Silicon Valley and the rules of the barnyard
The show: Silicon Valley, Season 3, Episode 2 (HBO) The moment: The horse sex Brilliant, meek Richard (Thomas Middleditch) invented genius software. But his company’s board coldly replaced him as CEO with Jack (Stephen Tobolowsky), who is destroying everything cool about Richard’s idea.
Richard confronts Jack at a stable — while Jack calmly watches a squealing white stallion mount a mare. (The horse sex is real.)
Over wild stallion grunts, Richard pleads the case for his software: “People who have nothing could suddenly have access to everything. We could make the world a better place, and make billions of dollars.”
The stallion noises drop out; music plays. “Richard, I don’t think you understand what the product is,” Jack says, smiling. “The product isn’t your software.”
“Is the product — me?” Richard asks shyly.
“Oh! God no!” Jack hoots. The music stops. The horses shriek. “The product is the stock. Maybe sometime in the future we can change the world. Now excuse me, I paid $150,000 for that stallion’s semen, and I’d like to see it happen.”
It took me a while to warm to Silicon Valley, where everyone is hapless, voracious or both. I’m thrilled I stuck with it, because Richard’s plight is so poignant: He achieved the goal we all dream of — invented something good, moved the needle in a positive way — but the universe craps on him anyway.
This scene dramatizes that magnificently, by setting Richard’s royal screwing over against the most alarming animal screwing you are likely to see.
It’s one of the most audacious juxtapositions I’ve witnessed on TV. Silicon Valley airs Sundays at 10 p.m. on HBO Canada. Johanna Schneller is a media connoisseur who zeroes in on pop-culture moments. She usually appears Monday through Thursday.