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get that OUT of my face
Feb 10, 2007



(forgive the thumbnail, the only GIS image I could find of the Season 3 poster is 2520x3000)

Silicon Valley is an HBO comedy created by Mike Judge that's loosely based on his time as an engineer in that part of America during the 1980s. It's eerily relateable if you have experience working in Silicon Valley, much like King of the Hill was for people who live in Texas, or like Office Space if you've worked in an office environment (both are previous Mike Judge works, naturally). If you haven't, then don't worry- it's got one of the best casts on TV and is filled with memorable moments and oddball characters.



Richard Hendrix (Thoms Middleditch, on the right) is the founder of Pied Piper, a company based on his program that compresses video. After winning a tech competition in Season 1, he is forced to find venture capital money after finding out that Peter Gregory- a Peter Thiel-esque Silicon Valley "renegade"- was killed on his African vacation (this corresponded with the unexpected real-life death of Peter's actor, Christopher Evan Welch). Last season, he faced arbitration from Hooli- which is a direct real-life parallel to Google- over the rights to the Pied Piper program. The season ends with Raviga, a venture capital firm, stripping him of his title of CEO of Pied Piper. Richard is pretty reckless and causes trouble for himself over his rash decisions, like hastily deciding to sue the board of his own company in the season premiere.

Erlich Bachman (T.J. Miller, on the left) runs the start-up incubator that gave Pied Piper its spot. He is an arrogant self-styled alpha male who's not above putting his own balls on a conference table in an attempt to "neg" venture capital companies into giving funding. In spite of the fact that he's an egotistical rear end in a top hat, he has an uncharacteristic love for the company that started under his watch.



Dinesh Chugtai (Kumail Nanjiani, on the left} and Bertram Gilfoyle (Martin Starr, on the right) are Pied Piper's chief coders. Probably more importantly, they provide some of the best two-way banter on this show, and I think that they're one of the better comedy character duos on TV right now. A couple of topics include an in-depth discussion of Schrodinger's cat and coining the term "R.I.G.B.Y." (Richard Is Great, But, Y'know) to encompass Richard's pros and cons as the head of Pied Piper. Just refer to them as "Dinesh and Gilfoyle" instead of their full names.



Donald "Jared" Dunn (Zach Woods) was plucked from Hooli by Richard to work on Pied Piper at the beginning of the show. He's a wimpy yes-man who is loyal to his new company and serves as the butt of many jokes cracked by Erlich, Dinesh, and Gilfoyle. He also gets into the weirdest situations of the Pied Piper crew, like being in a self-driving car headed towards a shipping boat and, in an upcoming episode this season, falling for an Airbnb scam.



Monica (Amanda Crew, on the left in the background) served as Peter Gregory's assistant. She provides support and advice to Pied Piper even when they're down on their luck. She's also one of the only cigarette smokers in the usually smoke-free environment of Silicon Valley. After the death of Peter Gregory, the head of the venture capital firm Raviga was taken over by Laurie Bream (Suzanne Cryer, on the right in the foreground). Whereas Peter's management style was eccentric and overly dramatic, Laurie's is extremely emotionally detached. Both of them voted to remove Richard as CEO at the end of Season 2.



Gavin Belson is the CEO of Hooli, Richard and Jared's former employer. Although Hooli is modeled on Google, Gavin is based on Steve Jobs. He's widely considered to be a brilliant corporate visionary, but he's also a ruthless businessman who wants to stamp out his competition. He didn't take losing to Pied Piper in arbitration very well, and at the beginning of this season, he fired the team for Nucleus (Hooli's answer to Pied Piper) as well as a decent portion of his company's staff.



Nelson "Big Head" Bighetti (Josh Brener) was one of Pied Piper's original workers, but he decided to work at Hooli instead of seeing things through at the start-up. At first, he had nothing to do at Hooli and would slack off on the roof with employees in the same situation. Last season, he was used as a pawn for Gavin in an attempt to one-up Pied Piper, even though he isn't really good at much. He was constantly falling into more important positions at Hooli, and who knows what's in store for him this season. He was offered at $20 million severance package at the end of the season premiere, but you can bet he's going to make things interesting.

I know that was a boring writeup, but this show is great and funny and you should watch it.

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kloa
Feb 14, 2007


this show also contains great music

MoPZiG
Jun 6, 2006

So is Big Head based on any real life person / story from the valley? This guy just fails upwards and onwards into fat stacks.

Last Chance
Dec 31, 2004

That was great.

Erlich fighting the robot deer. Dear lord.

Although my favorite part was probably Richard's visit to his imprisoned lawyer. I almost pissed myself at his lawyer's stoic advice:

"Richard let me tell you something I learned here on the inside: swallow your pride. Or you'll eating something way worse than poo poo. Believe me."

I said come in!
Jun 22, 2004

The robot deer, the opening animation of Silicon Valley, and the Snapchat parody were fantastic. The whole episode had me laughing pretty hard.

bull3964
Nov 18, 2000

DO YOU HEAR THAT? THAT'S THE SOUND OF ME PATTING MYSELF ON THE BACK.


Erlich explaining 'forking' to Jared had me in tears.

get that OUT of my face
Feb 10, 2007

kloa posted:

this show also contains great music
Yes it does. Mike Judge has good taste in hip-hop and has had it since at least Office Space.

MoPZiG posted:

So is Big Head based on any real life person / story from the valley? This guy just fails upwards and onwards into fat stacks.
I don't think so. The "useless idiot who stumbles his way into fortune" character is a common comedy trope. Unfortunately, it's also frequently found in corporate America, where CEOs make horrible decisions, run a company into the ground, get a golden parachute, and do it all again at another company. Maybe that's Big Head's fate when all is said and done.

Bobby Digital
Sep 4, 2009

MoPZiG posted:

So is Big Head based on any real life person / story from the valley? This guy just fails upwards and onwards into fat stacks.

Carly Fiorina

SaviourX
Sep 30, 2003

The only true Catwoman is Julie Newmar, Lee Meriwether, or Eartha Kitt.

Every scene with JaredGabe in it just always has me smiling.

Golden Bee
Dec 24, 2009

I came here to chew bubblegum and quote 'They Live', and I'm... at an impasse.

MoPZiG posted:

So is Big Head based on any real life person / story from the valley?

Everyone Valleywag covered who wasn't a sexist

quote:

Carly Fiorina

Republican Nominee Carly Fiorina.

Troy Queef
Jan 12, 2013




Repost from the old thread: new things you'll note in the open are Google getting an Alphabet sign, the new Tesla building, the Uber balloon fighting it out with a smaller Lyft balloon, drones everywhere, and a very busy food stand selling Soylent.

Also knowing what I know about Evan Spiegel, the Flutterbeam scenes were hilarious.

RedneckwithGuns
Mar 28, 2007

Up Next:
Fifteen Inches of
SHEER DYNAMITE

Happy Silicon Valley is back, episode was great. Annoyed that their use of a new RTJ track (even if it is their DJ Shadow collab) for the credits just makes the wait for RTJ3 that much more unbearable :negative:

RedneckwithGuns fucked around with this message at 08:44 on Apr 25, 2016

Lycus
Aug 5, 2008

Half the posters in this forum have been made up. This website is a goddamn ghost town.
I cracked up when watching the trailer at Erlich kicking the robot and now I cracked up all over again.

Ciprian Maricon
Feb 27, 2006



This show is great (except Richard)

gohmak
Feb 12, 2004
cookies need love

Lycus posted:

I cracked up when watching the trailer at Erlich kicking the robot and now I cracked up all over again.

I avoided all media for this an GoT. That scene was the funniest thing I've seen since 80s Eddie Murphy.

Run them Jewels mutha fuckers

https://m.soundcloud.com/massappealrecs/dj-shadow-nobody-speak-feat-run-the-jewels

gohmak fucked around with this message at 15:50 on Apr 27, 2016

Terminally Bored
Oct 31, 2011

Twenty-five dollars and a six pack to my name

Ciprian Maricon posted:

This show is great (except Richard)

Yep. He's the least funny and interesting of all the characters. It's irritating that his constant whining takes up time that could be spent on Dinesh and Gilfoyle. TJ Hooker is killing it, too, every single scene he gets.

The Dave
Sep 9, 2003

I got excited when Dog (or is this the smaller one with a different name?) showed up and my wife stared at me with a blank expression.

Whale Vomit
Nov 10, 2004

starving in the belly of a whale
its ribs are ceiling beams
its guts are carpeting
I guess we have some time to kill

Golden Bee posted:

Everyone Valleywag covered who wasn't a sexist


Republican Nominee Carly Fiorina.

Uuuuhhh... Nip Alert? I think the litigator made a convincing argument it was wholly sexist

drunkill
Sep 25, 2007

me @ ur posting
Fallen Rib
The best joke were the lawyers. The one who asked what was just said is gone the next time we see them. "1 in 5 people should be fired"

Kevyn
Mar 5, 2003

I just want to smile. Just once. I'd like to just, one time, go to Disney World and smile like the other boys and girls.

Terminally Bored posted:

Yep. He's the least funny and interesting of all the characters. It's irritating that his constant whining takes up time that could be spent on Dinesh and Gilfoyle. TJ Hooker is killing it, too, every single scene he gets.

Man, a TJ Hooker crossover would be awesome

Mortanis
Dec 28, 2005

It's your father's lightsaber. This is the weapon of a Jedi Knight.
College Slice
I'm going to laugh with glee if the endgame is Big Head buys Pied Piper and is the ultimate winner at making money entirely for doing nothing.

Great start. I loved S2 but I'm looking forward to a hopefully more light-hearted S3. Though it'll be hard to beat Dinesh and Gilfoyle's SWOT charting from S2.

Echo Chamber
Oct 16, 2008

best username/post combo
Big Head, despite his lack of screen time for much of the show, is still one of my favorite things about it. As people mentioned above, the successful do-nothing character isn't new in comedy, but there's still something hilarious about seeing such a character climb in silicon valley's bullshit hype culture in particular. Yesterday's episode where he finds the dumbest reason to "have to think about this" continues this. I want to see where he goes.

But yeah the whole show is great.

Edit: looks like they updated the website

Golden Bee
Dec 24, 2009

I came here to chew bubblegum and quote 'They Live', and I'm... at an impasse.
Although he played the straight man here, I'm psyched to see an entire season of Boss Tobolowsky.

Edit: The PP webpage says he "collects race horses and wineries."

Golden Bee fucked around with this message at 17:18 on Apr 25, 2016

Aardark
Aug 5, 2004

by Lowtax

gohmak posted:

I avoided all media for this an GoT. That scene was the funniest thing I've seen since 80s Eddie Murphy.

Run them Jewels mutha fuckers

https://soundcloud.com/massappealrecs/dj-shadow-nobody-speak-feat-run-the-jewels
:krad:

Awesome surprise at the end of a great episode.

Aardark fucked around with this message at 18:25 on Apr 27, 2016

roffles
Dec 25, 2004
RIGBY, I'm looking forward to episodes where he's not being a super whiny diva which is weird because it seemed like he started off not wanting to be A BOSS in the first place.

wukkar
Nov 27, 2009
is Tobolowsky playing a Steve Ballmer, the way Russ was Cuban and Gavin is Jobs?

bull3964
Nov 18, 2000

DO YOU HEAR THAT? THAT'S THE SOUND OF ME PATTING MYSELF ON THE BACK.


While I can agree that Richard gets a bit whiney sometimes, his reaction is exactly on point in this episode.

I mean, his baby is being taken away from him. Yes, it's better for the overall health and success of the company, but he was voted out as CEO of his own company just when it was getting successful. It's a completely human reaction to have.

The whole episode was about everyone's journey to figure out their proper place.

Boris Galerkin
Dec 17, 2011

I don't understand why I can't harass people online. Seriously, somebody please explain why I shouldn't be allowed to stalk others on social media!
There's a huge difference between being fired from his own company and being given a different C-level title at his own company, though.

Analytic Engine
May 18, 2009

not the analytical engine
Weren't Dinesh and Gilfoyle already the co-CTOs?

Also props to Kumail Nanjiani, dude lost weight since last year. He doesn't have that programmer flab anymore.

Teriyaki Hairpiece
Dec 29, 2006

I'm nae the voice o' the darkened thistle, but th' darkened thistle cannae bear the sight o' our Bonnie Prince Bernie nae mair.

Golden Bee posted:

Although he played the straight man here, I'm psyched to see an entire season of Boss Tobolowsky.

Edit: The PP webpage says he "collects race horses and wineries."

I'm hoping his character turns out to be a more charming version of Deadwood's Hearst.

roffles
Dec 25, 2004

bull3964 posted:

While I can agree that Richard gets a bit whiney sometimes, his reaction is exactly on point in this episode.

I mean, his baby is being taken away from him. Yes, it's better for the overall health and success of the company, but he was voted out as CEO of his own company just when it was getting successful. It's a completely human reaction to have.

The whole episode was about everyone's journey to figure out their proper place.

In a vacuum, I agree that his reaction in this episode was well within reason, but being a giant baby and storming out after Ron lays out the truth about how he only has himself to blame for this situation is not. Though we got that hilarious mustache scene so it's cool. I just think they need to do a turnaround on his character soon, which I think is happening with how the episode ended.

I guess the fact that he basically has to change one letter in his title after all his massive fuckups is a testament to his genius and he should be happy that he gets to continue to just Write Code. It'll be interesting to see where they take Jack Dorsey Barker, he's clearly not as chill as he seems to be, right?

Bill Brasky
Apr 13, 2008

Aardark posted:

:krad:

Awesome surprise at the end of a great episode.

Have this on repeat. loving great

bull3964
Nov 18, 2000

DO YOU HEAR THAT? THAT'S THE SOUND OF ME PATTING MYSELF ON THE BACK.


Boris Galerkin posted:

There's a huge difference between being fired from his own company and being given a different C-level title at his own company, though.

Of course there is.

It's still a huge deal though. The company is no longer his from his perspective. In reality, it wasn't his anyways since he was building it with someone else's money. That's the bit he had to come to terms with.

He created something big and then was told by everyone he trusted that he wasn't worthy to helm that creation anymore. That's a gigantic blow to the ego and it surprises the hell out of me that so many people here think it's just whining. I would think most people would have experienced something similar at some point in their life and could relate (just not with the same stakes.)

Analytic Engine
May 18, 2009

not the analytical engine

roffles posted:

It'll be interesting to see where they take Jack Dorsey Barker, he's clearly not as chill as he seems to be, right?

He says Pied Piper has the potential to be a 100 billion dollar company, and his string of successes have been around $1B, so he probably wants to take a once-in-a-lifetime shot at building the next Google. That would set up some great conflict with Richard and the guys because they haven't really cared about explosive growth yet, and the "interesting technical problems" of a small/medium startup often shift towards supporting ads, marketing, and sales in Unicorn companies. A bunch of nerds will be less happy dealing with "growth hacking" and constantly pivoting the company's direction to satisfy the VCs providing millions in capital. The preview showed Barker already hired a bunch of non-technical people to work on that. So hopefully we get good conflicts and jokes about scaling a company, without contrived situations where PP screws up the technical work. There's a lot of material there about how nerds like Richard get exploited by the business system of SV since all they want to do is the coding.

Golden Bee
Dec 24, 2009

I came here to chew bubblegum and quote 'They Live', and I'm... at an impasse.

cheerfullydrab posted:

I'm hoping his character turns out to be a more charming version of Deadwood's Hearst.

I hope he's Clayton Townley by way of Sammy Jenkins.

Holyshoot
May 6, 2010
Wheres Jian Yang!

nah thanks
Jun 18, 2004

Take me out.

roffles posted:

I guess the fact that he basically has to change one letter in his title after all his massive fuckups is a testament to his genius and he should be happy that he gets to continue to just Write Code. It'll be interesting to see where they take Jack Dorsey Barker, he's clearly not as chill as he seems to be, right?

Dudes a good manager and just mindfucked Richard into letting him on board. Nothing about that was him being particularly chill, it was all him knowing that going in guns blazing was the wrong move, and that he needs Richard on board to make the company work and that Richard won't get on board unless he thinks it's his idea in the first place. Same deal with Erlich: there's no way that he's actually a fan of Erlich and Aviato.

I'm guessing he'll be a lot less chill in a different situation, though it'd be pretty funny if he's just a super nice guy and Richard and Co keep having conflict with him out of fear that he's tricking them.

nah thanks fucked around with this message at 20:59 on Apr 25, 2016

EugeneJ
Feb 5, 2012

by FactsAreUseless
I visited Palo Alto for the first time a few weeks ago - the show needs more Asian girls if it wants to be realistic

JUST MAKING CHILI
Feb 14, 2008

EugeneJ posted:

I visited Palo Alto for the first time a few weeks ago - the show needs more Asian girls if it wants to be realistic

Holyshoot posted:

Wheres Jian Yang!

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BIG HEADLINE
Jun 13, 2006

"Stand back, Ottawan ruffian, or face my lumens!"

EugeneJ posted:

I visited Palo Alto for the first time a few weeks ago - the show needs more Asian girls if it wants to be realistic

*next episode*

"Wow, Monica...you look...different."

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