List of Halt and Catch Fire episodes
Halt and Catch Fire is an American period drama television series created by Christopher Cantwell and Christopher C. Rogers, that premiered on AMC on June 1, 2014.[1][2] The series depicts a fictionalized insider's view of the personal computer revolution of the 1980s and later the growth of the World Wide Web in the early 1990s. The series' first two seasons were set in the Silicon Prairie of Dallas–Fort Worth, while the third and fourth seasons are set in Silicon Valley.[3][4] The show's title refers to computer machine code instruction HCF, whose execution would cause the computer's central processing unit to stop working (but not really catch fire).[5]
The series was renewed for a fourth and final season of 10 episodes on October 10, 2016.[6] As of October 11, 2016, 30 episodes of Halt and Catch Fire have aired, concluding the third season.
Series overview
| Season | Episodes | Originally aired | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| First aired | Last aired | ||||
| 1 | 10 | June 1, 2014 | August 3, 2014 | ||
| 2 | 10 | May 31, 2015 | August 2, 2015 | ||
| 3 | 10 | August 21, 2016 | October 11, 2016 | ||
Episodes
Season 1 (2014)
| No. overall | No. in season | Title | Directed by | Written by | Original air date | U.S. viewers (millions) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 | "I/O" | Juan José Campanella | Christopher Cantwell & Christopher C. Rogers | June 1, 2014 | 1.19[7] |
| Joe MacMillan, a key player in the debut of the IBM Personal Computer, questions college students about their knowledge of several computing categories. One of the students, Cameron Howe, challenges him, and the two later meet at a bar to discuss her future. At Cardiff Electric, a Dallas-based mainframe software company, SVP John Bosworth hires Joe as a sales executive. Joe came to Cardiff to recruit Gordon Clark, a sales engineer and former system builder, into reverse engineering an IBM PC with him. Gordon is initially reluctant to do the project, telling Joe that he has a family to consider; Gordon had also suffered a public humiliation when the Symphonic, a microcomputer he and his wife Donna created, failed to boot at COMDEX in 1981. However, Gordon reconsiders Joe's proposal and is able to reconstruct the assembly language code of the IBM PC BIOS. Bosworth and company owner Nathan Cardiff confront Joe and Gordon, informing them that IBM knows about their renegade project, and that Cardiff Electric is being sued for copyright infringement. After Joe reveals that he deliberately told IBM about the project, Cardiff and Bosworth are forced to enter the PC business. Needing a programmer with no prior connections to Cardiff or IBM, Joe and Gordon recruit Cameron for the project. | ||||||
| 2 | 2 | "FUD" | Juan José Campanella | Christopher Cantwell & Christopher C. Rogers | June 8, 2014 | 0.970[8] |
| IBM's legal counsel interview each compromised Cardiff Electric employee separately. After IBM leaves, Joe reveals his plans for the new Cardiff PC: building it with twice the speed at half the cost of the IBM PC; Gordon states that the idea is impossible while Cameron dismisses it as boring. Joe is then introduced as "Senior Product Manager" of Cardiff Electric's new PC division. Joe sets up a "clean room" office so Cameron can write the BIOS code for the Cardiff PC; however, she relocates to a basement storeroom. Gordon is promoted to head hardware engineer of the PC project. Gordon shows concern about Cameron writing the BIOS code, and Joe tells him that they will fire her once the BIOS code is complete and successfully tested. To put pressure on Cardiff Electric, IBM aggressively undercuts Cardiff's business, taking more than two-thirds of Cardiff's revenue and attempts to lure Cameron away by offering her triple her salary at Cardiff. At night, Joe, Gordon, and Cameron confront each other in the Cardiff parking lot and have a three-way argument with Joe and Gordon getting into a physical altercation. Despite the tension among the three, Gordon and Cameron support Joe's vision. | ||||||
| 3 | 3 | "High Plains Hardware" | Karyn Kusama | Jason Cahill | June 15, 2014 | 0.765[9] |
| After IBM's raid, Cardiff Electric is forced to downsize its workforce. Joe tells the remaining engineers that the company will have a portable PC weighing less than 15 pounds by the end of the year; however, the engineers complain that Joe's plan is not feasible. After Joe attempts to secure venture capital from his East Coast contacts, Nathan tells him that Bosworth will handle all of the company's finances going forward; he also arranges a meeting with one of his own business contacts, an heiress named Louise “LouLu” Lutherford. During a dinner party, LouLu offers $10 million in exchange for an 80 percent stake in the PC project. Dissatisfied with the low offer and her attitude, Joe sinks the deal by seducing LouLu's boyfriend. Gordon attempts to come up with innovative ways to meet Joe's design goals; however, one of the engineers keeps killing Gordon's ideas without coming up with any alternatives, and Gordon fires him. Bosworth spots Cameron at the office after hours and tells her that she can work as late as needed, but she cannot live in the office, even though he apparently is temporarily doing exactly that. After cashing her first paycheck, Cameron stays in a hotel; however, she later goes to Joe's apartment after she struggles with the code. | ||||||
| 4 | 4 | "Close to the Metal" | Johan Renck | Jonathan Lisco | June 22, 2014 | 0.844[10] |
| Just as Cameron nears completion of the BIOS code for the new PC, disaster strikes, and she loses all her data. Further complicating the situation, Joe has brought in a reporter from a major business periodical, and he witnesses the chaos with delight. Bosworth is summoned to a meeting by Nathan, who seems to think he might be losing control of the project to Joe. Gordon turns to Donna for help with recovering the lost BIOS code; however, Joe is reluctant to have her there, as she is an engineer for Texas Instruments. She proposes an ingenious technical solution for recovering the data, which eventually proves successful, recovering more than 90 percent of Cameron's work. Later, a suspicious Donna confronts Joe in his office and accuses him of deliberately sabotaging Cameron's work in an effort to generate some publicity for the project. Joe reaches into a desk drawer and produces the real backup disks, proving her correct. While driving home, Joe is pulled over by the police, savagely beaten and arrested for no apparent reason; however, when Bosworth bails him out, Joe realizes that it was a message to remind him that Bosworth was still in charge. | ||||||
| 5 | 5 | "Adventure" | Ed Bianchi | Dahvi Waller | June 29, 2014 | 0.575[11] |
| After sending Cameron on a business trip, Joe hires a new software development team. To meet one of the design goals for the new PC, Gordon realizes that a liquid crystal display would be needed. The engineers and Joe argue that an LCD would be too costly; however, Gordon reveals that his father in-law, Gary Emerson, has connections with Kuzoku, a Japanese electronics manufacturer, and can get the displays at a discount. Upon returning from her trip, Cameron clashes with Joe over his recent hire. She tells Joe that adding programmers to the project will delay it, and she argues that Steve, the new project manager, is inefficient; however, Joe tells Cameron that she needs to learn how to work with others. After Gary reluctantly agrees to broker the meeting with Kuzoku, Gordon promptly blows the deal by making drunken comments about his father in-law. Joe goes to the Kuzoku executives the next day in an attempt to salvage the deal and to apologize on Gordon's behalf; however, Gordon reveals that Gary had already intervened. Cameron installs Colossal Cave Adventure on the company mainframe as a test to find which programmers are the most valuable to the project. Impressed with her ingenuity, Joe makes Cameron the software manager and fires Steve and the extra programmers. | ||||||
| 6 | 6 | "Landfall" | Larysa Kondracki | Zack Whedon | July 6, 2014 | 0.718[12] |
| The prototype computer is finally finished, and boots up successfully to the cheers and applause of the assembled Cardiff employees. Cameron proposes changes to the operating system's user interface to make it more user-friendly. Both Gordon and Joe reject her idea, with both stating that radical changes to the computer would be too complex and costly to implement and thus more difficult to sell. Hoping to ease the tension between them, Gordon invites Joe over to his house for dinner. After the programmers get frustrated with receiving conflicting orders from both Cameron and Gordon, Bosworth calls Cameron into his office; he cautions her to be careful, as there are those who would like to see her fail, as she "represents the future". When Joe arrives at the Clark household, Gordon isn't home yet, as he had earlier made a promise to Donna that he would find Cabbage Patch Kids for their daughters, a task made more difficult with Hurricane Alicia battering Dallas. Joe must then endure two boisterous children as well as Donna's lobbying on Gordon's behalf for there to be no further changes to the new computer. While playing with the kids, Joe has second thoughts about Cameron's OS; he stops off to see Cameron on his way home, and asks to see her work. | ||||||
| 7 | 7 | "Giant" | Jon Amiel | Jamie Pachino | July 13, 2014 | 0.832[13][lower-alpha 1] |
| Bosworth learns that the PC division is almost out of money. During a QA meeting, the engineers complain that Cameron's OS has negatively impacted the computer's performance. Joe introduces renowned industrial designer Simon Church and his designs for the Cardiff PC case; Joe also reveals the PC's name, the “Contrail”. Gordon voices his disapproval; he claims that the case design is impractical and sarcastically suggests that the computer should be called the “Cardiff Giant”, which causes Simon to leave. Donna accompanies her boss, Hunt Whitmarsh, on a business trip to meet with TI executives; however, during the trip, Donna inappropriately flirts with Hunt, which causes her embarrassment. After a failed attempt to hire a local industrial designer to build the case, Joe goes to a photography exhibit to try to get Simon to reconsider, and he finds Cameron there trying to do the same. Cameron learns from both Joe and Simon that the two had a brief relationship 10 years ago. When Bosworth asks Nathan for a loan to keep the PC project afloat, Nathan refuses, stating that he's ready to cut his losses. Before he leaves, Simon reveals to Joe that he has AIDS, but agrees to design Cardiff's case. | ||||||
| 8 | 8 | "The 214s" | Daisy von Scherler Mayer | Davhi Waller & Zack Whedon | July 20, 2014 | 0.627[14] |
| As Cardiff Electric makes preparations for COMDEX, the FBI shuts the company down and arrests Bosworth for embezzlement. Gordon hastily disassembles the Giant prototype to prevent it from being seized as evidence; he later breaks into the office at night to recover the Giant's component parts. At Texas Instruments, Donna learns that Hunt had suddenly resigned. At Gordon's garage, tensions among him, Joe and Cameron flare up; after Gordon accuses Joe of framing Bosworth, Cameron reveals that she was the one, at Bosworth's behest, who hacked the bank's mainframe. When Gordon tells Donna that Cardiff Electric was shut down, she contemplates leaving him. While attempting to get orders for the Giant ahead of COMDEX, Joe learns of a rumor that IBM is building their own portable PC, and he flies to New York City to confront his father, who is a high ranking executive within IBM. When Joe returns to Dallas, he finds Cameron and Gordon in his apartment, and he tells them that he intends to return to IBM. Gordon persuades Joe into seeing the Giant project through; however, Joe reveals that he doesn't have the money to go to COMDEX. After Cameron convinces Joe to sell his Porsche to fund their trip, the three and Donna drive to Las Vegas in the Clark family station wagon. | ||||||
| 9 | 9 | "Up Helly Aa" | Terry McDonough | Jason Cahill | July 27, 2014 | 0.549[15] |
| When the Cardiff Electric team arrives in Las Vegas, they learn that their reservations have been cancelled due to the company's corporate assets being frozen. After the team manages to secure a suite and a booth by other means, Donna and Gordon discover that the Giant is malfunctioning; during the would-be demo, Joe distracts the drunken attendees with booth babes. Eventually, Donna and Gordon get the Giant repaired. The next day, the team notices a large gathering at a particular booth; they then realize that Donna's former boss Hunt was marketing a knockoff of the Giant called the Slingshot. At their suite, Gordon accuses Donna of having an affair with Hunt. Joe realizes that the Slingshot is faster and cheaper than the Giant, and Gordon removes Cameron's OS in response. Cameron is upset over Gordon's actions; however, Joe has to side with Gordon for the sake of survival. Joe successfully pitches the Giant during the on-floor presentation, securing a large order from a computer retailer. As Cardiff celebrates their hollow victory, Joe stumbles upon a gathering in another room where the Apple Macintosh is being demonstrated, and Joe immediately sees it as the IBM PC-killer he envisioned. | ||||||
| 10 | 10 | "1984" | Juan José Campanella | Christopher Cantwell & Christopher C. Rogers | August 3, 2014 | 0.574[16] |
| After COMDEX, Joe and Gordon manage to convince Nathan into giving them operational control of the company as well as minority ownership. Donna severs her ties with TI after she deliberately tanks her performance review. While testing the first batch of Giants, the engineers discover a defective test unit. Now fixated on the Macintosh, Joe tasks the programmers with creating a killer application to bundle with the Giant. After Gordon suspects that Joe had engineered another crisis, Donna tells Gordon that he must force Joe out of the company; Gordon plans to do so by threatening to turn Cameron over to the FBI for her role in embezzling Cardiff's money. After parting ways with Joe and Cardiff Electric, Cameron creates her own startup company called Mutiny to host online games, recruiting most of Cardiff's programming team. With no programmers left, Joe drops his plans for a killer app, and Gordon too drops his plan to oust Joe. Gordon holds an office party to celebrate the launch of the Giant. Later, Gordon invites Donna to work as head engineer at Cardiff Electric; however, she declines, deciding to work with Cameron at Mutiny. Gordon is left unsure of how to move forward after Joe abruptly, and dramatically, leaves Cardiff Electric. | ||||||
- Notes
- ↑ Denotes individual program numbers were not available so AMC's primetime average is listed.
Season 2 (2015)
| No. overall | No. in season | Title | Directed by | Written by | Original air date | U.S. viewers (millions) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 11 | 1 | "SETI" | Juan José Campanella | Christopher Cantwell & Christopher C. Rogers | May 31, 2015 | 0.659[17] |
| More than a year has passed since the launch of the Giant. After leaving Dallas, Joe had reconnected with an old college classmate, a freelance journalist named Sara Wheeler, and he is now living with her in Austin. Cardiff Electric is liquidated after Nathan sells the company off to an overseas corporation. Gordon, as the outgoing company president, receives a dividend payment of over $838,000. Joe, however, receives nothing after Nathan shreds Joe's check as retribution for his actions over the past two years; despite returning empty-handed, Joe proposes to Sara, and she accepts. At Mutiny, Donna expresses her frustration over Cameron's lack of discreet leadership and foresight to keep Mutiny successful for the long term, especially as their makeshift network infrastructure experiences latency issues and power outages. Donna also warns Cameron that Mutiny has plateaued, and without new subscribers and a new game, the company could go under. Donna misses a celebratory dinner with Gordon and the kids when she helps Cameron deal with a fence selling stolen computer components; before dealing with the fence, Donna and Cameron agree that they would share responsibility for the leadership role in Mutiny. The next day, Cameron picks up Bosworth after he is released from prison. | ||||||
| 12 | 2 | "New Coke" | Phil Abraham | Jonathan Lisco | June 7, 2015 | 0.494[18] |
| Joe and Sara meet with her father Jacob Wheeler, a wealthy oil magnate and head of Westgroup Energy. Noting Joe's troubled work history, Jacob offers him a job with Westgroup. Joe initially declines, but he later accepts the offer; however, after going to Westgroup's headquarters, Joe discovers that he was given a low-level data entry job. When Cameron tries to bring on Bosworth to manage Mutiny, Donna protests since he is an ex-convict. At home, Gordon loads Mutiny's Tank Battle and obsesses over a glitch in the game. Donna and Cameron attempt to seek capital to expand Mutiny, but they are turned away by a sexist venture capitalist. The coders discover that a user had cloned Mutiny's flagship game Parallax and is distributing copies for free. After confronting the hacker, Tom Rendon, Donna attempts to take legal action against him; however, Cameron had hired Tom after he demonstrated how he got multiple users on a single phone line. Donna threatens to walk out on Mutiny if Cameron continues to make brash, unilateral business decisions. After the coders find a rather personal letter between him and Cameron, Bosworth tells her that Mutiny isn't the right place for him at the moment and needs time alone. | ||||||
| 13 | 3 | "The Way In" | Jeff Freilich | Jason Cahill | June 14, 2015 | 0.452[19] |
| In his garage, Gordon writes a program, Sonaris, to map the size of Mutiny's network. Bosworth sees his ex-wife Ginny for the first time since his release from prison, and she tells him not to come to their son James' rehearsal dinner. At Westgroup, Joe suggests to Jacob that data analytics and data collections should be merged into one department, and Jacob agrees, allowing Joe to oversee the consolidation. After moving back to Dallas, Joe and Sara invite the Clarks over to their apartment for a dinner party, and they reluctantly accept. Against Ginny's wishes, Bosworth shows up to the rehearsal dinner in an attempt to reconcile with James. After Mutiny is infected by unknown malware, Cameron orders the coders to shut down the network, and Tom explains to her the extent of the damage, which would likely cause them to lose subscribers. Tom later discovers that Gordon's Sonaris program is the malware. Cameron lashes out at Gordon for his interference, and he reveals that without Donna secretly paying Mutiny's bills, the company would have collapsed much sooner. The next morning, Cameron experiences a panic attack after seeing no subscribers logged on, and Tom calms her down. Gordon apologizes to Donna for launching Sonaris without telling her, and Donna shoulders some of the blame. In Westgroup's data center, Joe sees potential for a new venture. | ||||||
| 14 | 4 | "Play with Friends" | Kimberly Peirce | Dahvi Waller | June 21, 2015 | 0.451[20] |
| Joe pitches an idea to a Westgroup executive, configuring the company's mainframe for time-sharing during off-hours; however, Joe's proposal is dismissed. At Mutiny, Cameron and Donna tell the coders the company is operating at a deficit and cannot afford to pay their salaries; however, many of them choose to stay in exchange for shares in Mutiny. Bosworth reviews Mutiny's expenses, and he volunteers to go door-to-door to persuade Mutiny's biggest customers to rejoin the service. Joe comes to Gordon's house to recruit him for his time-sharing project; Gordon agrees to help with the stipulation that Mutiny is Joe's first client. Already mounting tensions between Cameron and Donna intensify when Cameron wants to cut Community, Mutiny's chat rooms, from the network, and Donna later discovers that Cameron had made disparaging comments about Gordon and her children. While playing dart tag with the coders, Tom and Cameron get an idea for Mutiny's next game, a multiplayer first person shooter. Joe reveals to Gordon that he intends to configure Westgroup's mainframe for time-sharing without Jacob's knowledge or approval, hoping to show Jacob physical evidence of his idea before legitimatizing it. The next morning at home, Gordon tells Donna that he arranged a new network partner for Mutiny at a substantial discount, and she sits in the bathroom with a positive pregnancy test. | ||||||
| 15 | 5 | "Extract and Defend" | Michael Morris | Zack Whedon | June 28, 2015 | 0.543[21] |
| When Donna asks Gordon about Mutiny's new network partner, he reveals that Mutiny has been leasing their improved network from Joe; Donna relays this news to Cameron, who does not take it well. During a doctor's visit, Gordon learns that he has toxic encephalopathy due to his long term exposure to lead solder, and the diagnosis leaves him in shock and desperate for a human connection; however, he does not share his diagnosis with Donna. Due to Donna wanting Mutiny's network rental agreement formalized in writing, Gordon tells Joe that he needs to tell Jacob about his time-sharing project; despite Joe doing the project without approval, Jacob takes an interest and requests a meeting with a representative from Mutiny. Joe wants Donna to go to Westgroup to help pitch his idea; however, she tells him that Mutiny is Cameron's company. Despite her animosity towards Joe, Cameron meets with Jacob and demonstrates how Mutiny works. After the meeting, Sara sees Cameron confront Joe, with Cameron accusing him of using Westgroup to advance his own agenda; however, Joe insists that it's a legitimate business endeavor. After Joe signs a prenuptial agreement from her father, Sara tells Joe that they're moving too fast and need time apart. | ||||||
| 16 | 6 | "10Broad36" | Larysa Kondracki | Jamie Pachino | July 5, 2015 | 0.558[22] |
| Jacob tells Joe that he has made some changes to Mutiny's network rental contract, wishing to raise their hourly rate from $3 to $5. Gordon takes his daughters to California to see his brother Henry, and Gordon reveals his condition to Henry; Gordon also reconnects with Henry's ex-girlfriend Jules Duffy, which later escalates to an affair. When Joe goes to Mutiny to discuss the new terms, Donna lashes out against Joe, which results in him taking Mutiny offline. Donna goes to Westgroup to apologize to Joe for her outburst; he then offers Mutiny a reduced rate if they meet certain technological benchmarks, including porting their programs to the AT&T Unix PC. Thinking Joe won't know the difference, Tom suggests faking the Unix demo to get the reduced rate, then go cross-platform at their leisure; however, when Joe returns to Mutiny for the demo, he sees through their deception. After lying to her mother earlier about having a miscarriage, Donna has Cameron drive her to an abortion clinic. Gordon's trip is cut short when he and Henry have a falling out over Gordon's affair with Jules. Despite their ruse, Joe saw potential for innovation within Mutiny, and he suggests to Jacob that Westgroup should acquire them. | ||||||
| 17 | 7 | "Working for the Clampdown" | Karyn Kusama | Christopher Cantwell & Christopher C. Rogers | July 12, 2015 | 0.499[23] |
| Gordon finally reveals his condition to Donna; however, he downplays the severity of his disease. When Joe comes by Mutiny with Westgroup's formal acquisition offer, Cameron rallies the coders against "selling out", and she tears up the contract. Gordon recruits Ed and Larry, two of his former Cardiff colleagues, for his new venture, direct selling custom built PCs. Joe speaks with Bosworth and Tom individually in an attempt to get Cameron to reconsider Westgroup's offer. Curious about the contract, the coders piece it back together, and after discovering its value, they pressure Cameron into holding a vote on the acquisition. While voting, Cameron receives a call and finds out that Lev, her housemate and one of Mutiny's coders, is in the hospital after he had been attacked by a homophobic gang posing as a gay Community user. In the ER waiting room, Cameron tells Tom that she plans to sell Mutiny. After toasting their acquisition, Joe learns that Jacob wants to cut game development from Mutiny; seeing this as a betrayal of his intentions, Joe advises Cameron to pull out of the deal, and he tells her that he will no longer interfere. After reconciling with Sara, she tells Joe that she wants to get married right away and move to California, and Joe agrees. The next morning, Cameron tells the coders that she is not selling Mutiny. | ||||||
| 18 | 8 | "Limbo" | Daisy von Scherler Mayer | Zack Whedon | July 19, 2015 | 0.497[24] |
| Donna chides Cameron for her decision to not sell Mutiny to Westgroup. Joe and Sara reveal to Jacob that they got married, and Joe gives Jacob his resignation from Westgroup. As Mutiny makes preparations for a customer appreciation party, Cameron and Tom finish up their latest game, Extract and Defend. After Joe comes back from his honeymoon, Jacob introduces Joe to Jesse Evans, his successor on the time-sharing project. Ed and Larry walk out on Gordon's venture when they question his mental health. As Joe and Sara pack, she finds a bag of ecstasy and suggests that they go to a nightclub to celebrate their last night in Dallas. Gordon finds an advertisement for another Dallas-based PC builder, and he suspects that Stan, another former colleague of his, had conspired against him; Gordon breaks into Stan's garage at night, and Gordon is arrested after Stan confronts him. Joe and Sara sneak into Westgroup's data center to have sex, and Joe discovers that Jesse and his team had created "WestNet" by copying Mutiny's user interface. After Mutiny's party winds down, Donna and Cameron brainstorm about Community's future; however, they discover that the coders have been locked out of the network. When Joe goes to Mutiny to explain that he's not responsible for WestNet, they don't believe him. | ||||||
| 19 | 9 | "Kali" | Craig Zisk | Jason Cahill | July 26, 2015 | 0.588[25] |
| Donna and Cameron discuss their options against Westgroup, and Cameron decides to sell Extract and Defend to sustain Mutiny. Tom is upset that Cameron made this decision without consulting him, and the two end their relationship as a result. When Donna threatens legal action against Westgroup, Jesse brushes off her threat. After Joe bails Gordon out of jail, Gordon investigates the computer company that he believed copied his idea; however, Gordon has a lapse in memory and forgets where he parked. Mutiny meets with Funtime Games, selling Extract and Defend for $50,000. During Westgroup's shareholders meeting, Joe gives a keynote speech about WestNet and gives Cameron her due credit; however, unbeknownst to Joe, Cameron had sabotaged the presentation by uploading Sonaris to Westgroup's mainframe. After Gordon falls down a flight of stairs and injures his ankle, the doctor tells Donna that Gordon is suffering from psychological stress beyond his brain damage, and Gordon finally admits to her that he needs help. Sara accuses Joe of still holding feelings towards Cameron and sabotaging WestNet. Bosworth informs Cameron that he's leaving Mutiny for a more stable job with his son, and she also finds out that Tom was responsible for arranging the meeting with Funtime; Cameron tries to reconcile with Tom to no avail. | ||||||
| 20 | 10 | "Heaven Is a Place" | Phil Abraham | Christopher Cantwell & Christopher C. Rogers | August 2, 2015 | 0.485[26] |
| In the fallout of the WestNet fiasco, Jacob is ousted as CEO of Westgroup, and Sara files for divorce from Joe. Desiring independence, Cameron finds a listing for a used IBM 3033 mainframe Mutiny could use to host their network; however, Donna tells her that the mainframe is located in California, in a state of disrepair and prohibitively expensive. Donna finds out about Gordon's affair, which causes their elder daughter Joanie to run away. The next morning, Donna arrives to work early, and Cameron suggests that Mutiny should leave for California and start over. Feeling responsible for Joe's misfortunes, Gordon comes over to Joe's apartment to give him a counter-program designed to remove Sonaris from infected systems. At his son's company, Bosworth shows remorse for leaving Mutiny. After finding Joanie, Donna tells Gordon that to save their marriage, she wants him to move the family to California, work for Mutiny, and purchase and repair the mainframe Cameron wanted. Using Gordon's program, Joe secures $10 million in venture capital; Joe then tries to recruit Gordon for another venture, but Gordon tells him that he's working for Mutiny. One month later, the Mutiny team board a flight bound for San Francisco; at the same time, Joe looks at prime office space in the Bay Area for his new company, MacMillan Utility. | ||||||
Season 3 (2016)
| No. overall | No. in season | Title | Directed by | Written by | Original air date | U.S. viewers (millions) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 21 | 1 | "Valley of the Heart's Delight" | Daisy von Scherler Mayer | Christopher Cantwell & Christopher C. Rogers | August 21, 2016 | 0.367[27] |
| Six months after Mutiny moved to California, Gordon and Donna finally get their mainframe operational, and Cameron announces that the company has surpassed 100,000 subscribers. After reading a scathing article about Mutiny, Donna realizes that the company needs something new in order to stay relevant in Silicon Valley. Ryan Ray, a new coder at Mutiny, reveals vulnerabilities within Mutiny's private chat; he proposes a solution, but Donna and Cameron aren’t receptive to his ideas, especially after he violated Mutiny's terms of service by hacking the private chats to find faults in the code. During a long work night, Gordon attempts to connect with the coders over beer and marijuana, venting his anger over how Joe had used him and his antivirus idea to make a fortune. Reviewing the private chat transcripts, Donna and Cameron realize that users are using private chats to facilitate user-to-user transactions, and they believe that this could be the next big thing for Mutiny. At the Castro Theatre, Joe reveals at a press conference that MacMillan Utility is offering its newest antivirus program, Citadel, free of charge for consumers, with the audience reacting with applause. | ||||||
| 22 | 2 | "One Way or Another" | Kimberly Peirce | Michael Saltzman | August 23, 2016 | 0.339[28] |
| Donna and Cameron attempt to secure venture capital to expand Mutiny for its newest feature, Mutiny Exchange. Gordon decides to take Ryan under his wing, seeing a kinship with him; however, Ryan tries to seek out Joe. After a disastrous meeting with a sexist venture capitalist, Donna and Cameron meet with Diane Gould, who Donna had previously met as their daughters attend the same school. As Mutiny makes its presentation, Diane ends the meeting abruptly, leaving Donna and Cameron confused about the quick rejection; Diane later reveals that another company, Swap Meet, had the same idea as Mutiny, and had the advantage of an 18-month head start. Ryan manages to get a meeting with Joe after the former hacked the latter's calendar; Ryan makes his pitch on why he wants to work for Joe and MacMillan Utility. As Gordon is being deposed in connection with a lawsuit against Joe, Joe interrupts the deposition to offer Gordon a 70 percent stake in MacMillan Utility in exchange for dropping the suit and partnering once again, but Gordon staunchly rejects his offer. Donna and Cameron return to Diane’s office with a new proposition: instead of competing with Swap Meet, Mutiny wants to buy them out. Joe calls Ryan at Mutiny, inviting him to work at MacMillan Utility; as Ryan walks out, Gordon is left in shock over Ryan's decision. | ||||||
| 23 | 3 | "Flipping the Switch" | Jeff Freilich | Lisa Albert | August 30, 2016 | 0.397[29] |
| Cameron goes to Ryan's house to warn him about working with Joe, and invites him to return to Mutiny; however, Ryan decides to stay with Joe. Marital tensions between Donna and Gordon flare up during a project meeting, leading to a heated argument on Mutiny's office floor. Diane accompanies Bosworth to Swap Meet to tender their buyout offer. Mutiny had initially planned to acquire Swap Meet for $600,000; however, after seeing their bare-bones operation, Bosworth realizes that Mutiny had overvalued Swap Meet, and he haggles down the offer. At MacMillan Utility, Joe has Ryan accompany him to a senior board meeting; during said meeting, Joe and the board decide to start charging $14.95 for Citadel. Ryan sees this as a betrayal of Joe's principles, and he insists to Joe after the meeting ends that Citadel should be distributed for free as Joe announced. Joe later pulls Ryan from his office job to work on a special project from Joe's apartment. After Cameron gives a guest lecture at a local college, Joe confronts her, thanking her for destroying his career, which allowed him his new success. At Mutiny, Gordon and Donna apologize for their earlier outburst; however, they start arguing again when Cameron decides that she'll take over Ryan's duties. | ||||||
| 24 | 4 | "Rules of Honorable Play" | Jake Paltrow | Alison Tatlock | September 6, 2016 | 0.312[30] |
| At Mutiny, Cameron shows stubbornness towards Doug and Craig, the former owners of Swap Meet, in adapting Mutiny's code to be compatible with Swap Meet's; Diane insists to Donna that Cameron and Doug need to fix their untenable relationship lest the partnership collapses. At Joe's apartment, he and Ryan brainstorm ideas for MacMillan Utility's next venture. In hopes of easing tensions between the Mutiny coders and the Swap Meet coders, Gordon takes them to an arcade to play laser tag. Cameron eventually decides to implement Swap Meet's changes; however, she tells Donna that she wants to fire Doug and Craig. When Donna tells Diane of Cameron's intentions, Diane states that she would reluctantly accept Cameron's decision if it would benefit the company; however, Donna lies to Cameron, saying that Diane won't let her fire Doug and Craig. MacMillan Utility loses a major contract with General Atomics, which represented 37 percent of their revenue, after Joe is insulted by a senior executive during a meeting. Despite this, Joe gives Ryan access credentials to ARPANET, and Joe tells Ryan to map the network before their security clearance is revoked. | ||||||
| 25 | 5 | "Yerba Buena" | Andrew McCarthy | Mark Lafferty | September 13, 2016 | 0.324[31] |
| At Mutiny, the coders discover that users want a way to make cash transactions on Swap Meet; Doug and Craig have been working on a solution to accept credit card transactions prior to Swap Meet's acquisition, and Donna implores Cameron it implement it, but she is reluctant to do so. At Joe's apartment, while studying the ARPANET map, Joe sees potential in NSFNET; however, Ryan sees it as a waste of time, since commercial usage of the network is illegal. During the Fourth of July weekend, Bosworth and Cameron return to Dallas, with Bosworth seeing his newborn grandson, and Cameron intending to retrieve her father's motorcycle, as her mother and stepfather are moving to Florida; she also meets with her ex-boyfriend Tom to reconcile. When her father's motorcycle is sold to someone else, Bosworth and Cameron have a falling out, and he returns to San Francisco without her. Donna gives Doug and Craig the green light to implement their credit card interface; however, when Cameron finally returns to Mutiny, she and Donna argue over that decision. Joe stands by his decision to focus on NSFNET, telling Ryan that they're going to create a regional network from it. When Cameron calls Diane, Cameron finds out about Donna's lie. | ||||||
| 26 | 6 | "And She Was" | Michael Morris | Angelina Burnett | September 20, 2016 | 0.280[32] |
| At MacMillan Utility, Joe and Ryan begin setting up their regional network. At Mutiny, Cameron reveals that she just fired Doug and Craig; Diane then comes into the conference room, telling Cameron and Donna that Mutiny should consider going public after receiving an acquisition offer from CompuServe. Sensing tension between them, Diane tells Cameron and Donna to think about the decision over the weekend, inviting them to her vacation house in Sonoma to unwind. Joe pitches his NSFNET proposal to the board; despite disapproval from the board, the sector chief of NSFNET accepts Joe's bid. While Donna takes up Diane's offer, Cameron stays at home, where she bonds with Gordon while playing Super Mario Bros. and working with Gordon's amateur radio; Gordon reveals his medical condition to Cameron and airs his grievances against Joe. Cameron goes to Joe’s apartment to convince him to give Gordon his due credit for creating MacMillan Utility. Cameron later unexpectedly moves out of the Clark household, and she reveals to Gordon that she and Tom had gotten married. Ken Diebold, a senior executive at MacMillan Utility, informs Joe that the board had voted to kill the NSFNET project and revoke Joe's executive authority. During a deposition meeting, Joe, against his lawyer's advice, admits that he stole Gordon’s idea. | ||||||
| 27 | 7 | "The Threshold" | Karyn Kusama | Michael Saltzman | September 27, 2016 | 0.307[33] |
| In light of his confession, Joe is ousted as CEO of MacMillan Utility. Joe tells Ryan that the NSFNET project is on hold, and that he will end up getting fired as well. Gordon's lawyer informs him of Joe's confession and the lawsuit's potential settlement; Gordon later learns about Joe’s NSFNET project after confronting him in his apartment. Donna and Cameron eventually agree to pursue an IPO; the next day, Cameron shows Donna a business plan she drew up to improve Mutiny before the IPO. Donna shows concern over Cameron’s plan, since her plan could take up to two years to fully implement while the IPO's time frame is three months, discussing it with both Diane and Gordon separately. During an office party celebrating Cameron and Tom’s marriage, Cameron calls an impromptu meeting regarding the IPO; the group comes to an impasse as Cameron wants to wait and improve Mutiny before launching the IPO while Donna wants to move forward with the IPO. Diane, Gordon, and Bosworth reluctantly side with Donna, leaving Cameron in shock. Feeling that he can no longer trust Joe, Ryan reveals that he released the source code for Citadel to the public, claiming that he made it truly free. Shocked, Joe tells Ryan what he did was illegal; however, Ryan shows overconfidence in covering his tracks. | ||||||
| 28 | 8 | "You Are Not Safe" | Reed Morano | Lisa Albert & Alison Tatlock | October 4, 2016 | 0.366[34] |
| Ryan is being investigated by the FBI for violating the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. Donna, Diane, and Bosworth figure out how to go forward on Mutiny’s IPO without Cameron. Because of Ryan's actions, the future of the NSFNET regional network is put into doubt. Joe turns to Cameron for help in tracking Ryan, since he went off the grid, and Joe is concerned for his safety; she eventually finds Ryan at a college library. At Cameron’s house, Tom tells her that his company wants him to move to Tokyo for a promotion, and Cameron supports him. Ryan later goes to Joe’s apartment; Joe gives Ryan two options: he can either remain a fugitive and lose the network, or turn himself in for a chance at redemption. When Mutiny’s IPO goes live, their stock trades much lower than they expected, leaving Donna in shock while everyone else at Mutiny is left speechless. When the FBI comes to Joe’s apartment asking for Ryan’s whereabouts, Joe admits that he was there but doesn't know where he went; however, after seeing the patio door open, Joe realizes that Ryan had committed suicide by jumping off the balcony. After Ryan's death, Joe tells Gordon to complete the work on the regional network without him, as Joe feels he can no longer profit from it. | ||||||
| 29 | 9 | "NIM" | Christopher Cantwell | Mark Lafferty | October 11, 2016 | 0.407[35] |
| Four years have passed since Mutiny’s failed IPO and Ryan's suicide. Mutiny has folded, Donna and Gordon have divorced, and she is now a senior partner at Diane’s VC firm. Donna contacts Joe, who is now an independent consultant, stating that she has a proposition for Cameron; however, he refuses to be her middleman. Cameron, now working for Atari, goes to Las Vegas for COMDEX to promote her latest game, Space Bike IV; Joe shows up at her booth, and the two reconnect. At home, Gordon has trouble dealing with Joanie's rebellious behavior as he tries to entertain his new girlfriend. Joe and Cameron attend a suite party hosted by Atari, and Cameron finds Donna there. Donna tries to pitch her project and wants to make amends, but Cameron, who is still resentful about Donna's past deceptions as well as Mutiny's downfall, refuses to hear her out. Joe goes to check on Cameron, and the two have sex in her suite. Before Cameron leaves Las Vegas, she reconsiders Donna's proposal, and when Joe returns to San Francisco, he finds a memo faxed to him by Donna about the project, the World Wide Web. | ||||||
| 30 | 10 | "NeXT" | Phil Abraham | Christopher Cantwell & Christopher C. Rogers | October 11, 2016 | 0.287[35] |
| Donna sets up a meeting in the old Mutiny building. She, Gordon, Joe, Cameron, and Tom discuss the future of the World Wide Web, but each have conflicting ideas and concerns. Joe reveals that he met Tim Berners-Lee at a conference in Paris, receiving the hypertext toolkit for the World Wide Web, including the transfer protocol, markup language and server software. The group leaves at a stalemate. Cameron visits Bosworth, having doubts about the project, and he tells her that the project must be worth pursuing if it got everyone together. The next day, Joe writes out the source code for CERN’s web browser, suggesting that they can build something bigger. Everyone except Tom is receptive to Joe’s idea; Tom and Joe get into a petty argument, which results in a physical altercation between them. Gordon warns Joe that their personal grievances against one another will destroy the project before it can even get off the ground. When Donna offers Cameron an opportunity to oust Joe from the project, Cameron tells Donna that she can no longer work with her. Donna replies, with regret, that Cameron can take ownership of the project and leaves. Joe, Gordon, and Cameron gather at a NeXTcube workstation and take the first step into the project. | ||||||
References
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- ↑ "AMC Drama 'Halt and Catch Fire' to Bow June 1 After 'Mad Men' Finale". Variety. March 5, 2014. Retrieved March 5, 2014.
- ↑ Darling, Cary (May 31, 2014). "AMC does Dallas, and Fort Worth, in 'Halt and Catch Fire'". Fort Worth Star-Telegram. Retrieved June 29, 2014.
- ↑ Labrecque, Jeff (June 1, 2014). "'Halt and Catch Fire': If Don Draper and Walter White met in 1983". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved June 29, 2014.
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- ↑ Holloway, Daniel (October 10, 2016). "'Halt and Catch Fire' Renewed for Fourth and Final Season at AMC". Variety. Retrieved October 10, 2016.
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- ↑ Pucci, Douglas (July 30, 2014). "Sunday cable finals: 7/27/14". TV Media Insights. Archived from the original on November 6, 2015. Retrieved January 2, 2016.
- ↑ Patten, Dominic (August 5, 2014). "AMC's 'Halt & Catch Fire' Finale Draws 574K Viewers". Deadline.com. Retrieved August 5, 2014.
- ↑ Metcalf, Mitch (June 2, 2015). "SHOWBUZZDAILY's Top 100 Sunday Cable Originals (& Network Update): 5.31.2015". Showbuzz Daily. Retrieved June 2, 2015.
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- ↑ Metcalf, Mitch (July 8, 2015). "SHOWBUZZDAILY's Top 100 Sunday Cable Originals (& Network Update): 7.5.2015". Showbuzz Daily. Retrieved July 8, 2015.
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- ↑ Metcalf, Mitch (July 21, 2015). "SHOWBUZZDAILY's Top 100 Sunday Cable Originals (& Network Update): 7.19.2015". Showbuzz Daily. Retrieved July 21, 2015.
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- ↑ Metcalf, Mitch (August 31, 2016). "UPDATED: SHOWBUZZDAILY's Top 150 Tuesday Cable Originals & Network Finals: 8.30.2016". Showbuzz Daily. Retrieved September 1, 2016.
- ↑ Metcalf, Mitch (September 8, 2016). "UPDATED: SHOWBUZZDAILY's Top 150 Tuesday Cable Originals & Network Finals: 9.6.2016". Showbuzz Daily. Retrieved September 8, 2016.
- ↑ Metcalf, Mitch (September 14, 2016). "UPDATED: SHOWBUZZDAILY's Top 150 Tuesday Cable Originals & Network Finals: 9.13.2016". Showbuzz Daily. Retrieved September 15, 2016.
- ↑ Metcalf, Mitch (September 21, 2016). "UPDATED: SHOWBUZZDAILY's Top 150 Tuesday Cable Originals & Network Finals: 9.20.2016". Showbuzz Daily. Retrieved September 21, 2016.
- ↑ Metcalf, Mitch (September 28, 2016). "UPDATED: SHOWBUZZDAILY's Top 150 Tuesday Cable Originals & Network Finals: 9.27.2016". Showbuzz Daily. Retrieved September 28, 2016.
- ↑ Metcalf, Mitch (October 5, 2016). "UPDATED: SHOWBUZZDAILY's Top 150 Tuesday Cable Originals & Network Finals: 10.4.2016". Showbuzz Daily. Retrieved October 5, 2016.
- 1 2 Metcalf, Mitch (October 12, 2016). "UPDATED: SHOWBUZZDAILY's Top 150 Tuesday Cable Originals & Network Finals: 10.11.2016". Showbuzz Daily. Retrieved October 12, 2016.
External links
- Official website
- List of Halt and Catch Fire episodes at the Internet Movie Database
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