Halt and Catch Fire: Season 1, Episode 9 "Up Helly Aa"

Halt and Catch Fire: Season 1, Episode 9 "Up Helly Aa"

 July 27, 2014


“Up Helly Aa” is the penultimate episode of Halt and Catch Fire’s first season, and it is a beautiful episode. The main theme is “betrayal.” Due to some unforeseen circumstances, Cameron’s vision for the Giant has been compromised by both Joe and Gordon, which will undoubtedly lead to an interesting future for the three characters. The final scene is amazing and rather crushing. Donna played a bigger role here and Kerry Bishe did an excellent job. The scenes were Gordon chewed her out and her reactions are great. This episode is funny, moving, and entertaining from start to finish.

Joe sold his sports car for $11,000 and the gang hope that is enough money to promote the Giant at COMDEX in Las Vegas. They arrived in Gordon’s station wagon. With the bad publicity Cardiff Electric received over the embezzlement scheme, Joe hopes to use it to his advantage. With the usage of smoke and mirrors, they should be able to get by. Still, the computer had trouble booting so they had to quickly think on their feet to make it work. There is one huge problem, however. Donna’s former boss and Gordon’s former coworker teamed up to create Slingshot, a smaller, more portable version of the Giant. Shades of Macintosh versus Apple, anyone?

I liked the episode’s title. Apparently, the name comes from a Viking festival. Anyhow, great episode! When the computer struggled to properly load, I love how Joe and Cameron uses shrimp and a party to keep investors waiting as Gordon and Donna worked out the kinks. Perhaps the most amusing sequence of the entire episode.

My Grade: A

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