Halt and Catch Fire

"They All Laughed" playing

Ahem. Ooh.

Is he doing Frank Sinatra?

He can do Frank Zappa for all I care.

As long as it holds him off.

All right, let's cycle her through again.

- Donna: Her? - Yeah, her.

Temperamental, high-maintenance,

only responds to the right touch.

Yeah, well, I've been touching this thing for six months

and he still hasn't turned on.

Hey, could you make them hurry up downstairs?

- Yeah. Yeah, yeah. - We're gonna lose this dude.

Hey, it's nice to see some ladies here for once. ( Chuckles )

Probably should've waited to schedule the celebration

of a working mainframe

until the mainframe was actually, you know, working.

Hey, Bos says hurry up. That reporter's gonna leave.

Donna: Yeah.

All right, try that.

Still not booting up.

You okay?

Yeah.

Scale of one to 10?

I'm fine.

Do you want to lie down?

Yeah, of course I want to lie down.

I've been awake for 20 hours.

I just...

Scale of one to 10?

Two.

Three, max.

Mm, let me check the power unit again.

And now, please, without further ado,

let's welcome our founder, Cameron Howe.

- Come on. - ( crowd cheering )

Come on.

Hey.

- Hi. - Man: Hey.

- Cameron Howe. - Ross Weaver, "InfoWorld."

- Mm. - Quite a party, but, um, maybe a little premature.

Seriously, how much longer?

Um...

Oh, God, somebody put a cigarette out on this wire wrap.

You know, once we're our own network,

Cameron and I can get back to what really matters.

I'm sure she's eager to get you back.

Booting up?

- ( loud pop ) - ( mainframes whirring )

It's on!

It's on!

Oh!

The Death Star is online and operational.

Alderaan will never know what hit it.

Hey, Donna. Cam wants you upstairs like right now.

Yes. Let's go celebrate.

All right! Suck it, Telenet,

you faxed us your last invoice!

Bosworth: Whoa, ho! Whoa, whoa, hey, hey!

- ( Popping ) - ( crowd gasping )

That is way more fireworks than we talked about.

Speech! Speech!

Bosworth: Hey, come on.

- ( Cheering ) - Donna: Okay. Okay, okay, okay.

Okay, first of all, I would like to welcome

our guest, Ross Weaver, from "InfoWorld."

I hope you've all had a chance to talk to him.

He'll be covering our relaunch.

- Hide the drugs. - ( laughing )

As you know, we hit 100,000 users last week.

Yeah!

But, more importantly,

it's a banner day, you guys.

Our Independence Day!

Cameron: Oh, oh, one more thing.

This is very important.

John Bosworth is officially a grandfather.

Look, I know it feels like we got to California two minutes ago,

but we can't slow down now.

We are continuing to expand user experience on the network...

Avatar modification, building out neighborhoods.

We have a ton of really important deadlines coming up

and we are counting on you guys.

We know how hard it was to leave all our friends and family in Texas,

but we are so impressed with your commitment

- and we just want... - Speaking of commitment,

there is one person I would especially like to thank...

my husband Gordon Clark.

- ( Applause ) - Donna: Come on up.

Crowd: Gordo!

I just want to say thank you so much

for believing in this crazy idea

and slaving away in the basement with me,

because we couldn't have done it without you.

I couldn't have.

Crowd: Whoo!

Cameron: All right, come on, let's get back to the party.

"Shut Us Down" playing

I couldn't have done it without you, Gordon.

Yeah, couldn't have done it without your money.

Unbelievable.

This is a complete hatchet job.

Gordon: I know it hurts, but, trust me,

there's no such thing as bad press.

And the Pro got creamed in the trades

and it still outsold the Giant by a factor of five.

No, this is different. This is bad.

What, let me guess. You're gonna kill him?

No, it's his facts that are killing us.

We're a quarter of the size of CompuServe,

we have less infrastructure than The Source,

nowhere near the investment visibility of Q-Link.

I hate it, but he's right.

- What's up, squirt? - "Family Circus" still sucks.

- That's true. - Hey, language.

Language.

- Where is Joanie? - Getting dressed.

He calls you upstarts, says you're a welcome addition

of heart and vitality to the Valley landscape.

The guy's... that's great.

Yeah, he's also got us going under by '88.

Well, if you're that worried about it,

issue a press release full of stats and revenue

and, you know, tell your version of the story.

What? No one reads press releases.

They read magazines, like this one.

Well, then, we might as well write an obituary.

- Oh, shit. - Haley and Gordon: Language.

Sorry, honey.

I've got to meet with Joanie's principal today at 4:00.

Why?

She got in a fight on Monday.

Okay, when were you gonna tell me about that?

I'm sorry. Completely forgot.

She win, at least?

The school wants a parent meeting.

Uh, we have a development meeting at 4:00.

- I know. - So, can't he do it?

Okay, I'll give you guys a minute.

Roar!

Roar! Got you.

You totally didn't know I was in there.

Yeah, well, you're totally busted

for the fight you got into at school.

Whatever. I kicked her ass.

- Really? - Go ahead. You know you want to.

What?

You're such a little brat.

- And I... - ( modem screeching )

I know you're frustrated. I'm frustrated, too.

We're five people living on top of each other, and that's...

Donna, I'm frustrated because this was supposed to be temporary.

- It is temporary. - No, it's been six mo...

- ( rumbling ) - Oh, shit.

Haley, sweetheart, get under the table.

- ( Screams ) - Joanie!

- Mom! - It's okay, it's okay.

- ( Rattling ) - It's all right. You okay?

- Was that...? - Yes, it was. Hang on, there's broken glass here.

What should we do? Should we stay in the doorway or go outside?

You're fine. You're fine right where you are.

Joanie, baby, are you okay?

I'm fine, just don't freak out on me.

Sorry, do you think that was just a preview?

- Like a bigger one's coming? - ( whimpers )

- Or is that the final thing? - Hey, listen.

- You're not helping. - Don't be such a wimp, Haley.

- Hey, Joanie. - Your sister's scared. Be nice.

- You always take her side. - Joanie.

Hey, listen, guys.

Jesus, people, it's toast.

Donna: My, don't you look out of this world.

Cameron: Pretty rad, right?

The antennae just rolled out this week,

along with sunglasses, regular glasses,