S01.E02: FUD

[Tara Ariano]

After surviving a visit from IBM, Joe's team must overcome internal differences as they begin building the new machine.

[LJonEarth]

First, I'll say I'm really enjoying the show. Probably because I got the premise for the start. But it might be because my Lee Pace fan girldom.

 

I am a bit annoyed that I see so much of Walter White and Don Draper in him, especially with that last beat of this episode. It's almost like I can hear the directive from the powers that be over at AMC. "What's been successfully for us in the past? Yeah. Just do that again."

[Stinger97]

The episode worked for me, although I thought there was a little too much tension between the core three. Lee Pace was quite literally tearing up the scenery in all his scenes. Joe in the going-out-of-business electronics store just felt odd. And didn't the clerk say he was calling the police? I'm surprised Joe wasn't carted off. 

 

I enjoy Cameron. She's punk-y and unapologetic, and she's not afraid to call Joe or Gordon out on their shit. The montage of her flailing around in the mall dressing room got me to chuckle, as did her five-finger discount of those baseball tees. I also appreciate that she's in charge of her own sexuality and totally owns it. But I feel like that might be an unpopular opinion. 

 

Gordon still kind of strikes me as a huge fuddy duddy (reminiscent of Droopy Dog), but I guess you can't win em all. Maybe he'll evolve over the season.

[DrSpaceman]

I find Cameron to be over the top and annoying. COmpletely idealistic and impractical. Its 1983, all computers were "grey boxes" at the time. And they would be for another 20 years.

She is coming off a bit cliched to me, plus she can't speak without making some comment about evil corporate america or disparaging remarks about how everyone is beneath her with no vision.

I am a bit confused actually on what they are going for with Lee in terms of the character. They seem to be throwing a bunch of stuff in about him over the first two episodes that is all over the place. Seems to be a maverick loner formerly abused by someone with daddy issues and who was doing who knows what for the past year.

SO I assume they have two months to finish this computer so the company doesn't go bankrupt?

Edited June 9, 2014 by DrSpaceman

[GaT]

I have to admit, I don't really know what's going on except that they're making a computer. What was all that stuff with the IBM raid? And what the hell are bios?

[hincandenza]

The IBM raid is something from the standard monopoly playbook, auch as MS in the 90's, or Wal-Mart... ever. They see Cardiff as a small but not nonexistent existential threat; so, use their deep pockets to basically undersell all of Cardiff's contracts, at a loss... but still peanuts to the giant that is IBM. Result: Cardiff's PC division dies in the crib when the company has no money, and any other small to medium sized company with dreams of making their own PC clone will now think twice when they see what happened to poor Cardiff.

A BIOS is a "basic input/output system". It's the first language or instructions a computer runs, with the most basic operations for managing the CPU and memory. Your OS, such as Windows or Mac OSX or Linux, will talk to the BIOS to get things done at the barest 1's and 0's level. If you can imitate the input/output language in your own PC clone, then no one has to "buy IBM" to run their existing applications. They can buy a clone that runs functionally the same way but is cheaper, so hardware devices, or software such as Operating Systems, can run on your clone. We know the end result because we live it: an open architecture where countless manufacturers of PCs (or laptops, tablets, and smart phones) graphics cards, software, etc, can all follow the same common interfaces, and things mostly just work together.

I did notice that they name checked Compaq explicitly this episode, so that does raise the question of who/what Cardiff is, if they aren't a fictional stand-in for Compaq. We know Cardiff doesn't exist in our world, so I'm curious if the end result of this season is an alternate timeline where Cardiff has wild success, or perhaps blazes a trail but dies like so many first innovators, with the last acene of the last episode having one of those postscript blurbs about how huge the impact of the PC clone market was in our lives.

[GaT]

 

 

The IBM raid is something from the standard monopoly playbook, auch as MS in the 90's, or Wal-Mart... ever. They see Cardiff as a small but not nonexistent existential threat; so, use their deep pockets to basically undersell all of Cardiff's contracts, at a loss... but still peanuts to the giant that is IBM. Result: Cardiff's PC division dies in the crib when the company has no money, and any other small to medium sized company with dreams of making their own PC clone will now think twice when they see what happened to poor Cardiff.

A BIOS is a "basic input/output system". It's the first language or instructions a computer runs, with the most basic operations for managing the CPU and memory. Your OS, such as Windows or Mac OSX or Linux, will talk to the BIOS to get things done at the barest 1's and 0's level. If you can imitate the input/output language in your own PC clone, then no one has to "buy IBM" to run their existing applications. They can buy a clone that runs functionally the same way but is cheaper, so hardware devices, or software such as Operating Systems, can run on your clone. We know the end result because we live it: an open architecture where countless manufacturers of PCs (or laptops, tablets, and smart phones) graphics cards, software, etc, can all follow the same common interfaces, and things mostly just work together.

Thanks for the info. It seems to me that this kind of stuff should be explained to me on the show, I shouldn't have to hope some random person on the internet is going to explain it to me.

[Peace 47]

I am a bit annoyed that I see so much of Walter White and Don Draper in him

Maybe with a bit of the Joker mixed in? I.e., "You wanna know how I got these scars? Here's a complete lie."

I would be (am) a bad visionary. I know that we're probably supposed to respect Joe's foresight and drive to make things happen, but I just felt bad for the guy who's his boss (forgot his name) when all the clients started jumping ship. This poor man asked for none of this: he just wanted to keep on doing what was working relatively well for the company. I was anti-Joe in almost every single one of his scenes.

Why is Cameron so poor that she has no apartment and has to shoplift her clothes? She negotiated her salary up by something like 100%, right? She couldn't have negotiated an advance? And was she in school before, or did I misunderstand? If so, she wasn't living on the streets then, was she?

One thing I like is how they zig when you expect them to zag on these supporting characters. Last week, it was Gordon's wife being a competent programmer in her own right; this week, it was that guy who was supposed to babysit Cameron at the office having that throwaway line to Joe that he found Cameron interesting (when you'd expect him to be a hostile bean-counter).

I think I'm still a little bit on the fence overall. We'll see.

[DrSpaceman]

Maybe with a bit of the Joker mixed in? I.e., "You wanna know how I got these scars? Here's a complete lie."

 

Oh my god, that was exactly what I was thinking this morning when thinking about the show and given a night to consider what happened.  I wonder if each episode they will throw in a new story about his scars. 

 

I got the part about IBM raiding the business.  Its cruel but its the expected reaction I think from a large company.  From a business standpoint, makes perfect sense.  Have a small company trying to rip you off?  Undersell them at every turn, even at a loss if needed, and put them out of business. 

[heebiejeebie]

 

I did notice that they name checked Compaq explicitly this episode, so that does raise the question of who/what Cardiff is, if they aren't a fictional stand-in for Compaq. We know Cardiff doesn't exist in our world, so I'm curious if the end result of this season is an alternate timeline where Cardiff has wild success, or perhaps blazes a trail but dies like so many first innovators, with the last acene of the last episode having one of those postscript blurbs about how huge the impact of the PC clone market was in our lives.

 

It's a little before my time in terms of awareness of such events but I was thinking maybe Cardiff is a mix of Compaq and Dell with a few other companies thrown in to give it a good mix.

[green]

Why is Cameron so poor that she has no apartment and has to shoplift her clothes? She negotiated her salary up by something like 100%, right? She couldn't have negotiated an advance? And was she in school before, or did I misunderstand? If so, she wasn't living on the streets then, was she?

 

I don't think she is meant to be "poor" as in homeless.  Not rich for sure as she is worried about a job.  But not ultra poor either.  I got the feeling she just likes to shoplift to make her a "rebel."  Also for the thrill of it.

 

As for sleeping at work that was pretty much the standard operating mode for most hot shot programmers and engineers back in the day.   People would throw in a bean bag couch or old mattress into the area they worked and lived on high caffeine level colas and pizza and worked until they passed out, woke up, worked some more and crashed etc.  It was the feeling of living on the exciting new frontier and high power tech types that took to that life style were looked up to and considered the trailblazers. 

 

If you just always remember that programmers and engineers are the left brain equivalent of writers and painters you will get it on this show.  Just as some of the great writers and painters and composers etc often went off on creative working jags for several weeks at a time until they satisfied their muse then crashed dead drunk for several more weeks "recovering;" so too their left brain counterparts, high tech types.  Both types push the envelope and usually live off the boring 9 to 5 grid the rest of us are trapped in and inhabit instead a far more exciting and stimulating world inside their heads.  If you remember that you will understand these characters on the show better.

[DrSpaceman]

I didn't get the impression she was shoplifting because she was poor.  I assumed she is probably a klepto or that was just what she was used to doing and just doesn't care even if she has the money now

 

Wasnt clear to me though if she was sleeping at work because she was busy and working around the clock or because she is truly homeless.  Probably the former. 

[hincandenza]

Yeah, Cameron's a bit of an enigma- one of the reasons I'm not liking her character yet, as she's coming across as a Mary Sue cliche, the troubled-yet-brilliant outcast engineer. We know nothing about her still besides her comical hatred of all things authority. I'm sure we'll find out she had a terrible/abusive family life or past, blah blah blah etc, but I find that utterly boring in a show about technological innovation. Same with Joe and his Draper-like running from his past "mystery". I think Gordon's backstory is more interesting, as we're shown more of how he once dreamed big, but family life and security took precedence. He's not some central casting cliche like Cameron, or a big loud distraction where we'll be strung along for weeks on what horrible secret he has, like with Joe.

Based on Gordon's reaction to the whiteboard, it's clear we're supposed to recognize that Cameron has made fantastic strides in creating a faster BIOS than IBM, without referencing the binder, one that may have a chance of the "twice as fast, half the price goal", and that Gordon will come to respect and admire her gifts (and she him, no doubt). The early days of computing, incredibly smart engineers would come up with clever tricks to squeeze a little more out of limited memory or CPU, although I guess to GaT's point, if they can't find their footing to add enough lay person exposition- without being clunky- they're gonna lose their audience.

Edited June 9, 2014 by hincandenza

[paramitch]

I really loved this episode, and Lee Pace blew me away. I always love him (why isn't he a bigger star?) but here I thought he was really explosive. I'm enjoying him as a character I don't even like, but who interests me and rivets my attention.

 

I thought the interesting thing about Joe's final monologue here about their enterprise, their commonalities, and his scars, was that even if every word was a lie, somehow his desperation and desire to connect with them was still true -- and drew them in. I just found it so powerful, and knew that he was both lying and telling the truth at the same time. 

 

I'm okay with Cameron -- she's a cliche but is also bringing some vibrance to the character. I did laugh at her mainlining orange soda (it's a geek reference). And I have never liked Cameron more than when she showed that she knew Joe's monologue was BS -- and she showed up at 7 a.m. anyway.

[88Keys]

So what does FUD stand for?

[hincandenza]

Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt. The term actually came to prominence in reference to IBM's basic marketing tactic of the time (but has spread elsewhere), to sow fear, uncertainty, and doubt in the customer- the same mindset that gave us the expression, "No one ever got fired buying IBM". I don't fully understand its relevance to this episode, other than IBM's push to steal all of Cardiff's major clients.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fear,_uncertainty_and_doubt

Going along with my previous statement, I realize I'm already on the fence with this show due to dramatic sloppiness, and probably will give it 1-2 more episodes to draw me in. I'm in tech, so I'm following along, but if I have to explain some of these things here, then how the bulk of the audience isn't getting frustrated, I'm not sure.

Edited June 9, 2014 by hincandenza

[scowl]

The show is doing a terrible job explaining its technical plot points -- lots of people are scratching their heads over this buy-ass Cameron is supposed to be building because they've never explained what it is. Open Architecture? That's gone over people's heads too. The yelling and fist fight seem like attempts to add drama to something that isn't dramatic. And we had to have the cliché scene where someone looks at a blackboard and in twenty seconds is astounded by the brilliance.

 

Wait, it was a whiteboard. I don't remember whiteboards in common use in 1983, certainly not in the basement.

 

Make it run twice as fast? That prompted technical nonsense like "changing the crystal"? Uh, the CPU will only run reliably at its specified speed so that made no sense. I thought maybe they were going to make a BIOS that ran twice as fast but many DOS applications didn't use the BIOS so that won't work. What the hell was that about?

 

Could we please see Cameron typing in assembly code instead of scribbling junk on paper?

 

The contrived drama plus the disregard for any technical accuracy is making this show hard to watch for me.

[thuganomics85]

I'm just glad this is the summer and there are less shows out there, so I'm willing to keep giving this a chance.  Because right now, I'm still not feeling it.  I love Lee Pace, but I still find Joe not only Don Draper-ish, but even more unlikable, if that is even possible. To be fair, that does seem to be AMC's thing (Don, Walter, etc.), but he needs to be interesting too, and right now, I find Joe just a bore.  I'm already bored with his "mysterious back-story", his freak-outs, his pitiful faces when things don't go his way, and his smirks when they do.  I hope they get it together soon.  Lee Pace is much better then this.

 

Not a fan of Cameron either.  Just finding her way to cliched and obnoxious.  Of course she's such a rebel that she shoplifts.  Oh, and her favorite attire is sleeveless, tight undershirts.  Got it, guys.  She's hot.

 

I guess I find Gordon a bit more likable, mainly thanks to Scoot McNairy.  But I was rolling my eyes during the entire "Didn't tell his wife Cameron was a girl" story-line.  Way to cause unnecessary drama, dude.  I'm still not sure why he didn't want her to know, because I really don't think it's because he secretly has a crush on Cameron or anything.  It really feels like he can barely tolerate her.  I guess it was him just being an idiot.

 

I do like the boss character.  He's probably the one I root for the most.

 

At this point, I've already given up on trying to figure out this computer stuff.  They really aren't doing  a great job at explaining anything, IMO, so I'm just "Computer stuff.  It's important!  Got it!" about it.  I am interested in how they are going to deal with IBM stealing their clients.

[Charlotte Vale]

I'm just glad this is the summer and there are less shows out there, so I'm willing to keep giving this a chance.

 

I feel just the opposite--with my Sunday Night Bonnet Sagas off for the summer (Call the Midwife, Turn, Mad Men), the only thing I'd be watching would be Halt and Catch Fire. While I kinda like it, I don't like it enough to stay up till 11:00 on a worknight.

[ABay]

I agree that the lack of TV-viewing competition is mostly what's keeping me around, and I record it to watch the next day or later in the week.

[88Keys]

I thought they upped the drama in this episode.  And by "upped the drama," I mean that they made the characters scream and flail around a lot.  I'm not sure if the things they were screaming about were really that big of a deal, though.  Like when they were so freaked out about Cameron looking at the BIOS binder that they were yelling and throwing the book around, it was almost comical, you know?  And the scene with Joe at the electronics store, and the showdown in the parking lot... it was all just really over the top.

 

 

 

I enjoy Cameron. She's punk-y and unapologetic, and she's not afraid to call Joe or Gordon out on their shit. The montage of her flailing around in the mall dressing room got me to chuckle, as did her five-finger discount of those baseball tees. I also appreciate that she's in charge of her own sexuality and totally owns it.

 

See, I get the complete opposite vibe from her.  I feel like she's trying to act like a badass who doesn't care about authority or rules, but she's really just insecure and scared and not sure where she fits into this corporate scenario.  She's trying way too hard with her shoplifting and cussing out her boss and her sex for stress relief.  I do like her calling Joe out, because he does seem to be full of crap most of the time and I appreciate that she can see through that.  But overall, her punk persona just comes across as fake to me.  That scene at the very end, where she calmly implied to Joe that she knew he was lying about his scars, felt like the most genuine thing she has done yet. 

 

As for her sleeping at the office, I thought it was just a reference to how focused tech people can be on their work, as someone upthread pointed out.  After seeing her carry her bag of stuff around and shoplift new clothes, I think they were trying to imply that she is homeless.  It makes sense- if she was in college living at a dorm and dropped out, she would probably have nowhere else to go.  And I doubt she has gotten a paycheck yet, since she's only been there a day or two.

 

 

 

It seems to me that this kind of stuff should be explained to me on the show, I shouldn't have to hope some random person on the internet is going to explain it to me.

 

This.  Exactly.  Every time I watch this show, I feel like I immediately need to come here so someone can explain it to me.  I think this show might have benefited from having an outsider who knows nothing about computers be part of the main cast of characters.  Not that I want tedious labored explanations every five minutes, but SOME explanation would be helpful. 

 

I think the writers of HACF have a difficult task.  Too much tech explanations and the audience gets bored.  Too little and they get confused.  So far, I don't think they have figured out the right balance yet.

Edited June 9, 2014 by 88Keys

[green]

This.  Exactly.  Every time I watch this show, I feel like I immediately need to come here so someone can explain it to me.  I think this show might have benefited from having an outsider who knows nothing about computers be part of the main cast of characters.  Not that I want tedious labored explanations every five minutes, but SOME explanation would be helpful. 

 

I think the writers of HACF have a difficult task.  Too much tech explanations and the audience gets bored.  Too little and they get confused.  So far, I don't think they have figured out the right balance yet.

 

And this is why all tech manuals are totally boring and non-understandable.  Why controls and prompts and stuff make no sense to the end user most of the time.  Tech people have an absolutly horrible time conveying their world to the rest of us.  Of being able to design interfaces that make sense to us.  I've said for years they needed real life, non-tech people to vet their work before it ever appears on the market. 

 

But techies tend to like to keep to their world to perhaps feel a rush of superiority over those not initiated into their realm maybe.  Lots of people do weird things seeking self-validation for their lives.  Being able to speak/work/function in a totally different universe then most seems to be a techie trademark for many of them.

 

And this show follows the same pattern as the tech industry's biggest flaw.  I find this highly ironic because I would assume most film makers are more your right brain types because communicating to people via their art is what they do after all.  Yet this whole series feels like it was put together by a bunch of zonked out tech people instead.  Fun for the insider view and jokes I guess but losing the general viewership quickly.

 

Who are the people who made this and why can't they translate techno-speak into a TV show that people will want to watch outside of the tech industry?

Edited June 9, 2014 by green

[Hanahope]

I also think that they are messing up the plot-point that Joe is supposed to know what's he's doing.  Sure, he seemed to know how to get around IBM's patent/copyright infringement claim, but he had no idea IBM would go all scorched earth on Cardiff?  No idea that the "brilliant rebel" he hired would be unconventional in how she worked?  If he just wanted someone to read the binder and alter the code a tad, why didn't he hire the more boring dude from the Boston Tech class? 

 

I have to agree that they are making up drama with the fights, sex cliches such as whether Cameron was a guy or girl,.and completely losing the actual story, both in terms of not explaining what the hell is going on and in trying to do too much too fast.  Heck, even as someone who's probably a little more tech savvy than the average bear, I'm still lost half the time (until I come here).  I don't know how they expect an average Joe (lowest common denominator for TV) to understand and follow the show. 

 

Everyone knows how advertising works (why you want to buy stuff) and drugs (money, messed up people), but not everyone knows how a computer works.  There are real scenarios of how people didn't know how to "rewind" their floppy discs, or even turn on the stupid grey box.  They aren't even going to know wtf a BIOS is why its important.  Yes, BB didn't explain exactly how you made meth either, but that really wasn't necessary.  You didn't have to know exactly how WW made the blue meth, you just had to know it was 99% pure and that made it the best over the 60% pures already in the market.  But I'm not sure people really "get" what 1/2 price and twice as fast means for a computer when they don't tell you what's already there.  All we heard was Gordo saying the IBM machine he bought was 'expensive.'  Did they even say how much it cost?  Was there any explanation as to why the current IBM speed was so limiting?  Without the base line, how can you appreciate what they're trying to do to make it better?  I just feel like they needed a pre-episode that showed or explained why people wanted to make clones in the first place.  When even some of the older viewing audience don't really remember how computers used to be 'so limited' in speed or price, you can bet the younger generations have no clue whatsoever.

[Lee4U]

The lack of character development - at all - is really jarring.  It's like they beamed in from another planet and they are coloring outside the lines for no discernible purpose.  This bit with the scars (true or not) just came too quickly for me to give a hoot or be able to associate it with anything else about the character.  

 

They (the core three) feel a bit like they are talking over and around one another rather than actually TO and WITH each other.  It's a bunch of disjointed sentences and thoughts.  I'm a wee bit tech savvy but if they are going to stand around oohing and aaahhhing around a chalk board, they really do need to fill in a bit with exposition.  

 

What a mess.  I will tune in for one more episode before deciding whether to hang in there; I rather want to see the box with the handle….

[John R]

I really want to like this show, but I think others have made valid points that cause real concern.  I loved the pilot, but don't know where the show is going now.

 

Since, in this universe, Compaq already exists, what is the  point?  Is Cameron's genius going to result in some new invention totally off the charts?  In the Apple/IBM-DOS universe, I don't know what that would be.  Joe is too incoherent, Cameron to much the stereotyped punk rebel.  I still like Gordon, though.

 

I love shows about a band of zany, risk-taking, rebellious pioneers taking on the system.  But to have any chance at success, they need to be competent and organized.  Hope HACF moves in that direction.

[Dowel Jones]

The scene right after the shoplifting; who were those three guys who approached Cameron?  They weren't store security, as they would have detained her for the police and that would be that, and they mentioned something else to her that I didn't catch.  Also, gordon finds a ninja knife in her stuff in the basement.  I wonder if that is going somewhere?

[GaT]

 

The scene right after the shoplifting; who were those three guys who approached Cameron?  They weren't store security,

They were from IBM, they were trying to recruit her.

[dubbel zout]

The scene right after the shoplifting; who were those three guys who approached Cameron?

 

Guys from IBM. They were trying to hire her away from Cardiff. It was part of the whole undermining they were doing.

 

ETA: Jinx with GaT!

 

I'm not sure people really "get" what 1/2 price and twice as fast means for a computer when they don't tell you what's already there.

Exactly. I don't really care about the technical stuff (and I don't understand even with the explanations here), but there has to be some baseline information so we understand why what these three are doing will be revolutionary. I think talking about a portable computer is a step in the right direction—everyone can grasp that—but if you don't have a comparison point for the innovation side, it's gibberish. They tried a bit to explain BIOS with the secretary who showed Cameron to the clean room, but Cameron was so condescending that I thought it too much about Cameron and negated the exposition.

 

It's kind of fun for me to watch this anyway, because Cameron and I are near contemporaries, and I can remember some of the broader stuff the show touches on.

 

Of course Joe has daddy issues. And a deep dark secret. Sigh.

Edited June 9, 2014 by dubbel zout

[film noire]

 

I do like the boss character.  He's probably the one I root for the most.

Me too. Give him a smart wife & a legal team of two (low key) Texans and then give him the whole damn show, because I'd much rather watch a series about him getting his company back by tricking the 'core three' into reading that stupid blue binder -- and then sending them off to jail -- than what's happening right now.

Edited June 10, 2014 by film noire

[Snowprince]

I thought the pilot was decent. This one, not so much. Joe is Don Draper lite. Different decade and profession, same character. Cameron is a cookie cutter cliche who at this point I find nothing likable about. All I want to do right now is smack her in her smug condescending mouth. Gordon is the only one of the three I really want to know so far, but that's about all I can say. If "The Triad" are supposed to be the ones we're supposed to root for and care about, whoever is writing this better do something to make us do that quick. I don't think they intended for the Texas good ol boy boss to be the one to fill that bill but right now, I'm more interested in how he and Cardiff are going to counter IBM's effort to gut them than anything else.

 

An audience will tolerate and get past techno-babble in a sci-fi show because they know it's fictional and they at least have some idea what it's supposed to mean or what the device is supposed to do. If the audience here is drowned in tech talk with no explanation or understanding, then techies will be the only ones who "get" it and the rest of us will eventually tune out. 

 

I want to like this show. I think the story is a compelling one in a "how did we get here?" sense. I'll give it a couple more episodes, but I'm not in for the long haul yet.  

Edited June 10, 2014 by Snowprince

[attica]

I'm continuing to like the show. The troika are each compelling to watch in their own ways: the camera loves Pace (and I love the tie that perfectly matched his shirt -- which is probably anachronistic, but it's pretty wardrobing), they're letting Cameron have hairy armpits, and boy did I love Gordon and his Boz Scaggs driving character note. Plus Toby Huss, who's getting to do a lot more than he's usually hired for. Good editing, well-scored, tight blocking, and everything's ticking along at a good clip. 

 

I find myself surprised the hour is over already.

[AriAu]

I realize I'm already on the fence with this show due to dramatic sloppiness, and probably will give it 1-2 more episodes to draw me in. I'm in tech, so I'm following along, but if I have to explain some of these things here, then how the bulk of the audience isn't getting frustrated, I'm not sure.

 

I am one of the ones getting frustrated. I want to like this show since I like Ned the Pie Maker and the other characters seem interesting and clearly have secrets on some level (only one of which is Draper like at all), but I am not following what is going on with the most important topic-the computer stuff. I don't know what "bios" is and I don't think I am supposed to be guessing. I know that they want us to focus on the "other" issues involving the characters and their pasts (as well as their futures) but I think it would be nice to have some idea what forms to basis for the storyline and the drama. I easily followed that IBM was getting back at them with their economic muscle (something our genius Pie Maker should have anticipated since there was no way IBM was going back to Greenwich Conn (or Armonk NY) with their tail between their legs), so why couldn't they figure out how to explain or demonstrate the basic tech stuff that would have made the other 40 minutes of the show understandable?

[scowl]

Since, in this universe, Compaq already exists, what is the  point?  Is Cameron's genius going to result in some new invention totally off the charts? 

 

It seems like that's what the show is aiming at with all that genius stuff Cameron scratched on her whiteboard. Yep, that stuff is gonna make a computer run twice as fast at half the price.

 

The only thing I can remember that made IBM PCs go faster was avoiding the BIOS whenever possible. 

[Agfa]

Well, I like the show for now. I haven't seen Mad Men or Breaking Bad, so I can enjoy and appreciate Lee Pace's character for what he is (smarmy, show off, a liar... someone I like not to like, for now).

What's been missing for me is a direct, real interaction between Gordon and Cameron. And I hope they won't just use Gordon's wife for drama and jealousy.

 

But I do find it entertaining, and even though it's not my domain, I can more or less follow. If I recall properly, Cameron did explain what a BIOS was to the secretary, that was enough info for me.

[ABay]

Unless Harold Finch shows up and shows them what a real computer genius looks like, I think I'm done. Maybe I'll give it another week. The characters just aren't holding my interest--I don't care if they eventually gel as a team or not since none of them matter to me as an individual. As others have said, the boss and the TI wife are more intersting to watch and the wife at least has a story that hasn't been told before on TV. Even the babysitting lawyer interested me more than the core trio.

[green]

It seems like that's what the show is aiming at with all that genius stuff Cameron scratched on her whiteboard. Yep, that stuff is gonna make a computer run twice as fast at half the price.

 

The only thing I can remember that made IBM PCs go faster was avoiding the BIOS whenever possible. 

 

Well they also did mention a portable computer with "handles" too so if Compaq beat them to the big punch I suppose they could go with inventing the first laptop earlier then real life on this show thus creating the "mobile revolution" instead.

 

Man this show is so slowwww.  I kept looking at the clock and it looked like it was frozen in time.  Not a good sign for me to keep watching.

 

Also I usually basically hate business types with a passion but this show is so bad I too am rooting for the old, white, conservative Texas owner trying to save his company from both Mr Arrogant in house and Big Blue. 

 

Okay I still get to hate one business since IBM and their silly conservative dress code guys are still around in this series lurking in dark corners.  I recall back then IBM guys were NOT allowed even slightly long hair or facial hair of any kind or even short sideburns.  We are a free country ... but not at work where it is totally dark ages uber ruler "business look" sheep herd think.  I'm sure they probably even would have had a ban on cool chick's natural armpit hair if they even thought about it but that would have been so outside of their box it would have exploded their mind.  Die, bastards, die!  (Ah yes that felt better).

Edited June 11, 2014 by green

[kieyra]

I have a lot of issues with the show, but unfortunately you all beat me to them. From the crypto-tech to the schizo characterization to the obvious AMC "branding". It sucks because I should be the ideal viewer for this show (typical AMC viewer, plus grew up in the 80s AND was a computer nerd in the 80s). Instead I just want them to calm Lee Pace the hell down and show me some more competency porn.

I think, for me, the show is also suffering by comparison to Silicon Valley (HBO), which managed to make the tech industry accessible (and funny) to both tech and non-tech viewers while communicating clear concepts and rock-solid characterization...including much better versions of real-world tech industry personality archetypes. I guess it's not a fair comparison since it's a half-hour comedy, but it's still fresh in my head and making this show seem perhaps even worse to me.

Edited June 12, 2014 by kieyra

[ganesh]

I enjoy Cameron. She's punk-y and unapologetic, and she's not afraid to call Joe or Gordon out on their shit. The montage of her flailing around in the mall dressing room got me to chuckle, as did her five-finger discount of those baseball tees. I also appreciate that she's in charge of her own sexuality and totally owns it. But I feel like that might be an unpopular opinion.

 

She is coming off a bit cliched to me, plus she can't speak without making some comment about evil corporate america or disparaging remarks about how everyone is beneath her with no vision.

I think it's both. The actor is doing ok, but the writing isn't doing her any favors. Plus, she was isolated for most of the episode so it's hard to actually 'do acting' by writing meaningfully on a whiteboard. She isn't as tough as she thinks she is, but being in programming, it was all men back then and still mostly men now, so I think she kind of feels a need to through her dick on the table, so to speak. Being into punk and having a short hair cut doesn't seem cliche to me because that was some people's style in the 80s.

 

I'm of the mind that she's homeless too. 

 

I don't really have a problem with the level of technical exposition. Really, Cameron explained BIOS quickly early on, and that was the current goal: replicate the IBM BIOS that Gordon did in E1 without violating the copyright. As for twice as fast, half the price; it's a fast computer that can crunch numbers faster than IBM and cost less than IBM. That's the gist and there really isn't much more to know. All the technobabble Cameron was spouting was to screw with Joe, but it wasn't necessary to know any of it.

 

Maybe with a bit of the Joker mixed in? I.e., "You wanna know how I got these scars? Here's a complete lie."

I thought the interesting thing about Joe's final monologue here about their enterprise, their commonalities, and his scars, was that even if every word was a lie, somehow his desperation and desire to connect with them was still true -- and drew them in.

I said in E1 that I do think Joe's belief in Gordon's abilities are genuine. Now, who is Joe to decide for Gordon what Gordon should do with his life, but Joe was kind of right. Gordon did confess to his wife that he was unfulfilled. I thought they were going to drag out the zomg Cameron is a girl and I'm pissed between Gordon and his wife, but it was resolved quickly. I think she was actually amused by it all. I don't want this show to have marriage drama.

 

I got the part about IBM raiding the business.

 

This was a big deal in the 80s. Corporate raiders were all the rage for a time. So this wasn't unexpected for me. I'm surprised Joe didn't forsee this. 

 

I'm assuming Joe tearing up the scenery is a deliberate acting/directing choice because I'm feeling that Joe isn't nearly as put together as he's letting on, and I assume it's tied into his leaving IBM. And that's fine. It doesn't mean his idea to clone the PC isn't a good one (as we know with hindsight). I assume he'll tone it as the show unfolds and he's developed more. 

 

I don't mind the show being what it is. So far, I'm entertained. Not everything can be Breaking Bad, Mad Men, Game of Thrones. This is a good idea for a summer show. I usually give a show 5 episodes and take it overall before I drop it/stick with it. 

 

[Kel Varnsen]

This was a big deal in the 80s. Corporate raiders were all the rage for a time. So this wasn't unexpected for me. I'm surprised Joe didn't forsee this.

 

I am kind of glad they didn't take too much time explaining this. It was obviously something that would have happened very fast, so having someone basically pause the show so that the viewers can have it explained to them would be kind of jarring. I mean this isn't House of Lies or Saved by the Bell where the main character talks to the audience. 

 

One thing I didn't get was how the year between Sputnik and the football game proved to Cameron that Joe was full of crap. I mean couldn't the timeline have been that he saw Sputnik and was obsessed about it for a year and wouldn't shut up about it. When the other kids hear him talking about it for a year and the giants lose that big game they finally have enough and beat the crap out of him? It is something that could possibly happen, especially when these are little kids.

[Hanahope]

As for twice as fast, half the price; it's a fast computer that can crunch numbers faster than IBM and cost less than IBM.

 

Yeah, but why does number crunching need to be faster?  How fast was it then?  Did it take two hours to crunch X amount of numbers and boy those companies would make so much more money if the numbers could be crunched in one hour? 

 

Cost less than IBM, but by how much?  Did IBMs cost $1,000 back then and now would cost $500 so a company that needed 100 computers would save so much money?

 

What use would that be, if any, to individuals?  Why would individuals need a numbers cruncher?

 

I just think they needed to explain why making a computer twice as fast at half the price would mean?  Give some sort of an example.  All I can remember at the time was using a computer in 1985 to input car repair info into a database at my part-time job at the dealership mechanic. If we needed to look up someone's repair info, input their name and it would give a list of dates and repairs.  We print that out.   Didn't take all that long.  They had 4 computers.  I have a hard time understanding how or why we would need a computer to do it "twice as fast" or at "half the price".

[ganesh]

Who would want more computing power? Sales data for large corporations, for one. Scientific computing. So basically take anything in science that uses equations. All the national labs would want them. What would regular people want them for? Word processing? Games. Spreadsheets and charts for use in typical offices. 

 

As for exactly how fast, how fast is my phone? I don't know, but I plan to buy the Galaxy 5 when I have enough money and I know it's faster because I read the reviews. It's not important to me how much faster. Fast enough that I can watch/listen to streaming media. Cost? Who doesn't want something that's a better product and costs less? Joe wants wants the cost to be low enough so 'regular' people can buy them rather than just big firms. 

 

Not that those aren't important questions, but I don't think the show needs to stop to point out all the reasons why people might want a faster/cheaper computer given how ubiquitous technology pervades our lives. 

 

I am kind of glad they didn't take too much time explaining this. It was obviously something that would have happened very fast, so having someone basically pause the show so that the viewers can have it explained to them would be kind of jarring.

 

It certainly fit the flavor of it. I think it was a good choice. It seems like the show is going to kind of pound away with the pacing, and that's kind of an 80s feel. I tend to cut a show slack on a pilot episode that's exposition-heavy in terms of talking, but you can give exposition by showing too, and I think that's what they did in this episode. I think they did a good job with Gordon on the white board: She wrote the BIOS and it looks like it's actually faster. They could have written hieroglyphics on the board for all I care, those two lines were enough. 

 

There's the bit with Gordon talking about crystals, etc., but he was already shown to have build a computer, so he's talking there about things he can do to the actual hardware design. That's good enough for me. 

 

I'm always less is more with the exposition, but I get that you don't want to lose the audience. With a show like this, where people aren't familiar with BIOS, etc., I think they're going in the right direction with just "2X fast 1/2 cost", or Joe proposing the computers be portable. I think those are things that people get right off the bat. Cameron does code, Gordon and his wife know how to actually build a computer. We saw Gordon be able to take apart the Speak and Spell and then re code it to say the daughter's name. That's a good way to show what he can do without exactly having to sit and explain it. 

Edited June 12, 2014 by ganesh

[StatisticalOutlier]

What bugs Mr. Outlier is that they bother to have jargon and then get it wrong.  "Multiply by eight or right shift by three" should actually be "left shift by three."  Or something like that.  If they have somebody who knows enough to write even an outline of a sentence like that, why can't they get it right? 

 

Plus he explained to my noncomprehending brain why the characters' whole approach doesn't make any sense.  This show should be right up his alley (young computer nerd in the 1980s), but he's on the verge of being out. 

 

Me, too, because:

 

(1) The girl looks and acts just like Starbuck from Battlestar Galactica, which I couldn't stand because of Starbuck.  (Plus I hate science fiction.  That said, when the Pie Maker had his shirt ripped off, I said, "He's a cyborg?!")

 

(2)  Boz Scaggs' "Lido Shuffle" came out in the mid 1970s.  I suppose that the guy could be still listening to it in his car, but my understanding of using music to lend authenticity to the setting of a show is to use music that was current in that period. 

 

(3)  Was the lighting budget $0? 

[green]

(1) The girl looks and acts just like Starbuck from Battlestar Galactica, which I couldn't stand because of Starbuck.  (Plus I hate science fiction.  That said, when the Pie Maker had his shirt ripped off, I said, "He's a cyborg?!")

 

Ah that finally explains why I LIKE the woman here.  Starbuck is one of my top 10 characters ever on one of my top 10 shows ever.  And I love good sci fi (as opposed to "the bug of the week" invasion type shows).

 

But at this point it would take the arrival of the real Starbuck as well as Gaius frackin' Baltar and half the Cylons lead by Six to save this show.

[zillabreeze]

I love this show.  It is more real about Dallas than "Dallas"

This is an amazing show for me.  I was a little girl for the Mad Men era, but a young woman during the Silicon Prairie in Richardson, Texas.  I worked for the closest "town" where all of these new rich boys built homes that were monuments to themselves.  Everything is just as shown. The attention to detail is fabulous.   The area where these buildings were slamming up left & right was just north of Dallas.

The moguls were ripping down gorgeous historic homes in the Park Cities south of their highrises north.

The highways were expanding to accomate the traffic.

It was almost surreal.  I made money hand over fist just working in construction, mostly infrastructure stuff.  But it crashed and it crashed bad.

I'll be interested to see how it plays out.

[ganesh]

I can't say that I'm really seeing "acting like Starbuck" any more than that both characters are women in male dominated fields so they tend to 'man it up.' As far as looking the same, Cameron's look is pretty real for a girl in 1983. I honestly didn't even think of Starbuck. I was more like, "come on, don't just write her as typical hacker chick, do something more." Maybe Cameron is the prototype that the angel based Starbuck on?! Everything has happened before, no?

 

They're writing Cameron fairly one-note so far, but after 2 episodes I'm hoping that will change. I assume there will the the typical character-centered episode for her fairly soon since Gordon and Joe have been featured so much. 

[kieyra]

Yes. As a longtime female IT worker, nothing bugs me more right now than TVs experiments with this female hacker trope lately (Skye on SHIELD makes me nuts), and while I should like Cameron, they're just showing us a collection of idiosyncrasies and yelling, not a person.

Ditto Joe, on that note.

[paramitch]

I don't really see Don Draper in Joe at all, and I'm a fervent "Mad Men" watcher. Except for the fact that both men are arrogant and assume they're right about whatever they do, I don't really see any similarities there at all. Joe seems to me to be a far more mercurial, explosive and straightforward character thus far. I'll revise my opinion, of course, if it turns out he grew up in a whorehouse, changed his identity, or marries and then cheats on his spouse.

 

I rewatched the first two and am totally on board with the show. I don't know if it will succeed (I suspect not, since I've officially decided I like it, which usually dooms shows like this, "Rubicon," etc.) but I'm in for the ride.

 

There's definitely an element of nostalgia for me and this show captures that dual feeling of excitement and frustration that came with computing on IBM clones in the early days.

 

Cost less than IBM, but by how much?  Did IBMs cost $1,000 back then and now would cost $500 so a company that needed 100 computers would save so much money?

 

 

Although I was a teen during the events depicted, I still remember that my computer in 1988 -- a monochrome Compaq that I got after my college graduation -- cost over $2200. (I remember how excited I was by what I could see on the horizon -- by what computers would eventually do.)  

 

And at $2200 my first PC was very much a budget version. PCs frequently cost $4000-$5000 back then if they were loaded (with what will now seem like incredibly tiny hard drives, RAM, etc).  What companies like Compaq did -- and what Joe and his team are doing -- did help to slash those numbers by huge percentages pretty quickly. They are why PCs became ubiquitous, appliance-level items and not specialty curiosities.

 

Then not too long after, I was a computer magazine editor in Dallas from 1993-1995, and this show just totally captures that world -- the clone PC proliferations and BBS community and the infancy of the online world, the old-school modem noises (I still get nostalgic when I hear one)... even at my computer mag, there was this aspect of working at 90 mph or zero -- we worked insane hours, often took Mondays off after 80-hour work weeks, and more than one of us napped in our offices.

 

zillabreeze: This is an amazing show for me.  I was a little girl for the Mad Men era, but a young woman during the Silicon Prairie in Richardson, Texas.  I worked for the closest "town" where all of these new rich boys built homes that were monuments to themselves.  Everything is just as shown. The attention to detail is fabulous.   The area where these buildings were slamming up left & right was just north of Dallas.

 

 

This. I lived in Dallas for 5 years, working in production and then publishing, and have incredibly great memories of that entire time. Dallas wasn't where I wanted to spend eternity, but a few years there was awesome, and I still remember watching the tech sector expand from Las Colinas as well as from North Dallas along the toll road out north toward Plano.

 

I like Cameron thus far but do hope she relaxes a bit from showing how edgy! she! is! all! the! time!  Meanwhile, did anyone else find Gordon's search of Cameron's bag kind of creepy? He seems like the type who could get a bit stalkery -- I was actually relieved when he admitted to his wife (whom I like a lot) that Cameron was a girl.

 

I agree with those who also like Joe's boss. I've always liked the actor and find him really rootable and sympathetic here.

[ganesh]

 

I don't really see Don Draper in Joe at all, and I'm a fervent "Mad Men" watcher. Except for the fact that both men are arrogant and assume they're right about whatever they do, I don't really see any similarities there at all.

I think it's strictly from a pov of this is a very alpha character with a 'secret' in his past. Mad Men just ended and it's on the same network. People make snap judgments about everything all the time. It's human nature.

 

I actually find the show thus far to be more co-lead by Gordon and Joe. They've shown in each episode that Joe clearly believes in Gordon's talent, so whatever Joe's plan he clearly can't accomplish them on his own.  As much as I like Mad Men and all the characters, the strength of the show is when events flow through Don or in reaction to Don.

 

It's almost the same thing as saying Anarchy is the same as the Shield because they're both on a network that branded themselves on shows about antiheros. 

Edited June 15, 2014 by ganesh