcoin founder.

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*Meanwhile, The Simpsons provides the most accessible, beginner-friendly explanations wrapped in humor, but it limits them to one type of distributed ledger (the blockchain). There are others around, even more decentralized: the Directed Acyclic Graph (DAG) used byObyte, for example.

Despite all these inaccuracies, together, they build a basic vocabulary: ledger, token, mining, anonymity, storage, P2P. And exposure matters. Pop culture is where many viewers encounter crypto for the first time. These portrayals spark curiosity, encourage questions, and make the technology less intimidating. Even flawed depictions can push people to explore further!