By Mike Judge played second fiddle for a while in his career. After outright producing the work of the devil, Judge’s King of the Hill, while wildly successful and lasting 13 seasons, would be also-ran to The Simpsons and then Family Guy immediately after that. No one doubted the quality of his work, but even stuff like Office Space and Idiocracy fall under the cult classic category, not outright classics that everyone knows and loves. Thankfully, any chance of Judge always being a bridesmaid evaporated with the huge success of Silicon Valley, and it looks like HBO wants his hand in marriage.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Judge recently signed a two-year extension with the premium cable channel that is supposedly worth a pretty multi-million dollar penny. In exchange, Judge will be making two new comedies for HBO titled A5 and Qualityland. A5 centers around a biologist discovering a gene that makes people jerks and the inevitable efforts to quash said jerkiness. Qualityland seems to be more in the vein of Idiocracy as the central conflict seems to be people versus convenience, assumedly to an outrageous degree that we expect from Judge. All of this money being thrown is apparently in response to the streaming wars ramping up as the more traditional media companies are scooping up talent to get shows on their shiny new streaming services.
Before Silicon Valley, Judge was easily one of the most underrated creators in Hollywood, but now he’s sitting pretty comfy at HBO and boy does he deserve it. Working in tech myself, there are few days that a coworker doesn’t quote the show and how it is a perfect encapsulation of the weirdness that are tech companies. My hopes are and always will be with a new King of the Hill because if something that ugly looking can last 13 seasons, you know it must be funny.
Mike Judge Solidifies HBO Future With Rich Overall Deal, Pair of Series Orders [The Hollywood Reporter]