This is it…this is the season finale of Chuck. Or rather, it would have been if NBC hadn’t been awesome and picked up another six episodes of what is one of my favorite shows on TV – if not my absolute favorite. This episode brought all of the storylines of this season crashing together…but did it work?
Find out after the jump.
Synopsis: The spies regroup upon discovering that a villainous operative was responsible for the death of Shaw’s wife. They spring into action to find the evildoer – but Chuck worries about Shaw’s psychological state. Meanwhile, Morgan mulls over leaving Buy More.
What Was Good: This was without a doubt the best episode of the season. In fact, this would be a very strong contender for my favorite episode of the series, as it was just jam packed with incredible moments. If you could cut the entire episode into one scene with one reaction from me, it was the moment at the end when Sarah says “you saved me” to Chuck and boom…commence the consummation of their relationship (with a quick shutdown of Beckman of course) and the beginning of the single greatest trip to Paris ever. My reaction was shouting “YES!” and throwing my arms up in the air. It was incredible.
This episode really captured the Chuck and Sarah relationship as well as any episode ever has, beginning with Chuck doing literally anything he could to save Sarah from Shaw. When it turns out Shaw wasn’t actually going to kill her and Chuck rolls in with a tactical squad in tow (as well as a tank and Stealth Bombers), the laughter rolls in from yours truly.
Then, when Chuck finds out that Sarah and Shaw are leaving together he somewhat predictably goes into a tailspin. He relies on Casey’s old throwback to get through a tough day of Johnny Walker Black, and it leads to the best flashing ever, in which he uses the Intersect to properly tie up Morgan (who was trying to take his alcohol away from him). A drunk and sugar high Chuck finally asks Sarah a simple question: does she love him?
She does! Yeah!
Eventually, when they go to take out the Director of The Ring, Shaw is revealed as first a super badass and then a total sham and a villain. It was brilliantly done, and he would have gotten away with his plot to earn revenge against Sarah and to take the CIA down a notch if it weren’t for Morgan’s love of Sonny Chiba flicks.
Really.
Morgan proving his value in this episode was hysterical, and Joshua Gomez earns mad props from yours truly for his strangely superb speech to Casey to get him back onboard. It was freaking awesome.
The eventual showdown between Chuck and Shaw in Paris is brilliant, and Fedak and Schwartz setting Chuck up in the quandary of having to kill Shaw to save the entirely helpless and drugged Sarah (when she had previously been destroyed by the prospect of Chuck having killed on his Red Test). This event was set up by everything that preceded it this season, and it was an superb moment.
Everyone in the episode killed it, from Zachary Levi to Yvonne Strahvoski to Adam Baldwin to Joshua Gomez to Brandon Routh…they were just flat out spectacular.
Throw in the exceptional usage of music as per usual for this show, as they twice used “Kettering” by The Antlers in precisely the right and most devestating moments. Man, it killed me.
This is just television at its finest, people.
What Was Bad: Bad? BAD?! There wasn’t any bad here.
Overall: Best episode of the season. Probably one of the best three or four episodes of the series. Realistically, if the series ended here I would have been happy. It was fulfilling, and it was just wonderful. If you were a Chuck fan before, this episode was joyous. If you weren’t a Chuck fan before, this was reason in itself to get cracking and to get caught up.
Sarah and I have something in common – we both love Chuck.
