HBO's Silicon Valley Reviewed: Episode 4

Now that we're now four episodes into an eight episode season I am finding myself more than a little bit worried about the increasing inability of this show to make me laugh.

And yes, sure, there were some clever moments that popped up here and there — mostly revolving around Bighead and his situation at Hooli (loved the land of misfit contracted employees on the roof) — but the wasted Toga Party setup was just a big disappointment. Richard gets drunk but doesn't really do anything especially interesting and the guys talk to a couple of actresses paid to mingle at the party — which was just a stupid waste of a good comedic setup — just as was Peter Gregory's liter born entrance to a party he appeared to have little or no interest in attending.

I mean what was all that about?
And after the season is half over is Monica, the only woman on the show, is still doing nothing more than announcing that Peter Gregory is ready for you?

I mean how ironic is it that in an episode built around Richard trying to explain to people what Pied Piper is about, Mike Judge still doesn't seem to know what Silicon Valley is about. At first I thought they were going after the Entourage model, but these guys are too antagonistic to make that work. But if they think moving Richard around from one awkward situation to another — and really, that bit in the bathroom with his pants off was just plain embarrassingly bad — well, that's not enough to carry a show.

And why go to the trouble of creating an interesting villain like Gavin and his Hooli monster, but then barely even use them? Its absolutely maddening to watch them flounder about this really neat little world they've introduced us to, only to fall back on Erlich to once again save Richard's bacon by magically pulling a resolution out of his ass.

And projectile vomit in the face? That's how you're going to get me to come back for episode 5? I am more than a little disappointed, but nevertheless I will be back here next Sunday with my review of episode five and until then follow me on Beamly and Twitter and be sure to head over to YouTube where you can hit my subscribe button because I review lots of other things like SNL and the really, really wonderful new show from HBO and John Oliver, Last Week Tonight which premiered tonight and about which I have a lot of nice things to say