Silicon
Valley (2014/HBO Blu-ray Set)
Picture:
B Sound: B+ Extras: B Episodes: B+
Mike
Judge (Office Space, Beavis and Butt-head) is a pretty clever
writer/ producer and that really shows in HBO's new series Silicon
Valley. The story focuses on six young men who found a startup
company in Silicon Valley. What's interesting is that Judge himself
has a degree in psychics and went to Silicon Valley in the late '80s
but quit because he didn't like the culture there. Who would have
known that so many years later, he would come up with this concept.
The show plays off with high production value, incredible comedic
performances, and a Social Network-style flare.
The
show stars Thomas Middleditch, Josh Brener, T.J. Miller, Martin
Starr, Kumail Nanjiani, Zach Woods, Matt Ross and Christopher Evan
Welch.
Richard
Hendriks (Middleditch) is a shy, reclusive programmer who works at a
large internet company called Hooli. He is also developing a music
app called Pied Piper in a live-in startup business incubator run by
entrepreneur Erlich Bachman (Miller). After a rocky post-TED
elevator pitch of Pied Piper to venture capitalist Peter Gregory
(Welch), Hendriks also shows his work to a pair of programmers at
Hooli who mock him. Within hours, however, Hooli executive Donald
"Jared" Dunn (Woods) and Gregory's assistant Monica (Crew)
discover that the app contains a revolutionary data compression
algorithm. Hooli CEO Gavin Belson (Matt Ross) proposes a $4 million
buy-out of Pied Piper, while Peter Gregory offers a $200,000
investment for 5% ownership in the company, an offer that would
result in an equivalent valuation for the company. This led Gavin to
increase his offer to $10 Million. With encouragement from Monica
and the support of Bachman, Hendriks chooses Gregory's offer. He
hires the residents of the incubator, except for his friend Big Head
(Josh Brener), to become the Pied Piper team.
The
8 episode first season of Silicon Valley looks better than ever with
its 1080p high definition transfer 1.78:1 widescreen. The audio
sounds near perfect for a joke-based show with a crisp, lossless
DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) 5.1 track in English, French, and Spanish.
Extras
include:
Making
Silicon Valley: A behind-the-scenes look at the making of Silicon
Valley
Tech
Crunch: Disrupt!: Find out how Silicon Valley created their own Tech
Crunch: Disrupt! conference
The
Hacker Hostel: Take a tour through the Pied Piper headquarters
8
Audio Commentaries with Mike Judge, Alec Berg, T.J. Miller and many
more
Episode
Previews
Digital
Copy
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James Harland Lockhart V
www.vimeo.com/jamielockhart
