Contracts IN THE FUTURE

So far in the future, they’re on Mars. 

I’ve been doing a ton of traveling over the past few weeks, which is why my blogging has been so sporadic. One of the things I’ve been doing, therefore, is listening to lots of podcasts. So many podcasts that I’ve run out of many of my more news- or education-oriented ones, and so I started delving into a podcast called “Penumbra,” which a friend recommended. Specifically the Juno Steel series of stories. “It’s about an emotionally complex, sardonic character,” she said, “that sounds like your thing.” Such is my reputation. 

But yeah, totally my thing. Juno Steel is a private investigator on Mars many centuries from now. The podcast plays around with the film noir genre, complete with hard-boiled narration. But the reason why I’m rambling about it on this blog is because the first episode, Juno Steel and the Case of the Murderous Mask, happens, delightfully, to revolve around contracts. The most powerful family in Hyperion City on Mars requires everyone who is allowed in their house to sign an intensely detailed contract. One of the characters remarks that they’ve seen novels shorter than the contract and would need a month to read the whole thing. They end up signing the contract without reading it, mostly because they’d already had to agree to a shortened version of it before receiving the long version. And the contract, of course, required them to reveal nothing about the family in question. So apparently, in the future, the powerful will still be surrounding themselves with NDAs! (Interestingly, the “liquidated damages,” should you breach the contract, appeared to be that the wealthy family would broadcast all of your secrets. Mutually assured privacy destruction, I suppose!)

Part of the plot also involves an oral agreement that isn’t properly captured by the subsequent written agreement, as well as forged signatures. I don’t want to spoil it, but if you’re looking for something somewhat more fun than the latest cases (although what is more fun than the latest cases???), you can give it a listen and still feel like you’re Thinking About the Law.