(A play in 4 acts. Please feel free to exit along with the stage character that best represents you. Take intermissions as you see fit. Click on the stage if you have a hard time seeing it. If you get bored, you can jump to the code. Most importantly, enjoy the show!)

Act 1: Once Upon a Time…

intro
sad
aes act 1 scene 03 cinderella
aes act 1 scene 04 started
aes act 1 scene 05 judge
aes act 1 scene 06 nbs decree
aes act 1 scene 07 lucifer
aes act 1 scene 08 anoint des
aes act 1 scene 09 des ruled
aes act 1 scene 10 des defeated
aes act 1 scene 11 triple des
aes act 1 scene 12 nist decree
aes act 1 scene 13 rallied
aes act 1 scene 14 rijndael
aes act 1 scene 15 vote
aes act 1 scene 16 won
aes act 1 scene 17 intel
aes act 1 scene 18 crypto question

Act 2: Crypto Basics

aes act 2 scene 01 three big ideas
aes act 2 scene 02 confusion
aes act 2 scene 03 diffusion
aes act 2 scene 04 key secrecy
aes act 2 scene 05 aes details question

Act 3: Details

aes act 3 scene 01 sign this
aes act 3 scene 02 agreement
aes act 3 scene 03 state matrix
aes act 3 scene 04 initial round
aes act 3 scene 05 xor tribute
aes act 3 scene 06 key expansion part 1
aes act 3 scene 07 key expansion part 2a
aes act 3 scene 08 key expansion part 2b
aes act 3 scene 09 key expansion part 3
aes act 3 scene 10 intermediate round start
aes act 3 scene 11 substitute bytes
aes act 3 scene 12 shift rows
aes act 3 scene 13 mix columns
aes act 3 scene 14 add round key
aes act 3 scene 15 final round
aes act 3 scene 16 more rounds the merrier
aes act 3 scene 17 tradeoffs
aes act 3 scene 18 security margin
aes act 3 scene 19 in pictures
aes act 3 scene 20 decrypting
aes act 3 scene 21 modes
aes act 3 scene 22 questions what really happens
aes act 3 scene 23 math

Act 4: Math!

aes act 4 scene 01 algebra class
aes act 4 scene 02 reviewing the basics
aes act 4 scene 03 algebra coefficients
aes act 4 scene 04 remember multiplication growth
aes act 4 scene 05 cant go bigger
aes act 4 scene 06 clock math
aes act 4 scene 07 clock math polynomials
aes act 4 scene 08 divide by mx
aes act 4 scene 09 logarithms
aes act 4 scene 10 using logarithms
aes act 4 scene 11 polynomial as byte
aes act 4 scene 12 byte operations
aes act 4 scene 13 byte inverses
aes act 4 scene 14 sbox math
aes act 4 scene 15 round constants
aes act 4 scene 16 mix columns math
aes act 4 scene 17 crib sheet
aes act 4 scene 18 got it now
aes act 4 scene 19 so much more
aes act 4 scene 20 gotta go
aes act 4 scene 21 the end

Epilogue

I created a heavily-commented AES/Rijndael implementation to go along with this post and put it on GitHub. In keeping with the Foot-Shooting Prevention Agreement, it shouldn’t be used for production code, but it should be helpful in seeing exactly where all the numbers came from in this play. Several resources were useful in creating this:

Please leave a comment if you notice something that can be better explained.

Update #1: Several scenes were updated to fix some errors mentioned in the comments.
Update #2: By request, I’ve created a slide show presentation of this play in both PowerPoint and PDF formats. I’ve licensed them under the Creative Commons Attribution License so that you can use them as you see fit. If you’re teaching a class, consider giving extra credit to any student giving a worthy interpretive dance rendition in accordance with the Foot-Shooting Prevention Agreement.