Season 1 Episode 9 'Up Helly Aa' re-watch discussion (series spoilers inside)

What did you think of this episode? What scenes and themes did you enjoy, and what did it all mean?

Episode name: The name of the real-world Scottish festival Joe describes in the car ride, marking the end of Yule and ending in the burning of a small ship.

Episode Highlights:

We’re introduced to the Printer Bros

Hunt and Brian made a Giant knockoff

Gordon and Donna fight

Gordon removes the OS expansion

Cameron leaves

The Giant has buyers

Favourite quotes:

“It was like climbing a cliff on a dare. Where you hit an overhang and you can’t go up, and it’s too steep to climb back down, and you realize what the word ‘jump’ really means. And if I held your hand and counted to three, I wasn’t sure you’d come with me.”

“It wasn’t an affair but it should have been.”

“It speaks.”

Zero of the episode: Hunt. Gross.

Hero of the episode: No clear winners here

Tracklist: https://www.tunefind.com/show/halt-and-catch-fire/season-1/19060

Additional rewatch notes: I think the final scene of this episode is my favourite moment in the entire series (for so many reasons).

It’s lucky the OS expansion was added as a separate board after the original Giant was already planned out. Maybe this wasn’t the norm at the time, but I would have loved if they could have offered the expanded OS as a more expensive ‘deluxe’ version of the Giant.

Full Synopsis:

The gang drives through the night and arrives at their hotel the next morning to find their bounced checks have lost them their room and booth. Gordon and Joe crash an independent company’s demo to trick them into believing IBM is coming out with a better version of their product. Joe (impersonating an IBM suit) offers to cover their hotel costs and takes their room off their hands. Donna and Cam secure a tiny booth at the last minute. Cam pays some booth babes to come to their room party and creates a striking display to encourage people to attend. In the hotel room, Gordon and Donna can’t get the Giant to start.

As partygoers start arriving, Gordon is still troubleshooting the hardware issue, Cam befriends a young coder, and Donna mingles with some familiar faces. Joe decides to show the Giant as is, and describes the machine’s features without turning it on, then brings in the booth babes as a distraction. When things wind down Cameron’s coder friend tells her about California and she leaves with the young crowd. Joe discusses a deal with an interested retail buyer, and Gordon and Donna finally get the hard drive to mount and the computer boots.

The next morning Donna and Gordon discuss their life, and Donna tells Gordon she wished that he’d asked her to work on the Giant with him. Cameron wakes Joe up after coming back. He suggests she move to California. She replies that maybe both of them should. The gang wanders the convention floor, discussing the various demos, and spots a large crowd gathered around a booth. Joining the crowd they discover Hunt and Brian demoing a Giant knockoff, the aptly named Slingshot. The four rush back to their room, but Gordon closes the door on Cam and Joe. Donna and Gordon fight about Hunt and their marriage, and Donna leaves. Joe comes in and tells Gordon the buyers will flock to the cheaper, faster Slingshot. Now alone, Gordon disassembles the Giant and takes out Cam’s OS expansion.

Joe threatens to sue Hunt but Hunt convinces him it’s a lost cause. On the way back to their room Cam catches up with Joe, and the two enter to find what Gordon has done. Cam is devastated to discover the computer no longer responds to her. Gordon has loaded it with MS DOS, and says it’s now faster and cheaper than the Slingshot. Cam looks to Joe but Joe realizes they have no other choice. Cam leaves and Joe can’t convince her to return.

Joe and Gordon demo the stripped down Giant, and when questioned Joe dismisses the OS expansion as a gimmick, stating the machine should be seen as an employee and only speed and reliability matter. When asked about the size constraints Gordon gives Donna, who is in the crowd, credit for her piggy-backing idea. Joe secures a deal. Back at the hotel room Gordon, Donna and Joe pop open some warm champagne. Joe leaves to fetch ice, and the open door of a dimly lit hotel room catches his eye. Inside, a group of quiet people are gathered around a computer. The demonstrator inserts a disk and opens a file, the computer saying ‘Hello, I am MacIntosh’ in a distorted voice. The crowd gasps and Joe is mesmerized.

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