As the episode opens, Awesome is strapped to chair and looking down….from a skyscraper high-rise. His captor is a sexy Ring operative that goes by the rather ironic name of Sydney played with ravishing femme fatale ice cold sexiness by Angie Harmon. Apparently, she makes a mistake which almost begged to be made. Mistaking Awesome for a super-spy. I mean look at him. You put him and Chuck next to each other and what would be your assumption?
For such dire circumstances, we don’t get a real sense of impending danger, but we do discover a chink in Awesome’s armor. He’s a terrible liar as evidenced when he’s trying to explain to his wife why he’s been missing so long.
It’s great to see Chuck put in the position where Awesome’s life is literally in his hands and he’s given ample opportunities to strut his stuff in front of his impressed and grateful brother-in-law. At one point, Chuck even takes out some would-be assassins by shooting them all with tranqs Casino Royale-style. Loved Chuck’s answer.
However, that’s all child’s play until the second guest star shows up. The mysterious Shaw, played by Brandon Routh.
We’ve seen Shaw before briefly during Chuck vs. The Three Words. After Team Bartowski recovers the weird weapon Carina was after, Shaw was sent to L.A.–or rather he sent himself despite General Beckham’s vehement protests. It made Chuck fans sit up and take notice. We rarely ever hear General Beckham in a helpless position.
And right from the get-go we get a heck of an intro. Awesome has to kill Shaw in order to satisfy the Ring. Shaw asks Chuck to do it but he refuses. So Shaw shoots himself and it’s up to Awesome to revive him. Intense stuff.
Shaw ups the ante in a lot of ways. For one, Team Bartowski is pretty dismissive of him right off the bat because Casey is older than him. And one gets the sense that Casey’s experience with Chuck has made him skeptical of the benefits of youthful leaders. Chuck is willing to let the cat out of the bag to get Awesome out of the Ring’s clutches and Shaw backs his play.
But there’s one significant difference. Time and again we’ve seen Chuck improvise something and here it’s no different by bypassing the security on a Ring communicator. And time and time again we’ve seen Casey and Sarah there to bail him out of his crazy schemes.
But not this time. Shaw will back his team’s plays, but it’s their plays. They start something they’d better damn well finish it. And it’s to the show writers’ credit that Chuck pays for his impulsiveness.
Of course, this isn’t 24, thank God, so Chuck doesn’t suffer that much. Gets smacked in the lip pretty hard. And he gives a little back when he uses an electrified fence against a bad guy. And in the end, Sarah and Casey came through for him in the end, regardless of Shaw. And he ended up saving Chuck anyway.
But, hopefully, Chuck learned his lesson. He’s not gonna have Sarah and Casey around all the time. He needs to be more self-sufficient and have more foresight into his schemes.
As a sidebar in the side story, Morgan has to do his own manning up when he takes on Lester’s fight club. It was about as tedious as the other Buymoria stories, but it did tie in nicely with Chuck’s adventure and we got some forward momentum for Morgan when he becomes the new assman–better known as Assistant Manager. But it looks like civil war is brewing in Buymoria.
At the end, Chuck’s real family and professional family are reunited and all is well. We get a small moment of Sarah and Chuck friendly fondness. All the while being spied on by Shaw who takes out a ring, puts it on, and does his best Ethan Hunt brood. His story ain’t over.
All in all, an episode that started ho-hum but promises humdingers down the line. A happy ending no less, but Chuck’s separate worlds are beginning to converge.
Rating: * * * ½
TallGent
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