The premise of HBO’s half-hour comedy show Silicon Valley is this: five young men wearing the required hoodies and jeans and Steve Jobs attire (black turtlenecks with the occasional beard) launch a startup company in Silicon Valley. It’s the high-tech gold rush in Silicon Valley. The men become successful but they clearly aren’t ready for it–and therein lies the viewer’s fun. In its debut season (it got the green light for another), Silicon Valley has been nominated for an Emmy. And many believe it has a good chance of winning even against Modern Family. Ralph Galvan writes on GoldDerby: “Silicon Valley is the best ‘true’ laugh-out-loud comedy to come around since … Modern Family! Smartly written, a strong ensemble, and set in a trendy hot-spot (Silicon Valley), Modern Family has finally met its match.”
The side-splitting script is based on real life experiences of Mike Judge, creator of Beavis and Butt-Head, King of the Hill, and the classic film Office Space. Before creating those comedy classics, Judge was an engineer in Silicon Valley. On the real characters he met in Silicon Valley, Judge said: “These are these guys in college who were smart but introverted. People who suddenly have a billion dollars, and they’re still socially awkward. That’s just great for comedy.”
*Correction: this article originally implied that the show was set in the 1980s, rather than being inspired by the creator’s experiences then.
