Wednesday, 7 April 2010

Chuck Versus The Other Guy

Chuck Vs The Other Guy was billed as the Chuck we’ve been waiting for, and damn was it ever!

The other guy is of course Shaw, who has been looking a bit creepy in a number of episodes. Now we know why, or so it seems.

This episode is full of great moments for the fans no matter what your favourite element of the show is. We get to see Chuck gear up with a tactical assault team in the pre-credits, perhaps slight overkill, but then again, Sarah did appreciate the tank. Casey gets to kill some bad guys and capture the director of The Ring – a kind of reunion for Jayne and Badger if you watch Firefly – and gets his old job back. Morgan becomes an official member of team Bartowski, much to Gen. Beckman’s chagrin. I’m sure the biggest moments for a lot of fans are the Chuck and Sarah moments; Sarah finally admits that she loves Chuck and they get together, properly. I’m sure that in that hotel room in France, Chuck is hoping not to find another IOU from Morgan!

Despite the amount of planning that has gone into the operation to steal the Intesect plans and kill Sarah, Shaw seems to be somewhat a reluctant bad guy, he gives Chuck the chance to stay out of it, he didn’t want to hurt Chuck because he wasn’t involved in his wife’s death. He made sure that Sarah was drugged so that she didn’t suffer as much when he killed her, it was the CIA he wanted to suffer. In giving the Intersect plans to The Ring, he would harm the security of the entire country, but his mind was bent on revenge, so he wasn’t thinking straight.

On the NBC forums, not long after the season started, somewhere, although I can’t actually find the post, I said that Chuck would kill someone by the end of the season, but it would be in order to protect Sarah. I think we all hoped it would be Shaw that he killed and I guess our wish was granted J

One thing that doesn’t sit right with me is the question of when Shaw was turned by The Ring.
The most logical time would have been before he infiltrated Team Bartowski, but that is fraught with problems. If this was the case, why did The Ring try to get Shaw’s intel and destroy Castle, and why did he put on a performance of finding out about his wife’s death if that was a) what helped The Ring turn him and more importantly b) nobody was there to see it.
Sure, from a storytelling perspective, we needed to find out that Sarah killed Evelyn Shaw so we would understand Daniel Shaw’s motive. It was very much a reveal and deceive tactic if he was a double agent, but from a plot perspective, it didn’t make sense.

If The Ring turned Shaw after he found out that Sarah killed Eve, then more of the previous plot elements make sense. It also explains why the Director said that Shaw was his newest agent. However, what fails to make sense is the whole set-up of the ‘creepy Shaw’ that gave the audience the feeling that he had a hidden agenda. Given the fact that he must have been recruited in a really fast time, and a lot of other things would be put down to coincidence, and I don’t believe in coincidence, that whole idea falls apart.

As usual, check out ChuckYouTuesday’s podcast – remember, it contains strong language.

The next two weeks are repeats, Chuck Vs First Class followed by Chuck Vs The Beard, so no new blog posts, but remember to watch live as they still count on the ratings.
Also, as I said in the last post, why not rent Spies Like Us during the hiatus as well. It’s a film that is well worth watching, plus you get the fun of spotting the references from Chuck.

I’ll be back in three weeks with a rambling about 3.14 - Chuck Versus The Honeymooners.

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