‘Halt and Catch Fire’ season 3, episode 4 review: Laser tag, you’re it

Through four episodes, we’d say that this season of “Halt and Catch Fire” on AMC is officially in slow-burn territory. There have been moments where taking this slow, methodical pace has worked out for the series, and then there are times where it frustrates us slightly because we want to get to that next step.

For most of Tuesday’s episode, we have to say frustration took over, especially with Cameron as she overwhelmed herself with her new employees to the point where she balked on the dinner she was supposed to go to in order to ask Diane for them to be fired. As a result of that, Donna took over, and she made the move that she considered to be best for the company … even if the way she did it was a little bit unorthodox.

Was this Donna’s biggest move to date, delivering news to Cameron that was not in full accordance with what Diane actually said? It has to be up there, and it also has the biggest odds of blowing up in her face. Yet, she’s still allowing Cameron to stay at her place, which has become somewhat of an interesting subplot in its own right.

For every other main character, this episode was largely about plotting out what the future could be. For Joe MacMillan, this meant teaming with Ryan Ray in order to determine what the future of MacMillan Utility would be — which came about do to some brainstorming / covert actions at a party. Gordon, meanwhile, found himself frustrated with various symptoms and engaging in various team-building activities like laser tag (which he clearly got into). We definitely have to say that the show is spending too much time on what is plaguing Gordon without spelling it out in the easiest possible way.

We don’t mean to be too terribly hard on what is still in our mind one of the strongest dramas on TV, mostly because there were several great nuggets in here, whether it be Lee Pace’s performance as Joe met Gould for the first time, whatever is going on between Bosworth and Diane. Donna has quickly become one of our favorite characters, and we’d like to see her more engaging with the consumers than dealing with the constant stream of behind-the-scenes conflicts. Episode Grade: B-.