Silicon Valley Legal Drama ‘Cupertino’ Is a Breathless, Whip-Smart Tour of AI Insanity From Robert and Michelle King: TV Review — SkimNews
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- "Cupertino" premieres Oct. 8 at 10 p.m. ET on CBS and Paramount+, with remaining episodes airing weekly on Thursdays, and 10 episodes were sent to critics
- Robert and Michelle King (creators of "The Good Wife" and "The Good Fight") return to a legal procedural, shifting from Chicago to Silicon Valley to interrogate AI ethics as "straight-up spiritual" questions about machine souls, free will and culpability
- Mike Colter stars as Michael Price, a former AI startup co-founder and in-house counsel defenestrated from his company, whose new firm casts itself as David against seemingly infinite venture capital
- Rachel Keller plays Olivia Siffre, an observant Christian entry-level associate fired alongside Michael in retaliation for sexual harassment, whose faith — including the line "Consciousness is a divine endowment given by God's breath" — drives the show's religious angle
- Busy Philipps plays Natalia Boutella, a MacKenzie Scott-type divorcée investor with a dusty law degree, while Ella Stiller is investigator Christy and Renée Elise Goldsberry recurs as Michael's ex and legal foe
- The show's ripped-from-the-headlines cases touch artificial general intelligence, internal safety dissent, Zizians-style rationalist offshoots, AI psychosis, prediction markets and human "trainers," drawing material fast enough that the reviewer worries the writers could run dry.
Why it matters: The Kings have built a Silicon Valley legal show that treats AI safety, corporate liability and rationalist culture as moral and spiritual territory — not just tech policy — and a 10-episode commitment from CBS makes this one of the first broadcast dramas staking out the AI-ethics beat rather than treating it as sci-fi. For viewers tracking how pop culture frames the AI debate, the show's choice to anchor skepticism in a practicing Christian lawyer rather than a tech insider is the editorial swing worth watching.
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