04x09 - Search

Episode transcripts for the TV show "Halt and Catch Fire". Aired: June 2014 to October 2017.*
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Set in the early 1980s, "Halt and Catch Fire" dramatizes the personal computing boom through the eyes of a visionary, an engineer and a prodigy whose innovations directly confront the corporate behemoths of the time. Their personal and professional partnership will be challenged by greed and ego while charting the changing culture in Texas' Silicon Prairie.
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04x09 - Search

Post by bunniefuu »

It's starting.

What am I looking for? Uhh...

What am I looking for?

What am I looking for?

For bootlegs...

3/4-inch socket wrench.

For the best coffee in the city.

Winona Ryder. So into her.

Landscaping supplies?

- Shoes.
- Shoes.

For the meaning of life, bra.

I'm looking for something funny.

I'm looking for inspiration!

I'm looking for a cure.

- I'm looking for...
- I'm looking for...

I'm looking for...

I'm looking for...

I'm looking for...

I'm looking for...

Dude, the Internet.

- The Internet?
- The Internet.

What in God's name would
I look for on the Internet?

Yeah, you could...

...find just about
anything on the Internet.

Whoo! _

Okay... it's, uh, a commercial.

And commercials exist to sell products.

But this isn't just a product. It isn't.

It's a new way of connecting.

A new way of being.

Uhh, hit it.

Whoo hoo hoo!

So, this is the new Comet,
and it launches tonight.

No longer are we just a way station

on people's journey someplace else.

We are the destination.

This is the combined effort
of every single person here,

from our original surfers

to our coding team
headed up by Cameron Howe.

Good job, Cam!

It's Cameron's last day

now that work on the
relaunch is complete...

Aww!

Settle down. We all knew
her days were numbered.

Uhh...

So, one more person I'd like to mention.

A huge part of the soul of
this place is no longer here.

But this is a family business.

Comet began with Haley Clark.

Her dad and I met back in 1983.

And I told him, "Computers
aren't the thing.

They're the thing that
gets us to the thing."

And this is the...

Com-IT!
Com-IT!

Com-IT!
Com-IT! Com-IT!

Com-IT!
Com-IT! Com-IT!

Com-IT!
Com-IT!

Com-IT!
Com-IT!

Com-IT!
Com-IT!

Whoo-ooo!

All right!

Back to it!

Yeah, do like...

Think we can, uh, discuss that...

- We have some mock-ups.
- Yeah, five minutes.

You okay?

Yeah. Celebrate later?

Yeah. What you wanna do?

Just... get some dinner

and make out in a parked car somewhere?

A little over-the-clothes
stuff and some dim sum.

So I guess I will say
goodbye to the guys,

and, uh, I can call Alexa.

Of course. Yeah.

Ladies at gentlemen,

at this time, we are now boarding

our main-cabin passengers
onto Pacific Flight 590,

with nonstop service to Bangkok.

Oh, oh. I almost forgot. Hang on.

Here.

- What is this?
- That is a travel organizer.

I put a little map of Bangkok in there.

- Hmm.
- Compartments for loose change

and, um, your passport,
traveler's checks.

Mom, I'm not taking this.

Why?

Because I'm 18 and not 45.

I'm staying in hostels.

If you actually want me to get mugged,

I'll walk around with
a Louis Vuitton wallet.

Mom, this is my trip.

I just wish you'd treat me like an adult.

Which I am, by the way.

You...

Fine.

Be safe.

Okay.

- Bye.
- Oh, my God.

Keys to my Civic are on my desk.

Take my old driver's license, okay?

Just in case.

It's an old photo, but...

the cops will believe you
'cause you're a cute girl.

Maybe wear a hat just in case.

Yeah.

Ladies and gentlemen,

this is the final boarding call

for the Cathay Pacific Flight 590...

- Okay.
- ...with nonstop service to Bangkok.

Don't go.

You don't have to go.

I don't know why you
have to do this right now.

You should just... just stay.

This is such bullshit, Mom.

Uhh...

Let's go, Mom.

The doctor complains to his wife

that she ain't so good in bed anymore.

Well, he goes to work.

And by midday, he calls her on the phone.

And the phone rings and it rings...

And it rings and it rings.

And, uh, finally, she picks
up. She's out of breath.

And he goes, "What the hell

took you so long to answer the phone?"

And she says...

Something about a second opinion, right?

Yeah. That's the one.

So... stent looks pretty good.

Yeah.

Any shortness of breath, chest pains?

No. No.

Get a little light-headed
sometimes if I sh*t real big.

You know, I never asked you... Levecq...

what the hell kinda name is that?

Levecq? Is it, uh... Swedish?

Or... is it Norwegian, or...

Is it a Czech... Czechoslovakian?

Little French Canadian there?

Hmm.

Dutch.

You're good to go.

Well...

Okay, but... wh...

When do you want me to come back?

I don't.

Well, not even for a look-see?

I mean... don't you want to make sure

I'm not blowing a gasket?

Mm, nope.

Something goes wrong, call.

If doesn't, don't.

You're in good health, John.

If you take care of yourself,

you'll live well into the 21st century.

21st century.

Son of a...

So then Marc Andreessen and Jim Clark

fly out to Urbana Champaign,

gather all the Mosaic
coders in a pizza joint,

and offer them $65,000 salaries,

a-a week's vacation
on his yacht in Tahiti,

and 100,000 shares of the company.

And Clark tells them
that if they leave NCSA

and come work for him,

they'll be worth $10 million
in less than five years.

So Jim Clark steals all the best coders

from a shitty company to go
do something way better...

Why does that sound familiar?

Anyway, my point is that
they've all followed him

out to Silicon Valley to build a browser,

and now Netscape is
about to demolish Mosaic.

If we were to launch
Comet inside Netscape,

it'd be slow as hell, if
it even loads correctly.

And if it doesn't, then Rover
won't or any of our competitors.

But if we can figure out a way

to make Comet run smoothly on Netscape,

then all of their users will flock to us.

But those guys created Mosaic.

They already know how to
make a browser that runs.

But they can't replicate
what they've already done.

The Mosaic code is intellectual property.

Like the BIOS.

Yeah, like the BIOS.

And they won't know how it works

until it's out in the wild.

And... And... they...

They'll want to make
Netscape better than Mosaic.

Joe... what are we doing here?

You could've told me all of this in bed.

Oh.

The sound card's blown.

Other than that, it runs perfectly.

Oh...

'Kay.

I need one more thing from you.

Uh-huh...

It's a quick job. When Netscape launches,

we pull apart the code so
that Comet can load fast.

And you're bribing me with Centipede?

Mm-hmm.

If we can pull this off,
we'll have a... a showpiece

to offer Jim Clark so
he can promote his baby.

They will beg for us to be a
part of their infrastructure.

Okay.

We can't wait until Netscape launches.

It's too late.

We have to optimize Comet

so that it's running fast on Day One.

Which, if you want a
showcase for Jim Clark...

we need to start pulling
apart the Netscape code today.

But there's no way they're going
to just give us a working copy.

Oh, no, they won't.

Let me make a call.

I love you.

What is that sound?

It's Gordon's wristwatch.

Ohh.

It would go off when he
needed to take his medication.

I don't know where the
key to the office is.

Okay.

I'll call a locksmith today.

Mm-hmm.

Hey, do you want to play?

Sure.

All right.

Oh.

Hi.

How, uh... How was Seattle?

Soggy.

Sorry about the ambush.

I saw your car parked in the driveway,

and nobody answered when I rang the bell.

How was it? Sending Joanie off?

Oh, you know, fine.

Just hope she stays safe.

How's Jennifer settling in at Stanford?

Well, she was home the first weekend.

Ohhh.

Doing laundry, stealing food.

- Yeah.
- Last year at this time,

I couldn't bear the thought
of her leaving for college.

And now... I kinda wish she'd
at least left the zip code.

Yeah, well...

So... we have news.

Kimberly is pregnant.

Wh... I... Congratulations!

That's amazing.

Yeah. No, but thanks.

But the whole family wants
to take a big trip to Ireland

while she can still fly.

And John and I would like to
do some traveling of our own...

No, I know. You're ready to move on.

Donna, I understand. It's been hard.

But it's been four months.

And I need to know what you're doing.

I'm swimming.

We have greased the rails.

Managing partner is yours.

Period.

You said you wanted the
summer to be with your girls.

I heard that. But the
summer is over, Donna.

The longer you wait, the
harder it's gonna get.

Trip and his stooges are
strutting through that office

every day thinking they
can run it better than you.

They think you're getting soft.

Look, if you don't want this, it's okay.

We can have that conversation.

But you need to make a decision.

Okay, well...

give it some thought,

and let me know.

Hm.

You got to be kiddin' me.

Whaaat?

Oh, hey.

Hey, you're home later than I thought.

How was the trip?

- It was good.
- Ahh!

Sorry, I stopped to see Donna

on the way home from the airport.

Well, so what's the verdict?

We gonna sprout wings and see the world

or is she gonna float in
that swimming pool forever?

You know, I don't know.

I'm gonna go wash the plane off me.

All right. Hey, what is all this stuff?

Some of Ben's old junk, I suppose.

What have you been doing
with your bachelorhood?

Well, you know, fartin' around.

This and that. Went to the doctor.

Got a clean bill of health.

He said I should live
well into the 21st century.

You imagine that? Jet
packs and robot overlords.

Hey, look what I found, too.

Can you believe this?
This is a Cardiff original.

I could've packed this
thing in a box myself

when I was a teenager. My God.

I bet it still works.

I just need to get some batteries for it.

What?

Honey, what?

What?

I'm sorry, I...

You're gonna be okay.

Yeah, I'm okay

I'm okay.

I'm gonna be okay.

Ooh. Mercy.

You weren't kidding about
that plane goo, were ya?

Come on! Get to scrubbing!

Ahh, look at ya.

But how do we optimize for Netscape

if there's no Netscape yet?

Look, I get it. And I'm
trying to figure it out.

But in the meantime, we
still have to go through...

Oh, okay. One second.

Hi. For you.

Oh, God. Thank you.

Sure. Um...

Here, let me show you out.

So this is Comet.

Yeah.

Oh, I... I saw the Mercury today.

- Mm. - God, the robotics thing
you're doing looks so cool.

I'm flying out with those
guys in a few weeks...

conference at the
Sorbonne. You should come.

Oh, that's...

I mean, I find all that
stuff super fascinating,

but... it's not really my thing.

Right?

No, I know.

But it's just a couple of
days. All expenses paid.

Worst that happens?

You meet some fascinating people

and eat too much lobster thermidor.

Yeah.

Next time.

Is what you said last time.

Look, I know that...

I've been talking you up.
People are really interested.

And that's... great.

Hey, look, I'm sure that
it's been a tough time

for all of you.

And I get that you're
trying to help a friend out.

And I'm young, so, you
know, what do I know.

But you can get so tied
up in your obligations

you forget your biggest obligation

is to your future self.

I know that.

Okay.

Well...

Hey, thank you.

And...

Seriously, this is the last thing.

I hope so.

But these are, like, huge shrimps,

like, should not be called shrimp,

and had those, like,
little feeler touchy things

- still attached?
- No!

- Yes!
- No.

Huge plate, deep-fried,

and those... feeler things
were, like, this long.

- Come on.
- Oh, no.

Please tell me you didn't eat one.

It was a business dinner. I had to.

So I took a glug of saké,
picked one up, and just...

Oh, good lord.

You're disgusting.

That's my story.

Okay, Joe, you're up.

Yeah. Uhh... Porpoise testicles.

- Joe...
- Ughh.

...you did not eat porpoise testicles.

I 100% did.

It is not legal to even
eat any porpoise anything.

I ate those fishy balls.

I did.

Do porpoises even have testicles?

I think so. I mean, what is porpoise?

I mean, yeah. I think it was a porpoise.

But whatever it was, it
was... it was squishy,

- and I vomited...
- Mm!

...into the gutter,
and... Donna, you're up.

Oh. Uhh...

Yeah. All right... beef carpaccio.

Ugh. So weird.

Um...

Um, Cameron will do this thing

where she can, uh, like, set up, uh...

- What? - ...an assembly line
of bologna, mayonnaise...

- Ohh!
- ...and pickles.

No, not pickles... cornichon.

- And, yes, duh...
- I'm corrected.

It's delicious. You get
a pile of mayonnaise,

pile of cornichon,

dip the cornichon in the mayonnaise,

wrap it in bologna, pop it in your mouth.

That's pretty gross.

So have you guys heard from Joanie?

Yeah.

Uh, she went to the Grand Palace,

and she saw this huge elephant park

and something called
the Sanctuary of Truth,

which is this massive temple
carved totally out of wood.

And on her second night,
there was this monsoon?

But it's not like here,
the rain was super warm,

so she went running through the
streets and she got all soaked

and she ended up eating
noodles in this little shack

and made friends with
these total strangers,

and now they're all
backpacking to Phuket.

Wow. That's awesome.

Yeah, I know. It's like...

She decides she want to do something,

and she just does it, you know?

Where's she going next?

I don't know.

Uh, I don't know.

I, uh, didn't get a chance to
talk to her when she called.

She just spoke to Haley, so...

Oh.

Uh...

Hey, Haley. There's
something I want to show you.

Hm?

Come with me.

Yeah, go check it out.

- Okay.
- We'll clean up.

It's the commercial.

I've just been dying to show it to you.

Oh... no, that's... that's okay.

No, you got to see this. Come on.

We got to grab lunch soon.

Catch up, you know?

Yeah, sure.

Ooh!

Sorry.

We're not actually gonna do the dishes.

Um, Joe likes the dishes
done in a very particular way,

and I'm not good at doing them like that,

so I just don't do them anymore.

Hey, so you're the new Diane now.

Oh... Yeah, no. I mean,
nothing's official yet.

I'm still trying to
decide if I even want it.

What? Of course you want it.

Yeah, you know, it's just,

I'm already so far removed from
the creative side of things.

And it only gets worse if you're
managing partner, you know?

Oh, uh, how are things with Alexa?

Are you, uh, you
working on something new?

Kinda. Yeah.

God, she just scored with this...

Oh, yeah, the robotics thing.

Robotics, yeah, yeah,
yeah. The Mercury...

- Yeah.
- Ugh. God, I miss that.

Doing things.

Yeah.

I mean, it's not like
she actually did anything.

She just found those people, you know?

She doesn't really get her hands dirty.

Ah.

Why, do you want to do something?

No.

I don't know.

Aaaghh... I just...

I haven't had an original
idea in kind of a long time.

Well, you came up with Community.

That was just an idea

that percolated down
from one of your ideas.

That's not totally accurate.

And, anyway, ideas
are, like, not the work.

Yeah.

I mean, what you do...

it's more than just signing a check.

I-I get that now.

So I'm not parasite?

You're not a parasite.

What the hell.

Hey, hold on. Haley, wait.

Is it because...

It's weird to see him.

Is it weird?

Yeah, it's weird to see my
dead dad in a stupid commercial.


It's weird that I'm in it, and
that you didn't even ask me,

and I don't even look like that anymore.

And it's weird that you've
taken this thing that I made,

and... and now it's yours.

And all you want is to
make money off of it!

Hey, I understa...

I'm 15! I don't want to have lunch

and catch up or whatever.

I don't want to be at dinners.

I want everyone to leave me alone.

I'll be in the car.

Uhh...

I'm pulling the ad.

Joe...

Look, you put a lot of
money in that commercial.

Don't just throw it down the drain.

Maybe you can cut her out of it.

It's my company.

I'm gonna do some work. Before bed.

What work?

Uhh, I've... been putting
things off with Alexa.

And, uh... I need to
give that some thought.

I gave Joe permission, you
know, for you to be in the ad.

So if you want to be angry,
you should be angry with me.

It's not his fault.

I thought you'd like it.

I just want some Bagel Bites.

Haley, if there's anything
you want to talk about, I'm...

Hey, I know we said I'd go back to work

as soon as you started back up at school,

but if you want, I can stay home...

No. I want you to go back to work.

And I want you to stop
worrying about me so much.

Just, you know, worry about you.

You're here all day.

Swimming.

Well, I like swimming.

Yeah, Mom, I like swimming,
too, but Jesus Christ.

Not bad.

They're incredible.

Um... I'm gonna go to my room.

So good night.

Oh, that is a beaut, huh?

Uh-huh.

Ooh. That's good cocoa.

Mama used to make it with real chocolate.

She'd put it in the double
boiler and melt it down.

That instant bullshit they have.

Ugh, ugh.

It's alkalized cocoa powder, what it is.

That's the garbage that's left over

after they roast the cocoa beans,

and they run it through a chemical bath

so you can't taste how awful it is.

My God, it's a national travesty.

Yeah, well...

things used to be more real, right?

See the way they worked...
this connects to this.

Now it's just all on a chip.

Yeah, it's like magic now.

Ahh, yeah, well... not my kind of magic.

What's so special you need to
get this thing fixed today, huh?

You gonna miss the Glenn
Miller Orchestra or something?

No, just got a bug up my butt,

wanted to see if it still worked.

I used to pack that
exact model into boxes

all day at the Cardiff factory.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I can still smell that place.

It's weird, isn't it,

how much stuff you
remember from early in life?

And how all that stuff in
the middle just kinda...

just kinda runs together.

I am seven years older than
my father was when he d*ed.

He spent the whole day before

yelling about how the
tree from the Malone place

was gonna bore into that sewer line

and cost him a damn fortune.

And then boom, down.

Just... spent his last day
bitching about tree roots.

Oh, Dad.

Anyway, it just seems to
me if you want something,

best to go get it done.

Now.

It's a real pitchers' duel here.

Hey!

Now, that's magic.

See?

Perfect.

Hey, would you, uh...

Would you have Diane give me a call?

Will do.

Ahh, screw it.

Just tell her I'm ready.

Okay.

Hey... um...

So, I was thinking.

I have my sister's car.

Because remember how I said
she's going to Thailand?

Which she says is hella badass.

Um... and, I mean, I'm
sure you have a car, too,

and I'm not even supposed
to be driving it yet,

but... whatever.

So, um, I was... I was wondering, um,

have you h... have you heard
of "Natural Born K*llers"?

Yes.

Yeah. Juliette Lewis is awesome,

and it's playing at the Century 24,

but it's super popular
so it might be sold out...

- Oh, well, that's...
- But if it is, uh,

then we could go to the
Winchester Mystery House

which is right next door,

and they do these midnight tours.

Which are dope, I think...

And, um, yeah.

Anyway, um

Could I take you to see
"Natural Born K*llers"?

Um...

Okay, hold on.

Hold... almost.

All right.

Okay.

It's truly a masterpiece.

Yeah.

This is your Sistine Chapel.

Awww, hell.

I found a box of Miracle-Gro
down there from 1982.

All right.

I'm done.

Done, I say.

How about you and I
do some actual living?

Hmm?

Can't we cheat it?

Make it so we that we
store recurrent Comet images

in the user's Netscape cache?

It would make it load so much faster.

Yeah, I would, if
Netscape supported that,

but they don't, so...

Is the query box fixed?

Or does it still get a null response

if you put a space before
the carriage return?

Still on my punch list.

Joe, this is still an early beta.

So there's tons of bugs.

We don't know what they're gonna fix,

how they're gonna fix it, how
those fixes are gonna affect us.

Guess I should just shut up.

No, but could you just relax?

We've got tons of time.

We've got two days.

Yeah, we have two days.

Okay, here.

That looks worse than it did before.

I know. It's part of the... process.

Maybe you shouldn't watch
how the sausage is made.

Are you checking your e-mail?

What?

Nothing.

No, what?

What, am I not taking this
seriously enough for you?

I didn't say that.

You didn't have to say
it. You're acting like it.

We've got the cheat sheet to the exam.

We've won.

I just don't want to
miss another opportunity.

Two days. That's all I'm asking for.

Can you just focus long enough

for us to get Comet optimized...

- Oh, my God. - ...so that it loads
perfectly when Netscape ships.

I'm giving you my focus.

Jesus, I'm doing you a favor.

Who's the e-mail from?

Are you...

Alexa.

Go ahead.

Read it.

Oh, g...

It's the new beta.

Shall I thank her for you,
or do you want to compose

something That'll make her feel

like a total shitbag for helping you out?

Give me a break.

Okay.

Looks the same as the old one.

Yeah, the skin's the same.
Let's see how she runs.

- Whoa.
- Uhh...

That's way faster than I thought.

- Yeah.
- Wow.

Hold on.

What, you can put text in fields
before the page fully loads?

Really nice touch.

Okay, so they've got support for JPEG.

The formatting is perfect.

I'm gonna set a call with Jim Clark.

You know what we could do?

We could put a badge on our homepage

saying "Optimized for Netscape."

And the gifs would render smoothly if...

Wait, wait...

What is that? That wasn't there before.

What the hell is Yahoo?

Two guys. Stanford. Used to be called

"Jerry and David's Guide
to the World Wide Web."

But...

This sucks. The design's terrible,

there's no image support, they're...

On the toolbar.

What?

They're on the toolbar.

That's it.

They've won.

They're the directory to the Web.

We don't exist.

Oh, God.

Come on.

Joe.

Joe!

There's coffee.

I'm all right.

I wanted it to work.

I wanted us to work.

Yeah?

Me too.

It did.

For a while.

For a while.

Yeah.

The thing that gets you to the thing.

Huh?

It was you.

It was always you.

Thank you. Thank you all.

Let's, uh, get right
down to it, shall we?

Hi.

Glad you reconsidered.

Mm-hmm.

I'm just going for the lobster thermidor.

Mm.

...and to circle back to Web search,

I got word that when
Netscape launches this week,

Yahoo will be the default directory.

They've got their own
button and everything.

So Comet is pretty much kaput.

And...

Uh... so, where does that leave Rover?

Should off-load it for parts,
sell it on the B2B market.

Lucky for us, it's algorithm-based,

so it actually has some value.

There's a... What is it, Benji? It's a...

medical indexing company

that's actually expressed
some interest, so...

We should probably look into that one

and try to get 20% to 30% of value and...

Hey, go back.

What is Netscape's
search directory called?

It's, uh... Yahoo?

I'm sorry, what is it?

It's "Yahoo"?

Ya-hoo?

Yeah, Yahoo. Like, "Yahoo," with a...

with an exclamation point.

Oh, Yahoo with an exclamation
point, not a question mark?

'Cause you keep saying
Yahoo with a question mark,

- so I was...
- Okay.

Shouldn't it be more like... Yahoo!

Sure.

Come on.

Drill down with me now, Trip.

Yahoo!

Yahoo.

No, man! No!

Oh, Jesus!

Now put some mustard on it, you know?!

Yahoo!

Yahoo!

There! Ya-hooooooooo!

Ya-hooooooooo!

Ya-hooooooooo!

That's so...
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