'Halt and Catch Fire' Just Premiered on Tumblr

The brand new AMC drama Halt and Catch Fire premiers on Sunday June 1, but for those who can’t wait, there’s a free preview of the Halt and Catch Fire premiere now available on Tumblr. Since the show is a tech-centric drama, it’s a brilliant marketing move for the network to draw in a tech-savvy audience early on. For the uninitiated, the series focuses on a group of rebellious programmers and engineers who set out to create a groundbreaking computer in 1980, when Silicon Valley was just starting to boom. Following suit, AMC has taken a bold and innovative approach to its online content and reach.

The Halt and Catch Fire Tumblr premiere is a first for the social media monolith (which is known for its die-hard fandom users) as well as the network. According to AMC’s president Charlie Collier:

Halt and Catch Fire is a fun ride through the early days of the PC era, a time when no one could imagine a portable computer weighing less than 15 pounds, let alone one that was a few ounces and doubled as a phone. It’s a perfect show for summer and – given the subject matter – a good fit for Tumblr’s first TV series premiere and AMC’s first social media screening

AMC and Tumblr are not just aiming to promote the series through the website, they are building a community around the series from the ground up. Most Tumblr pages for series like Breaking Bad and Sherlock that have a huge online fanbase are reactionary, but here, AMC is turning the tables by using Tumblr as the platform that’s ahead of televised content. Essentially, it’s giving the fans what they want before they even know they want it. They’ve out-Don-Drapered themselves, folks.

And this, dear readers, is how you can cure your summer TV lull and end of Mad Men blues. Halt and Catch Fire, you have our attention.

Image: AMC