Chuck Vs The Anniversary

Welcome back Kotter Chuck!

Photo by: Jordin Althaus/NBC

 I’m a little late writing this blog post, so I expect most of you have watched the season opener a half-dozen times by now!

 This season started a little differently; no flashbacks to last season, no “Hi, I’m Chuck…” recap of what has happened previously. Straight into establishing that this is about the search for Mama Bartowski.

 I think it would be possible for people to jump in and be introduced to the series in this season. It felt, possibly because the lack of recap, that no back-story was needed in this case. It may have been simply that there wouldn’t have been enough time to do a recap. Of course, and I’m not trying to be pessimistic here, but it could be that they’ve realized, given the ratings (and you may know my feelings on those!), that the audience they have will be pretty much the audience they’ve always had. Unfortunately, the stunning lack of promotion by NBC won't do much for the viewing figures either! :(

 But back to the episode, and what a start to the season it was! It was the right mixture of what Chuck does best – comedy, drama and action. Chuck has a real heart in the stories; something that Bond, Bourne and Get Smart lacked, and it’s what puts this show above them in my opinion.

 There was a minimal main cast in this episode, no Awesome, Big Mike, Jeff or Lester. That may be due to the fact that they had not only Linda Hamilton, but also Dolph Lundgren and Harry Dean Stanton, so budget may have played a part.

 There were a number of references to get during the episode. There was, of course, the ‘Rocky’ reference – “I must break you” which most people expected. I thought it was brilliant that they not only had Harry Dean Stanton guest star, but had him play a Repo man. That was intense! True, it didn’t add much to the story, but if you’re gonna have a Repo man, might as well have the Repo Man!  If you haven’t seen the film ‘Repo Man’, then I’d recommend you rent it. It is very good, and you’ll also get the reference in this paragraph.

 With the lack of comic relief from the Buy Morons, it was up to Morgan to provide the humour, and he didn’t disappoint. The whole thing about the sexting was great; only Morgan would think that SOS could stand for Skin On Skin!

 I also liked the fact that despite his lack of experience in the spy world, he sees himself less as the assistant he claimed he was in ‘Vs The Other Guy’, but more as an equal, less an Alfred to Chuck’s Batman, but more as a Robin.

 I do wonder, now that the Buy More is a CIA/NSA substation filled with spies, gadgets, guns and trapdoors, how they will re-introduce Big Mike, Jeff and Lester. Surely you can’t have Jeffster in a spy base? Will Big Mike be working for Diane?

 One thing that I found interesting is that although Mama B was captured by Volkoff, she appears to be working for him in some capacity. All will no doubt be revealed as the season progresses.

 And finally, we have a new phrase to enter in the fandom – Tangiers – file it under ‘T’ in the Chuck-tionary!

 As I usually recommend, check out the latest ChuckYouTuesday podcast – just click the link to the Chuckgasmic blog in the side bar, but remember, it contains strong language.

 Next week, Chuck vs The Suitcase guest starring model Karolina Kurkova and Lou Ferrigno as well as Isaiah Mustafa as Greta.