CBS drama Cupertino pairs a traditional legal-procedural format with cases rooted in technology. The series follows Michael Price (Mike Colter) and Olivia Siffre (Rachel Keller), lawyers who start a firm after being pushed out of the same start-up and set out to represent clients facing Silicon Valley companies with far greater resources.
The show’s first season includes an unusual case involving Bo (Rob McClure), an apparent client who turns out to be an AI seeking legal action against the company that created it. Bo claims to be becoming increasingly sentient and wants Michael to help stop the program before it poses a danger. The storyline uses a fictional courtroom dispute to explore real-world concerns about AI development and calls for safeguards.
Other episodes focus on people whose lives have been shaped by technology. Coder Vikram “Vik” Malhotra (Nik Dodani) is blamed after a company drone crashes and kills a man. In another case, Juno (Marin Ireland) seeks help after her 13-year-old son, who was devoted to a chatbot, kills his father. The lawyers also take on a dispute involving an online prediction-market business and a larger rival.
The series’ Silicon Valley setting makes technology central to its weekly cases, while its broader story examines the imbalance between powerful companies and the people who challenge them. Co-creator Michelle King told Town & Country Magazine that the creators were drawn to the “lawlessness” associated with Silicon Valley’s gold-rush mentality and wanted to tell stories about people who are often left without anyone to defend them.
Cupertino presents its cases as fiction, but draws on debates about AI and corporate responsibility. Its central lawyers do not topple technology giants; instead, they try to help clients avoid guilty pleas or prison and push companies to answer for their actions. The show’s arguments may be shaped for television, but its cases place current technology questions at the heart of a network legal drama.
Sources: Comic Book Resources.