Bay Area residents have a tendency to be on the defense when it comes to outsiders’ unsuccessful attempts at posing as locals. We’re a cliquey bunch. So when we hear that HBO producers think they have us all figured out, it takes a lot to stifle a smirk.
We went into this week's screening of Silicon Valley with a certain level of apprehension, as most locals would, wondering how Hollywood decided to portray our home this time around. With an astounding level of national attention focused on the current Northern California tech revolution, it only makes sense that the television and film industries are coming along for the ride. Our suspicions escalated upon asking the cast what part of Silicon Valley they most enjoyed shooting in, only to hear that a majority of the series was shot in LA with a couple visits North to get exterior footage. Mike Judge more or less calmed our nerves as he went on to explain his brief brush with the early tech boom as an engineer and his desire to bring that culture to the big screen ever since. (He really is good at everything in life.)
The question remains, how was the show? It was a somewhat satirical approach to an industry full of characters that many of us work with every day. The premise: an incredibly bright and equally awkward clan of software engineers realizes their newfound place in this world as technology empire rulers and is dumbfounded at the power placed in front of them. Whether or not viewers personally connect with the characters will be heavily weighted on the industry they themselves invest their careers in. The momentum finally picked up at the end of the second episode, so we're attributing the somewhat slow beginning to HBO's attempt at explaining the tech industry to non-California viewers.
That said, this talented group of comedians made us laugh both on and off-screen, and we wish them the best of luck as the HBO-subscribing public gets their first taste of this new series. Mike Judge’s ultimate judgment day is this Sunday, April 6th at 10pm on HBO.
