June 3, 1983: "WarGames" Premieres

June 3, 1983: WarGames premieres, directed by John Badham. It isn't the best-known movie in which Matthew Broderick uses a computer to mess with people. Nor is it the best-known movie in which Ally Sheedy plays a troubled teen. But it is considerably more important than Ferris Bueller's Day Off and The Breakfast Club. Those films were comedies. Despite some funny moments, WarGames most definitely is not a comedy.

Matthew Broderick plays David Lightman, a teenage wisenheimer in Seattle. He is a whiz with the personal computers of the time, still in their Apple II and Commodore 64 stage. As his girlfriend, Jennifer Mack, played by Ally Sheedy, looks on, he unwittingly hacks into NORAD, the North American Aerospace Defense Command, and accidentally fools one of its computer programs, designed to run simulations for everything from chess to nuclear war, into thinking he's the program's creator.

Except the game they end up playing shows up on NORAD's main screens, and they think this is real, until the game ends. They go from DEFCON 5, a Defensive Condition meaning normal peaceful relations but you still have to pay attention, to DEFCON 3, a heightened state of alert. Realizing that there is no Soviet nuclear attack coming, but still thinking they'd better pay more attention than usual, they only go back to DEFCON 4. The government sends an official, played by Dabney Coleman, to apprehend the young couple, and explains to them what they've done. He tells them that DEFCON 1 means World War III is underway.

Except the computer program isn't done. It starts running more simulations. DEFCON drops back to 3. David decides he'd better find the program's author, Professor Stephen Falken. Except he died 10 years earlier. Somehow, David figures out that Falken faked his death, escapes from custody, and tracks Falken (John Wood) down, bringing him back just in time to trick his program into seeing that the result of all "games" it can run is "WINNER: NONE," turning DEFCON 1 -- in status, if not in reality -- back to DEFCON 5. The program returns control of NORAD to its human operators.

When first released, WarGames touched on Cold War fears. Today, it touches on the fears of out-of-control artificial intelligence (AI). In any age, it shows the dangers of combining the hard work of smart humans with superiors who are lazier and dumber.

A few years before that -- and I only saw this episode for the first time during the COVID lockdown of 2020 -- there was an episode of the TV cop comedy Barney Miller. A high school student had built an atomic bomb in his garage. (It was disarmed.) As Barney pointed out, that wasn't the scary part. The scary part was that he only got a C on his science project, and Barney was afraid to ask what the kids getting A's were building.

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June 3, 1983 was a Friday. These Major League Baseball games were played that day:

* The New York Yankees lost to the Seattle Mariners, 5-0 at Yankee Stadium. Matt Young pitched a 2-hit shutout, allowing only a double by Ken Griffey Sr. and a single by Lou Piniella. Dave Winfield went 0-for-4. Ricky Nelson hit a home run for the Mariners. No, not the singer.

* The New York Mets beat the Los Angeles Dodgers, 5-2 at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles.

* The Baltimore Orioles beat the Toronto Blue Jays, 3-2 at Memorial Stadium in Baltimore. Eddie Murray went 1-for-4 with an RBI. Cal Ripken went 1-for-3 with a walk.

* The Atlanta Braves beat the St. Louis Cardinals, 5-3 at Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium.

* The Cincinnati Reds beat the Houston Astros, 3-1 at Riverfront Stadium in Cincinnati. Johnny Bench, in his final season, went 0-for-4.

* The Chicago White Sox beat the Kansas City Royals, 2-0 at Comiskey Park in Chicago. Former Mets star Jerry Koosman pitched a 3-hit shutout for the Pale Hose. Ron Kittle hit a home run. George Brett went 2-for-4.

* The Chicago Cubs beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 9-3 at Wrigley Field in Chicago. Yes, both Chicago teams were not only at home on the same day, but both won on the same day.

* The California Angels beat the Milwaukee Brewers, 3-0 at Milwaukee County Stadium. Ken Forsch pitched a 6-hit shutout, outpitching Don Sutton. Reggie Jackson went 2-for-4 with 2 RBIs. Fred Lynn hit a home run. Rod Carew did not play. For the Brewers, Robin Yount went 0-for-4, and Paul Molitor went 1-for-4.

* The Boston Red Sox beat the Minnesota Twins, 6-3 at the Metrodome in Minneapolis. Carl Yastrzemski, in his final season, went 1-for-4. Jim Rice hit a home run. Wade Boggs went 3-for-4 with an RBI.

* The Detroit Tigers beat the Texas Rangers, 12-1 at Arlington Stadium in the Dallas suburb of Arlington, Texas.

* The San Diego Padres beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 8-5 at Jack Murphy Stadium in San Diego. They did this despite Tony Gwynn not playing. Mike Schmidt and Tony Pérez hit home runs. Pete Rose went 0-for-3, but drew a walk, and had an RBI on a sacrifice fly.

* The Montreal Expos beat the San Francisco Giants, 9-2 at Candlestick Park in San Francisco.

* And the Cleveland Indians and the Oakland Athletics were rained out at Cleveland Municipal Stadium. The game was made up as part of a doubleheader 2 days later. The A's swept, 8-3 and 9-2. Over the 2 games, Rickey Henderson went 4-for-10 with a stolen base and 4 RBIs.