Television

Chuck: Chuck vs. The Tic Tac

Casey steals a government secret and is caught as a traitor. Chuck and Sarah must figure out what happened and get him released. Casey’s old boss has turned and is part of The Ring now so we are left to try and understand what is really happening.

I had to keep reminding myself that nothing is necessarily permanent on this show. We’ve seen quite a few times where Chuck or one of the characters seems to be gone, dead, or through so again just keep calm…

I did not necessarily enjoy the direction this episode took. There were a number of things to recommend it. Chuck’s antics pretty much the whole episode. Breaking into the 15 levels of security, tattling on Casey thinking it was a test, and then the whole final battle scene after he took the medication.

We were hit with so many different possible changes it is almost impossible to mention them. Remember, keep calm…

We’re dealing with Casey and what he did and the consequences of his actions. Sarah and Chucks conversation and the fact she is considering her options. Elle and the whole Doctors Without Borders stuff. The scene with Awesome and Morgan was great though.

We are at a crossroads. So many different directions. So much new information. What’s changed and what hasn’t? We really don’t know yet and as this is not the season finale so I’m going to stay calm and basically wait for the conclusions to these story lines. So I think it’s time for a little meditation. Thanks for reading… Hum……

Jeffery Yarter
The Lizardman

Chuck: Chuck vs. The Fake Name

Chuck’s latest mission is too impersonate a captured assassin who is one of the best in the game. Elle meets Hannah and Chuck invites Elle and Awesome to dinner with Hannah. Things really start to heat up with Sarah and Shaw. Casey is the man!

Chuck is back after the Winter Olympics hiatus and he’s impersonating a professional assassin. Unfortunately or fortunately depending on how you look at it he is doing a really good job. I guess the dilemma is, as Sarah puts it, to paraphrase “We are losing what Chuck really is in this person he is becoming.” Sort of the same way she feels about herself. Boy, can I say she sure does seem to be fickle at times.

We have what I guess is a real breakthrough for Chuck. Elle decides to go over and talk to him about his situation and she interrupts Hannah who is coming out of the shower. So Chuck got lucky! I guess this takes the edge off, but it hardly does anything for the Chuck and Sarah situation other than to derail it for the moment. After going through all of that what does Chuck do? See the episode to find out!

The action in tonight’s episode is really terrific. The bar scene and Casey’s reactions were what makes this show go. Adam Baldwin is absolutely terrific as Casey. The whole tooth thing was painful, realistic, and really graphic. Very well done and certainly believable.

A well thought out plot overall that leaves a few things up in the air more than they have ever been and a leaves Chuck in a precarious position going forward. Will Chuck get what he really wants? Does Chuck really know what he really wants? We’ll see in the upcoming episodes! Thanks for reading…

Jeffery Yarter
The Lizardman

Chuck: Chuck vs. The Mask

Chuck goes on his first mission with Hannah along. Daniel and Sarah aren’t getting along. Hannah reveals she took the job at Buy More because she’s fallen for Chuck. Morgan and Ellie are still trying to figure out what Chuck is up too. Casey is Casey!

**** Major Spoilers *****

I am going to talk about spoilers as I really don’t believe anything I’m seeing in this episode. Have they been putting Sarah and Chuck together for two plus seasons just to have Sarah and Chuck end up with someone else? Are we going to spend the rest of the season with Chuck doing stupid stuff to Hannah and not being able to tell her now. How many times is Morgan’s little heart going to be broken? Isn’t Sarah being together with Daniel the same as Sarah and Chuck being together from the spies don’t get together standpoint? This all seems rather hypocritical.

Now don’t get me wrong. I like Hannah played by Kristin Kreuk so I wouldn’t mind them getting together, but what about Sarah? She still wants Chuck no matter what’s happening otherwise. Why would she do this just to let Chuck go. In the end she wanted Chuck over Bryce as well. Also now we’re going to have to deal with Chuck and the Ellie reaction to all this!

The episode itself was fun with multiple plot lines all converging into people getting stuck in that vault, running out of Oxygen, and Chuck saving them. OK, that wasn’t all that happen! The scene where Chuck and Hannah saved the day was great. Also the scene where Hannah spilled her feelings as well was pretty cool. Then Chuck had to go off and steal the mask and leave her to fix the mess. It’s always something.

Casey was his usual stoic self through all of this. Adam Baldwin is a great actor and hopefully not under-appreciated for his wonderful work.

An OK episode with a lot of questions about where this story is going. I for one really am wondering what will happen. Now we just have to wait a month through the Olympics to find out! Bummer! Thanks for reading…

Jeffery Yarter
The Lizardman

Chuck: Chuck vs. First Class

Chuck solo’s in his first mission on a plane to Paris. We learn some pretty important information about Daniel Shaw. There is insurgent activity among the Buy More crew and Morgan brings Casey in to put down the uprising.

What a wonderful episode. Just when you expect a little bit of a letdown after some really excellent episodes and you might have thought the direction the show is going in was questionable here comes a truly inspired storyline.

We have two major stories happening which have long term effects on the main characters. First after seeming to be critical of Chuck new boss Daniel Shaw sends him on his first solo mission. Back at the Buy More, Morgan is getting constant grief from the Buy More crew. He has to find a way to get control of the store.

One of the significant things that happens in this episode other than Chuck soloing is a new character Chuck befriends on the plane. We meet Hannah played by Kristin Kreuk. She happens to be a computer hardware whiz who just lost her job and is heading to Paris to close out her office. Does this seem too convenient to anyone else. I think we are going to see her for a while. My thoughts are she is either a love interest for Chuck or she is an Agent of some kind, but for who will have to wait and see.

Chucks mission turns out to be pretty cool and how everyone handles their piece of it was very interesting. Sarah has got some skills we really didn’t know about.

Casey goes out of his way to help Morgan and you had to love the results of his undercover work. Morgan in the machine was a hoot. How great was that? This story should still be a lot of fun going forward as well.

Overall an excellent story and the acting was superb. Very entertaining with some funny moments and plenty of actions and twists to the plot. I think this show really has hit its high note in this third season. Thanks for reading…

Chuck: Chuck vs. Operation Awesome

When Awesome is taken by the Ring, Chuck goes crazy worrying about him. Sydney Price a member of the Ring has him and ended up mistaking Awesome for Chuck. A new character is introduced to the group as well and in the end Chuck must save Awesome.

This episode was really hyped by the tremendous episode last week and the coming attractions for this week. Overall I think it disappoints, but I do believe it shows us some positive stuff for the coming season.

Chuck feels responsible for Awesome and in the end he feels it’s specifically him that must save him. A new member working with the team is introduced, Daniel Shaw played by Brandon Routh. It seems by the end of the episode even Brandon may be hiding personal things about himself.

Angie Harmon plays Sydney Price. Other than a fight with Sarah near the end we really don’t see that much of her. A little menacing of Awesome, some shots from a car, and then the final scenes with Chuck. Too bad, she’s an entertaining actress. I really expected more of a part.

The Buy More took center stage and had its own Fight Club going on for at least a while. The car battery on the metal fence was very funny. Also the whole concept was clever in general. I especially liked Morgan putting down the uprising at the end. He really is getting to be a mature young man.

Very nice final scene with the whole “family” getting together. Poor Casey, Ellie is never going to trust him and he doesn’t even know why!

Entertaining, but just not up to the hype the show generated. May have been slightly better than I rated, but gets a little more of a drop becasue of the last episode and expectations. Thanks for reading…

Jeffery Yarter
The Lizardman

Chuck: Chuck vs. The Three Words

Carina is back as a woman in love and about to be married to an arms dealer. The Buy More is also back and we get Big Mike back at the expense of Emmit. Chuck performs admirably, but really botches things when he gets off track during their mission.

A little better episode than the premiere for this season we also saw this evening. There is a lot of conflict going on and I refuse to allow the annoying new Chuck outbursts in the middle of the mission to ruin it for me. Really, don’t you think there is a little better time to try to talk things out?

Despite the acrobatics, Chuck almost gets Carina, Morgan, Lester, and Jeff killed, but in the end he saves them as well. I’m hoping that is not going to be the common denominator to this season. Chuck goes on mission, Chuck screws up mission, Chuck saves the day. Not that that didn’t happen in the past.

The dynamics of the team is a little rocky at this point with Chuck and Sarah not really communicating and Casey sort of holding down the fort. It is really great to see all these characters so it sort of makes up for any expectations that weren’t met in these first few episodes this season.

The situation with Emmit was pretty brutal. It is interesting that Casey choose to tell Chuck that he moved to Alaska. So we have Big Mike back at the Buy More. Of course this is much better for the cover as Mike is a much more reasonable person. We haven’t seen if Sarah will be back at the Hot Dog place or if it will be something else this time. I can’t wait to see that when the time comes.

I do think that Chuck is going to be killing people this season so let’s all get to the point where we know the show will be a little more action packed (violent) and that Chuck will cause collateral damage. It’s inevitable!

Nice scene at the end with Morgan and Carina. Based on her character that was pretty cool for him and really has got to raise his street cred with the other boys at the Buy More. So Anna’s gone, but not dead as some of the rumors told us.

A much more Chuck type episode and I for one am glad to have him back. Mondays are going to be jam packed with the CBS Monday Comedy Block and Chuck then Castle, but with DVR ready to go we’ll all be able to see everything we want. Thanks for reading…

Jeffery Yarter
The Lizardman

Chuck: Chuck vs. The Pink Slip

Chuck spends six months in Prague training to become a real spy. Sarah asks Chuck to run a way with her. Emmet has turned the Buy More into a military zone complete with drone employees. Chuck gets canned from the spy game.

Well its been quite a unhealthy long time with no fix of Chuck. So I must admit I am probably looking at this thru rose colored glasses. I was expecting Awesome. Not so much, but it is Chuck and I’m happy for the return.

This new Chuck needs to get a handle on himself. I think he was cooler under fire before the Intersect 2.0 was downloaded. His feelings are way out of whack and I guess that’s what we will be dealing with this third season of Chuck. The Intersect will not function when he is distracted or not focusing on the dangers in hand which could make things even more dangerous considering the expectations they have for him. In a lot of ways Sarah is as much to blame as Chuck for the situation. We’ll see how they deal with this as the season progresses.

Still a superior show to the majority of television being shown today. It seems that they have kept all but one of the characters intact from the cast last year. I had heard reports that there were going to be quite a few less starring characters. I actually think it has stayed pretty static. I will say Adam Baldwin as Casey is still tremendous as the third wheel and he manages to keep things moving along despite the problems that Chuck and Sarah continue to cause. Chuck is back and with the Leno deal occurring and decent numbers for Monday’s showings we should see Chuck for a number of additional seasons. I’m just happy the series is back for now. Great Hyundai commercials interspersed throughout the episode by the way. I thought for a second that the first one was part of the episode!?! I am also wondering if they are going to get the Subway sandwich promos in the show this season as well? It’s great to have Chuck back and I give him a gracious thumbs up for the first episode. Thanks for reading…

Jeffery Yarter
The Lizardman