Chuck Vs The Leftovers

Welcome to the party, pal! More turkey?

Photo Credit: NBC

 Proving he doesn’t need an Intersect to have a multitude of skills, Zachary Levi stepped behind the camera again to direct his second episode. There were some slightly avant garde shots, but overall another fine work.
 This episode contains plot elements that bear some resemblance to those in the episode he directed previously, 'Chuck Vs The Beard'. In both, there is an enemy takeover at the Buy More, both looking to break in to Castle. Both have a big reveal; in 'Beard' it was Chuck revealing his spy credentials to Morgan, in this episode, it was Frost revealing to Volkoff that Chuck is her son, and that she has a family. Most importantly for me, both of them feature a Chuck who is unable to flash at the beginning of the episode, and has his kung fu restored by the end.

 Timothy Dalton was brilliant as the menacing, threatening villain, and the lovestruck villain who is apparently great with kids and wanted to meet the family. The menace carried through so that even in the supposedly comfortable setting of the family dinner, there was still that underlying feeling that anything could happen.
 Dalton has, for me, been outshining Linda Hamilton with his passionate performances, first as Tuttle and now as Volkoff. He manages to tap into that balance between serious and silly which is something this show does when it is at it's best. He may be best known for his role as James Bond, but he completely owns the Volkoff character.

  Was it just me, or did you expect someone to shout out ‘License to Kill’ or 'The Living Daylights' during the game of Charades? Well, it was a film, three words - although I have no idea what he was actually trying to mime!

 We had another great homage to Die Hard with Morgan filling the role of John McClane in clothing as well as action, although trust him to tape the gun to his back in such a way that it was unreachable! Yippee ki….oh.

 There was also the African-American computer hacker (with Nerd Machine sticker on his laptop!) and the very subtle inclusion of Dean Martin’s ‘Let It Snow’ when Chuck and Sarah are about to be attacked by Volkoff’s assassins.

 Speaking of which, considering that Chuck was willing to take on three ninjas in Castle just a couple of weeks ago, why was he so insistent that he couldn’t take on even one of those guys without having the Intersect? Is he really that uncertain of his own abilities?

 It turns out that the laptop is a portable Intersect, another curveball for us just as we started to think it wasn’t.

 I’m sure most of the business with the laptop will be quietly forgotten about, given the number of questions it raises. Awesome would need to explain to Ellie where it was, and he couldn’t convincingly lie if his life depended on it. What would have happened if Ellie had put in the correct password meant for Chuck? She knew the phrase ‘Aces, Charles’, having used it in the pilot. Then the business about WHY it was left for both Chuck and Ellie is a little vague at best.

 Ellie had to solve the first problem to unlock it for Chuck so that the Intersect could be restored. Does this mean that Papa B thought that Ellie would be helping Chuck in a professional capacity as well as in a familial one?

 Originally Steven didn’t want Chuck to be involved in the spy world, so I’m guessing that the laptop was programmed after he came to accept that Chuck was going to be a spy.

 I have my own theory as to why it was given to Ellie and then had to be passed on to Chuck. It is possible that, given Ellie’s background in neuroscience, she had to figure out the data storage problem for the Intersect so that she could help Chuck either to restore it, or possibly to come up with a more efficient storage method in the brain, thus enhancing it. She did say that Papa B had been looking at it from an engineering perspective, rather than a neurological one. She made a few adjustments to it, so perhaps this is Intersect 2.1?

 I liked the subtle references to, firstly the pilot, with Chuck falling straight backwards after absorbing the Intersect, and to the end of Season 2 with the line: “Guys, I know Kung Fu. Again.”

 One more thing, there was (I’m assuming) a little fan reference with Casey referring to Frost/Mary Bartowski as ‘Mama B’.

 Next episode: “But, soft! What light from yonder window breaks?” It’s Chuck Vs The Balcony – unfortunately we have to wait until January 17^th for our next fix. :(

In the meantime, here are some things you can do to fill the Chuck-less void.

- Watch Chuck again from the beginning; remind yourself how far they’ve come.

- Rent films like Terminator, Repo Man, Spies Like Us, Cobra, Die Hard and Tron; Chuck has referenced them all.

- Listen to the Chuck podcasts; you may have missed some.

- Go and see Tangled (if you’re in the US, it’s not out until late January in the UK)
- Join a Strip Kick class :) (I'm pretty sure these don't exist!)

- Fight your way across Thailand and earn an unflattering moniker!

 

Chuck Vs Phase Three

Forget taking names. Sarah Walker is just here to kick ass.

Photo Credit: Greg Gayne/NBC

 If you were still sitting on the fence regarding the awesomeness of Yvonne Strahovski/Sarah Walker, then this episode should have turned you into a fan.

 It has been suggested by a number of people on Twitter that Yvonne deserves an Emmy for her performance in this. I think it would be hard to find many fans that would disagree, and I’m sure those outside the fandom would admit that she should at least be in contention.

 This episode was, of course, Sarah-centric, and it showed us that she needs Chuck as much, if not more, than he needs her. Fighting her way across Thailand and taking on anyone who got in her way, Sarah proved that she was willing to do whatever it took to rescue Chuck.

 For me there was a great comparison to Chuck in last week’s episode. Chuck thought that he needed the Intersect to be a spy, and needed to be a spy to have Sarah; for that he was willing to risk anything. This week, Sarah was willing to risk everything to rescue Chuck because she realised she needed him to have as normal a life as possible.

 As well as the kicking of ass that went on, there was a great deal of heart and emotion to Sarah in this episode. Despite the loss of Chuck taking her dangerously close to crossing the line, there were also some very tender moments. The scene where she finds his proposal plan, when she smells his shirt, and when Sarah tells Chuck, as he lies unconscious, that she loves him, that she wants to marry him were very moving.

 I loved that Sarah referred to Morgan as ‘The Magnet’. This could be his permanent new nickname; it’s certainly better than ‘Organ’!

 Casey was a lot more reluctant in this episode to include Morgan in the mission than he has been recently. From taking him to rescue Chuck and Sarah from his old squad, to telling him he wouldn’t learn anything if he stayed in the van, it seemed that casey had been embracing the bearded one as his protégé. Okay, so Morgan has never been trusted with a loaded gun, but there’s plenty of time – baby steps, little ammo-less baby steps.

“You’re not getting bullets for a long, long time” – Casey to Morgan.

 Events in this episode did get me thinking how Casey would react if ever something were to happen to Alex involving the spy world. No doubt that scenario would largely involve bodies flying about, as The Casey would truly be unleashed.

 Ellie finally found the computer in the car that Papa B left for her, and it was indeed specifically left for her.

 It was nice to see the Buy More gang outside of the store, although why Awesome would agree to give them all a physical regardless of their contribution to fixing the Orion computer is beyond me. Nice callback to Season 2 with Lester referring to it as a Roark 7.

 It made for a wonderful cliffhanger having Ellie log into it and then that reaction. I wonder what could be on it? Luckily it seems not to be a version of the Intersect – I dread to think what would have happened in it were and Lester had activated it, or even worse, Jeff!

 It seems that the Intersect-less arc will continue, hopefully for a few more episodes. Will we see Chuck being a spy during a mission without having the Intersect to rely on? Perhaps he needs to have the confidence not to use it for it to start working again.

What are your thoughts?

 Next episode: Guess who’s coming to dinner? Chuck Vs The Leftovers, which has, for me, one of the most anticipated Terminator references. I know that because it was spoiled by the preview at the end of this week’s episode. Thanks NBC!

Chuck Vs The Fear of Death

Intersect 2.0 encountered a serious error. If this is the first time you have seen this screen, restart your system.

Photo Credit: Joel Warren/NBC

  At the end of the last episode, which feels like an age ago, Mama B seemed to de-Intersect Chuck. However, all is not lost, as it appears that it was merely suppressed.

 Cue a team of scientists working for a month to try and restore our hero to his full spy potential and lift the ‘psychological rock’ off the Intersect.

 Follow this with the most bizarre Psychological Operations agent I have ever seen, Agent Rye, whose methods are less than conventional.

  This episode, like many others has a dual meaning in its title. The fear of death is supposed to be the thing that coaxes the Intersect into working again, but it is also Chuck’s fear that his spy career will be ‘dead’ without it.

 Sarah also has a fear that Chuck cannot function as a spy unless he regains the Intersect, something she makes clear to him when he decides to do whatever is necessary.

 Both of them seem to have forgotten the number of times he’s managed to save the day without using the Intersect. Even before the upgrade to 2.0 he was capable of great things, and I’m sure he must have learned something from having used Chuck-Fu a number of times now. He even took that online Gemology class on the flight over to Gstaad and thought to bring the loop for studying the diamonds.

 It seems that General Beckman has become a lot more emotionally attached to the team. Not only does she allow Chuck to use the ‘But my mom said..’ excuse, but when Sarah is anxious about finding where DeSmet has taken Chuck, she tries to calm her down by using her first name rather than Agent Walker.

 “Sarah, he’s out there, we’ll find him.” – Gen. Beckman.

The idea of the slightly crazy PsyOps agent helping Chuck was a good one, but I felt that the spy story swung between serious and funny without really finding enough of a balance. I also found the fact that 'Chuck Bartowski is the Intersect' seems to be an open secret now a little odd, unless they have a team dedicated to it, possibly trying to recreate it for use in more agents.

 The story in the Buy More worked a lot better, with Jeff and Lester on the verge of uncovering the secret of ‘Greta’ and the fact that the Buy More is actually a CIA/NSA substation. Quite frankly, if they worked anywhere else, they’d have been fired by now.

 We learned a couple of new things about Jeff this week. Firstly, his damaged brain makes him see things like people having tails and turning into woodland creatures, something I’m sure a psychiatric team would have a field day with. The second thing we found out is Jeff’s second skill (after Missile Command) – he can identify the ingredients in a Subway sandwich from a distance, and possibly by smell if you watch that scene again – how can he see it?

 Since Summer Glau was appearing in this episode, I’m sure many of us were expecting a Firefly reference. It was fleeting, likely to have been missed by anyone not familiar with the show, but if you listen carefully it’s there.

 Who else liked the fact that Greta growled like Casey at Casey? Worthy of a little smile at least.

 I should point out that I liked the opening sequence with the scientists, although how watching YouTube clips of kittens and people having skateboard mishaps would work is anyone’s guess. That skateboard fail was quite funny though!

 I'm looking forward to next week's episode and the resolution of the cliffhanger we were left with. I'm hoping that Chuck will learn during this Intersect-less story, however long it lasts, that he has abilities outwith the computer in his brain and doesn't need to rely on it to be a real spy.

 Next episode: Chuck Vs Phase Three, which, from the promo photos, looks to have some serious Sarah Walker in butt-kicking mode in it!

Chuck Vs The First Fight

For Sale: One family house with secret underground base (both slightly fire damaged). May require some work. Unique opportunity.

Photo: Warner Bros. Television Entertainment/Michael Ansell

  Holy crap!!

 That’s the cleaned up reaction of a lot of people to last night’s episode of Chuck. It seems that our hero wasn’t the only one who was duped by Timothy Dalton’s character of Gregory Tuttle, or should I say Alexei Volkoff.

 We all seemed to think when we heard that Dalton had been cast that he would be playing Volkoff, then it was announced that his character was called Tuttle and it seemed that idea went out the window. Bluff!

 This episode had some great comedy, good action, and enough intrigue and twists to be worthy of a Bond film. Having been written by the wonder-duo Rafe Judkins and Lauren LeFranc, I had high hopes for it, and it certainly did not disappoint.

 I know that a lot of people will have loved the scene between Ellie and Mary, with Sarah sitting in the background. Once again, Yvonne manages to say so much without saying a word.

 In an interesting link to last season, I noticed that they played the same song when the house was blown up as they played when Papa B was shot. One death and then another for Orion; firstly he is killed by Shaw and then his life’s work is destroyed by Volkoff with a little help from his estranged widow. Not only that, but it appears that Mama B de-Intersected Chuck, most likely not for the same reasons as Orion did though. Hopefully the computer left in the car will provide something for Chuck, or who knows, maybe Ellie will accidentally be Intersected!

 Mary Bartowski/Frost seems to be an interesting dilemma, she’s torn between her feelings as a mother, and her duty as a spy, albeit for the wrong side. She’ll do something to sabotage the mission he’s undertaken as he is an enemy spy to her; then she will do something in order to protect him as, despite their conflicting loyalties, Chuck is still her son.

 It leaves me wondering whether something will happen later on this season that forces her to choose between saving her son’s life, or completing her mission. I have a feeling that would not be an easy resolution for her at the moment.

 Morgan is enjoying himself as he becomes more involved in the missions. He might not be terribly adept at it, but he certainly brings an undeniable enthusiasm.

 The scene at the bar was hugely entertaining, from Morgan’s entrance, in which reminded me a little of David Caruso, to the classic flubbing when he drops the earpiece into the glass of water and tries to retrieve it.

 I loved that he referred to Casey and himself as a couple, and Chuck’s reaction to that was brief but brilliant. The scenes between Morgan and Sarah are brilliant, but those between Morgan and Casey show a little more; there is both an element of annoyance and of growing respect, or possibly just tolerance, from Casey towards the little bearded one.

 Timothy Dalton seemed to be having fun playing the character of Tuttle, a bumbling wannabe spy, somewhat of a departure from his role as Bond (a role I think he is highly underrated in) and the roles he played most recently in Hot Fuzz and Doctor Who.

 Of course, we’d guessed that he would be playing Volkoff, despite the bluff, but it was no less exciting when he eventually showed up, sharp-suited and ready to kill (licence or no) and destroy Orion’s secret base.

 There are two things I’d like to point out, the first being Chuck and Sarah resolving their fight whilst fighting off Volkoff’s agents was a brilliantly ironic idea.

 Secondly, I thought that the “Burgundy ’68 Mustang” was a little pushed as an idea. It could have been done with a little more subtlety rather than spelled out so that even the village idiot could see that it would be of major import.

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

 Next episode: Chuck Vs The Fear of Death, which guest stars Richard Chamberlain, Rob Riggle and Summer Glau. It airs on Mon 15^th Nov.

Chuck Vs The Aisle Of Terror

Prepare to be scared - Black liquorice… Man feet… OTTERS!!!

Photo by: Jordin Althaus/NBC

  The Halloween episode of Chuck was pretty much all you could have hoped for, unless you were hoping to see more of Sarah in that Princess Leia costume!

 It was creepy in places, funny in parts, and had a cracking twist upon twist with Mama B double and triple crossing; lies within truth within lies.

 Of course, a large part of the Bartowski family relationship seems to be about secrets and lies. The interesting thing is that both parents disappeared in order to protect Chuck and Ellie. Steven was Orion, and so left to protect them from his enemies, but in the case of Mary, did she disappear to protect them from her allies, or even protect them from herself?

 Chuck’s desire to believe his mother’s story blinded him to the possibility that she may not have been all she claimed to be. He was aware of this just enough to acknowledge this and tell Sarah, but not enough to stop him from, possibly naively, believing her despite all that she’s done. I would probably have a hard time trusting anyone who shot me!

 In the end, Casey lies to Morgan in order to protect Chuck from the truth. Then he teams up with Sarah to seize Mama B in order to both interrogate her and to protect Chuck from both her and himself.

 This also lead to Chuck having to reveal to Ellie the reason that their mother left all those years ago, and in doing so, he may have revealed to her that he is still a spy.

 Coupled with this story of maternal ambiguity was the often amusing Halloween plot featuring Dr. Stanley Wheelwright, played with zeal by the original Freddy Krueger, Robert Englund. Although this story was downright silly in places, such as the payoff with memories from Jeff’s demented brain saving the day, it was enjoyable fun.

 I did wonder about the scene with the toxin device in Castle though. I assume that Chuck and Sarah thought it may explode if not de-activated; why else release Wheelwright? However, it doesn’t explain why, after the countdown restarted and accelerated on the double booby-trapped device, did Chuck just stand there as the gas was released? Also, wouldn’t Sarah have been exposed to some of the gas as well, since she was standing about 6ft away in an open area for about 20 seconds before Chuck initiated the lockdown?

 After a couple of incidents in Castle involviing chemical agents being released, surely they’d have some sort of airtight blast-proof containers for just this sort of situation. Whoever deals with Inventory needs to get on that!

 It was good to see Morgan still providing comic relief in both the Buy More and spy worlds. Only he would take a paintball gun to an informant meeting, although how he managed to hide it in that jacket without ruining the line of the suit baffles me! I think I also detected a Casey-style grunt from him. Is he taking on things from his mentors? With Big Mike he adopted a (small) fish plaque, with Casey is he adopting a grunt?

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

 Next week: Chuck Vs The First Fight, which guest stars former Bond actor Timothy Dalton and SNL’s Ana Gasteyer.

Chuck Vs The Couch Lock

Weekend at Bernie’s Casey’s!

Photo by: Michael Ansell/NBC

 This week saw a very Casey-centric episode; filling in a little more of his past while having the character grow a little more by the end of it.

 Serious kudos should go to all involved, especially Adam Baldwin who was able to convey so much whilst doing so little. I didn’t think it would be possible to emote whilst paralysed on a couch and wearing a Stormtrooper helmet, but he managed it!

 Who could fail to love Morgan in this episode? There is a real hero beneath that Halo-playing, beardy exterior, and I think that Casey has recognized that.

 Despite having nothing to prove to anyone, he risked his life to save his friends, thus proving his bravery. Well, as the saying goes, he’s either mighty brave or mighty stupid, and sometimes I think it’s a bit of both, but I wouldn’t have it any other way. Okay, so maybe part of his selfless act stemmed from the fact that he wanted to help find Casey and was sent packing back to the Buy More, but over all, Morgan has manned-up enormously since the first season.

 The relationship between Alex and Morgan should be interesting to see over the course of the rest of this season, and just how closely Casey keeps tabs on them. Despite giving his blessing (although not without warning) and having warmed to Morgan a little more in this episode, I don't think Casey will let him far out of his sight when it come to dating his daughter.

 Jeff and Lester managed to sink further down into the social gutter. We knew that Jeff has some substance issues, but Lester? I thought he was the one that was supposed to be keeping Jeff as close to the straight and narrow as is possible for someone that messed up.

 As a former player of Magic: The Gathering, I did like the reference, although I'm not sure I'd be up for an evening playing it with Jeffster. Also we had the amusing notion that Casey can detect Jeff and Lester by smell. Either of them are the man your man could smell like, if he’s not careful!

 We had the strongest 'indication' that Chuck’s mother might be playing for the other side. No, not in that way! I mean that she’s working with the bad guys, or at least working for them. The fact that Casey's A-Team flat out told Chuck and Sarah that Frost was their boss and Volkoff's right hand, to which Chuck voices his concern that his mom might be one of the bad guys was a little clichéd but I can't really fault the writing.

 There was also the cliché of Chuck telling Sarah that he was going to stop searching for his mom, followed by the phone call from her. It should be interesting to see what she has to say for herself next week.

 It must be something about the new writers coming in, with one minor exception; all of them have absolutely nailed it. Possibly because they have come in during the shows run, as opposed to those who started with the show, they have the benefit of having an outside perspective. It’s kinda like the best possible fan-fiction making it to the screen, all within the confines of an ongoing plot.

 Lovely pop-culture references sprinkled throughout the episode, including the A-Team shout out, which just had to be done.

 One point I would bring up is that if the vault with the gold had been sealed for 10 years, how come they'd not figured out another way of getting the gold out, other than using Casey's cold dead hand? Just a thought.

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

 Next week: Chuck Vs The Aisle of Terror which guest starts Freddie Krueger himself – Robert Englund. After this weeks’ cliffhanger ending, it should be a good one!

Extra: It has been announced that Chuck has been picked up for a full season with an extra 11 episodes ordered!

Chuck Vs The Coup D'Etat

You say you want a revolution, well you know, we all want to change the world.

Photo by: Chris Haston/NBC

 First off, apologies for the lateness of this week’s blog; I haven’t been shot recently, but I have been ill.

 This Monday’s Chuck saw the return of the enthusiastic Generalissimo Goya and our first visit to the wonderful (just see his promotional video) island of Costa Gravas.

 I think many of us were assuming that Awesome and Ellie would feature more heavily in this episode, given the promo pictures of Awesome and his giant statue. As it was, they had some comedy moments, such as Awesome patting his own statue on the ass, but largely they just provided a conduit for the story.

 We had some awkward moments with Chuck and Sarah stemming from their inability to discuss emotional issues properly. They are crap communicators, and it didn’t help the fact that Chuck used Morgan as an excuse to hide behind when trying to bring up the fact that they weren’t communicating on that level. Man up, Bartowski!

 Of course, they weren’t the only couple to have awkward moments. We saw the fledgling relationship between Morgan and Casey’s daughter Alex stumble, but ultimately move forward. It also gave us a great scene between Morgan and Casey, as well as some wonderful dialogue between Morgan and Big Mike.

 All in all, Coup D’Etat was a story about relationships, one starting out, one taking awkward faltering steps to the next level, and one brought back from the brink of collapse. The spy story was very much a secondary consideration.

 Hands up all those who liked the scene with Sarah trying on the bikinis. *counts* That’s a lot of hands!  If that wasn’t used as a promo already, it should have been. Just that scene with a little ‘Chuck, Mon 8/7c on NBC’ at the end would have done well I think, especially during the football.

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

 Next week: Chuck Vs The Couch Lock which I’m assuming has nothing to do with the common definition of ‘couch lock’ (Google it if you need to) and guest stars Joel David Moore, Eric Roberts and Batista.