“Doctor” Agernop Krieger
Analytic Perspectives From The World Of Archer
While he is certainly the “mustached mercenary”, Krieger probably isn’t a doctor. He is certainly not the medical kind or “the other kind” by his own pronouncement.
What Krieger is, is an amazing character from TV’s Archer. He is a robust and interesting profile and a complicated caricature to boot. The internet abounds with tributes to Krieger. This article will pay its own homage to Krieger the Data Scientist.
Krieger, like so many other mad geniuses, is a polymath. In other words, he can do almost anything. From science to medicine, computers to chemistry — Krieger handles it all. I actually attribute that sort of pedigree more with analysts than data scientists… but lets continue.
Krieger builds robots — artificial intelligence. Krieger builds cyborgs — augmented intelligence. Krieger hacks government servers — computer scientist. Krieger builds mutant pig creatures — alright, that doesn’t really fit here. You might call him a renaissance man… if it weren’t for all the troubling Nazi overtones. In fairness, most of those references come from the team and his genetic history.
Krieger is dark, perverse, and morally … well, loose describes most of the rest of the Archer team… he is completely unbound. In some ways this makes him the classic profile of a scientist more concerned with learning and experimentation than society’s mores. It also makes him funny as hell. It is an adult cartoon after all.
Krieger is also a subscriber to creative analytics. He gets sh!t done — GSD. His pedigree is practical and so is his behavior. Archer has given us an academic profile or two… but more often in the guest appearance slot.
Sadly, Krieger is also a cost center. He sits on the cost side of the P&L. While he has had many bold ideas to generate revenue, few (if any) have been successful. He is also occasionally destructive to models. He has a nasty habit of taking flawed models (submarines, computers, and robots) and destroying them. He does occasionally salvage the parts, but it is not a trait one wants in their scientists.
He is also not really strong on analogies. His analogies are hysterical, just not very good. From humans being potato clocks to wanting his woman and coffee fair trade, Krieger’s analogies are … awkward.
Finally, Krieger struggles with a fundamental aspect of analytics — decision-making. He seems to lack basic frameworks for it. Oddly, while often a risk taker, he fundamentally lacks courage in numerous situations. Krieger is called to experiment and learn, not to chose and decide.
In many tough situations, Krieger runs. Smoke bomb! Well, no one is perfect… Krieger perhaps, least of all. With that, lets close our first profile.
Jazz hands!
Thanks for reading. Stay tuned for more profiles from this cult classic. And feel free to share your favorite quotes in the comments below.
Next up — Cyril Figgis
