Conclusion: Why Him? and the Dialectics of Silicon Valley Cinema

The book’s conclusion uses the light-hearted but forgettable comedy Why Him to reveal why Hollywood ultimately pulls its punches in its critique of Silicon Valley, as alluded to in the conclusions to each chapter of the book. It uses the film’s two key characters – a tech bro and his potential father-in-law, the owner of a paper factory – as models of two different forms of capitalism, the former representing Silicon Valley’s capitalism and the latter Hollywood’s. It demonstrates that a truly radical critique of Silicon Valley will never emerge from Hollywood, placing Hollywood’s gentle critique of Silicon Valley excess within the context of recent writing on Silicon Valley before looping back to reconsider all the films in parts one, two, and three through this lens. It ends by wondering about the extent to which Silicon Valley now dominates our live, as suggested at the conclusion of The Circle.