Media Reflection: Human Target

I recently "discovered" the show "Human Target." (I love Hulu!) I really like the show, and really like the fact that Luta likes the show as well, so we have one more show to watch together that we both love! The main character, Christopher Chance, is in the protection business: people who have someone trying to kill them come to him so that he can "protect" them. Actually, they come so he can eliminate the threat, not just guard them. And he is good at this because of his former career: he used to be an assassin himself, one of the best. The show is predictably violent, and he is predictably thrown into horrible odds so he can show how awesome he is.

But despite that predictable element, I find the show awesome to watch. The characters have a good blend, and are pretty consistently written. The actors are fun to watch, with great expressions. And the episodes have a balance I like between telling the story behind the characters and showing a thrilling plot that begins and ends in one episode. The action is good, and I'm a sucker for action even (or perhaps especially) when it is over the top and ridiculous.

In the first episode ("Pilot"), Christopher Chance tells people "No one deserves to die." That's why he protects them. Of course he also kills the people trying to kill them (he doesn't like loose ends), but generally he doesn't do it in cold blood. But he never says "people shouldn't die" just that they don't deserve to, so he tries to stop the deliberate assassination of people. In a later episode ("Baptiste"), his former apprentice reminds Chance that he used to say "Everyone deserves to die, as far as someone is concerned." So now Chance is confronted with the inconsistency that he is still willing to kill, just not in cold blood, even though he claims to have done a full switch from "everyone deserves to die" to "no one deserves to die."

Underneath this is an interesting theological issue. There is great support in the Bible that people should not kill one another. That since people are made in the image of God, they should be respected and not killed. So, no one deserves to die. Especially when we consider the original state of creation in the Garden of Eden, it seems reasonable to me to assume that there was no death. So in the final verdict, death shouldn't be here at all. But on the other hand, there is sin in the world, so in some sense people do deserve to die. People sin, sin must be punished, therefore death is deserved.

That is an over-simplication of the issue and arguments, of course, but I think the main point there is accurate: we both deserve and do not deserve to die. There is also the element of the agent delivering the verdict of "deserving." Jesus warns us that the measure we judge others will be used to judge ourselves (Matt 7:1-3), so it would be a good idea not to be quick to judge others deserving of death! In fact we might then want to conclude that no one is deserving of death, so that we will be judged "not deserving" as well. It would seem that only God should determine who is deserving or not. This brings us back to the previous issue: sin makes us deserving of death, even if in the original perfect world we were not.

The beauty and hope of Christianity is that through the sacrifice of Jesus, we can receive ultimate forgiveness. And once we do so, we are given the gift of life. We go from deserving to die, to being granted the right to not die.

So then Christopher Chance's claim that "no one deserves to die" can really be seen as a statement of redemption. Not only is he trying to redeem himself for his past actions, not only does the statement show his own redemption in his changed perspective, but it also speaks to greater redemption. It speaks to the fact that while, yes, we might do things that make other people want us dead, in the final judgment we don't have to deserve to die. We have a way out.

All of us can be protected from death, if only we choose.