It’s Official!
This is not a true spoiler, but it is interesting. Ausiello teases us and 3 other shows.
“A wildly popular show is plotting a killer twist before it takes its final bow this spring.
According to multiple sources, the series in question — which, barring an 11th hour stay of execution, is in its last season — is moving forward with plans to whack one of its original characters just prior to the series finale.
And I’m told the exit will be a dramatic one, impacting multiple characters and storylines.
…
It’s an hour-long series that bears the title The Closer. Or Desperate Housewives. Or One Tree Hill. Or Chuck.”
AAAAAaaarrrrrggggggg!
Season 5 Teaser:
Advanced reviews of the first 3:
- Mel @ ChuckTV
- Mo Ryan & podcast (transcript)
- Sepinwall podcast (transcript)
- DanielleTBD
5.01 – Chuck vs. The Zoom
Writers: Chris Fedak & Nicholas Wootton
Director: Robert Duncan McNeil
Guest Stars: Mark Hamill, Craig Kilborn
Synopsis:
Short synopsis: From Spoiler TV (with thanks to Bundy):
Carmichael Industries takes on a thief and a conniving investor; Morgan helps Chuck put together a surprise for Sarah; Jeff and Lester work on their latest scheme.
Official synopsis:
“CHUCK VERSUS THE ZOOM”
10/21/2011 (08:00PM – 09:00PM) (Friday) : AS CHUCK BEGINS LIFE AS A SPY-FOR-HIRE, HE MUST ADJUST TO HIS NEW BUSINESS, NEW THREATS, AND A NEW INTERSECT — HIS BEST FRIEND MORGAN GRIMES – MARK HAMILL AND CRAIG KILBORN GUEST STAR—Without the Intersect in his head or the support of the CIA, the world of espionage is a much more dangerous place for Chuck Bartowski (Zachary Levi) and his team of freelance spies. To start, Carmichael Industries takes on a slick, rich thief named Jean Claude (guest star Mark Hamill), and a conniving investor, Roger Bale (guest star Craig Kilborn), who has stolen money from some of the world’s most dangerous people. Meanwhile, Morgan (Joshua Gomez) helps Chuck with a special surprise for Sarah (Yvonne Strahovski). Back in the Buy More, Jeff (Scot Krinsky) and Lester (Vik Sahay) have taken things to another level with their latest scheme. Sarah Lancaster and Adam Baldwin also star.
Promo:
Sneak peeks:
EPKs:
Sneak peek:
Vodpod videos no longer available.
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Spoilers:
6-2011 TVLine:
Chuck | What do we know thus far about the return of NBC’s spy comedy?
For one, Season 5 is also its final season. Also, we know that there will be 13 (and only 13) episodes, to air Fridays at 8. Oh, and now there’s this: TVLine has learned that the season premiere is titled “Chuck vs. the Zoom.” The zoom, hmm? As in zoom lens? As in those TV kids in the striped shirts from P.O. Box 354, Boston, Mass.? No, and nope. All series co-creator Chris Fedak will say for now is, “The zoom is a very dangerous secret.” It’s also a helluva fitness workout. What?
Vodpod videos no longer available.
7-2011 TVLine:
“The beloved spy comedy kicked off its San Diego Comic-Con panel by announcing that Hamill will play a big baddie in the fifth and final season premiere, airing Friday, Oct. 21, at 8/7c.”
7-2011 And another link to TVLine:
Talking to Ausiello, Zac recounts a profound moment he had on the set, and does give out a small, but clear, spoiler for episode 5.01.
7-2011 EW:
(snip) ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: What was your reaction when you learned about the final season order?
Chris Fedak: We were very excited to be able to do one more season of the show. It’s really amazing to be able to plan a great finish for your story and it doesn’t always happen in TV. We look at it as an amazing opportunity to close the Chuck story in one epic final chapter. We have a big story pitched and we have a final moment for the series that we’ll have been working up to for five seasons.
Some fans worried about too much of a focus on Morgan next season. How are your going to balance Morgan’s new super-powered story and still keep it a show about Chuck?
Fedak: It’s still very much the Chuck show. He’s the star and Zachary Levi is fantastic. Watching Chuck without the Intersect is just as fantastic as watching him with it. We thought that would be a new fun way to start to season — watching him get used to not having it, and starting the spy team and working outside the government while best friend now has a super computer in his head. We have a lot of exciting twists and turns planned.
Will Chuck ever get the Intersect back? People liked badass Chuck.
For me, the most badass version of Chuck has been when he uses his brain. I always feel like was the hero who figures out the unconventional solution — in the writers room, we call it “The Chuck solution.” He’s still surround by two season spies and Morgan — the half-assed spy.
The first episode is “Chuck vs. The Zoom.” What is the Zoom?
The Zoom is a secret I will not be giving it up to you. But it’s a rather dangerous and powerful secret. (snip. Read more in link)
7-2011 Assignment X:
“The show is different,” says Fedak. “It still is the CHUCK show filled with comedy action-adventure, but a lot of things have changed. Chuck is not part of the CIA nd has his own spy team called Carmichael Industries. Then there’s the Verbanksi Vorp which is competition. We have a lot of fun with the idea they have to pay the bills. Some times they are going to work with people on the nefarious side of things. Morgan also has the Intersect in his head. He has to be like Sarah was – being Morgan’s handler. It’s a really kind of twisted season and it allows us to tell different stories.”
“I think there is a whole new dyanmic to explore in terms of being married,” says Strahovski. “Morgan is very much involved in the spy world. For me, it’s more ‘my god Morgan has the Intersect, what is he doing’ and also ‘oh my god Chuck doesn’t have the Intersect, what is he doing?’”
7-2011 AOL TV/Mo Ryan:
Vodpod videos no longer available.
“Still, all in all, Season 5 is a season of change for the show. Chuck is running Carmichael Industries, a private spy firm based in the Buy More (which Chuck now owns), and they’ve got big competition in the form of a company run by Gertrude Verbanski — who will emerge as a possible love interest for John Casey. Also, Awesome and Ellie will be a “big factor” in Chuck’s adventures, given that there are no secrets between Chuck and Ellie anymore.”
Panel videos courtesy of @thetechguychris:
8-2011 EW:
“There’s that whole growing process for Morgan as the intersect, and like what happened with Chuck, we don’t know exactly what effect it’s going to have,” Gomez told EW during the Television Critics Association press tour. “It, obviously, doesn’t run and work in everyone’s brain the same way. The potential is there for it to go a little haywire. And I’m sure — if I know these writers — I’m in trouble.”
Regardless of what transpires, Gomez says Morgan (at least starts off) loving his new abilities. “I think that in true Morgan fashion — and this is a scary thing — I don’t think he knows how scary it can be,” he says. “He’s completely gung-ho. It’s something he thinks is the coolest thing ever. It’s every nerd’s dream, ‘I can be a superhero! Chuck, I can do it!’ Chuck, meanwhile, is, like, ‘Whoa, whoa, whoa. Slow down.’”
8-2011 IGN:
“As Gomez put it, ‘Mark Hamill is a baddie! As the Intersect, I fight the baddie. That means I’m fighting Luke Skywalker! Are we putting these numbers together? I go, ‘Wait a minute… I get to punch Luke Skywalker tomorrow?!’ There’s some magic tomorrow.’ ” (interesting anecdote about JG and ZL nerdgasming on the article, click on link to read full story).
8-2011 Tweets from Cast/Crew
http://twitter.com/#!/adamsbaldwin/status/98478996060254208
http://twitter.com/#!/wendilynnmakeup/status/98423497742757888
8-2011 TVGuide:
Got any scoop on the final season of Chuck? — Matt
NATALIE: The Buy More is going through a few more changes this season. Now that Chuck’s private spy agency, Carmichael Industries, owns Nerd Herd central, Captain Awesome will become the face of the company, says portrayer Ryan McPartlin. (Can I please have a copy of the first Buy More magazine with his pretty mug on it?) “He’s going to be like the Tony Robbins of the Buy More,” McPartlin says, adding that Awesome won’t be quitting his day job as a doctor. “The fact that Ellie and Awesome know about the spy world, it’ll be like the A-Team and we’ll help out, but only when we’re absolutely needed because of the baby.”
8-2011 Zap2It:
Fedak says he and co-creator Josh Schwartz pitched an outline for Season 5 to NBC chairman Bob Greenblatt (who, by the way, isn’t wavering on his statements that this is the last season) earlier this year to help secure a pickup.
“So we have a big arc and shape of where we want to go, and we kind of know our ending,” Fedak says. “But right now we’re making it real and [working on] those week-to-week adventures.”
“Chuck” has aired, by our count, five episodes that could have served as series finales: the second-, third- and fourth-season enders, plus the 13th episodes in Seasons 3 and 4, which would have been the endpoint without the extensions. That’s a lot of practice, but also maybe a challenge for the show’s writers.
“This one better be better than all of them,” Fedak says with a smile. “But it’s great for us.”
Knowing this will be the final season, he says, “is freeing from a storytelling perspective. You really do know that you’re writing an endpoint, you know you’re getting 13 episodes, you know you’re getting a finale, and that’s great. However, we’ve always built seasons that way.”
Fedak of course wouldn’t say where “Chuck” will end, but he does say he has an ending in mind, and it’s different than what he’s conceived in the past. “It’s different in tone,” he says. “It’s just very different
8-2011 TVLine/Ask Ausiello:
Question: I just started watching Chuck this summer and love it and am really sad that will be the final season. Speaking of which, it really sucks that there will only be 13 episodes. Any chance TPTB will give them at least a few more episodes? —Sarah
Ausiello: Let me just put this out there: A back-nine pickup would bring the show’s total episode haul to a clean 100, the traditional threshold for syndication. Let me also put this out there: NBC president Robert Greenblatt told me on Monday that it’s probably not going to happen. “[The 13-episode order] is pretty much set in stone,” he maintained. “They’re designing the season to [build toward] a series finale.”
Question: How does the Buy More fit into this season’s Chuck? —Gabe
Ausiello: Chuck’s now the owner, which means “when his spy agency isn’t doing well, the Buy More might be the only profit center for his company,” explains exec producer Chris Fedak. “It’s important that the Buy More does well, so Chuck’s trying to figure out a way to make it into a successful store.” His first priority: Creating an awesome promotional campaign. “There’s a new commercial with the face of the Buy More, Captain Awesome,” says Fedak. “He’s the most successful salesman Chuck knows.” He’s certainly better than the store’s previous spokesmodel, as viewers will discover firsthand. Reveals Fedak: “We see the original Buy More commercial that Big Mike starred in back in 1981.”
8-2011 E! WWC Spoiler Chat:
Lianne from Forest Hills, NY: I just read that the powers that be are considering splitting up Chuck and Sarah on Chuck. PLEASE, please tell me this isn’t true?
What?! Split up one of the cutest couples on TV? The couple that just got married? And heading into their final season? That would just be cruel! Never fear, because when we chatted with Yvonne Strahovski at Comic-Con, she had much different plans for Sarah and Chuck (Zachary Levi)…and it involved procreating. That’s right, Strahovski is hoping for spy babies! “If they put [the pregnancy] in, it’ll be near the end. I can’t imagine the spy thing being pregnant, right?” Yeah, you might need to bubble-wrap that bump before getting into fistfights.
8-2011 AOLTV:
Well there are no secrets at Comic-Con …
“I know — I was shocked! I didn’t say anything, but when they announced it at the panel, Twitter and all the different new media went on alert. I was surprised … I’m only in one scene. It’s a dream come true because not only is it a really delightful show, but the scene I’m in is like a James Bond scene. I’ve seen these spy things before, but I never thought I’d be a part of one. I’m playing this arch-villain holding these two young people hostage, forcing them to jump off a cliff. It’s wonderful. I had a great time.” – Mark Hamill
9-2011 From TV Guide (credit to ChuckandSarahMedia, click on pic to make it bigger):
10-2011: DanielleTBD‘s interview with Joshua Gomez.
5.02 – Chuck vs. the Bearded Bandit
Writers: Lauren LeFranc & Rafe Judkins
Director: Patrick Norris
Guest Stars: Jeff Fahey (Karl Sneijder), Justin Hartley (Wesley Sneijder)
Synopsis:
Official synopsis:
“CHUCK VERSUS THE BEARDED BANDIT”
11/04/2011 (08:00PM – 09:00PM) (Friday) : CHUCK ASSUMES THE ROLE OF MORGAN’S HANDLER, AS CARMICHAEL INDUSTRIES FACES NEW BUSINESS COMPETITION—CARRIE-ANNE MOSS (“THE MATRIX”) GUEST STARS AS ‘GERTRUDE VERBANSKI’—JEFF FAHEY AND JUSTIN HARTLEY ALSO GUEST STAR—As the team takes on a missing persons case, Chuck (Zachary Levi) and company struggle to establish themselves as Carmichael Industries in the face of a rival security firm led by the tough and efficient Gertrude Verbanski (guest star Carrie-Anne Moss). Meanwhile, Morgan (Joshua Gomez) continues to adjust to the Intersect while Chuck adjusts to being his handler. Also, the Buy More finds an unlikely spokesperson to help drum up business. Yvonne Strahovski, Adam Baldwin, Ryan McPartlin, Vik Sahay, Scott Krinsky and Mark Christopher Lawrence also star.
Spoilers:
8-2011 Zap2it: (thanks to JC for the find)
“…Fahey plays Karl Sneijder, who, as the boss of a diamond company with mines in South Africa, has been investigated by the CIA in the past for alleged criminal activity. They’ve never been able to pin anything on him.
Hartley will star as Wesley Sneijder, Karl’s handsome younger brother. A Dartmouth and Oxford-educated anthropologist, Wesley has always done his best to stay out of his brother’s business, wanting nothing to do with the ‘world of espionage and spies.’
Of course… he isn’t given much choice when Karl’s enemies kidnap him. Karl will be forced to seek out Carmichael Industries for help.”
5.03 – Chuck vs. Frosted Tips
^thanks to Bundy for the find!
Writers:
Director:
Guest Stars: Carrie Anne Moss (Gertrude Verbanski)
Synopsis:
Official synopsis:
“CHUCK VERSUS THE FROSTED TIPS”
11/11/2011 (08:00PM – 09:00PM) (Friday) : WHEN LIFE AS THE INTERSECT INFLATES MORGAN’S EGO, CHUCK IS TESTED AS BOTH HIS HANDLER AND HIS FRIEND—CARRIE-ANNE MOSS GUEST STARS—As the team is tasked with finding one of the CIAs most wanted, Chuck (Zachary Levi) fears that the Intersect may be going to Morgan’s (Joshua Gomez) head. Meanwhile Sarah (Yvonne Strahovski) helps Casey (Adam Baldwin) navigate his relationship with Gertrude (guest star Carrie-Anne Moss). Elsewhere, Captain Awesome (Ryan McPartlin) makes a startling revelation about Jeff (Scott Krinsky) and Lester (Vik Sahay). Sarah Lancaster also stars.
Spoilers:
7-2011 TV Line:
The former Ms. Trinity will have a multi-episode arc as Gertrude Verbanski, “a former spy who now runs Verbanski Corp, the chief rival of Chuck’s new spy company. She’s ruthless and deadly, yet she also has a weak spot for one John Casey — her old rival.”
8-2011 Mo Ryan: (snippet):
There’s the casting of ‘Matrix’ star Carrie-Anne Moss in a multi-episode arc as Gertrude Verbanski, the head of a private espionage agency that competes with Chuck’s new firm. A woman as tough, competitive and weapons-obsessed as Gertrude naturally appeals to John Casey.
“What we wanted to do this season is really kind of open up [Casey] to a new romantic relationship, and we thought we needed someone as badass as him,” Fedak said. “Carrie-Anne seemed like the perfect fit.”
5.04 – Chuck vs. the Business Trip
Writers:
Director:
Guest Stars: David Koechner, Catherine Dent
Synopsis:
Short synopsis:
Chuck and Sarah track an assassin who is trying to eliminate the new intersect; Morgan tries to adjust to having the intersect; Jeff exposes a new side of himself.
Official synopsis:
“CHUCK”
“CHUCK VERSUS THE BUSINESS TRIP”
11/18/2011 (08:00PM – 09:00PM) (Friday) : CHUCK AND SARAH MUST UNCOVER AN ASSASSIN AMONG THE EMPLOYEES OF A BUY MORE SALES CONVENTION—DAVID KOECHNER AND CATHERINE DENT GUEST STAR—Chuck (Zachary Levi) and Sarah (Yvonne Strahovski) go undercover at a Buy More convention to hunt down an assassin whose mission is to take down the new Intersect. Meanwhile, Morgan (Joshua Gomez) must deal with the consequences of having the Intersect. At the Buy More, Jeff (Scott Krinsky) begins to show a very different side of himself. Adam Baldwin, Sarah Lancaster, Ryan McPartlin, Vik Sahay and Mark Christopher Lawrence also star.
Spoilers:
From TV|Line:
The actor-comedian [David Koechner] will guest star in the fourth episode of the show’s fifth and final season as “Crazy Bob,” a jolly Buy More manager with whom Chuck and Sarah encounter at the company’s Employee of the Year Convention.
The Shield‘s Catherine Dent also appears in the episode as Jane Robertson, another Buy More manager and a close friend of Bob’s.
Buy More’s new owners Chuck and Sarah spared no expense on the convention, as evidenced by their choice of venue: The beautiful Aloha Hawaiian Hotel and Resort located in (wait for it) Riverside, Calif.
5.05 – Chuck vs. the Hack Off
^thanks again to Bundy for the find!
Writers:
Director: Zachary Levi
Guest Stars: Danny Pudi, Beau Garrett
Synopsis:
Official synopsis:
“CHUCK VERSUS THE HACK OFF”
12/09/2011 (08:00PM – 09:00PM) (Friday) : AN UNDERCOVER MISSION AT A BIZARRE CULT RECONNECTS CHUCK WITH HIS HACKER PAST — CARRIE-ANNE MOSS, BEAU GARRETT AND DANNY PUDI GUEST STAR — DIRECTED BY ZACHARY LEVI — A mission to track down a computer super virus leads Chuck (Zachary Levi) to return to his roots as a hacker — and to call on his biggest competition, Gertrude Verbanksi (guest star Carrie-Anne Moss), for help. Elsewhere, a new Buy More employee (guest star Danny Pudi) complicates Jeff (Scott Krinsky) and Lester’s (Vik Sahay) friendship. Yvonne Strahovski, Adam Baldwin, and Joshua Gomez also star.
Spoilers:
From Mo Ryan and AOL TV:
We can exclusively reveal that Danny Pudi, ‘Community’s’ Abed, will have a cameo role in the fifth episode of the upcoming season of ‘Chuck.’ The details of his role are still under wraps, but really, what more do you need to know? Pudi is a very funny man and ‘Chuck’ will no doubt pull out all the stops to make sure his time in the spy world will be, in a word, awesome.
From E-Online!:
We can tell you exclusively that Tron: Legacy beauty Beau Garrett has been cast in what sounds like a very creepy role: a cult leader! What are the details on her role? And what’s it have to do with Chuck (Zachary Levi) and Sarah (Yvonne Strahovski)? You have questions, we have answers…
5.06 – Chuck vs. The Curse
Writers:
Director:
Guest Stars: Rebecca Romijn
Synopsis:
Spoilers:
From Spoiler TV:
Joining in the fun is Simms, an intense, slightly creepy CIA agent who may be what Team Bartowski needs to defeat Romijn. Or not.
5.07 – Chuck vs. TBD
Writers: Amanda Kate Shuman
Director: Peter Lauer
Guest Stars: Rebecca Romijn, Brandon Routh, Stan Lee
Synopsis:
Spoilers: This will be a Christmas episode!
http://twitter.com/#!/MarkChrLawrence/status/118807733381251073
(click on pic to make it bigger)
5.08 – Chuck vs. TBD
Writers: Rafe Judkins & Lauren LeFranc
Director: Matt Barber
Guest Stars: Cheryl Ladd, Tim Dekay
Synopsis:
Spoilers:
10-2011: TVLine
Former Charlie’s Angels sleuth Cheryl Ladd has been tapped to play the mother of Yvonne Strahovski’s Sarah on Chuck — and TVLine readers can (maybe) take credit for the casting!
Last week, TVLine suggested five actresses for the plum part, one of whom was Ladd. And when all the votes in the accompanying poll were counted, the 60-year-old actress won with nearly 27 percent.
Well done, my friends. Well. Done.
Look for Sarah’s estranged mum, Emma, to turn up in this season’s eighth episode, slated to air in January. I’m told mother and daughter share a very complicated past and haven’t seen each other in five years.
Something tells me we’re about to find out why.
5.09 – Chuck vs. the Kept Man
Writers:
Director:
Guest Stars:
Synopsis:
Spoilers:
5.10 – Chuck vs. TBD
Writers:
Director:
Guest Stars:
Synopsis:
Spoilers:
10-2011: TVLine:
Macfadyen’s arc (as a villain) will span the last four episodes of Chuck‘s fifth and final season
5.11 – Chuck vs. TBD
Writers:
Director:
Guest Stars:
Synopsis:
Spoilers:
5.12 – Chuck vs. TBD
Writers: Rafe Judkins & Lauren LeFranc
Director:
Guest Stars:
Synopsis:
Spoilers:
5.13 – Chuck vs. TBD
Writers: Chris Fedak
Director:
Guest Stars:
Synopsis:
Spoilers:
amyabn
atcDave
Ernie Davis
Faith
joe
thinkling
Chuck This 
I tweeted Norman Buckley about coming back for Chuck season 5 and this is what he said.————-@blitztrap i am not scheduled to do any episodes in #chuck season five. but i’ll be with them in spirit.————-I hope that can change between now and then.
Matt Barber tweeted this today——-Even though the Emmys snubbed me again, I do get to shadow director Robbie McNeill as he preps Chuck ep501. Today we scout!
Thanks for the heads up Bundy. I’ve added McNeil as the director up top.
You’re welcome.
Spoiler for S5: http://bit.ly/mX09dC
Got any scoop on Chuck? — Eric
NATALIE: Did you know Jean-Claude van Damme will guest-star this season? No? Well, that’s because he isn’t, but an arrogant, rich villain that shares his first two names will face off with Chuck & Co. this season. Dear Josh Schwartz, please cast the real “Muscles from Brussels.” Pretty please! Kthxbai!
And a detailed interview with CF can be found here: http://bit.ly/plIdUx
Some excerpts:
How does Morgan handle having the Intersect in him? Does he handle it differently from how Chuck did in the first season?
Fedak: Chuck having the Intersect, it was like, “Please get it out of my head. I want my life back.” Morgan thinks it’s the beginning of only awesome things. Morgan is incredibly stoked to have the Intersect inside of him. Here’s a guy who for years has been Chuck’s best friend. Chuck has helped out Morgan so many times and saved his bacon from the fifth grade on, and that is their relationship. And now Morgan is the guy who has the supercomputer in his head and has all these abilities, so he’s jazzed and excited to be on the team and to be a part of it. He just wants to be a spy right now.
What sort of concerns were there for giving Morgan the Intersect? Some fans weren’t too pleased with the decision.
Fedak: I think there’s always a degree of anxiety when you mess around with the bones of the show and the archetypes. Going into Season 5, we think it’s neat to change things up so that Chuck doesn’t have the Intersect now. He has to be a spy without the supercomputer training wheels. He has to go back to being the smartest guy in the room, having the Chuck solution. And now he has a friend who has the supercomputer in his head, and Chuck has become sort of like Sarah was: He has to become Morgan’s handler. He’s the one who has been out there in the world and now must take care of Morgan. And they still need the Intersect to get out of problems and be a successful company.
Will Chuck try to find a way to get the Intersect back for himself?
Fedak: Hmm, I may not be able to answer that, but I would think he certainly thinks about it. Absolutely.
BRING ON THE EMS. 😛
BTW, most important thing – Huge thanks for putting up this thread early on. You guys are awesome.
Why, thanks. But the awesome comes from those who contribute the spoilers, Genie. So, double thanks, and to Bundy as well.
Can’t wait to see what comes out of SDCC this weekend.
Try http://www.tvguide.com/News/Chuck-final-1035473.aspx lots of hints about directions although no definitive answers, probably no baby but maybe a baby talk.
Great sounds like a lot of Chuck and Morgan scenes, at the cost of more interesting characters than Morgan, just as I feared.
At least they did say Chuck and Sarah’s growth was the most important thing. I also found the mention of “Charmichael Industries” interesting, I wonder how many people will know about it. But of course, way too much Morgan talk; this is already the elephant in the room.
fedak does not do much to rally the troops in interviews, I feel sorry for Gomez, who appears to genuinely love the show, much like the shaw character in s3, the way TPTB have overwritten morgan is leading to morgan being very unpopular with a segment of the fanbase, Gomez appears to not deserve that … I hope TPTB give morgan a great season and do not overuse him, but given the number of times fedak used the word morgan in his interview, I have my doubts, he approached the use of ‘Bob’ in the bob newhart show – any of you old enough to have experienced playing the game ‘Bob’ while in college????
Wasn’t Bob a version of six-pack Star Trek (drink when ever they say Jim or Captain)?
yea – I never heard of playing a star trek drinking game, certainly would work
Why do I read Fedak interviews? It seems once again he doesn’t get the fan dissatisfaction with Morgansect. Even the interviewer mentioned that the fans don’t like the idea but his hubris shows through once again. It saddens me that Yvonne, Adam and Sarah will loose screen time for this ridiculous idea. To me the best Morgan is the least Morgan but ‘m convinced that Fedak at times thinks he is the second most important character behind Chuck which is a shame.
Oh well I guess all I can do is look for what I like and ignore what I don’t. I just can’t believe they are going to waste these precious 13 episodes on Morgan Grimes.
I would ditto most of that Uplink, but look at the bright side, they’re not wasting the last 13 on Shaw!
Agreed, Dave, I am encouraged to hear that Chuck and Sarah are the most important thing! But I sooo don’t like the bromance (unless it’s Casey/Morgan), and I fear I’ll get way more than I want.
I agree with Jason, it’s a two edged sword for Josh Gomez … more screen time could equal less fan love.
To me Chuck has a two-person yellow bulls-eye. That means that the bulls-eye is too big for just one person (their big mistake in S3) and too small to fit a third person (a potential S5 land mine). They seem to finally have grasped the former. I just hope they also realize the latter. Now the red ring, the next one out from the bulls-eye, to me, has three people in it: Casey, Ellie, and Morgan. So, Morgan should never intrude on the bulls-eye, and he should not have the red ring all to himself.
What that means is that Chuck and Sarah should get the most time. After that Casey, Ellie, and Morgan should share the spot light equally. I would be OK with Morgan pushed out a ring, but it’s a little late for that, so this is my best hope for a balanced season. I also want to see plenty of Devon and MamaB.
I just want to see one classic scene where Morgan can’t flash and either Chuck (funny) or Casey (far funnier) or Sarah (funny and squirm in your seat uncomfortable) takes him aside and explains that it happens to all the intersects. To see Sarah uncomfortably explaining how Chuck had some problems flashing after he lost confidence in Prague and then again when he had some anxiety about Sarah (Beard) and even sometimes just about being able to preform well enough (Operation Awesome and Tic Tac) whereupon Morgan asks, well is there a pill for that or something? Priceless.
I am way too sarcastic at times about chuck’s ability to do drama because of it’s lack of dramatic actors, but I will tell you this, if the 13 eps feature morgan as the intersect (which honestly based on may’s and now july’s spoilers is likely), they had better have morgan fail, lose alex, get hurt, get kidnapped, maybe turn bad for a while, something, because if he continues to be all knowing, saying the right thing at the right time to everyone, has a perfect little girlfriend to go “oh morgan” once an ep, and now is a perfect ninja fighter, perfectly brave with no consequences ever, and does all the comedy in every scene, this show is going to be boring even if chuck and sarah are a couple and are on adventures as a hart to hart couple – even chuck and sarah aren’t that good.
Jason, do you seriously think they made Morgan the intersect so things would go well with it & him? Do you watch movies? His final line before intersecting and introducing season 5; “What could go wrong?” 😀
@Thinkling and Dave – With all due respect, way back before/during S3, Fedak was parroting a lot about C/S being the heart of the show and we all know how S3 turned out. So, I won’t put weight on his talk about C/S being important etc,etc.
ernie – I predicted at the time, near everything will go wrong – but what I was talking about here was drama – if morgan is going to be a member of the big 3, or push sarah out of half the eps and be in the big 2, he needs to pay some consequences, some real ones, like I listed, or worse – I AM ACTUALLY A PRETTY SMART GUY ERNIE – i don’t know what your problem with me is, but if you want to be a pipe towards me, I am more than capable of defending myself
Jason, again, reading too much attitude into a post, I’m just kidding around. That’s the point of the smiley face. 😀
Morgan is virtually NEVER part of the longer drama arcs for more than a brief scene or two to set up another character, and I don’t see that changing. Chuck has paid the dramatic consequences of being the intersect because he’s the lead and he’s the character people invest in.
I think it is clear that Morgan gets the intersect so that Chuck has to up his game once again. If people are really afraid that Morgan is going to be elevated to a dramatic lead equal to Chuck and surpassing Sarah and Casey based on that, sorry. I’ll just avoid being optimistic and staying positive. I know how it grates on the fandom. 😉 ( <– still kidding around)
Ernie I think it’s safe to say that is exactly the fear. Morgan in small doses is amusing, Morgan displacing Sarah or even Casey as the second or third most important character on the show will annoy a lot of people.
Like you, I don’t EXPECT they will make that mistake, but I do fear it.
I think that we will have a better idea at the end of the weekend, since the story started there have been three big parts to it: Chuck, Sarah and the intersect. If the intersect is now in Morgan, I can’t see how CF can talk about it without mentioning Morgan.
Also as Chuck is the hero of the story I can’t imagine that they will write the story in such a way that Morgan is better with the intersect than the hero was. My guess is that we get scenes of Morgan going “flash” and his pants falling down instead like Chuck did in Pink Slip and scenes where the intersect Morgan makes things worse and clever Chuck has to fix things to save the day.
I’m going to disagree Herder. The three big things have been Chuck, Sarah, and Chuck fulfilling his destiny. The Intersect is largely the “high concept” plot device that drives a lot of possible storylines, like a Nerd Herder being recruited directly into the CIA with no training, or suddenly having the ability to be an equal player in the spy world. I think the big hint has come at the ends of season 3 and 4 (all of them). Chuck has always faced his final test either largely without the intersect* (Other Guy, Push Mix, Cliffhanger) or with it hindering him and his special nature allowing him to overcome and control it (Ring I & II). I expect the entire fifth season to be more about that theme, Chuck learning he has grown to the point he can cary the day without the intersect.
*In addition Sarah and Casey (and now possibly Morgan) will either be absent, executing another part of Chuck’s plan or incapacitated and unable to help Chuck.
Didn’t we see something a couple weeks ago where Fedak said something about how we would see why Chuck was the BEST person to have the Intersect. At any rate, I don’t think Morgan will suddenly become the big hero. A big hog of screen time maybe.
Excuse me Ernie but I do quibble with one point you made earlier. For me at least and I believe a very large part of the fanbase, Sarah Walker is the character we invest in and there is no way that Morgansect can’t have a detrimental impact on screen time for Yvonne. That is what really disturbs and annoys me the most about this stupid idea. To me they are emphasizing who I consider to be the sixth most important character on the show at the expense of the first and third. Incredibly dumb idea to me.
If you can promise me that Morgan will get no more screen and plot time than he did in s3 or 4 then I’ll probably ok with it. But we both know you can’t. His screen time has to come from somewhere and my guess is that it will come at the expense of Sarah and Casey and is a HUGE mistake.
A big hog of screen time maybe.
*shudders* and *twitches* 😉 🙂
when morgan first got the intersect i made the comment it can’t be good. then i read an interview where fedak said he wanted to reward josh because he felt he deserved it and came up with idea of morgansect. he broached the idea to josh while filming app. ep 21 or 22. i thought and said originally it was a joke that went bad, they thought they were done and used it for a laugh after the wedding. it’s not funny any more.
i posted a long time ago how fedak didn’t understand how much folks liked sarah after phase three. that came from an interview he did. seems he still doesn’t get that either. the other side of the coin is chuck will be smart by making plans (we know he still lacks combat skills) and such but morgan will replace him on missions. that part makes sense in a way. how many times did the intersect help during missions? i site 2 examples, the intersect provided the intel on the firing circuits in the a team, and on the soda machine in american hero ( i think thats the name where he goes after shaw when they drop the bomb and sarah see’s them come out of the ball of fire). no matter who has it, it will be on missions i fear and that means more morgan for you guys to watch.
secrets sarah still has? you guys are right. aren’t they past that point yet? i don’t get the interview at all. there was more than a mild outcry after the finale. didn’t they see that? heck, even mel was asking people to wait and see the reaction was so bad. i just don’t get it.
i know i bailed on the show, but seeing this type of interview and news makes me feel bad for the folks here. you guys deserve much better than it SEEMs you are going to get. i hope it works out in the end.
a fedak quote from the post mortem…Of course, don’t worry — he’s got Morgan Guillermo Grimes there to save his life when he and Sarah and Casey are captured by Bulgarian mercenaries. plus what he just said, i have the warm and fuzzies going strong now, lol.
Uplink, obviously I can’t promise you anything. Not my show, or despite your preferences (and many others I agree) Yvonne’s. Point being, between Chuck and any other character, with the occasional single Casey episode and with the more frequent exception of Sarah who gets more time devoted to her than any character other than Chuck, the other character loses out. If Morgan is in the scene with Chuck it’s about Chuck, if it’s Casey, it’s usually about Chuck. If it’s Sarah and Chuck, it’s usually about both with an edge to Chuck.
If Morgan has the intersect it’s about Chuck, not to elevate Morgan to a leading man. And I understand that that is precisely the mistake they made with Shaw, but Morgan is a completely different archetype and serves a different purpose. Morgan will not become Shaw. (I know, famous last words… )
…there is no way that Morgansect can’t have a detrimental impact on screen time for Yvonne.
Since you seem to conclude there is no other possible outcome based on a few seconds on the screen and some comments about a season that remains largely unwritten, let alone without a single scene having been filmed, I won’t try to dissuade you. But I don’t agree. I’d also quibble with screen time for Yvonne as a metric for the quality of the show or Sarah’s portrayal. I’d prefer good scenes to long or frequent scenes.
Ernie, interesting points but can I ask how elevating the sixth most important character on the show at the expense of what I consider the first and third is in any way a good decision for the final 13 episodes of the series?
To me these final thirteen should focus on what made the show a success and I don’t think I’m going out on a limb here by saying that was never Morgan Grimes. Hated him in season 1 and 2 tolerated him in 3 and thought he was ok in season 4. But if he was dumped going into season 5 and we never saw him again I really wouldn’t care one bit TBH. But yet they chose to make him a large focus, or at least we think so, of the final 13 episodes. It just strikes of Fedak not knowing, caring or understanding what folks see in this show and its not Morgan Grimes.
All of the other issues folks have with season 4 or the direction of season 5 have been trumped by this ridiculous idea.
You may say that most of the story resolves around Chuck but it seems to me what a large part of the fanbase comes to the show for is Sarah Walker. She is THE most interesting character on the show and possibly all of TV right now for me and Morgan Grimes probably isn’t even in the top 100. Yet the precious last 13 will in large part possibly revolve around what should be a peripheral player at best. I’m tired of the bromance. I’m glad we are getting an ending but I simply don’t care about Morgan’s story and feel that the stories I do care about will be diminished because of his.
You know Uplink I agree with much of what you say. And I find it amusing that the majority of fan fictions have little or no Morgan Grimes ever (many writers ignore him entirely); which of course proves nothing. But I think it strongly suggests how many fans just don’t care about his character one way or the other. Now I do believe casual viewers are more likely than us to enjoy his little comic interludes, but I still don’t think he can carry the show nor should he take any more screen time.
But I do want to encourage all of us to avoid over-reacting. We really don’t know yet how big a deal this might be. Remember last season many of us were quite worried about the secrets and lies situation between Chuck and Sarah, and yet that situation was resolved quickly and in a way most of us were completely satisfied with.
I can easily imagine the Mogansect working out in a good way too. If Chuck is the leader/planner of the team, while Sarah and Casey are the experienced professionals and muscle; there is still room for Morgan as comic relief. We can (and I believe should) make it abundantly clear to TPTB that we aren’t liking what we’re hearing, but we also can relax a little. I am sure this will not be a disaster of S3 proportions.
ernie and herder. i can see both points of view here. i always thought the purpose of interviews was to stoke the fans or ease their fears. this doesn’t seem to be the case.
take this line from Fedak…”it was late on Wednesday night, we were doing the final music stuff, and I watched the scene with Morgan getting the Intersect uploaded into his head, and I was just like “Ahh!” That’s when I got so concerned, because it was such a wonderful idea, and I really wanted to tell the story.” and “we love, love love the idea of taking Joshua Gomez and putting Chuck into the situation, very much like Sarah and Casey in season one, of being the guy who has to protect the
guy with the Intersect in his head.” and Fedak: Chuck having the Intersect, it was like, “Please get it out of my head. I want my life back.” Morgan thinks it’s the beginning of only awesome things. Morgan is incredibly stoked to have the Intersect inside of him. Here’s a guy who for years has been Chuck’s best friend. Chuck has helped out Morgan so many times and saved his bacon from the fifth grade on, and that is their relationship. And now Morgan is the guy who has the supercomputer in his head and has all these abilities, so he’s jazzed and excited to be on the team and to be a part of it. He just wants to be a spy right now.”
heres the link to more ….http://www.tvguide.com/News/Chuck-Final-Season-1035473.aspx.
none of those indicate to me anything other than increased morgan screen time. that seems to be the biggest concern of most fans. so while it may be a few lines here and there they all appear to say the same thing …more morgan. herder is right, the time has to come from some where. anyone but the idiots should annoy the fans.
Dave, I know you and I see the show in a very similar fashion and I agree about not over-reacting but every interview or discussion seems to revolve first and foremost around Morgansect. In the TVGuide interview there was minimal mention of the conspiracy, what should be driving this final 13. It is all this ridiculous idea and the only resolution I’d be happy with right now is if it is gone from his head by the end of 5.01 which from all of the discussion seems extremely unlikely.
Fedak hinted about a character death and TBH I think I’d like that to be Morgan going out into the field thinking he can do it with the Intersect and getting himself killed off. That could be an amazing story but probably way too dark for this show now. Hopefully some great FF writer will write it.
I’m sorry but I just don’t care about Morgan Grimes story and wish the focus was off him and on to who I do care about, Sarah, Chuck and Sarah, Sarah Chuck and Casey and finally Ellie. Hell I would have been much happier if the gave an Intersect to Ellie or even Devon long before they gave it to the little bearded man.
Uplink,
I don’t want this to come off wrong, but you keep talking about Morgan as the sixth most important character and Chuck as the second and Sarah and Casey as the first and third, which is fine, but those are your rankings. And some people actually like Jeff and Lester. Who knew.
In my view we don’t get Sarah, that great character, without Chuck. We love Sarah both because Chuck loves her and because, tough as it is for her, she loves Chuck. There is no Sarah without Chuck. In a similar but lesser way there is no Chuck without Morgan. Morgan is the guy that constantly holds him back, but whom he will not casually discard for his own ambition or convenience. If Chuck can leave home without looking back to be a spy, severing ties with the Morgan and Ellie and Devon, well, he’s not the same Chuck. Morgan, the character is about serving Chuck, the character. It is not about Morgan Grimes, it is about what he gives to Chuck, and Casey, and perhaps even Sarah. That character gives FAR more than he takes, which is why he was integral, yet hated by many in season 1 & 2. He provides opportunities for growth, heroism, humor and for empathy, for all of the three main characters, and all TPTB have asked is to allow him to tag along at the rear, with enough minimal growth to make his presence plausible, so he can continue to provide that.
That’s my view. The rest is speculation and opinion that requires neither agreement nor discussion.
You know really, I don’t disagree with any of that Uplink. It is valid concern that it seems to be where all the focus is. I just keep thinking and hoping it won’t be as bad as we fear. But I would much prefer if they were phasing Morgan out at this point, not increasing his role.
it had to be a hard interview in a way, they have already done, lets see – 5 happy endings, he can’t come out and promise another one, can he – yet his answer was such BS? Morgan and chuck – the way fedak describes them they are going on ‘two nerd’s excellent spy adventure’ for 13 episodes, I doubt that really is what is going to happen. And sarah, fedak must not like her, he struggles to come out and say anything positive about her, while he has trouble not wetting himself when he utters the word morgan. I tend to agree that it’ll be fine, but the interview struck me the wrong way, and interestingly, it struck others poorly too. Either way, 13 eps to go and we are done, I might be one of the few to think this way, I am sort of glad, I don’t think this creative team would do a very good job with many more eps.
Ernie, I agree that those are my rankings but I disagree with you about there would be no Sarah without Chuck and that there would be no Chuck without Morgan. I think you can take your analogy the other way in a much more plausible way by saying there would be no Chuck without Sarah because we have already seen that. Look at pre-Sarah Chuck he was crushed, defeated, a slacker with no direction. He was a taller Morgan Grimes. Morgan has done nothing to help Chuck become the man he is now. Maybe when they were kids yes but the person Chuck has become was most impacted by Sarah Walker not Morgan Grimes as you yourself said he holds him back. Sarah lifts him up.
To me who grounds Chuck is Ellie. She is FAR more important to the Chuck character than Morgan is. Would there have been any outcry from the fans if they had kept Morgan with Anna in Hawaii after season 2? I doubt it. Would there have been an outcry if they kept Ellie in Africa with Devon? Absolutely. Morgan is a much more important character to Fedak than he is to the fans I believe. I don’t mind growth for him as I kind of liked him in season 4 but enough is enough. I don’t want to see any more of him in these precious last 13. If there are any characters they need to utilize more its Ellie and Devon.
Uplink, I’ll put this simply mostly because it’s late and I’m tired. What makes Sarah remotely sympathetic? She loves Chuck and wants to protect him. What makes Chuck remotely sympathetic? He is a man who COULD move on to greater things, but values people, other people, more than himself or his ambition. Yes, at first it was being crushed, but at every opportunity to move up or exercise power, he makes it about other people.
Chuck without Sarah (meaning spy life) would have likely worked his way up the BuyMore ladder, probably to eventually run the company. Just one more Carmichael.
Ernie, how was pre-Sarah Chuck about putting other people first? He was all about wallowing in his own misery, lack of ambition and direction. He felt sorry for himself. There was NO concern for other people driving him. In fact nothing was driving him. He rejected what his sister wanted and reveled in what Morgan wanted, the status quo. Morgan would have been completely happy to spend the rest of his life as a loser as long as he could keep Chuck down there with him. He even was grossly threatened by Sarah possibly taking Chuck away from his life of misery instead of rejoicing in his best friend finally getting his life together. He could go on a date and get laid but have a girlfriend and a life? No way.
I think your view of Sarah is way too simplistic. Sarah Walker is sympathetic also because through no fault of her own she was given a horrible life of cons, secrecy and murder. She was told her only worth was her body and her ability to get others to do what she was told to get them to do. She was told she wasn’t allowed to even think of finding love, having a family or a real life. That’s what makes her sympathetic. The little girl inside the beautiful sexy super spy. Not simply her love for Chuck and desire to protect him. In fact if anyone put others before themselves it was Sarah. That is why I love the character so much and want her to finally have the life she deserves. Chuck had it available to him but was lazy and wallowed in his misery letting others take advantage of him. Sarah didn’t have that choice really. Chuck did and chose not to act on it until Sarah came into his life. Sarah took what was available to her and made the best of a bad situation. Chuck simply was a loser.
Uplink, again, tired, short version. Sarah says explicitly without Chuck she is nothing but a spy. Cannon. All the BuyMorons say explicitly it is Chuck’s presence that makes the BuyMore run. Cannon.
uplink, i agree, ernie i’ll quibble. i’m not tired but here’s my take. simply put how long did chuck work at buymore with morgan? 5 years or there about right? did he improve, grow, or move up? nope, he played video games with morgan and lived with his sister . enter sarah, growth desire, advancement and moved out. as you said canon.
when he was with just morgan he was a dud, now with sarah his true nature comes out. as for the buymorons, if you look at it based on the characters in the show (all losers) they can’t help but see chuck as the one that makes the buymore run.
has morgan had shining moments sure, but in my opinion sarah and to an extent casey had more to due with chuck being who he is than morgan ever did.
uplink – ernie says it is canon, so it is canon, pretty soon he will describe a hero’s journey chuck went on between stanford and the pilot – smiley face ernie – evidentily then it is ok to be a jerk – QED. But in the real world, I am pretty sure chuck was shown to be a sociopath – a 20 something climbing out of his bedroom window to avoid a birthday party thrown in his honor who was living with his sister making minimum wage, even though he was one of the smartest people in the room. In that same world, sarah walker was an agent for the united states government, routinely risking her life in defense of her country – a hero of sorts – without the journey – LOL – QED – RIP!
Once again, a great discussion, all. I haven’t quite read through everyone’s musings today, but there’s much I agree with on both sides of the Morgansect idea.
Perhaps, all I can add is that it comes down to balance. There’s no doubt the majority view is that, though not perfectly, TPTB have indeed kept the characters in balance the way we’d hope for the better part of 4 seasons. That’s why we enjoy the show. Failure to do that is all the more noticeable because of their success.
What I’m seeing in the discussion is a general feeling that it’s okay to have a few doubts, but there’s little reason to say there’s no hope for S5 because of one interview.
That fact that my personal idea of balance is 42m30s per episode of Sarah in a bikini has got nothing to do with anything.
That fact that my personal idea of balance is 42m30s per episode of Sarah in a bikini has got nothing to do with anything.
LMAO. Ah! Some much needed levity. 🙂
Joe, what an upstanding view on balance.. Someone tell Fedak – if he wants the 42m30s to be a Chuck and Morgan show , then let it be. Just split the screen with one showing Sarah in various bikinis. 🙂
Wow, monster thread! I do agree with a lot of what Ernie is saying. I think Chuck was a great character right from the Pilot. He was loyal to friends and family, had the respect of his co-workers, and had a strong moral center. Remember the ballerina moment was really before any Sarah influence, and he had risen from green shirt to Nerd Herd Supervisor without Sarah’s help. Maybe not living up to his potential, but not completely wallowing either. And I think someone misused the word “sociopath” above. A sociopath has no conscience, which is quite markedly wrong where Chuck is concerned; he is “anti-social”, and not even in the most severe sense of the word. Trust me, I am also anti-social; it doesn’t mean I wish ill on anyone or consider others to be disposable tools for my advancement, it only means I often like being left alone. I completely related to Chuck from the Pilot. Sarah gave him motivation to achieve more, that’s awesome; but there’s no need to trash on Chuck because he hadn’t achieved much yet.
But I would disagree with trashing Sarah at the start too. “I’m nothing but a spy without you” is a rather painful statement about her lack of self worth, but we know from quite early on that it is nowhere near true. She has a moral compass that other spies like Casey and Carina are lacking. We see clearly that she values others, she can even be gentle and kind when the situation arises. She is a wonderful and complex character from the very start of the show; just like Chuck.
To me, that is the very heart of the show; two awesome characters that I like, love, respect, and relate to from the very beginning. But they are as completely different as two decent people can be; and enriching each other as they come together is my favorite part of the story. That is what was lost in S3; and its what was on display full force in S4. Look at Yvonne’s quote from the article Faith posted a few days ago; that’s exactly how she sees Sarah’s growth too. She’s become complete; but I think we tend to exaggerate her deficiencies before (some of that may be because Sarah does that to herself). Again, to cite personal experience; my wife completes me, but that doesn’t mean I was nothing but an air traffic controller before. It only means I am greater now than I was before she came along.
Sorry Ernie, but making the BuyMore run is doing for others but being “nothing but a spy” isn’t? Is that what you are saying? If it is then wow. With that bunch of complete losers if you could actually make out a sales form you would be the hero of the BuyMore.
Sarah Walker took a horrible childhood and made the best of it with a life dedicated to the “greater good” Yes canon. Chuck took a horrible childhood made the best of it and as soon as he was challenged with a crisis fell apart into a complete loser who spent 5 years deciding on a font for his 5 year plan. Sarah on the other hand dealt with crisis virtually every day and excelled. He was kind yes but he wallowed in self pity and accepted no responsibility for his pathetic life. Morgan was an enabler. He did nothing for his friend to get him to better himself, he just gave him a comfortable hole to crawl into and whine. Not much of a friend there. A true friend after 6 months or so would have talked Chuck into doing something with himself but if Morgan did that he would have had to examine his own pathetic life. He had no ambition to do that. So he allowed his best friend to become a pathetic shadow of himself. Again not a good friend I’d want. The status quo was safe and so they both took the easy way out. Bryce may have betrayed Chuck but what was even worse was Chuck betrayed himself, betrayed his sister who worked to raise him and Morgan allowed it all to happen because it made it easier for himself.
Sarah wouldn’t allow that to happen to Chuck. She was the true friend who saw his potential and gave him a reason to reach it. Again canon. Morgan never did that for Chuck. As I said Morgan was an enabler, Sarah and Casey actually did something about it.
There are people that do like and enjoy Morgan. The show has to try and service all types of fans. No fan is more important than any other. I want to see everybody get their time. The whole cast. Not just Sarah. Not just Morgan. All of them. I want a balanced show.
Dave, while I get your point about Chuck being a kind person who cared about his friends he still accepted less of himself and used Bryce and Jill as an excuse for his under-achieving. Now maybe in Chuck’s case loser was a bit harsh but he certainly was an under-achiever with no ambition and no one pushing him except Ellie. All the BuyMorons wanted Chuck to stay the loser/under-achiever he was because it made them not feel so bad about themselves. He may have made it to Nerd Herd supervisor but how does he repay the sacrifices his sister made to raise him, help pay for college and give him a home? By making 11 bucks an hour 5 years after spending 3 and a 1/2 years at Stanford. He was a good person yes, but he and his sister deserved more from him and it never was going to happen with Morgan as his best friend. Only Sarah and Casey to an extent did that for him.
Of course I agree Chuck was not living up to his potential; but I guess I rate the moral qualities more highly. I respected and liked Chuck from the start. He was destined for greater things, which Morgan also saw and commented on; both in terms of Chuck’s rising to lead Buy More (which may have been all Morgan’s little brain could grasp anyway) and later that Sarah was the agent of Chuck’s growth. I just don’t see any need to get down on Chuck or Morgan or anyone else over this issue.
Now I’ll continue to agree I don’t want to see Morgan dominate screen time, but I would not agree he was ever a “bad friend.”
Once again, Dave, I agree. There’s no need to be down on any character, not even Morgan. Morgan has his niche. He’s sometimes really good, but I don’t want him to have any more screen time than he has. For the record, I think the bromance (that Fedak and Zac seem to love so) is the least appealing relationship of the show. Morgan with Sarah or Casey or Ellie is better than Morgan with Chuck. Just my 2c.
As for being down on Chuck, that doesn’t wash at all. It’s his good-guy-who-wants-to-help-people, hero side that attracted Sarah on day 1. Likewise, he saw and valued her in a way that no one else ever had. They are two people whose past had robbed them of their future, who find each other, complete each other, and find their destiny together. That’s the appeal of the story. The point is that the whole heroes that have been emerging for 4 seasons were always in there. They needed each other to bring them out.
As to main character, Chuck has the edge. It’s his story that drives the mythology. Sarah’s importance, as the show sees it, is wrapped up in her relationship to Chuck … even though she is the fandom’s favorite character. S4 has done a nice job of shifting more importance to her story, which is smart, though slow in coming. I think it’s an Yvonne phenomenon. The show runners probably didn’t envision her character becoming quite so large. It seems they are catching on. We’ll see if the lesson sticks. The fandom wants more Sarah and CS, not more Morgan and certainly not more bromance. Again, just my 2c.
Well I’ve learned two things. Don’t blog tired and don’t try to be brief, so I’ll apologize for not making myself understood and I’ll try to be clear. And please don’t take this as condescending, I’m merely trying to be very explicit and clear about what I am saying and claiming or opining on.
Sarah Walker and Chuck Bartowski are fictional characters created by Chris Fedak et. al. A fictional character is built gradually, and the audience has to see and conclude what they can about who they are based on what they are shown. In the most literal sense Sarah Walker doesn’t exist without Chuck because she is part of the supporting cast. I’m sorry if that upsets people but it is a fact. In fact it is probably contractual based on SAG union rules about who gets paid what and credited how, but that wasn’t what I was getting at.
From the beginning we are shown a Chuck who, while unmotivated, awkward and shy, cares about other people and puts their needs ahead of his own. We are shown this through his interaction with the entire cast, from Morgan to his sister to a random clueless father and his ballerina daughter. We are shown that while he’s suffered some setbacks he’s maintained his decency and his generally positive and optomistic view of life and people. He is a sympathetic character. We can identify with and like him. There are other characters, like Harry Tang and Morgan Grimes who aren’t as sympathetic (yet). They serve to show how Chuck treats people he has nothing to gain from (Morgan, Jeff, Lester et. al.) or who treat him badly (Harry, Big Mike, Casey). They also serve as a contrast to who he could be. Chuck could be a petty despot like Harry, or a complete slacker like Morgan, but he isn’t.
From the beginning Sarah Walker is mostly an enigma. What we see about her is how she treats Chuck. While she initially is trying to manipulate him and gain information from him, and is willing to hurt him if necessary (shown explicitly in Hellicopter, so yes, she is willing to physically hurt him, sorry) she sees a decent person who doesn’t deserve to be put in a bunker or killed for having been someone elses pawn or fall guy. It is how she treats Chuck and reacts to him that makes Sarah Walker a sympathetic character.
John Casey initially is not a sympathetic character. He treats Chuck as a disposable comodity. He shows him no deference for having been unwillingly pulled into a life he never asked for, nor respect for his abilities, nor sympathy for his plight. He is what Sarah Walker could be, but chooses not to be. Casey and Sarah are portrayed as sympathetic or unsympathetic initially almost entirely based on their interactions with Chuck. This is how the characters are built, and that is what I am talking about. It is what we see on the screen, not what we fill in or get from speculation or fanfiction, it is the show canon.
As the show continues we get to see far more of the backstories. Previously unsympathetic characters grow into more sympathetic ones and the backstories give more depth and history to previously defined characters, adding levels of complexity and giving context to their previous actions. But these decisions are shown as the story progresses. We didn’t know a thing about Sarah Walker’s life before Chuck (other than that she dated Bryce and felt betrayed by him) until the 17th episode, but I’d give odds that all of us loved the character long before then, based on how she interacted with and cared for Chuck. That is what I am saying. In Chuck’s case the character was built far more broadly from the beginning. We are given his backstory immediately, and he is not defined through Sarah Walker alone. Her character is important, and arguably the most important, from the beginning, but he is not defined and built through her to the extent she is through him.
As the story progresses and the characters evolve and grow, certain elements of the drama, the plot, the backstory and the mythology are resolved and can no longer serve to push the characters or provide conflict or comedy. Chuck can’t exactly be a whiney insecure nerd who stalks Sarah because she says she has plans for the night, and Sarah can’t put Chuck in an arm-lock without those characters regressing and suffering some damage, so those elements are left behind, as they should be unless there is a damn good reason for re-introducing them. A lot of people hated the season 3 PLI arc for that very reason. Now, having lost those plot and story drivers, whatever they may be, the show runners need to find new ones. They can introduce new ones in the form of plot devices or foes like Roark and Volkoff or love interests, like Hannah and Shaw, or they can modify existing ones like intersect 2.0, or making Fulcrum a Ring subsidiary, or by making Morgan aware of Chuck’s (and the rest of team B’s) entire story. It makes Morgan a more flexable character. You can now show Casey’s growth through not only how he treats Chuck, who has earned his respect and no longer deserves to be cuffed on the head at every turn despite having saved his life and saved the day more than once, but how he treats Morgan, who hasn’t yet earned a place on the team, or needs someone to take a chance on him and believe in his potential. We expect Sarah to treat Chuck with love and respect, and to allow his residual inner child to come out to play on occasion, that doesn’t move, or define her character anymore. But when she takes the time to try to make Morgan feel less irrelevant, or like a member of the family, or to ask Ellie for help in a way she couldn’t before she was made a part of the family, Sarah can still change and grow. But to properly serve those characters the ones like Awsome and Ellie and yes, even Morgan sometimes need to grow also. That takes screen time.
Now, as the show develops the characters and their history we can reach certain conclusions because we are shown how their lives would or could be with a few changes. Chuck never would have survived his introduction to the spy life without Sarah. That much is clear. Without the spy life Chuck would have a less meaningful life, that’s also clear. But as early as First Date and as late as Ring I we see that Chuck, absent the spy life, would eventually get his bearings and move on. That Sarah was the thing that snapped him out of his funk does not negate all other possibilities, it just makes her special and a great part of his life, as we want her to be. But Morgan stated it pretty explicitly in First Date. We all know you’ll go on to do great things, eventually. Chuck, while he wanted to keep Sarah in his life (as we were shown in First Date and Ring I) was preparing to move on with his life, and was prepared to do so without Sarah if necessary, because she was offering him no illusions (or hope) in First Date or Ring I, or even as late as American Hero. The fact that he didn’t leave Sarah behind despite his ability to do so is one of the things we love most about him, and hated most about him when he appeared ready to. It is that same unwillingness to discard people or leave them behind and belief in them that makes Chuck Sarah’s perfect savior. And I say savior to paraphrase Sarah. More than once we’ve been shown that Sarah’s life without Chuck would have been far from a happy fulfilling one. It is Chuck who opens Sarah to new and undreampt of possibilities. The gift she never thought she could want or have, but that she now wants to prove she deserves. Without Chuck she could be another season 1 Casey or Carina, or Cole or Shaw, and while willing to serve the greater good would do so abstractly, acting on orders and treating assetts as merely a conduit to information, having a romance or two along the way, but as Heather Chandler said, pulling the ripcord the second it got serious. That was Sarah’s own view of herself and her future, and what we’re repetedly shown as the likely outcome without Chuck.
I am not in any way seeking to diminish what a wonderful and marvelously multilayered and deeply drawn character Sarah is, nor to be a mysogynist sexist pig who thinks women can only be defined through the men in their lives. I am also not in any way seeking to diminish Yvonne Strahovski’s talents or her ability to be a lead actress or define a character without Zac Levi or portray a Sydney Bristow who doesn’t need a Chuck Bartowski. I am not saying this to bash on fanfiction. I enjoy indulging in it and have great respect for the talent and creativity of a number of the writers. I am also not in any way trying to offend or diminish anyone’s opinions or points of view. I’m simply saying what we have is the canon, where Sarah Walker, the character, is built and made sympathetic almost entirely through Chuck Bartowski at first. We don’t have the luxury of internal monologues or a god-view of her thoughts and process. We have what is on the screen, so that’s what I’ll work with. You aren’t required to agree, and you aren’t required to respond positively to my attempts to lighten the mood. I may not agree with everything people say or post or blog about, but I don’t take it personally unless someone makes it explicitly personal and I don’t personalize the disagreement. I’ll argue with opinions and points of view, passionately at times, but I hold no personal animosity for anyone, despite what some people may think. I know it may feel personal when I disagree with a deeply held idea or opinion or dismiss a personal POV as one I don’t see or agree with. It isn’t and it isn’t intended to be.
the only thing strange about Thinkling and I agreeing on this is that we seem to be a bit of middle ground; it seems we’re normally at one extreme or the other!
And yeah, there’s a difference between popularity and importance. There’s no doubt Sarah is the most popular character on the show; she’s heroic, likable, and complex in an interesting way (it doesn’t hurt that most of the audience is male either…). But Chuck is clearly the most important as far as driving the story and plot. Now I would concede that from an entertainment/viewer perspective that may go back to saying Sarah is the most important character; if she’s the one most people are watching for, then she’s the character that most needs to be properly served. And that’s the very thing that I think many of us are a little nervous about right now; I’m hoping she isn’t sidelined like in S3, or even worse, made unlikable again by some silly “big secret” story-line.
But I do think TPTB know better. Fedak just thinks poking fans with a stick is a good way of building excitement. After the masterpiece we got for S4 I’m willing to give them a chance to show their accumulated lessons learned and finish this out in the proper style.
think – my point isn’t down on chuck, the point is chuck is written to lead us to believe he is an underachiever, kicked out of stanford, no girl friend, works at the buymore, lives with his sister, plays computer games in his room all night, etc. And … climbing out the window at your own birthday party with your BBF to avoid girls, well that is not what normal folks do. He mentions this ‘underachiever’ several times when describing himself, including in cougars when he goes thru his dossier just b4 the class reunion with sarah.
Much like you and i discusssed how sarah the real girl shows up around chuck (sometimes much to sarah’s chagrin), starting near immediate in the pilot, chuck the hero seems to show up around sarah (once I think she even challenges him, what are you going to be chuck – or something to that effect) …. some of the best parts of the show is how and when chuck the hero responds , starting in the pilot with the ballerina, insisting on finding the bomb, then diffusing it.
I felt the notion that it is CANNON that chuck is a success from the start because he runs the buymore better the skip, lester, jeff and morgan and secondly that sarah a failure because she is ‘just’ one of the most heroic spies in the world risking her life for her country on a daily basis deserved a strongly worded rebuttal, which indeed I crafted.
Ernie you always do well with the long type of comments. I think I agree with most of your point; I would likely quibble over some of the details, but I’ll let it pass for now…
“But I do think that there is still a part of her that will always be unattainable. Even though Chuck lives with her,there are parts of Sarah that are still unattainable, secrets and thoughts.”
.
Really? Its statements like these that make me bang my head, If you wanted Sarah to be mysterious and unattainable don’t marry them. You can’t have it both ways When they’ve tried it made her character look bad and the relationship very unbelievable.
I agree. I don’t get that in the least unless it means no Sarah’s Mom story this season which would be a HUGE shame. That is what I want to see most but instead I’m gonna get ridiculous Morgansect.
Hey Fedak I and I bet a rather large portion of the fanbase watch this show for Sarah Walker and NOT Morgan Grimes. How can anything about be unattainable about your freaking wife? Are you kidding me? That is what marriage is, a complete partnership. Yikes!
Yeah Uplink I don’t think its really even close about who people are watching the show for. I mean Morgan as comic relief is fine; but I think men and women both find Sarah the most compelling character. That is something TPTB have never quite understood.
Totally agree with you JC. That was the second thing in the interview that really irked me.
JC looking at that statement again what irks me the most is this phrase “Even though Chuck lives with her” he doesn’t just live with her he is MARRIED to her. There is a huge difference and the fact that he would even say that is totally bizarre.
Is there another showrunner out there that comes across as this clueless so many times?
“You don’t close a book after chapter 7”
“Shaw is perfect for Sarah”
“The intention wasn’t to make … [pause] To me, Shaw is the epitome of a classic spy. ”
“But I do think that there is still a part of her that will always be unattainable. ”
Yikes.
I completely agree with that Uplink! Fedak in interviews is kind of a disaster. He has consistently caused more frustration and anxiety than excitement. Remember all those comments late in S4 that made us all a little crazy; he is the master of negative promotion.
Cripeys guys, I’d tend to agree if we were talking about normal well adjusted people and couples. The thing I’ve loved about this show and Chuck and Sarah in particular is that they aren’t, and they shouldn’t be, but they manage to muddle through. Well adjusted full and open partnership is the end of the show. Happily ever after. Just my opinion though.
What’s the old adage about insanity – doing the same thing and expecting a different result? Seriously, if some of you think Fedak’s interviews are that bad, then you probably just shouldn’t read them. Odds are that his method isn’t going to change much at this point.
Morgan with the intersect isn’t the road I would have gone down either – but it’s just a theory until we see it on the screen. It may be just the perfect amount of comic relief in between the stories you all want to see. It may turn out to be lousy – who knows? But let’s at least wait till the episodes air before writing them off.
By the by, the amount of natural antipathy to Fedak in this fandom still astounds me, but that’s another discussion.
@Ernie,
Completely agree about normal and well-balanced characters being the end point. Normal and well-balanced is real life. I don’t watch Chuck (or TV in general) for that.
It has nothing to do with normal and well balanced. If I’m being told a story where two people are supposed to be a loving married couple but one of them doesn’t talk or share anything about themselves I’m not buying it. Like I said if they wanted to keep Sarah mysterious and aloof with Chuck fine but once you got them together and married that went out the window. Uplink said it best how can anything about your wife be unattainable.
You know the comment is probably a throw away anyhow. It may have to do with one story they’re looking at where we find out some Sarah detail that Chuck doesn’t know yet. I mean, big deal, they’d both lived over two decades when they met, things will come up. And my bet is they’ll play it for comedy anyway. I’m thinking the only heavy drama we’ll likely see for the Bartowskis in S5 is of the life and death variety.
You know, here I am one of the blog’s biggest marriage advocates, and the remark didn’t bother me all that much.
I don’t think they’re going to regress Sarah. But I don’t expect her to be Chatty Cathy overnight. She is growing and talking, expressing intimate feelings in public (her vows). But there are probably still some things that will be harder for her to talk about. That does not mean that she is trying to withhold herself from her husband, just that there is still room for growth for her. And Chuck will be an integral part of that growth. I see her as totally committed to Chuck. I also see that she still has some past pain (her mom) that will be difficult to deal with.
That’s one side. The other is that even after you marry someone, there are more things to learn about them. (Unlike the portrayal of movies, marriage is not the end of the story. It’s the beginning. Courtship is more of a prelude.) I notice it’s the guys complaining about this one. Come on I thought women were supposed to retain a little bit of mystery. Maybe I’m off, but I think women are a bit more layered than men. It makes total sense to me that Sarah would continue to be a bit of a mystery to Chuck, as most women are to their husbands. But not in a bad way of being closed off or intentionally withholding herself from him.
I could always be blindsided, but I’m not expecting internal angst with the Bartowski’s, just normal growth. I don’t expect to see any worse than the end of Seduction Impossible, which to me reflected intimacy and growth more than angst.
That’s more than interesting, Thinkling!
Here’s a theory for you. Remember that “role reversal” comment (from Fedak, I believe) that got so much attention before last season? Perhaps this is what he was talking about; usually it’s the guy who’s portrayed as the “strong, silent type” in popular media, and the women is emotive, the “Chatty Cathy”.
Now that’s a popular and persistent stereotype, but the persistence has to be due to its familiarity. Yeah, there’s a tiny kernel of truth that we recognize. And Chuck goes against that stereotype by making him the one who won’t shut up about his “girl-feelings” (as Casey would put it), and her being a touch reticent. We’d probably not notice it at all if that aspect of their characters was reversed.
We’d have no problem believing they were comfortably in the normal range of married couples if that was the case, and it would not be a source of angst, I’d betchya. So I ain’t gonna let it bother me now! 😉
@Thinkling
You’re right about the constant learning about each other in a relationship. But what you said about being closed off and intentionally withholding is how they do play Sarah alot even in S4. I can’t name one thing she’s shared about herself that wasn’t the equivalent of pulling a tooth or Chuck found out through someone else. That’s my problem with the statement.
I understand that somewhat, JC. But for all her struggles, I don’t ever see her as wanting to hurt Chuck, since they’ve been together. She was surprised to know how her not unpacking had impacted him in Suitcase, which led to her trying to initiate a chat in Cubic Z. She was devastated in Phase 3 when she realized the consequences of her silence. In Seduction Impossible, she realizes that she shouldn’t have made Chuck figure things out … she should have told him. In Cat Squad she realized she needed Chuck’s help which led to an all new, delightful level of openness in FBoE.
I see a pattern of old habits taking over, only to produce regret and more openness afterward. It doesn’t seem unloving to me, but sort of expected in her growth, considering how emotionally closed off (to herself and everyone else) she started out. The best part of S4 is that the growth seems to stick. Because of what we’ve seen in S4, I don’t expect regression. I’m hoping that the pattern of growth we’ve seen will continue. If it became a big deal or constant source of conflict for them, I would consider that a terrible story and colossal waste of time. I just don’t think that’s going to happen.
Heh, absolutely. While the Morgan stuff is indeed ridiculous, it was that comment about Sarah that irked me more than anything else in Fedak’s interview.
I find the implication that Sarah might still be refusing to tell Chuck anything about herself or not opening up to him, to be absurd now that they are married.
Whoops. That was supposed to go under JC’s reply. Ah well.
Yeah I didn’t care for that comment much either. I’m hoping its just a one time thing that comes up, like maybe something she doesn’t want to disclose about her mom. But really the characters and story should be way past making a big deal of something like this.
“42m30s per episode of Sarah in a bikini”???!!!!
What!!!!!
When? Where? How? ……
Ok, Joe. That wasn’t funny. Do you have any idea how many keyboards I’ve gone through because of the posts and pictures on this site regarding the Tawny Australian Temptress?
Lucky for me, I still have a barrel of that Keyboard Klenser (T) that Thinkling sent me.
Too funny. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen anything sexier than Yvonne with a light saber, WOW! Although I’d be willing to give that 42’30” a try to find out…
VV’s a victim of my cunning wit and humor.
Oh, and my honesty. 😉
My job here is done!
Yeah, but I’m such an easy target.
I almost hesitate to bring this up but CF is directly asked the question of too much Morgan.
Fixed the link and removed the other tries Herder. Thanks for the info.
And at the risk of another firestorm, his reply pretty much points out what I was saying. He’s asked about the Morgansect, and he talks about Chuck and his journey. It isn’t about Morgan, the show is still about Chuck, Morgan is just being used in a new and slightly different way. He’s been part of the team since 3.14. That’s 30 episodes, over a third of the series, and overall those 30 have been some of the best and most consistently good IMHO.
In any case we can all relax, since Fedak has clearly received the message that a part of the fanbase has concerns. As has Robert Duncan McNeill when he heard and addressed some of those concerns in a podcast interview with Mel from ChuckTV over two months ago. It’s definitely worth a listen, if for nothing else to hear how they go about writing Chuck.
if this is real – it appears to be from the first 5 minutes of the comic con panel, it might get updated more, looks like TPTB are going to have a blast with gomez and levi this season, maybe yvonne & baldwin won’t even have to show up – LOL
http://www.hitfix.com/blogs/the-fien-print/posts/comic-con-live-blog-nbcs-chuck
Lots of spoilers coming your way.
You can check out Shoelin’s recording of the panel here:
Part one, two.
Mark Hamill (Luke Skywalker) will guest star on Chuck for season 5 as the villain.
And I’ll put up the Comic-Con exclusive video from NBC.com up top.
“He’s still surround by two season spies and Morgan” makes me want to hit something.
my fav from his EW interview referenced above:
‘But if you look at episode 24, we’re exploring Chuck starting up his own spy firm and exploring the bromance between Chuck and Morgan — he has to become Morgan’s handler. And the heart of the Chuck show the show is a romance, just because they’re married doesn’t mean they’re riding off into the sunset. ‘
Was 4×24 about a bromance in other’s opinion – I kind of thought it was about a romance between chuck and sarah, starting with chuck saving her life and culminating with them getting married? If you don’t read that carefully, you’d think chuck and morgan got married in 4×24, no mention of sarah by name in the entire interview, morgan 5 times, chuck I think I counted 13.
I think he meant that the romance of Chuck and Sarah took the heart in 4×24. The “heart” used to be the family: Ellie-Chuck, now it’s Chuck and Sarah. Not sure those two sentences were supposed to be directly related, Chris Fedak tends to talk in stream of consciousness.
Having said that, I’m not at all happy at this (if this is true). It seems as if Sarah and Casey have become secondary and that’s not acceptable. At all.
jason, i believe he was referring to the final few minutes of 4.24. the part they showed at the beginning of the nbc vid faith posted. that vid had a lot of morgan didn’t it? he seems to like the bearded troll more than most so..it is what it will be.
Faith, I think you need to look at the whole quote: “He’s still surround by two seasoned spies and Morgan — the half-assed spy.”
That last part is important. To me that’s the dynamics of the team for pretty much all of season 4. I read it as the team will remain largely the same even with the change of who has the intersect.
Jason, I think given the question CF was answering was about season 5 and potential villains CF’s context is things they set up in 4×24 that will be explored this season. Things like Chuck setting up his spy company and how that works. Morgan, being his best friend, the intersect, his employee, and necessary for the success of his new venture (what could go wrong?) And at the heart of the show, how a romance weathers all those changes and challenges. Ep. 4×24 set up Chuck and Sarah as a married couple, Chuck starting a new company, and his best friend accidentally becoming that company’s most valuable asset.
Apologies for not quoting the entire thing…I did read that part but the emphasis remains and so does the oversight.
The fact of the matter is Chris Fedak is recognizing and addressing unrest as it relates to how Morgan’s increased role (intersect) may slight Chuck, and how that may unnerve some fans but he fails to see how that same thing affects other aspects of the show for fans. Specifically for Casey and Sarah. This is just one example of it.
faith me as well, lol.
this was a strange quote (posted by Joe) Q to Yvonne Strahovski: What do you hope for the character? YS: hopes to take “a bit of a break from the lime-light” – “Let Morgan have it.” ouch!
ernie, how about a poll to see how many folks are interested in the bromance of chuck and
morgan? and one to see who the favorite characters on the show are? would be fun to see!
Although I think I got the gist of it, I’m not completely sure I got that quote exact, Army. So please don’t make too much of it. My memory and feeling about it at the time was that, in context, it was a bit of a “throw-away line” from Yvonne, and not meant to be taken very seriously.
even ‘I’ think season 5 is going to be ok in terms of sarah’s screen time vs morgan’s, what some of you have to understand, is from my POV, the show can be so much better than OK, had the decision been made to essentially give Yvonne a seat at the co star table with near equal status to zac’s role. It seems to me, that the creative team has purposefully knocked her down. Little things like having gomez go on every zac and yvonne interview, have gomez sit next to zac on the panel, and largely promote the morgan storyline for season 5, carefully not even including the word sarah in the latest interview, not even once. It is the sum of the little things that often tell a story, and the ‘limelight’ word, I also saw someone tweet her call morgan ‘joshy’ when discussing her lack of story, all little things, taken alone not big deal, taken in full measure, well, whatever.
Faith, I know we see things differently, but to me Chuck surrounded by two seasoned spies and one half-assed spy, and specifically CF’s use of the word still indicates he’s seen that as the ongoing dynamic that will continue. Since I’m pretty pleased with the past season I see that as a good thing.
If what you mean is that they’ve already gone past your level of tolerance and they needed to dial it back, I’m sorry I missed that at first.
Army, you have to remember that the panel came after the into video Faith posted. The video, if you haven’t watched is one big joke about how they decided to hang the entire last season and the fate of the show on Morgan being the intersect and taking on the role of the show’s lead, and how disastrously it would turn out.
In that context I think Yvonne was making a joke.
Maybe I’m missing something but I’m somewhat reassured by all the news coming out, mostly if they are aware enough of it to mock the worry in the opening video then my take is that it will be played for laughs for a few episodes then be gone.
ernie, i know it was a joke, it shows they suspect some fans may not be happy. they also intend to continue on with it for a while at despite knowing how the fans feel. just my opinion.
this season is a dream come true for TPTB on ANY show. they can do whatever they want during the season and there is no fear of anything. they are still done so what does it really matter if it upsets fans. they can write the season they want how they want.
Herder, I’m comforted by the fact that they acknowledge fans unrest, less confident that they understand it completely. Nevertheless, I’m optimistically looking forward to what will be, for now I choose to rant ;).
Ernie, you know that I thought Morgan’s increased maturity was a welcome change, I just fear they’ll go overboard with it and I’m not exactly confident with this new venture. That said, I’ll see it unfold, see for myself. Although you’re correct that the dynamic may be similar to that of season 4, there were times (before they found the balance) where even in season 4 it was too much. Having the intersect inside Morgan’s bound to shake things up a bit more. Look I like Morgan, I just fear how much this Morgansect will affect other aspects of the show and not just “Chuck.” And like I said above, although I’m comforted, it’s not alleviated. Especially when I read interviews that makes me want to hit something.
Ack! I really hope you don’t mean to come off quite so paranoid as this seems, Army. They really just want to tell the story they way they want. Ya know?
There was a bunch of other stuff too, adversarial relationship with the CIA, Gertrude Verbanski as a potential love interest for Casey? Could that mean a return of honey bear (or is that huggy bear?). Mark Hamill in episode one, let the Star Wars references fly. Chuck looking to the Buy More as a profit centre, like that’ll ever happen, maybe they’ll put Sarah in charge of the Buy Morons, she could scare them straight. All these are fun things and I have to beleive that at some point they will have a Chuck/Sarah conversation about her biological clock tick tick ticking.
I just see the whole Morgan thing being similar in thought to the season three thought process, “how would Chuck react to Morgan having the intersect, how would Chuck react to being Morgan’s boss” in season three it was “how would Chuck react to Sarah…” and remember how well that worked out for the Sarah character. If anything I’d be worried about them ruining the Morgan character by making him do stupid things if only doing stupid things wasn’t already Morgan’s character. Really I see them doing it for laughs and a little drama and then moving on.
Joe, i put ANY in caps for a reason. i WAS NOT referring to chuck but any show. it gives TPTB freedom to do what they want. it does not have to be bad either. maybe its a darker show they want to make light but the fans like the darker show. knowing its the last season they can finally do the lighter show they always wanted to do, even though the loyal fans would be upset. they get to tell their story their way, ya know? what TPTB may want to do may not be what the fans want. i’ll use season 3 of chuck as an example. they claimed it was the show they wanted before it aired. so just to be clear i was not referring to the show chuck when i said any show.
FYI keep on checking up top, I’m updating things as I find them. That is until my battery dies and then we’re out lol.
has anyone considered that the reason they ALWAYS put Gomez on Strahovski=Levi interviews now and always sit Gomez next to Levi on panels is because that is the way Strahovski wants it? I mean, she’s had to put up with so much crap in her personal life with folks trashing her real-life boyfriend just because he’s NOT Levi. Maybe she thinks one way to be able to continue to do Chuck-related interviews with Levi is to make sure there is a buffer there so no one can misinterpret. Just my opinion, of course, but it’s as good a theory as any because there really is a lot of garbage out there from the nutty end of the people who claim to be Chuck fans…
Hi, WillyG. Welcome to the discussion.
You know, I’ve wondered about this for a long time. I can’t say that I’ve seen any indication that Yvonne S. has endured any serious threats to her well being (as if I would be privy to that information!); she also hasn’t seemed particularly annoyed by that sort of thing, either. I’m under the impression that the male members of the cast have actually been somewhat protective of her.
I know that the fans, taken as a whole, have been.
I’m not sure what’s to be read into their seating order, either. I might have wondered until I heard Zac talk saying doing a sexy (for prime time) scene with her was a bit like kissing his sister. Their relationship does seem to be very friendly, but very professional, as it seems to be between all the cast members.
I’m sure that there are crazies out there. But every time I see any of them interviewed or tweeting, they inevitably come across as having a good perspective on fame and it’s discontents. They all seem to appreciate the fan’s interests as well.
There definitely are Zach/Yvonne ‘shippers out there though. I do wonder if the staging of interviews is deliberate to reduce that non-sense.
Yeah, I remember that too many people thought Robert Wagner and Stefanie Powers were actually married too. And Mariette Hartley and James Garner (who were together in a series of commercials, for pete’s sake)!
And of course, there was Ozzie and Harriette Nelsen. Oh, wait… 😉
Of course Hartley and Garner had fun with it when she appeared on Rockford Files. But if memory serves, she got pretty testy about the issue not too much later.
that is odd, real life they seem really mismatched to me, can’t see that one, I loved watching zac promote tangled with mandy moore clips, she looked at him like he was a 12 year old boy, kind of like yvonne used to. But still, I sort of do agree, seems like something changed from year one or two when they promoted the show to now, who knows what really, I don’t think multi-million dollar enterprises worry real much about what a co star’s boyfriend thinks about promotion strategy however, do you guys?
Jason I’m sure the people arranging appearances do worry about how their people interact and what the people doing those appearances want to do. The old studio system has been dead for decades (early 1970s), SAG makes sure actors have input into their public life.
let me get this straight, you are saying yvonne insists that josh is present when her and zac appear in public – that seems both irrational and unlikely to me – maybe even funny, except that a bunch of you think that is true – you guys really think that is a conversation Yvonne had with those responsible for promoting the show – that amazes me actually?
I’m not saying I think that’s the case at all Jason. Only that it could have been addressed if any party involved was concerned about something. I don’t think there is any particular problem between them, and they have done appearances, just the two of them, even during S4 (Teen Choice Awards and George Lopez Show). But if there is a problem we might never hear about it, its something their agents or reps COULD take care of.
Joe mentioned the Mariette Hartley/James Garner thing from the 1970s; it really did reach the point where Hartley turned down work that would have paired her with Garner (another series of Polaroid commercials). Supposedly, it wasn’t because of any dispute between them, but she was tired of people assuming they were married, and didn’t think it was fair to her husband. So yes, it really is possible one party doesn’t want the assumption they are “together” to become common “knowledge”. Not just for personal reasons, if they are assumed to be a professional team it could even impact the type of roles they are considered for.
Again, I don’t believe there is an issue. But it absolutely is an issue the actors have control over if they want or need to. It is all part of managing their image.
Honestly, why does it matter how they are being interviewed? Speculation on inter-personal relationships seems unneccessary, especially when it is just pure speculation.
No offense intended to anyone.
This is Luckygirl, forgot to sign in on my bros computer.
I find it interesting that Yvonne is quiet, and she appears to be the biggest prankster on the set.
I married a woman like that too, DL. It’s a deadly combination. She’s lobbying Congress to make April Fool’s Day a national holiday.
They did those interviews for NBC day and although josh was there, she sat next to zac. They did those interviews for cliffhanger and did it together and he joked that they are just like a couple and she said right. They did that recent magazine article together too. I think it is just the comic con panel seating and any interviews they do josh is always there because he is great friends with zac and so is always there. I mean Yvonne did the talk show interview with ryan and josh and no one said anything. I would not read too much into any of this, it would be nuts to do that. They know that fans do this all the time, especially fans of soap operas, I mean heck castle last season did an episode on this crazy shipper phenomenon, the basic fact is I doubt they will let crazy fans or any fans get in the way of their work and their friendships. Lifes too short.
I’ve read somewhere that YS will announce her engagement with he-who-shall-not-be-named during her birthday party in Vegas. I don’t know if it is true (this would break so many hearts, including mine, but hey, “what happens in Vegas, etc…”), but maybe this will put an end to all the speculation…
I don’t see the connection at all between the real life characters – they seem near polar opposites. I have been on this site for a long time, the real lives of the pair seldom has gotten mentioned until yesterday, seems like the ones the most worried about ‘crazies’ are the ones that want to talk about it calling other people crazy. If yvonne gets engaged, I would guess 99.9999999% of the chuck fans will be happy for her, the guy seems kind of like a good match for her in temperament the little I have seen of him. But I can’t imagine why anyone would barely take note.
the reason I so dislike gomez on the interviews, is he does not let yvonne talk, she seems bored silly listening to gomez and zac go on and on about nothing at all (or maybe that is me being bored silly?). zac at least might ask her a ? to include her, but josh will usually answer it for her, or cut her off after she gets a few words in edgewise. When she and zac interview alone, they are forced to talk about the show, which is quite interesting.
If she is getting engaged then that is wonderful ! Congratulations to her! I have not seen that in the news but in Hollywood to find happiness is difficult and she has and. That’s fantastic.
So true Jason, that is exactly why I don’t like interviews with Josh there. Also doesn’t speak much value towards the person Joshua Gomez.
Hey guys, let’s not make this too personal or turn it into a character issue. The cast seems to get along, which is all good news. All we can say for sure from interviews is Zach and Joshua are energetic and talkative; Yvonne is more quiet (even in solo interviews she seems reserved, but good natured). whatever quirks there may be in their group dynamics do not seem to be a big deal, we’ve never heard of fights or problems on set. Things seem to be friendly enough to get the job done.
dave – a little while back you were saying yvonne may be requesting to not do interviews with zac based on james gardner – now you are saying others are getting personal based on responding why josh ruins interviews, noting it has nothing to do with some fanboy / girl notion of zac and sarah real life shipping, which to me should have been reprimanded as very distasteful, rather than backed up with some half baked reference to james gardner – reprimand those who start the distasteful stuff, rather than encourage it
Jason I have never questioned the character or intentions of anyone. In fact, I’m the one who pointed out that such appearance management does not seem to be going on here. But when you challenged that it was ridiculous to think it even could happen I provided the history lesson that in fact it can and does happen. I honestly believe the cast gets along fine. The exact dynamic and friendships may not be what we would guess from watching the show (are Vic Sahey and Jeff Krinsky really best buds? We really just don’t know). But I see no reason to get upset about it either way. They get along well enough to produce a product we all enjoy, and on-set behavior has never been the subject of tabloid stories. So I’d say all is well.
Jason, we’re a little loathe here to reprimand anyone. I’m sure you know that.
As Dale said up above, “Life’s too short.” And besides, we sorta have a motto: write gently and read generously.
Also Yvonne did that thing on lopez with zac, turned up to support him at the tangled premier and went to his nerd hq party. So no worries! The whole cast and crew love each other and get on really well. That is great stuff.
Mo Ryan reports that———Fun fact for #Chuck superfans: @BarberMatt (aka Chuck editor MattBarber) will direct a S5 episode. He’s really scared NO WAIT I mean excited
One of the things about shows as they get on in years is that the cast and writers get to try out pet projects. Matt Barber gets to direct as did Zack Levi, Yvonne got her idea of a spy plot at fashion week, one wonders what Adam Baldwin might want, more Ronald Reagan?
Actually Adam addressed that in the panel. Making Casey a huge Reagan fan WAS his idea.
I added a link under episode 5.01 spoilers to an Ausiello interview video with Zac. It’s very good, and ties right into what he said during the Chuck Panel at ComicCon.
https://twitter.com/#!/SWFanGirls/status/94968352950337536
This should comfort some, ok me ;):
https://twitter.com/#!/SWFanGirls/status/94968567174414336
The last may be the best news yet. I really didn’t they’d be dumb enough to ignore her again.
I love how you put that Dave :D.
an interview with the whole cast by mo ryan, snipets, but the giant blond shemale was mentioned, as well as triplets by YS:
http://www.aoltv.com/2011/07/23/comic-con-chuck-panel-interviews/?a_dgi=aolshare_twitter
Should probably have said I’ve embedded that video up top. 🙂 Also a hi-res of the panel embedded
(part 2 in the works).Edit: both vids are now up. With thanks to @thetechguyChris
Yvonne seemed to like the she-male part, it came up a few times Saturday!
@ rav (and all the others) I don’t know if it is true, but I hope that it is clear that I was joking (except for the broken heart part…). As I said in another website, as long as she’s not dating ME, I’m fine with her and the guy, as long as she’s happy! 😀
And I have say, this is true for her personal life, and for her professional life… So, if the end of Chuck is the starting point for an amazing carreer for YS, I can handle it…
Funny, not! But I meant what I said. It is nice for anyone in Hollywood who works 15 hour days year round to have someone there all the time. There to travel with you and do stuff and be at your beck and call.
I may have missed it but it seems to me that there were no questions about the whole “one unifying conspiracy about everything that has happened to Chuck”, does that mean the idea has been dropped or that they want it to be a suprise when it is brought up.
I think it means we all ask more questions about the relationships and characters than we do about the story!
I think I saw something about it one of the other interviews, but not the Comic Con stuff.
It’s difficult to tell because in essence they only answered questions so if it wasn’t asked it didn’t come up.
Chuck 5.01 vs the Zoom…. Ohhh I hope they go back and buy that Yellow Gremlin and get it all pimped out [ AKA the Green Hornet] – but Morgan gets so caught up in the gagets that he forgets to work on the engine… that leaks oil – blows blue smoke – and has a top speed of 23 mph….
hence Zoom as the sarcastic nickname! I’m really looking forward to more gagets and gizmos now that Carmichael Industries have a buget… errrr – millions to spend…
Heh! I like it. At 23 mph, that Gremlin would beat Morgan’s Delorean in a race! 😉
You’re spot-on about the gizmos, Gringo. But I suspect that Casey knows of few things he’d like to invest Chuck&Sarah’s money in. Those things do tend to go BANG, however.
Joe,
Once upon a time – I put together a ” World According to Casey” poster:
[ I think it might even be somewhere in the NBC archives by now]
“There’s no problem that can’t be solved
without the right application of High Explosives!”
~ just say’n… Now that they have some money
– and disposable income [ so to speak]
I can see Casey back at the annual Arms Dealer Convention in the middle east –
PLUS – it’d be fantastic to see Manoosh back as their gaget guy “Q”!
I better stop – I’ve wandered well into FanFiction again.
Episode 5.02 of Chuck will be called “Chuck vs. the Bearded Bandit”
Taken from: SpoilerTV http://www.spoilertv.com/2011/07/chuck-episode-502-chuck-vs-bearded.html#ixzz1TFpNbWfx
This my friends is what they call epic casting: Trinity (aka Carrie Anne Moss of The Matrix fame) guest stars on Chuck as Casey’s love interest. Whoa.
Wow! Should be great.
Oh, I’m still hanging on the hopes that Fedak will change her name from Gertrude to Svetlana…. just so we can hear a couple Jeffster jokes about Casey’s ” Shvetty” girlfriend…. ok, I’ll stop now.
Gotta tip my hat to their casting decisions…. hmmm, can you win an Emmy for best Casting? ~ Can’t wait to see who else they can get.
Kinda reminds me of the old Muppet show – they always had the best guests each week!
Matt Barber answered my question on twitter on what epi he is directing——–@blitztrap episode 8. My new favorite number.
Scroll up (or just click on the link to auto scroll–it’s magic) for spoilers. And the content behind these photos (click on photos for hi-res):
Photo credit: Adam Baldwin
Edit: One more!
http://twitter.com/#!/adamsbaldwin/status/98553915653623809
I’m not sure this is the right place for this link, but it seems to fit into the early S5 themes.
http://fresnobeehive.com/2011/08/yvonne_strahovs.html
It’s short and sweet.
Don’t look now but I’m apparently not the only one that squees! Ha!
http://t.co/b17EO6i
P.S. Even more spoilers coming out of the woodwork. Click this scroll to it.
That was very funny Faith! Thank you.
Holy cow, Faith! I missed it the first time. Zac actually *does* squee at the end there!
Fuuunnnnnnyyyyy! 😉
lots of new spoilers out there, no time to link them all, but ausiello talked to golbatt again about renewal, sounds like no. Awesome will be involved with the buymore – a tony robbins comparisono was made, morgan talked a bit about the morgansect, fedak said the end is pretty well thought thru now the challenge is to make the ind eps match up with the end, and will be different than any other ending, also jeff and lester were compared to Lennon and McCartney … Fedak must make frequent journey’s to other universes – eh?
All and all, the strange silence starting at comic con about Chuck and Sarah continues, my expectations are being substantially lowered for chuck and sarah as each new bit of info comes out – I think that is a good thing – I’d rather get a sense of where things are heading and brace for it, than get to imagine what I want, which is a sure recipe for disappointment. My issue with no mention of chuck and sarah, is something I have long suspected, TPTB don’t project a sense of passion, joy and excitement about the couple that I used to feel from the promotional material, I hope I am wrong, but makes me wonder if they are creatively tapped / burnt out on those two.
I don’t think we need to consider relative silence in the Chuck/Sarah front as bad news. They’ve reached a stable and happy spot where their relationship naturally won’t be the center of attention. I like seeing them together, and hopefully that will just be the normal state of things in S5. I do wish we’d hear something about a couple of Sarah-centric episodes, but that has been hinted at enough times I still think it may happen. The only other issue that may arise is children, but I really don’t expect (or even want) that to be a big topic. As Yvonne herself indicated, if anything is going to happen along those lines it will most likely be in the finale.
I agree, Dave. S4 was very CS centered with proposal/engagement/marriage. Now they can be that stable, spy-couple we love to see … together, on screen together, doing great things, not centered around couple issues. I expect some couple-y moments (perhaps a smidgen of passion every now and then) and the great CS moments “Chuck” does so well, but their issues won’t be the main story. I’m fine with that … more than fine.
Schwedak said from the get-go that Chuck and Sarah are still the heart and center of the show. I’m excited to see the story and the weekly adventures of H2H meets the ATm.
dave – you might not have gotten the point I was driving at about CS, the substance of my point wasn’t about bad news, more about TPTB’s apparent indifference towards CS. I used the relative lack of news as evidence, relative in terms of casey, awesome, jeffster, and all things morgan getting talked about this season, some more than others. Much more of a ‘meh’ than a SOS, but I used the words ‘strange silence’ and ‘lack of joy, passion and excitement’ from Fedak about Chuck and Sarah – as a fan of the show, they still are pretty exciting to me, I would love to hear good news about them, I don’t think I am alone. Who knows, most of his and schwartz’s attempts to communicate stuff about them has been received poorly, usually a negative spin on something that turns out well, maybe they decided to quit saying anything about them?
Oh yeah I agree with all of that Jason. TPTB may be a bit baffled by how to handle or discuss a stable couple. It would be nice if we heard some excitement about how they were going to write them. But I’ll take silence over malicious glee any day!
http://yfrog.com/kenynbxj
Morgan and Sarah in a fun looking scene, or just Josh and Yvonne goofing off, either way, Josh seems to have gone out of his way to tweet about Sarah / Yvonne (I can’t think of anything smarter for him) – I like Josh and it appears he loves the show chuck.
On the other hand, I have never cared for the Morgan character, but I must admit, if he is NOT in every scene with Chuck, then S5’s morgan arc will be much, much better. IMO Chuck / Morgan scenes lack chemistry, they don’t have that Ying and Yang thing going for them, just 2 “Yangs” so to speak. For the same reason, Morgan has never done well with Jeffster. On the other hand, Morgan has been great with casey, ellie, sarah, and even big mike (a funny straightman, sort of like casey). I know lots of you guysngals like morgan with alex, but the two of them have not had chemistry so far, I think Morlex might get better is s5 …. as morgan’s spy life obsessions may give way to some fun conflict, they need to squabble, such fun battle lines drawn: casey being mad at morgan, chuck / awesome backing morgan, sarah / ellie backing alex, it is a great subplot for the show ‘Morgan’ – hahaha I try to be nice to him, evidently I cannot.
Fun! Thanks, Jason.
@Jason,
You make a great point – as similar as Chuck/Morgan Zac/Josh are, that doesn’t always lend itself to a great dynamic in their scenes – although the scene in the dojo in Beard when Morgan finds out the secret is one of my favourites of the series. Morgan definitely plays better off Casey and Sarah. I can see the comic potential in Chuck seeing Morgan make the same mistakes he did, but I hope they don’t overdo it. Keep the training to Sarah and Casey – and keep it to a minimum.
I loved the Tony Robbins/Awesome as the face of the Buy More spoiler – made me laugh out loud! And Mel from ChuckTV said on their podcast that Ellie is going to be much more integrated into the spy world this season – which is also a great sign.
As for the lack of Chuck and Sarah, it may be just that from a showrunners perspective there’s not much to add. They’re married, they’re happy, we know they’re going to stay married and happy – no real news there. Yvonne mentioned how important she thinks it is to meet Sarah’s mother to round out the story, so I think we can take it as read that it will happen, probably towards the back end of the season. I actually like the fact that it looks like they’re going back to a more ensemble feel this season (if that’s what they do) – and I don’t think it needs to mean less Chuck and Sarah screen time. It just means they might be sharing the stories round a little bit more. I think that’s a good thing – I’ve always thought the show works much better when they integrate the whole cast.
@kev – it might be funny, I hope so, what I see with those two is they get carried away into their own little world of humor, it works best when sarah or casey or both or ellie are there to roll there eyes or smile & laugh (think when they hummed the star war tunes prior to morgan’s undercover mission), if left alone that type of goofiness might fall flat …. we’ll see
think, dave, and you all responded to my posting of the lack of CS promotion in the same general way, it still does not refute the notion that TPTB’s passion for the couple seems to be missing so far at the start of season 5. If it were me, I would be brimming with enthusiasm over how a stable CS allows me to finally get to tell a bit more of morgan’s, awesome’s, ellie’s, jeffster’s and casey’s stories and add depth to each of the characters. I’d rant over how chuck and sarah will bring out the character in those others, rather than overshadow and overpower. I’d also would have re-enforced the hart to hart nature of CS for S5, and how this season is about how they overcome evil together to save the world, not to save each other. See – passion is not that hard!!!!!
Haha! It’s not – and I completely agree with your sentiment. Having Chuck and Sarah settled and happy means you can involve all the characters – especially now that Carmichael Industries/The BuyMore has a legitimate set up to do so. I think the promo shows that’s what they’re planning – even if there’s no specific reference about how the Chuck/Sarah dynamic allows them to do that. Who knows? It may just be that Fedak has given up talking about them because everything he says on the subject gets parsed to the nth degree and he’s been burned before. I kind of see his point if that’s the case….
I do take your point though – it’s a little different to previous years. I’m not at all worried about Chuck/Sarah screen time though – there will be plenty!
Great comments, Kev. I generally don’t like the Chuck/Morgan scenes, but I did love the dojo scene.
It does sound like it’s going to be a good season … if they find that Morgan balance. I think you’re right that they can’t think of anything to add about Chuck and Sarah, so they are leading with what’s going to be new and different. I do get Jason’s point about promoting them, though. I don’t think they’ve yet figured out how to promote the show. Seems we’re on the same page here.
If they use Morgan well and don’t over-use him, keep up the great CS, and give us the rest of Sarah’s story, and of course the mythology tie-ups, it will be a fantastic season. I’m pretty optimistic at this point … at least until the next Fedak interview. 😉
Source: TVLine
Pregnant Sarah FTW! 😉
Awesome! Sounds like they’re responding to fan comments again….
Lianne from Forest Hills, NY: I just read that the powers that be are considering splitting up Chuck and Sarah on Chuck. PLEASE, please tell me this isn’t true?
WWC: What?! Split up one of the cutest couples on TV? The couple that just got married? And heading into their final season? That would just be cruel! Never fear, because when we chatted with Yvonne Strahovski at Comic-Con, she had much different plans for Sarah and Chuck (Zachary Levi)…and it involved procreating. That’s right, Strahovski is hoping for spy babies! “If they put [the pregnancy] in, it’ll be near the end. I can’t imagine the spy thing being pregnant, right?” Yeah, you might need to bubble-wrap that bump before getting into fistfights.
Episode 5.03 of Chuck will be called “Chuck vs. the Frosted Tips” and will center around a “wikileaks” style character.
Taken from: SpoilerTV http://www.spoilertv.com/2011/08/chuck-episode-503-chuck-vs-frosted-tips.html#ixzz1UWaGOpW7
Casting News
The Green Arrow and the Lawnmower Man guest star.
http://blog.zap2it.com/frominsidethebox/2011/08/chuck-season-5-smallvilles-justin-hartley-and-losts-jeff-fahey-to-guest-star-as-brothers.html
this one ought to frost some people, shaw returns!! if this is true, lol.
http://scifimafia.com/2011/08/chuck-a-galaxy-of-farewell-season-guest-stars-and-a-clip-of-the-new-intersect-in-training/
Misquote. It lists (specifically references AOL) the hall of fame of stunt casting…stars that have been on Chuck, rather than ones that are going to be.
The ones that are going to be on Chuck and are confirmed are Moss, Hamill, Killborn, Hartley, Fahey. Though I was excited for Tricia Helfer to return for a moment there, but alas buzz kill!
whew thanks, i checked again and they did indeed change what was posted earlier.
I know there’s some exceptions, but I don’t think most of us care too much if Shaw returns again anyway.
But of course the flip side to that is, he has no effectiveness as a stunt casting.
Episode 5.04 of Chuck will be called “Chuck vs. the Business Trip”.
Taken from: SpoilerTV http://www.spoilertv.com/2011/08/chuck-episode-504-chuck-vs-business.html#ixzz1VAeTEWmj
So who is going on the business trip, while it might be Chuck or Sarah with the story being how they deal with being apart, like any other married couple where one goes on business trips with all the cliches. What I would like to see is for Awesome and Ellie be the ones that go on the business trip leaving Chuck and Sarah to take care of baby Clara. That or a team Bartowski trip back to Weap-con, Casey’s favorite place in the world.
Great spec, Herder. TeamB in charge of Clara … hilarious.
my guess is this will be gertrude’s first episode, here is an article that some might find interesting, seems to talk about morgansect’s scope a bit also, b4 giving us a hint of when gertrude shows up:
http://www.ottawasun.com/2011/08/12/carrie-anne-moss-joins-chuck
“The first few episodes of Chuck — a series about an average computer whiz next door, played by Zachary Levi, who receives an encoded e-mail from an old college friend who leads him into working with the CIA — will deal with the cliffhanging end of Season 4.
Moss’ character will enter after three or four episodes, NBC said. She will play a former spy who now runs Verbanski Corp and the word is Chuck’s best friend and fellow spy, John Casey (played by Adam Baldwin), will fall head over heels for her.”
Thanks for the name of 5.04, Bundy. I’d added it above.
You’re welcome!
http://www.spoilertv.com/2011/08/chuck-season-5-bts-photos-of-yvonne.html
The fans worst nightmare is here!!!!!!!!! More BTS photos are out and it is of yvonne and Josh…Sarah and Morgan. The fans worst fears are now here in full force! I suppose when Chuck dreamed in 4.09 that Sarah would leave him if he did not have the intersect has just come true, lol. I suppose you are only as good as your last flash Chuck (chuck versus the beard), the show is now Morgan and Sarah and not Chuck and Sarah, uh oh! Chuckpockolypse 555 here we go!
Those were the days, my friend
We thought they’d never end
We’d sing and dance forever and a day
We’d live the life we choose
We’d fight and never lose
For we were young and sure to have our way
La la la la la la
La la la la la la
But the end is here! and now we have to have a 5ft2 midget and our 5ft10 blonde bombshell as our new hereos…Chuck ended in 4.24….Cheers Fedak!
Cute pics. Clearly BTS fun. But on screen I would prefer Morgan and Sarah (not romantically of course) to Morgan and Chuck any day. Morgan/Sarah = comedy gold.
@Thinkling
“Morgan/Sarah = comedy gold”
From your keyboard to TPTB’s ears. I have doubts about the Morgansect, but if it means pairing those two for comedy, I’m in. Sarah plays off Morgan as well as Casey, or better.
After all, who has more experience handling an Intersect?
Poor Morgan! Took that knee right in the jaw!
Such are the trials that befall The Intersect.
😉
joe – your statement makes me laugh – I think morgan’s diminutive height has had benefits in scenes with sarah. the relative height of morgan and sarah, near always places his face about even with …. well watch the scene where he gets between casey and sarah in phase 3 – you’ll see what I mean
Well, being rather – uh – vertically challenged myself I always identify with the bearded one. However, I did envy the actor that scene you mentioned, where he’s caught between – ahem – Sarah’s rock and Casey’s hard place.
Okay. I’ll stop now. 😉
That scene always makes me laugh, pretty much the ideal height difference from a guy’s perspective.
johnny – I think chuck & morgansect will be ok, and I dislike morgan as much as any fan on this blog – I just don’t think it will ruin anything. I don’t think Morgansect will even be a top ten s5 event by seasons end looking backward, a prediction & opinion of course.
I love seeing them have fun on set. It always encourages me that the cast actually gets along.
Ditto that, Dave. It always makes me smile when the characters we love (and even the ones we don’t) have fun BTS.
Jonny,
Thanks so much for the link. Since they provided the HTML, I couldn’t resist added them to this spoiler page, up top.
Next time you refresh, you’ll see them.
As someone who kept track of the BTS photos that came out at this time last year, they are no indication of much. Last year, there were quite a few of Adam and Yvonne. There were rarely any pictures released of Zac and Yvonne BTS during the entire season. I guess that meant they weren’t together in Season 4, eh?
The photos tend to be random and only reflect when the cast or crew randomly get a chance to take some. They also tend to release stuff that doesn’t particularly spoil anything.
For instance, could you imagine how ruined the “belly dancing” scene would have been if someone released a bts picture of Zac and Yvonne in their outfits beforehand?
Someone visited a film location last week and saw Zac, Josh, and Ryan in a night scene together and no Yvonne.
http://m.ign.com/articles/1188504
a fedak interview, shaw’s return is mentioned / teased, as are bryce and jill. Given my distaste for the shaw misery season, I still might bring him back if I were in charge to settle the score, maybe 2 or 3 scenes in a bottle ep, have some fun with him (he is quite funny in a deadpan (or deadwood) sort of way. Do a bit of retcon for the shippers & give him a bit of redemption, like one noble act (he honestly was given mostly incompetence, cowardness & slime in his entire season of misery). Maybe have him fall from grace right at the end, let Mary or Casey put him out of his misery (there is that word again), or both, one of those arguments over whose shot was the kill shot, heck may as well let sarah, chuck, and morgan shoot at the same time, why not?
It was the interviewer who brought up Shaw and Jill. Had the interviewer said “Hannah” and “Cole”, Fedak’s response probably would have been exactly the same.
It also seems the interview occurred a few weeks ago. The show probably is only laid out until about halfway through the season. They may have ideas on who they’d like to bring back, but who actually makes it back may depend of practicalities like who is available at the right price.
I agree Jason, it would be fun to see Shaw properly disposed of. Jill too for that matter. I like Bryce (mainly due to Matt Bomer) as a character, but I would rather he just stayed dead.
Bryce and Orion flashback? You know they probably want them back and that would allow it to happen without any more magical resurrections.
Yeah. Much as I miss PapaB, I think the dead people should stay dead. A flashback would be great for PapaB, though. Bryce, meh.
Shaw and Jill can stay wherever they are, Jill had her moment of redemption, so she doesn’t really need to come back … meh. Of all those types, I would rather see the return of Cole. He accepted his defeat w/ Sarah and treated Chuck with respect. I liked him OK, and he could fit in with the new biz.
Funny, I was thinking about Cole shortly after I posted that comment. He would be the best character to have back. He believed in Chuck and pushed his growth, it would be interesting to see his view of where things stand now.
I think Cole would be an good choice; they could have a lot of fun with that (“a Miss Bottecelli to see you, Sir.”). Although it would be interesting to see a jealous Sarah, I agree with Thinkling that Jill’s time is done.
I don’t think Shaw is even on TPTB radar, and I hope they let the dead stay dead in the last season.
I’d have no problem with a Shaw mention in order to even the score and to make Sarah admit/apologize for her weird/didn’t make sense enabling/rewarding behavior with him.
Agreed. It would be nice to have some explanation or resolution in regards to that.
Looks like we have a couple of real spoilers here.
Read no further if you’re sensitive!
http://teamchuckster.tumblr.com/post/9301889613/no-chuck-and-sarah-baby-thats-a-big
Kristin on-line reports that, according to Zac, there won’t be any weddings this season – not Big Mike & Bolonia, or Morgan & Alex or Jeff & Lester (ahem) anyone. No babies, either.
There will be plenty of comedy, drama and hijinx, just the way we’ve always known and loved it on Chuck.
Although that doesn’t rule out a pregnancy for the finale (which sort of does line-up with some of Yvonne’s earlier comments)!
I had the same thought, Dave. An announcement for the finale isn’t ruled out at all!
Ditto on that. I really don’t want a baby right away, but a pregnancy at the end would be fine. I’m OK either way.
Episode 5.05 of Chuck will be called “Chuck vs. the Hack Off” and will feature a commune.
Taken from: SpoilerTV http://www.spoilertv.com/2011/08/chuck-episode-505-chuck-vs-hack-off.html#ixzz1W1uly9GF
Hmm, an intersectless Morgan retreats to a commune (to sulk) as he thinks he is no longer a part of the team, there he stumbles onto some sort of dastardly plot. Possible but it sounds awfully Morgan-centric.
5.05 vs the Hack Off…. The Floor is open for suggestions:
A, Casey finally has to hack off his own arm when he gets stuck in a wall [again…. ]
B. Sarah decimates a grubby terrorist squad using only a butter knife
C. Jeff and Lester get locked in the new Buy More after hours and try to hack the security system …. as time runs out on Happy Hour
I heard the episode was about a commune of computer hackers.
Mark Hamill talks about his “cameo” on Chuck and also about the cast and crew. I love hearing how much fun they are, and how great people they are, because it’s true.
I’ve already been seeing a few extended trailers for Killer Elite during football. Obviously, this will be a fairly high profile movie and may get some attention for Yvonne, and we can only hope some of that trickles back on Chuck.
But the bad news is on two counts, first, the movie is a September release which certainly is not a prime date. Secondly, YS is pretty low profile so far. We see her briefly in a swim suit, obviously not without it’s appeal; but she seems to me be the no-name girl friend part in an action flick. My suspicion is this will bring no attention to either Chuck or Yvonne’s career. Hopefully I’m wrong, and I’d love to see NBC make a big deal of the Chuck/Killer Elite connection. But my current expectations are pretty low.
Dave, i agree. the lead actor NEVER has a female that has a large role other than eye candy, at least in the ones i have seen him in. i knew from jump street her work was minor at best.
Still can’t hurt her career. If someone likes her, even as arm candy, in KE, then they might check out Chuck and see the breadth and depth of her talent.
You’re right Thinkling, it can’t hurt. I’m just a little disappointed because I had hoped it would really help, and so far she’s not even being mentioned in previews. In fact, I would guess only those of us who know she’s in the movie would recognize her from the very brief appearense she gets (it’s really only a couple frames in the trailer I saw running last night).
So if it is just an arm candy sort of role, the help to Chuck will be minimal. I think in most cases, guys don’t even remember who the arm candy is in an action flick of this sort. I hope I’m wrong, I hope she makes a big impression; but I’ve seen enough Statham movies to not be optimistic.
I’ll stick this here since it’s a KE thread.
Killer Elite Yvonne interview: http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/16577654
http://www.aoltv.com/2011/08/30/community-star-to-stop-by-chuck/
Danny Pudi who plays Abed on Community will have a cameo in the fifth episode of the season.
It was also really nice to see such a positive plug for Chuck from Mo Ryan.
Yay! I just hope its a bigger cameo than the one he did for Cougartown.
Best comment that I have seen so far is to make him Lester’s brother. That or make him one of the Buy Morons.
Zac will be directing Episode 5 per SMODCast with Kevin Smith. Language warning for those of you not familiar with his podcasts.
More guest star news http://www.tvline.com/2011/08/chuck-david-koechner-catherine-dent-spoiler/
This episode is sounding awesome.
It almost sounds like Chuck and Sarah will be in the open about owning the Buy More, I wasn’t expecting that.
Yeah. It will be interesting to see how they explain that.
Or if they even bother! I can imagine an easy way; an old friend of the family gave Chuck and Sarah a substantial wedding present. That would change Chuck’s relationship with the Buy Morons pretty substantially…
But the more I think of it we may be jumping to conclusions. The owners of the Buy More, Charmichael Industries may be hosting we event, which we know means Chuck and Sarah. That doesn’t mean anyone else knows it. Still, it would be interesting if their cover was blown.
I betchya you’re right, Dave. Chuck would be the logical one for the Buy More Manager to send to a convention anyway.
BTW, who’s the manager? Morgan??? The Intersect? I’m predicting that Big Mike is back in his old job, by dictate of the new management because he’s away from his post too often.
(Annnnndddd loving it!)
I hope you’re right Dave. I think it would be WAY more fun if the “new owners” were the big Buymore mystery. CS can still be there. After all, Chuck has been there all along. Don’t know what Sarah’s excuse will be.
But if the owner is Carmichael Industies, headed by billionaire Charles Carmichael, there doesn’t have to be an obvious connection to Chuck and Sarah.
I bet that’s how they play it, at least for a while. At some point, everyone has to find out though. That would be a funny event towards the end.
I might be the only one, I’d much rather an early reveal, and have the story move on, I think far more humor and fun exists once the reveal is out, much like telling ellie or morgan about the secret, this chuck story has erred far more on beating a dead horse with a wooden stick than by going too quickly … get the reveal out and move on I say
joe in response to:
“BTW, who’s the manager? Morgan??? The Intersect? I’m predicting that Big Mike is back in his old job, by dictate of the new management because he’s away from his post too often.”
jeffster and the buymore is often regarded as the weakest part of the show, try someone new, I near guarantee the buymore B plot will trump the morgansect A plot – jeffster and company will steal the show, how? Make the manager someone super bossy, driven, used to be in charge, handling subordinate nerdy men, throw in a little sexy, ok alot sexy, you of course know who I refer too!
I think at some point they may lose their fortune in the first episode. All they will have left is the buymore and it’s stock. I think that is why the Buymore becomes very important for the whole season. They will need to keep their sales very high so they can fund their missions, lol. So you are probably going to see them host a bunch of different buymore events throughout the season in order to pay for each mission and then I think they will get paid by the spy customers. Making them billionaires would have been awesome if the show ended at the end of season 4 but it is an impossibility for season 5, they do not have the budget to have Chuck, Sarah and Casey and Morgan fly around the world doing all these awesome things.
@Jason
“Make the manager someone super bossy, driven, used to be in charge, handling subordinate nerdy men, throw in a little sexy, ok alot sexy, you of course know who I refer too!”
You mean Diane (the Titian-Haired Temptress) of course.
Holy Cow! My wife knows “The Aloha!” She lived in Riverside for more than a few years. How cool is that?
Thanks for the tip, Luckygirl.
Very welcome. Always happy to share Chuck related news. Actually, Chuck related news just makes me happy in general. 🙂
I’d like to thank everyone who’s been providing news and spoilers for this page. You’ve been doing yoman’s work!
And I’d also like to thank the technical staff (Hi, Faith! and everyone else who snuck the updates in there) for taking the time to keep this page updated. Extra gruel for all!
Not really a spoiler but is it wrong that I want to see Skip Johnson with a haircut prior to 5.13?
And Fernando should have the last line of dialoge for the series….
Looking at a blonde female customer singing “Vicki Vale” as she walks towards him obviously having phone problems.
Oh, and the only way Morgan can get the **rolls eyes** Morgansect out, is to shave.
Yes, it is very wrong. You want to see him forget the groady beard and shave again.
😉
If CHUCK can do one thing this season, please of please do something like this:
I talked a little bit about the smiles of Zach and Yvonne, even if they are ripping the scene off it will still be beatiful, lol.
I also think that kind of scene can say so much without the characters saying much at all. The look on Don’s face is fascinating and Betty’s smile is of pure joy and happiness, it is such a simple scene yet it shows so much, they are at that moment in time, happy. Brilliant.
A Chuck/Sarah promo pic is out http://chucktv.net/2011/09/02/photo-season-5-keyart-with-chuck-sarah/
Love it! Chuck’s attitude, Sarah’s confidence, the fact that both have pistols in one hand and the other’s hand in theirs… POWER COUPLE.
Thanks, Luckygirl!
Oh yeah, Joe, totally agree. Maybe I’m reading too much into it, but to me it says a lot. Like, Chuck and Sarah are together and a real power couple; it’s Chuck and Sarah, no Chuck and Morgan; and Chuck is no wimp without the Intersect.
Don’t know what the Buymore means. I can’t see it burning down until the end.
It is billed as “Chuck and Sarah’s spy company” or their own spy company or whatnot. Volkoff gave the money to them and they’re both outfitting the business, etc. My biggest worry is Sarah will be the “secretary,” but since that was never the case to begin with, I think I can rest easy.
It’s perfect! And it’s just me or the Buy More at the background is on fire?
I think you’re right, Amron. It is the Buy More! Looks like the aftermath of a explosion, and really, the look on C&S’s faces say to me that they’re responsible.
Now my imagination is running amok!
yeah it is. it looks like the scene at the end of season 2 when it blew up and the sign fell down. could happen again i suppose.
I really love the picture! Not so sure that the exploding Buy More means anything, but it is intriguing.
WOW!
Indeed
pretty darned serious looking, no Morgan, no foolin around, if Jonathan and Jennifer Hart saw the Bartkowski’s coming towards them, I’d recommend to the Hart’s that they turn and run the other way, Chuck and Sarah look like a pair of superstars. Heck Jonathan and Jennifer could not even take Stephen and Mary?
I think the person who did that key art was probably influenced by this Quantum of Solace pic:
http://www.imdb.com/media/rm3704722688/tt0830515
New photos! All of them looked bad ass!!
http://www.hitfix.com/galleries/new-chuck-season-5-gallery-images
Love the pics. Thanks. It’s always interesting to see how Castle evolves.
Yeah, they look like quite the professional team. I love it!
Me too. Although I had to admit, I miss the Chuck Taylors…
If those 6 photo’s are any indication of the legacy this season seeks to create, looks like near everyone might like s5, by everyone I mean fans of drama and shippers, who seem to be the two most vocal parts of the fan base. Of the 6 photo’s, the most noteworthy one was the photo not there, causing a significant part of the fan base to breathe a sigh of relief.
OK. Would that be a bromance pic? It was kind of reassuring … just the right 6 pics.
Although I like the photos, they show Chuck’s development into a functioning adult, I’d still like to see some photos about how Chuck is still Chuck and even how Sarah is moving towards him as much as she is moving towards her. I may be saying this poorly, but much of Chuck’s development is to become more like Sarah, I’d like to see Sarah’s development to become more like Chuck. Just a simple scene like the one with them watching tv with her in socks and his head on her lap. That worked for me, them playing board games seemed forced and didn’t work for me.
Mind you Sarah not fitting in is also great, think of her playing monsters with Morgan’s action figures
I absolutely agree with that, Herder. There’s always been concern coming from TPTB, I think, that fans didn’t want Chuck to change; they wanted him to remain the semi-goofy, lanky nerd we first met, at least, mostly. My guts said that, as a group, we liked seeing Chuck grow into Charles Carmichael, though. And if anything, that was exactly the part of him that was the best of Sarah. You know – confident, strong, capable.
It must of been conceptually harder for them to evolve the Sarah character, because she was designed to be mysterious. I know I struggled to get a handle on her. Was Sarah cold? Was she a repressed volcano? Merely confused? Perhaps when you think of Sarah sitting on the bed unable to say a word when Chuck asks for her name, just her middle name, it’s possible to wonder if she’s slightly autistic, the way Gregory House is supposed to be.
Sarah’s wedding vows was a major step towards Chuck’s openness.
Anyway, I know what you mean about scenes of them just sitting and relaxing – just being themselves. If The Power Couple is a persona that reflects their inner strength, then we’d also want to keep the image we have of Chuck and Sarah in private, quiet and genuine. I always enjoy seeing them focused on each other!
Have a look at the background…Chuck is still Chuck and Sarah in her infinite wisdom “allowed” him to decorate Castle that way 🙂 So in a sense you’re seeing in that one picture the best of both worlds.
Herder – I thought most of s4, Sarah moved toward Chuck, she moved into his house, assumed his social life, two of her three best friends became Ellie and Morgan (Chuck’s two best friends), she got funnier, and she sort of ‘girled up’ to the working toward becoming a normal girl.
What I did not like, is as Sarah moved toward Chuck, TPTB wrote Chuck very inconsistently, at times brave, clever, & warm hearted like we want, but at other times self conscious, prone to whine and obsess, and somewhat self absorbed. Morgan seemed to steal near all of Chuck’s common sense, which I seem to recall was sort of the bedrock of Chuck’s character in S1/S2.
For S5, I don’t need Sarah to act more like Chuck, I need Chuck to act more like Chuck.
Go Packers! My 22 yr old son was at the game, talked to him afterwards, he said it was the ‘best night of his life’. His g/f did not have a ticket, but said she sat in the front row for the 50,000 attended pre-game concert, got a guitar pick as one of the band members was exiting. As I was talking to them, the background noise outside the stadium seemed like a tornado was coming thru.
Anyhow, enough Packer bravado, there was a point to this post. NBC had no Chuck previews during the game that I recall nor did I expect any, but the previews for the upcoming NBC season seemed abnormally weak. I think I am in a huge minority here, in that I hope Chuck is done unless the show gets retooled as ‘Bart to Bart’, but given what I saw last night, I would not exactly count Chuck out yet.
I thought last night’s game was on ESPN or NFL Network? You might have had a local station that broke ranks, but I don’t believe it was a network game for NBC. Sunday night should be a real test; although it may be another couple weeks before a returning show like Chuck gets much press. Of course all the “exposure” Yvonne is getting right now may help some.
I do agree about some retooling needed if the show is to last any further. I think they could keep the entire cast, but they need to drop all pretense of serialized structure and go to something more episodic. And of course I agree it should be all about Chuck and Sarah!
I did not know it wasn’t a NBC game, there was a huge amount of advertising for the upcoming season on the affiliate I watched – huge. Killer Elite did have one spot, did not see Yvonne’s face, but I think I saw a quick shot of a hand on a bikini clad bottom, I am guessing that is pretty much her job in Killer Elite. I doubt it will help Chuck much, Zac appeared all over the country last year and became a bit of a pop star for Tangled, with little help to Chuck. I sure wish TPTB had gotten his co star, Mandy Moore to make a guest appearance on Chuck, yet another missed opportunity. But who knows, last year Chuck got no promotion, maybe without Zac’s Tangled success and without the kinder, gentler themed Chuck / Sarah relationship in S4, the show would have bombed big time, that is one theory we will never, ever know for fact, my way of ‘fake it till you make it’.
I don’t know for sure who had the national rights (I missed it, bummer), but normally Thursday games are cable except in their local markets.
For Yvonne I was referring more to her Maxim cheesecake than the movie. I don’t think Killer Elite (no one will even know who she is!) will have any bearing on Chuck, but a cover feature for a national magazine might.
I agree that KE probably won’t have an impact, but comparing it with Tangled isn’t quite fair. In KE you will see Yvonne. That has a bigger impact than just a voice. Annimated films don’t generally offer much visibility to the people who provide their voices.
I don’t know if anyone picked up on the interview link I put in another thread, but it has a KE clip at the end of the interview that shows Yvonne’s character a little better than the bikini shot. Besides that it’s a really nice candid interview with Yvonne, answering random questions from fans.
Dave, Jason NBC gad the rights to the game. there was a huge stink because of the presidents speech. so if it ran on another network they probably had to run the NBC ads. i was driving last night so i missed the game or what it aired on.
EW is psyched about Chuck!
Oh and there’s a photo:
“A little more shady than they’re used to” sounds like trouble. But I’m thinking a fun sort of trouble; Chuck has always done well eccentric and oddball characters. Usually just over the top enough to be funny, without being complete caricatures.
Boy, I’m having a hard time figuring if this season is going to be “darker” or “lighter” than S4! Seems to have qualities of both!
We’ve got characters who are “more shady than they’re used to” (more shady than Sh@w????) and it looks like we’ve got cults (shades of The Mentalist!) and there are rumors floating around Twitter about a nudist colony!
Um… sexy time??? I’m not sure what to make of it all. I think I must wait for the season to actually air before I find out! 😉
I’m hoping it’ll be a balance between season 3 and season 4. the gritty drama of 3 mixed with the light hearted of 4. 🙂
New spoiler from E-Online! above, for 5.05.
Beau Garrett (Tron Legacy) will be guest-starring as a “cult leader”.
We have Spoiler News, but I don’t know where to put it yet!
Inside TV reveals that actress and supermodel Rebecca Romijn will guest star on an unspecified episode.
Sounds exciting. That’s the kind of drama and tension we haven’t had since the days that Chuck was constantly threatened by death or bunker from the CIA … in addition to enemy threats. Seems like that dynamic may return this year.
I think I saw somewhere that was 5.06. I’m really liking the idea of butting heads with the government this season; Chuck and Sarah (and teamB) vs the world!
this is from the article you linked to. “EW has learned exclusively that the actress will appear in the sixth episode of the upcoming season”
Ah, I missed that! Read too quickly.
Thanks! 5.06 it is!
Scroll up (or just click on the link to auto scroll–it’s magic) for a TV Guide photo and article!
OK. I hate the money crisis bit. Sooo predictable. Bleh. But if that’s my only complaint, I can’t really complain. 🙂
Episode 5.08 of Chuck will be called “Chuck versus The Baby”
Taken from: SpoilerTV http://www.spoilertv.com/2011/09/chuck-episode-508-chuck-versus-baby.html#ixzz1YrRZk9AE
SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!
[Gasps for air…]
SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!]
ouch my ears, lol. my bet is they have to baby sit clara.
A – BABY Clara
B – BABY Stephen is one the way
C – BABY EPT scare
D – that crazy Fedak is yanking our chains again, probably going to be about Jeff and Lester babysitting Jeff’s nephew
That is the type of title that will get some attention however, I’m voting for 5×9 to be Chuck versus Honeymooners Part Duex – in France of course!
I think you’re right Jason. I don’t think Chuck and Sarah will get pregnant until the very end, if then. Although we may get some nice Chuck and Sarah baby discussion out of this episode.
Ah, clarification, whose baby Stephen? Woodcomb or Bartowski?
Think – in case you weren’t aware, I’ve already named Chuck and Sarah’s first baby Stephen. I think I did that last season when I was rooting for the Alias ending for 4×24, with CS walking hand in hand on the beach along with their two children and ‘Uncle’ General Casey.
Ok, Jason, I remember your beach scenario. I liked it. But I had forgotten about the name. Then of course Stephen may go to the next male child of either couple. Let the race begin 😉
Think – this ending sets the bar. Fedak has more than once said he is a fan. The baby in Sydney’s arms is named “Jack’, named after Sydney’s hero father (Sydney is Chuck essentially). Uncle Dixon is Sydney’s old partner. And the puzzle that Isabelle puts together right at the end, that would be like ‘baby Stephen’ downloading the intersect, the puzzle is something nobody can do as fast as Sydney, and now her daughter can to just as the credits role. What do you think?
Oh yeah, great ending, Jason. I would be happy with something like that.
Yeah I think baby sitting or a false alarm is most likely, with actual pregnancy in 5.13.
Although unlikely, the baby could be Sarah’s car ;). Or CI is engaged some dignitary and his family. Either Casey or Sarah having to watch Clara would be good also.
That’s a great idea Shep … dignitary’s baby … protecting a baby somehow being the assignment.
Anyway, maybe we’ll get some baby talk.
My guess is that yes, it’s a teaser. But their motis operandi (did I spell that anywhere close to right???) has been to tease and then have the tease become a real lead in at the very end.
I suspect it’ll get us to our first real indication of little spybabies wearing superhero capes.
Oh – And i hear (via twitter) that Rafe and Lauren have written the episode. That’s a good sign.
Honestly?
All I want is one scene…just one…where Casey babysits Clara.
(and for Chuck and Sarah to have spy babies at some point, but that’s an obvious desire). 🙂
Casey babysitting would be a hoot!
That’s sort of my hope too, kind of a Kindergarden Cop vibe, can’t you see Casey saying “it’s not a tumor”. Also the omni capable Sarah being stumped, frustrated and frightened of a baby. Loads of opportunity for laughs.
I’m not one for spoilerTV but if this one does go through, pregnancy scare FTW!
Hola Amigos:
Wasn’t sure where to post this question: But, in Season 4 were we too easy on Mary Bartowski?
Were we get too giddy [ or dazzled] by Volkoff/Winterbottom to pay close attention to her?
Were we easily resigned to sweep all her excuses for being away from her family for 20 years [as another plot hole the writer road crew failed to fill in properly]?
In a strange way – I’m really hoping we see a stronger return of Mary Bartowski…. not so much to answer questions – but that she plays a bigger role in what lies ahead.
I hope I’m not alone in waiting anxiously for this big conspiracy plot to actually become a significant story arc….
Yep – too much to ask for… but I think there’s a glimmer of hope.
I think so yeah, well depending on who you ask that is. Some are too harsh on her and others too easy. For myself I was too easy on her. I was swayed by the intentions behind her actions and the memory of PapaB but now in hindsight I think we were too easy on her. With all this Decker stuff, I can’t imagine she didn’t at least know some part of it and if she does play a bigger role in what lies ahead I think it would restore a bit of her character in terms of credibility though not necessarily sympathy. And you’re definitely not alone on rooting for the conspiracy, I am too. I’m not expecting it to be what the fans want it to be, I think it’ll fall short of that, but I’m hoping it satisfies at least some of what fans want out of it.
Hum.
Spoiler TVMichael Ausiello at TV-Line (sorry!) has a poll up about who might play Emma, Sarah’s [Spoiler!].At the moment Carrie Fisher has a slight lead, and color me surprised!
Added: Looks now like this is a major spoiler. MA seems to be saying we’re going to meet Sarah’s mom, positive, definite.
Thx Joe – Jeri Ryan, Jeri Ryan, Jeri Ryan, but actually, who gives a darn, she’ll be great no matter who.
I guess it hadn’t really been confirmed they would this season, but I believe Chris Fedak said they’d planned to do it last season but couldn’t find the time.
Based on other spoilers, i.e. Chuck Versus The Baby, it looks like they are going where I thought they would. Use either a pregnancy scare or Chuck&Sarah taking care of a baby to bring up Sarah’s mother issues to set up her reconnecting with/reconciling (or not) with her mother, thus giving closure and allowing Sarah to consider motherhood for herself at the end of the season and series.
Eso es todo!!! That’s the final piece, the last unknown character that we needed to meet before the final curtain… and I don’t want Emma to be a spy. I want her to be “normal”… or as normal as Sarah’s [spoiler] could be… But of course, the last word would be Fedak’s…
Someone suggested Vicki Vale herself Kim Bassinger, I have to admit, that probably is perfect
I think I said that about a year ago, I do like that choice. But Carrie Fisher? Oy! She’s what, 5′ nothing? No way!
Wahoo! That is good news … and possibly recurring. Hmm.
I also have been suggesting Kim Basinger every time it comes up. I think she would be the best choice. She’s not as tall as Yvonne, but she would be believable … in height and looks. I think she could pull off whatever personality they wanted. She can be brainy and serious or daffy and ditsy.
And it would circle back to the Pilot (Batman).
That’s a very exciting spoiler Joe. I had to vote for Lynda Carter (my very first TV crush…)
I would DIE if it ends up being Lynda Carter. Team America Lynda Carter for Sarah’s mom F Yeah!!
Awesome! Super interested in how they are going to explain the strained relationship if her mom is a “walking hug”.
From the list they have Rene Russo. She was my pick for Mama B so why not Sarah’s mom.
This was one of my wishes for season 5. Yay! http://twitter.com/#!/wendilynnmakeup/status/118408855297327105
I think my head is about to explode with all this new Chuck info, first we get to find out that they are casting for Sarah’s mum, but also find out they’re seemingly making a christmas episode? Think I’ve died and gone to Chuck heaven. This is awesome 🙂
Yeah this is all pretty exciting!
Two down and one wish to go … Sarah’s birthday.
Damn it! I had never thought about it!
Oh noz! Spattered Lappers all over the walls! 😉
Yeah, this has got my imagination going like it hasn’t for a while.
Chuck – Episode 5.01 – Chuck Versus The Zoom – Short Synopsis ——- Carmichael Industries takes on a thief and a conniving investor; Morgan helps Chuck put together a surprise for Sarah; Jeff and Lester work on their latest scheme.
Taken from: SpoilerTV http://www.spoilertv.com/2011/09/chuck-episode-501-chuck-versus-zoom_27.html#ixzz1Z92i0oqa
Thanks for the tip this AM, Bundy! I’ll put it up top.
You’re very welcome!
one thing that bugs me about the synopsis is, when will chuck be able to plan or do something for sarah without someones help? just saying.
It’s simply for the sake of exposition. If he does it alone there’s no reason for Chuck to talk aloud about what he wants to do for Sarah and why. Morgan is just a tool.
ernie i agree morgan is a tool.
We can all agree with that! It just varies as to what to sort…
Confirmation for the Christmas, guys:
Bigger photo up above.
I’m just happy to see the return of the elf costumes. I will sleep well tonight…
Dave, that’s just…disturbing.
You know what, I bet the elf costume isn’t even in the episode; that’s just someone in the crew wearing one to get in the spirit of things while shooting. Dang, now I’m all disappointed.
Another Ausiello tidbit http://www.tvline.com/2011/09/ask-ausiello-spoilers-glee-dexter-fringe-sons-of-anarchy/
More from Sarah’s past. Oh Yippee.
Forgive me for being skeptical or apprehensive about either mom’s or this handler’s possible story. I want them to work out and will be pleased if they do. But after the Mama B / Papa B debacle of S4 I can’t help but have reservations.
Shep seriously, if you didn’t like S3 or S4 why are you even still here? Maybe you should find a show and site that is more to your liking. I saw no “debacle” of any sort in S4, and I think its safe to say a majority of posters here were pleased with last season. You are always welcome to offer opinion and analysis just like anyone else, but it baffles me that you are so unhappy with this show but continue commenting on it. They’ve certainly done stories I disliked too, but I can’t imagine I’d still be here if I was so down on so much of the show.
Dave, it’s clearly because Shep thinks we’re fantastic writers and the regular commenters always have insightful, interesting and amazing things to say.
And I agree!
😉
Ahhh, well that would explain a lot Joe!
Dave i can’t answer for Shep but i can tell you why i am still here. i disliked most of season 4 and missed the last couple of episodes on purpose, except the finale, hoping it would bring me back. it didn’t. i know enough about the pitfalls the show has looming over it for the up coming season, like morgan and the Intersect. most fans agree its a bad move. i can still offer an informed opinion on that.
i can still offer an informed opinion on what trouble they can and most likely will get into with sarah’s past. the cat squad is a good example of that. if she was with such an elite unit engaged in gun battles like they showed (i think) why did she need the red test? wasn’t she an agent with the CATS? it makes the red test even stupider. it clouded her time line even more, and that issues was addressed on this blog when it aired.
sarahs mom is another can of worms they are going to get into. it’s going to be hard to explain a woman’s absence from her daughters life when she was young. it’s an area they will need to tread lightly in and do it right, something the past has shown me probably won’t work.
based on the fact i did watch last year i can still offer an informed view of what the spoilers could mean. like i can guess that sarah’s handler is the same agent mentioned in the spoiler at the top of the page, the one who may be able to help.
JC is right sarah’s past is a mine field i feel they should stay away from. like her mom i don’t think it will end well. i don’t mean the episodes will be bad i mean it will change things we believe are true ATT.
the final reason is it’s entertaining reading. watching people defend their points of view against someone else is like watching he debate teams in high school. that’s not a dig by the way i did enjoy that. i will say this i won’t comment at all on the new season unless by some chance i actually watch an episode, that could happen depending on the reviews here. i hope that’s not the case however, because for me to come back the show will have gone in a opposite direction from what you guys want to see, and it’s not right for me to wish for that. i’m done with it and you guys should get to enjoy the final season of the show you guys think is great.
It’s a strange thing, Army. If you asked me in what direction I want to see the show go, I don’t think I’d have a ready answer for you. Although I’ve known from the first that I really, really wanted Chuck&Sarah to get together, I don’t think I even had a timetable for that, and I certainly didn’t have a preferred method. (Well, actually, at times I wanted them to run away and elope, at times I wanted the white wedding. My preference changed over time.) Everything else was negotiable.
Truly, I’ve always preferred to see what their imagination had in store. I already know what my imagination could conjure, and I sorta liked to see theirs.
As you can tell by reading nearly any of the posts I’ve written, I’ve generally come away satisfied, and even impressed. But that’s just me. There’s no guarantee that you (or anyone) will come away being able to say “I recognize some truth in that story.” It just happens to be true for me and, I see, quite a few others.
Army I wouldn’t argue with any of your points, but it does still surprise me that you would spend so much time here. I certainly do enjoy the debates, and the challenge of deciding how to defend a position or make a point understood. But I still can’t imagine I would still be here if I’d given up the show like you have. Usually if I throw in the towel on something I want nothing more to do with it. Obviously that’s your business, but its something I’ll never quite get.
For one specific point, yes they made a bit of a mess of Sarah’s timeline. Not only is it ridiculous that the Red Test apparently occurred after her time with the CAT squad; but pretty much everythiing about the Red Test is offensive and absurd. I would hope that they just ignore the Red Test going forward. In fact, when we meet her old handler, I hope they do it with a minimum of fuss about the past (like when Beckett encountered her old partner from her rookie days on Castle last season; apart from establishing their history together, the episode was clearly about current events). If they do delve into the past (which given the “conspiracy” story line, is certainly a strong possibility) they could likely talk about college, training, and Omaha Project without getting into CATs or Red Tests at all. These sorts of stories always get trickier the longer a series runs and the more history has already been established; just look at all the contradictions that had piled up in the Star Trek universe by the end of Voyager; or even worse, by the end of the entire retcon series Enterprise (I actually enjoyed the series, but it presented A LOT of problems with continuity). I’m actually not trying to complain or criticize about anything here, just acknowledge that making up a universe that is always consistent is very difficult, and gets harder the longer it runs.
So while I would acknowledge that there are risks and potential pitfalls in exploring the past yet again; I think its actually something that’s been done quite well on Chuck (again, with a few exceptions). And I really look forward to learning more about my favorite setting and characters once again.
Sooo the wrong thread but anyways……
Dave,
You and I agree on the value (or lack thereof) of S3 storyline, no issue there.
I have never said I disliked S4, however I do not see the “genius” in that some do. If fact my view on S4 is similar to Big Kev’s.
The Chuck and Sarah romance aspect of S4 worked for me. There was maybe too much of it, but I was OK with it. However the part that gives me heartburn is trying to have to make sense of the Mama B, Volkov / Hartley, Papa B story, and this is where we seem to disagree. I have no issue with Mary in S4, until Volkov showed up, from then on it makes little to no sense.
For me having C&S together (in some form) is a necessity for the show to function properly, however it can’t be the show’s driving force, a story is needed. For various reasons for me both S3 and S4 spy stories (season long arcs) haven’t worked.
Now S5 is coming and I hear that we’re going to meet Sarah’s mom (excellent – I want to meet her too), Sarah’s handler (I have no opinion), and that a season long conspiracy arc will be used as an all encompassing explanation to most of everything that ever happened. But since most of the comments I have seen have most agreeing that this group doesn’t do season long arcs well, handle retcons somewhat questionably, and having trouble drumming sympathy for some of the characters we should have sympathy for, I think being both excited and apprehensive about what I’m hearing not a stretch.
As far I to why I’m still here – don’t worry about anymore.
Joe, stop with all the family stuff, 24 episodes is enough. their together married and happy, have it simmer in the back ground. don’t waste time on the past, you have 13 to go write a good story that’s funny and has some spy drama that doesn’t center on the family. lose morgan with the intersect put him where he belongs out of sight most of the time. they had 4 years to bring up her past and didn’t do it then why do it now?
Dave, were just different that’s all. like i said the discussions are good. just like you feel they did a good job, i think they did a lousy job. its just different point of view. you just forget about a show when you give up on it is the same as me wondering why you would sit through a show you hated (s3) when i chose to give up because i disliked S4. some things will never be explained or understood. human behavior is one of them and this is one such case.
Shep I agree with almost everything you said, I guess somehow our intensity levels are just different on those things. I had somehow missed that you were mostly happy with S4; I really am glad to hear it. It just seems you focus a lot on what went wrong and I hadn’t realized there was so much you were pleased with. I do get that its natural to want to talk more about what could have been done better than what is already considered good.
Army believe me I get that we’re very different. And even if there are things I don’t get, its fine with me if you enjoy the debate here! And I stuck with the show in S3 purely from the belief it woulld get better, and it did! Usually when I give up a show its because I don’t like what I believe to be long term issues, not a single story or theme I dislike. At least, not unless I believe that single story will have long term implications I don’t like. And it is VERY rare for me to give up on a show after the first season (but I am a pretty harsh judge of any show’s first season!).
Answers to the name Ryker – a little throw back to Star Trek / Robert Duncan McNeil. although I suppose Tom Paris or Jon Luc Picard would have been more so? The timing seems to be shaping up, with the 7th ep being the Xmas ep, probably a 3-6 week break, and the final 6 eps being in the New Year. The show will come back to the vs the Baby ep, which seems like a tremendous idea.
I had earlier spec’d that Mama Walker will come on for the 9th and 10th eps, I still think that, given they are shooting the 7th as we speak, and still have not casted the actress. I suppose she could stay thru the 13th, depending on what her character is, but I would guess she will only be around thru the 10th.
I would guess Sarah’s handler will be part of the last 3 eps, and we will find out that Sarah was somehow connected to Chuck before she walked into the BuyMore. That probably will be the time where the legacy of the show will be cemented, one way or the other. If told well, lots of past sins will be made up for, if done poorly, Chuck will be known as a comedy / action series that polarized its fan base most of the time when it got serious.
I’m mostly excited about this; I’m not exactly sure when Sarah would have had a handler, presumably while she was in college or training. So that may mean we’ll learn something about why a teenager was recruited in the first place, perhaps we’ll learn more about the long neglected Omaha Project. It will be interesting to see if “Ryker” is a part of the vast conspiracy or someone teamB can get answers from.
But the really good news here is it means Sarah will still have an important part to play in the story; its not going to be just the Morgan show.
It would be great fun if this Ryker were played by Jonathan Frakes (far too old, though, I guess)
Ditto, Dave. I’m very positive about what we’ve heard, and I’m even dreading Morgansect a little less.
Wilf! You read my mind! Jonathan Frakes for the win!
It’s interesting to see them explore Sarah so much. I kind of can’t wait. Though I would like more Bartowski backstory if I’m honest. I still feel like there are a lot of unanswered things going on there.
*tries not to get too excited for season five*
I’m wondering if some of these people in Sarah’s back story are connected to some of those in Chuck’s backstory that we already know ie Mama and Papa B, Bryce, Hartley, Graham ect. Doing this as a way to bring the conspiracy full circle.
Leigh, I feel just like you do. I love exploring Sarah’s back story (except for certainBlack Box *cough* items). I’m really glad we’re finally going to get the mom story.
I’m also really looking forward to the conspiracy story that will answer some of those unanswered things. But hey I loved the S4 final arc and all its reveals.
You have me beat though. I’m not trying not to get to excited about S5. The only down side is that it’s the end 😦
I wonder if it’s a bit like comics, though, Thinkling, where it might be better that it goes out early so we can have a real ending, and a real wrap-up to a story.
There are so many comics and shows that outlive their shelf life and have a hard time coming up with fresh stories, that they often become a shadow of what they once were; old and stale and without any excitement. So maybe Chuck going out in season 5 is a little bit of a blessing. They’re getting to tell, essentially, a complete story; a complete character arc. Nerdy Tech Guy to Professional Awesome Spy. I think that’s pretty amazing. 🙂
I AM still crossing my fingers that NBC will pick up more episodes though. Their ratings are apparently horrendous this season, so I’m holding out a bit of hope.
Leigh, I know people have mixed feelings about the end, and I know it’s nice to be able to end the story the way they want.
I just think there’s always another chapter. Just like Chuck has dramatically changed from S1, they can take another turn. I agree with tying up all the mythology threads … for the most part — there could always be another Orion file to surface from time to time, but the Puppet Master needs to be revealed, and Chuck and Sarah need to have all the mysteries solved, so they can open the next chapter of their lives. And that’s what I want to see … the next chapter. (That said, I suppose the PM could escape to keep being their Nemesis, but the mysteries and the past need to be resolved)
I love Ernie’s idea of a trilogy of trilogies that show us chapters in Chuck and Sarah’s happy ever after … 1,3, and 5-7 years down the road … new place, new setting, new life. But obviously the spy life will keep knocking at their door and interrupting their life. — Maybe they will always be the team that does things governments are afraid to do. Maybe they’re a ghost team that POTUS calls on for certain black-ops missions from time to time. We could see baby(s) Bartowski and Sarah the soccer mom and some new people who think they are the weirdest family ever. Sort of a Thin Man/MM Smith/Undercover Blues type of scenario, with compelling 3 episode arcs or made-for-TV movies. … I know, but a girl can dream.
Oh well, I would keep on watching their story as long as they keep telling it. So, I agree that the shelf life of this particular segment is ready to be wrapped up. But I think there are plenty more chapters that I would enjoy just as much.
@think – it is interesting that more than one of us regular bloggers somewhat want the show to end. For me, one of the reasons, is if the show were to go on, I do not trust the show runners to do the characters or the mythology justice. I honestly love the characters, but don’t like how Chuck’s team tells a story. That is why I like Chuck’s procedural eps far more than the season ending mini arcs.
For s5, I sort of have my fingers crossed that they tie things up nicely (which they all but have promised they will), but TPTB don’t have a great handle on what I want, what seems satisfying to TPTB, might not be so much with me. With more eps, I see the only way this team knows how to keep going, is to do something that harms either the characters or the mythology. Again, I am apparently not the only fan feeling that way, as many fans seem content for it to end.
One more quick point, I have blogged about the alias ‘run away to a life on the beach and seclusion’ for CS’s end. One thing I failed to mention, Alias foreshadowed that ending probably a dozen times in the 5 seasons. I ask you / others for confirmation on this, but haven’t both Chuck and Sarah talked more (both as a collective dream, as well as them individually?) about having a ‘normal’ life as opposed to a life in seclusion as free agent super spies? I could see the end for them being the ‘Suburbs’ in Burbank, Burbank being the only place Sarah felt like she was home, except of course that Chuck is her home????????
You know I agree with all of that Thinkling. There have been shows that continued on past the point where they still had good ideas, but I don’t believe Chuck is anywhere near that yet. I’d be happy to laugh with and enjoy these characters for another few years yet. As I said elsewhere, I think the key is how long the principle players want to continue; and I don’t believe that’s something we, as outsiders, can really know. I hope they get to continue as long as the principles want to, and I REALLY hope that includes an S5 back order!
Well, Jason, in the scenario I mentioned, the mythology is over. It’s the next chapter, which means a change.
Your reason for wanting the show to go ahead and end is based on a lack of trust in the show runners. While I think TPTB committed grievous errors in S3, the other 65 episode have been very satisfying. Of course I have liked their final and mid season arcs. So I don’t have the basic distrust that you do.
Jason you’re exactly right about the “normal” part; so yeah, I think the suburban house and 2.5 kids is very likely last scene.
Dave – but once you show that ending, in a Burbank suburb, how can you show eps with the ‘consequences’ that a substantial (maybe not a majority, but it is not exactly zero either) part of the fan base wants to see? Now for me, I’d be OK with 5×13 ending in the suburbs ten years in the future, with the 2.5 kids, then have add on episodes like Ernie blogged about to fill in gaps in those years. But my vision for those add ons (and I think yours and thinks too) might be quite different than we might get.
I think many fans want Sarah hanging upside down being tortured or some back story where she had sex with a dozen creepy CIA handlers, cause she couldn’t keep her hands off any man that buys her coffee or lunch with desert. Or they want Sarah to leave Chuck to save his life, or Chuck’s mind to go haywire so he forgets Sarah. I don’t see this at all for the show, but many do. My fear is, the creators seemingly at least think such thoughts, and I do not trust them.
I could watch a couple hundred lite, Castle like procedural adventures that the Bart to Bart team would undertake, I just don’t ‘think’ that is what we would get if we get more.
Jason I’m really not that worried about them going that dark. I know some viewers want that, but the only time they really went that dark (misery arc) was pretty thoroughly trashed by everyone. We actually see more defenders for that season now than we did at the time, and I just don’t believe they would ever choose to tell that sort of story again.
But I would have to admit, my preference for a longer running show would be different show runners. I think the current brain trust tries too hard to make everything into an epic story. Historically episodic shows have done better in the ratings and lasted far longer than more serialized shows do. Now I still consider Chuck a hybrid in that regard; but if they were to continue doing stories into the normal suburban family period they would need to respect that stability of that family as a major issue. I think fans of darker entertainment have mostly jumped ship by now anyway; or at least I think they will by the end of S5 (most talk we’ve seen has indicated a lot of comedy and light hearted fun for the coming season). And IF the show is to continue past S5 in any fashion it will be for viewers who want the stability and happy family stories. Which by the way, would include almost every single one of the more casual viewers that I know (I’m just sayin’, there IS a market!).
It’s interesting to me when you guys talk about season 3 being dark…because for me, it wasn’t. I mean, it was a little painful to watch the Shaw stuff, don’t get me wrong. I wanted the guy to fall off a cliff, but to me, it was just another case of Schwartz wanting to do another love triangle. If you ever watched the OC, you know he has a thing for them, and sometimes they work, and sometimes they’re sour. But dark, really dark, to me, would have been if they had played more with the Laudenol than that one episode. If they were going for dark, there it was right there. Emotion inhibiting drug. I would have been glued to my friggin’ seat, Daniel Shaw be damned.
Jason – I don’t really understand about your thoughts on Sarah having sex with creepy CIA agents…it seems like something out of smutty fanfic, which is fine, but I don’t think they would go that way on the show. I know Casey shames Sarah a little about her past (and to be fair he shames everybody for their romantic entanglements) with falling for the people she works with, but I just don’t see that happening….I think the creators, no matter how flawed they are, know their own story and ability to tell said story well enough to know they couldn’t, and shouldn’t try to pull that off. *shrugs*
Ditto all that, Dave. I just really don’t see them going dark any more, especially since they have said that S5 is a love letter to fans.
I do think they would need to turn the page and go more episodic. The mythology needs to conclude and a new chapter begin. Can you have some stray Orion files or nemeses that lurk in the background? Sure, but that’s different from continuing to spin more mythology. Chuck and Sarah could still get caught up in other conspiracies, just not the Orion ones.
Anyhoo my vision for more Chuck is along Ernie’s lines of mini arcs from Chuck and Sarah next chapter … their happy ever after … which means basically that … normal happy life with periodic inconvenient-hilarious-dangerous-suspense-action interference from the spy world.
Leigh – she is on the books with Bryce, Shaw, nearly Cole and Chuck, that pretty much is every man she has worked with as written by the real writers, not FanFic. Then there was the mark at the start of Pink Slip, not a story well told, but again, not exactly fan fic either. The problem is the actual written script puts impressions out there.
Anyhow, I hope you are right, but TPTB don’t really seem to love and respect the Sarah character near as much as fans do.
Also, I wanted to say, Jonathan Frakes would be great, but I think the handler is in his early 40’s, sounds more like a great role for Robby McNeil to dust off his acting chops for an episode or two?
Leigh that’s really interesting. I would have preferred to see the laudenol/now-we-have-to-protect-the-world-from-Chuck type of darkness (with him victorious of course), because that’s more of an external darkness — something that Chuck (with Sarah helping him) would have to overcome. Chuck would have to learn to control the Intersect rather than the other way around. They set that up but never really explored it. Instead they went for internal angst and character damage in the central relationship (the glue of the show — no wonder it fell apart for so many people). Internal (character damage) darkness is always darker to me than external darkness. What bothered me was the CS lack of togetherness and continued lack of faith in each other that had always characterized their relationship, that and the damage to their characters because of the geometry. A dramatic arc with Sarah at a loss without Chuck would have been good, but not a whole season of her floundering. It was too much for me. For me the the time for geometry was done. It really only got in the way of the story … Chuck becoming a spy without losing himself. And the red test was too dark and heavy for Chuck IMO.
Jason – Yes, Sarah has been with those people, but she also didn’t have any friends or contacts outside of the spy life until she met Chuck, and only began opening up to those people after she and Chuck became serious. There was no one else in her life, so it’s not really surprising that there were people in her work that appealed to her.
I don’t understand why this is negative, or disrespectful of Sarah on the writers’ part. She is a grown woman who works closely with often attractive men in dangerous situations. There’s nothing wrong with her getting close to and having relations with those men. The fact that she fell for Chuck, and he happens to be whom she truly fell in love with and chose to be with makes it a great story and it drives the plot.
Her past relationships help make her interesting and are part of her character, just as Chuck’s are, or Casey’s, or Morgan’s.
Leigh we talked at length about the dark thing a couple weeks ago, and while I admit Chuck has never been as dark as many shows, S3 was noticeably darker in several ways than anything that came before or after on Chuck. Which also means it was far darker than I like to watch.
For starters, it was dark in the moody sense of the word. Chuck himself was depressed for much of the season, from his cheese ball eating depths of Pink Slip, to his drinking alone at the end of Nacho Sampler, to being so depressed the Intersect shut down in Beard, to a drunken gaming session in Other Guy. That makes the entire front part of the season dark in the depressing sense of the word.
Even more importantly to me, it was dark in the sense that Chuck was morally conflicted for most of the season, including the back order. He was trying to become an agent and loosing his own sense of right and wrong. Granted, in most cases he did the right thing, but the moral/philosophical traps he dealt with all season long like betraying a friend/asset, torturing Casey, and doing a Red Test, were draining and tiring to this viewer and sucked enjoyment right out of the show. But the really troubling and lingering part of it was the lying; I lost a lot of respect for Chuck the way he lied all season long, and that it lingered into the back part of the season was particularly disappointing.
Now as I’ve said elsewhere, the relationship malfunction was the most discouraging aspect of S3. I probably never would have liked the darker themes, but I could have lived them more easily if the story had been Chuck and Sarah working together to deal with the various moral pitfalls as Chuck was becoming an agent. But the story we got was more distasteful to me than anything I ever expected to see on Chuck.
Leigh I would also add on the relationship front that much of Sarah’s past isn’t a big deal to me; I mean, if part of the story is how Chuck changed Sarah then a slightly trashy past (I gather she was never as trashy as Carina!) is fine, it’s part of what Chuck saved her from. But that still makes Shaw distasteful for many of the same reasons Hannah was (although worse since he always came across as an arrogant a**); namely that he was too fast of a rebound and Sarah was playing around with him while she was clearly in love with someone else. It doesn’t really matter to me what story they thought they were telling, it’s ugly and I hate seeing any of it.
Dave – As I said, she’s a grown woman, with a healthy romantic appetite. I don’t think that makes her past trashy. If Chuck saved her from anything, I think it was her feelings of disconnection with “normal” people around her and loneliness, and not her romantic past.
Shaw WAS yicky, but I think what happened was that the writers realized that the power dynamic between Chuck and Sarah was still so off that getting them together in the beginning of season 3 couldn’t happen yet. Him still being a noob at spy work and Sarah was still way more experienced, and still kind of his superior/handler. They had to get the two of them to a point where they were equals before a romance could really work in a believable and functional way. So they tried to think up something else to keep them apart, and Shaw happened, which…wasn’t great.
@Leigh: I have to respectfully disagree. Even if that was the story they wanted to tell, and even if it was because of the unbalance between the two of them, then adding Shaw/Hannah didn’t add anything to the story, in contrary it only created more unbalance, pain and problems.
If you want to create a situation in which both characters grow to be more of equals, then they should have simply made it about two adults in a new situation. They should have just simply let the two of them sit down together and talk, let Sarah explain how he ruined everything she had hoped and dreamed for them, that they were back at square one because now she had to not only protect him, but also train him, and let her and Casey protect and train him to be a spy(and let him slowly prove to the both of them via that route that he actually was an equal to them.. Adding Shaw into the mix added absolutely nothing, zip, nada to character growth, or storylines.
I have to agree with Dave, the Shaw storyline was trashy in the fact that Sarah and Chuck were both people so clearly in love and so clearly in pain, you’d have to be a complete scumbag to take advantage of that. But that’s the way I view things like that.
Fogh – I totally agree that Shaw/Hannah didn’t add anything to the story. I guess I just think they were at a loss for how to make things exciting in season 3, and still keep the tension up, while getting Chuck on a more equal level to Sarah.
While having them sit down and talk things over would have been sensible, I don’t think it makes for terrible exciting television, especially for a show that boasts a lot of action. 😉
Thanks for that fogh, well put.
Leigh I agree entirely that Shaw/Hannah didn’t add anything to the story, and that is a big part of my complaint. And yes I realize I made a value judgement earlier, but I’m perfectly happy to do so. Those are my values and the values of a significant number of viewers; a woman who has been sexually active with a large number of her co-workers is trashy (and this is NOT a double standard, I would say exactly the same thing about a man!). Now “trashy” is not an irredeemable situation; in fact, escaping from that cycle and becoming settled and happy about it is a beautiful story. For the most part, that is Sarah’s story and I love it; but again in makes Shaw an ugly mistake. If you’re happy with what Sarah learned through the Shaw situation then the story works for you and that’s fine. But you do have to realize that story does not work for a large number of us and we’ve just been explaining why. S3 was a wonderful opportunity in many ways, and Chuck growing into the spy world with Sarah as his partner, confidante and lover could have been beautiful and epic; instead they played to the lowest common denominator and gave us The OC recycled.
Dave – we are going to have to agree to disagree on the “trashy” aspect. We’re never going to see eye to eye on that, and that’s totally fine. Shutting up about it now in 3…2…1. *zips lips* 🙂
As for the Shaw stuff, I do agree with you, and it didn’t work for me, either. I was commenting on what I thought the writers were attempting in what they did. It didn’t work, it totally fell flat, and the Shaw/Hannah stuff was kind of a wreck. You’re right, it was a redux of what the OC did. I think it was a little better managed, and tempered by the spy stuff but still the same ideas, that didn’t fly.
That’s all good Leigh. And for the record, I never really saw Sarah as very trashy anyway; in fact if her history really just comes down to Bryce (there’s still a narrow window of opportunity to deny Shaw) then she’s practically a good girl! (yeah I know, value judgement again…)
Leigh, while I largely agree with you I also see Dave and Thinkling’s point. Your view that keeping Chuck and Sarah apart to establish them as more equals probably has some basis, Sarah had at times almost a maternal attitude towards Chuck, and at the end of season 2, even though he was “that guy” Sarah Walker, as written, was a strong confident woman with a somewhat troubled past who didn’t really need saving. I think we all saw from the beginning what Sarah gave Chuck and why he needed it, but in Sarah’s case what Chuck gave her wasn’t as clear. In a sense he gave her hope and offered an alternative to her spy life, but it wasn’t entirely clear she needed to be saved from that. Season 3 was a dark one for Sarah because it established that Sarah Walker was not a happy or especially well adjusted person.
In a way that sort of splits the difference between you and Thinkling and Dave I agree that as a grown woman Sarah should feel free to move on from Chuck after having her heart broken, and choosing the wrong guy is plausible. But there is a bit of damage to the Sarah character involved. Without calling it trashy I’ll just say that Sarah seems in season 3 to be a woman who does make bad choices based on needing external validation through a relationship with the nearest convenient guy. I also don’t see it as anything worse than serial monogamy, other than the fact that one of the guys is her boss. Her poor self image and issues with it should have been better established to make her a bit more sympathetic. But other than the WT/WT being drawn out there was a story aspect to both Hannah and Shaw. I’ll just deal with Shaw for now since he’s the topic at hand.
Having lost Chuck, Sarah lost a source of support and validation to compensate for her poor sense of self and self image, and she is a bit lost at a time when she is being called on to do something that goes against her developing conscious. It is plausible for her to turn to Shaw, a man with a similar background who is familiar with loss and understands the distasteful things that are sometimes necessary, but it wasn’t really until Final Exam that we really got some idea of why Sarah seemed unwilling or unable to support Chuck in his desire to be a spy. With Chuck unavailable to provide that validation that she is a good person doing the right thing, something we weren’t aware she needed, her rebound with Shaw seems a bit flakey and needy, and she seems to be acting in unexplainable ways. Some of it is that people often forget to abandon their bird’s eye view, knowing everything, and see one character’s actions from another’s POV rather than ours, or to accept, even for a time the premise that Chuck and Sarah’s lives may be headed down different paths for a time. Seeing Sarah turn to Shaw for support he is unwilling or unable to provide does start to show us what Chuck gives Sarah. He gives her a shot at redemption not by defining or changing her, but by awakening her own sense of self and desire to change. Now that aspect of her character was explored and resolved much better in season 4, so I tend to think the damage was worth it. At the time though I agree it wasn’t much fun, even if I did think I saw where they were going and why.
Speaking of Bryce, and changing the topic completely, am I the only one who wants him to come back for season 5?
I just want him and Chuck to be friends again, and for Bryce to perhaps give Chuck and Sarah some sort of nerdy wedding gift…I may be alone on that. lol
I suppose it won’t be much of a shock that I agree with you, Dave. Well said. Casual sex and bed hopping are not admirable traits, and S3 only served to damage both our leads. If a show features that sort of story line and those kinds of relationships, I never give it a second look. It’s unappealing and uninteresting. For the most part, Chuck doesn’t doesn’t go there. I suppose it could have been Sarah’s past, but we see signs that, at least after Chuck, that wasn’t who she was. She passed up Bryce 3 times and said no to Cole twice. I always assumed her comment to Shaw about being involved with people she worked with meant Bryce and Chuck. (Anything more is speculation. I hope they don’t go there with Ryker, but like you say her past is in the past.) Chuck on the other hand would have bedded Lou in record time had the mission not interfered, and of course he was quick to be back in bed with Jill. Then Hannah was the all time low. Hannah called him on it, and good for her. Hopefully none of that is ever revisited now that Chuck and Sarah are settled and happy about it.
What is The OC again?
Leigh, seeing Bryce like that would be sort of fun … if he had been in Istanbul all this time. I’m just not personally up for another resurrection. Too bad, because it would be fun to see him come back and be friends with them or even help them sort out the conspiracy
Thinkling “The OC” was Josh Schwartz’ first show; it was a teen soap that ran on CW (or was it WB then? it was a while ago!)
I’d agree about Bryce, and Orion too for that matter. I liked both characters and would love to see them respond to the new lives Chuck and Sarah made for themselves. Bummer they were both killed off, but I really don’t want to see another resurrection.
Sarah’s spy past is a mine field. Jason already mentioned it but I’m wondering if they’ll play out Sarah being Chuck’s handler was all part of the conspiracy somehow.
That could actually be quite interesting, especially if Sarah did not do what the conspirators expected. At the very least, Sarah falling in love with Chuck was likely an unexpected complication; like maybe she made it difficult for them to control Chuck to the degree they wanted because of how Sarah protected Chuck’s freedom and dignity. I think it would be a fun twist to find out how frustrated Graham was with Sarah; thinking she would just be his tool, but instead becoming a buffer between Chuck and the government.
My 2c? I don’t care if they bobble it (honestly I doubt they will), I’m just happy they’re exploring more Sarah-centered episodes. Look back through the past 4 years, outside of one “dud” (subjective opinion BTW, one I don’t necessarily agree with), the rest have been pretty damn good. If we’re talking Cougars or Delorean, two of the best of the series…so I say bring on these Sarah centered stories. And keep them coming.
I don’t know what to think http://chucktv.net/2011/09/29/spoilers-sarahs-past-is-catching-up-with-her-exclusive/
Hahahaha. Oh this show sometimes…
10 to 1 says they make it so Sarah has a romantic/shady past with her handler. I will laugh and laugh if that’s true.
See, I was thinking maybe her mom hooked up with her handler and that caused the “strain” on their relationship. Maybe they ended up having a kid together.
That would certainly be a preferable situation. I don’t know how likely it is, but certainly preferable. Good idea, luckygirl!
Though that seems like an odd thing for Sarah to cut off all contact with her mother over. Then again, Sarah is not exactly the most rational person in the world when it comes to emotional problems, so I guess it’s possible.
Its definitely flimsy. But considering her strong loyalty to her father, I could see Sarah taking that as a betrayal. Again very shaky logic. I just couldn’t let my mind go where everybody else’s seemed to. 🙂
well it would fit. Bryce, almost Cole, Shaw and Chuck. why rule out a guy before Bryce?
There is no way possible that Sarah has a baby. There is no way they could fit Sarah having a baby in this story line.
If they did do that the massive Sarah character assassination would be complete.
It has to be something with her handler and her mom.
I agree Rac … obviously can’t be Sarah’s baby, but I’m not sure it’s a handler/mom connection either, though. … a few intriguing puzzle pieces, that’s for sure.
I agree.. it could be that her mom fell for this Ryker guy or something like that. More drama.
I just can’t imagine them doing such a cheesy story as Sarah having an 8 year old kid. I’m thinking “baby” will actually be a nickname or code word for something…. And Chuck and Sarah draw babysitting duty for Clara… And Sarah gets a false positive on an EPT…
This seems likely to be the mid-point episode of the season, so IF anything really big happens it could be a pregnancy announcement at the very end before the break. But I think even that is pushing it; my Costa Graven Pesos still say no baby Bartowski until the finale.
Or maybe all of the above. What if Mama Walking-Hug (that’s her Indian name) calls Sarah Baby? ( I get the feeling only Chuck can get away with that, now) At the same time, as you suggested, “Baby” is a code or something related to a case that she and Ryker worked, which may or may not have involved an actual baby. (If it did involve a baby, it could be that the child is now in danger.)
Add to that babysitting and a pregnancy scare … sounds fun.
And apparently Stan Lee has now decided to join in the fun. Too funny!
OOOOH BABY!!! but I really hope its more than the token cameo “Find the Stan” spots he gets in most of the Marvel features.
Grampa Bartowski???? ~ anyone ~ anyone?
I think it is a cameo.
Yeah my bet would be a cameo. It sounds like that’s all Mark Hamill has too. Its getting to be like the old Batman tv series were everyone wants to get in on the act.
That’s an intriguing notion.
I would love to see Chuck approach Stan with an idea for a new superhero comic about a guy who downloads a computer into his head and Stan says that’s the dumbest idea he every heard.
That would be perfect!
Stan Lee – with his minions Stephen King and George Lucas : ) [ ok, I’ll stop]
Even if its only a cameo – I hope its at least a significant moment…
rather than just a face in the crowd. Well, there’s always hope.
“CHUCK VERSUS THE ZOOM”
10/21/2011 (08:00PM – 09:00PM) (Friday) : AS CHUCK BEGINS LIFE AS A SPY-FOR-HIRE, HE MUST ADJUST TO HIS NEW BUSINESS, NEW THREATS, AND A NEW INTERSECT — HIS BEST FRIEND MORGAN GRIMES – MARK HAMILL AND CRAIG KILBORN GUEST STAR—Without the Intersect in his head or the support of the CIA, the world of espionage is a much more dangerous place for Chuck Bartowski (Zachary Levi) and his team of freelance spies. To start, Carmichael Industries takes on a slick, rich thief named Jean Claude (guest star Mark Hamill), and a conniving investor, Roger Bale (guest star Craig Kilborn), who has stolen money from some of the world’s most dangerous people. Meanwhile, Morgan (Joshua Gomez) helps Chuck with a special surprise for Sarah (Yvonne Strahovski). Back in the Buy More, Jeff (Scot Krinsky) and Lester (Vik Sahay) have taken things to another level with their latest scheme. Sarah Lancaster and Adam Baldwin also star.
UPDATE!!!! They changed the premier date to Oct. 28th instead of the 21st!!!!
I’m a baseball guy, so maybe it has to do with the world series starting that night, or maybe it’s the second game. i do know the series is on that night.
Sepinwall said the reason is so “GRIMM” can premiere closer to Halloween. Ugh.
ANOTHER WEEK???? are NBC torturing us or something
Okay, that’s just terrible news.
Well, yes it is. But I don’t really want the premier to go up against the World Series.
Would this allow more time for shadenfreude?
Thinkling , yes it would, but on the other side it give them one less week to decide. they should finish filming about mid nov i heard. that being the case it’s one less week of seeing how well or poor chuck does in the ratings for them to decide on more eps.
Well, that’s true, but by then if everything else is tanking they can hold off on the hard wrap a few weeks. Plus the big guys will have seen previews I’m sure.
I know it’s a long shot 😉
I sort of poked fun at this topic b4, but with the delay, coupled with something I read about the new man at NBC being a patient, big picture type guy, I still think something else could happen.
For example, I don’t think a show really gets cancelled until May, what if NBC comes back and says wrap it up, 5×13, but give us a 3 year plan to move on from there, cast, major story arcs or themes, budget, etc but create something new with Chuck, Sarah, and anyone else you want to include in a ‘What’s next for the Bartkowski’s’ themed show.
I could imagine a scenario where Chuck is considered a better creative property for the next three seasons than say, Grinch, or Squeech or what yea I remember Grimm, as well as the Playboy Club or probably near half the current schedule will be by the time next May rolls around. I honestly think this current NBC head would love to have The Event or the JJ Abhrams writen Undercovers versus some of the stuff on his menu right now?
Were I in charge, I would keep all my options open for as long as possible. This is not a battle that can be won this month or next.
Some really good points Jason, I would love it if they did that. Although my current expectation is that they’re ready to just let Chuck go away. Hopefully the current desperate situation will make Chuck look a lot more appealing before it’s too late.
Jason, faith posted the link to the article on another thread where i read the same thing. i think if it was up to NBC alone that might be an option, but its not. WB has the final say i think or part of it. if NBC would make it worth it to WB i could see it as an option. but if WB can make more money in syndication than live, why go any longer? thats the point that will decide it i think.
WB would never turn down an order for one of their properties. Many shows exist for quite a while both in production and syndication concurrently. That is the most appealing of all possibilities for the parent studio (2 and a Half Men is in exactly that position; it’s a WB show, first run episodes on CBS, and syndicated airings all over the dial).
dave, i understand that. what i was referring to was how much of a loss if any does WB incur to produce 1 new episode. they may have been taking a loss this year to get it into syndication. when does it become cost prohibitive to both networks to just say we’re done? i hope that makes more sense.
I’m pretty sure that’s just special “studio math.” Studios have long claimed they make little or no money in production and have to make everything back in syndication. Much like they claim even their biggest blockbusters make nothing in the theater. I’m pretty sure its all accounting games. Given the number of shows that never make it to syndication, and the various ways “profits” are supposed to be shared, its in their best interests to exaggerate production costs.
But even if its true, more episodes is always a good thing for a syndicated show too. Especially since 100 is considered a magic number of sorts (Chuck will be at 91 at the end of the current order) where syndicated properties suddenly jump up in value. That has to do with how long a series will run (and how long it will take to repeat) if its being shown 5 days a week. At 100 it should take 20 weeks, or about 5 months to run the entire series.
Of course these days disc and various download sales further confuse the market of these things. But again, I really can’t imagine WB turning down an order for more production unless it comes after the production has been shut down for too long (and I don’t know how long too long would be in this case; but it would likely have to do with physical sets and cast availablility)
I think according to an interview that zach did, even with the subway deal the wb has been loosing money since the end of season 2. I mean the reason the buy more has been kept is to reduce losses until they reach syndication.
They’ve casted Sarah’s handler…http://insidetv.ew.com/2011/10/06/chuck-tim-dekay/
Tim Dekay is an interesting choice. They have to make an inside joke for Bryce/Bomer fans to make it complete! Oh, and Yvonne really needs to do a guest spot on White Collar.
Wow! That is exciting casting news! Loved DeKay since Carnivale.
i like the confront her past and the things she’s done part of the article.
Maybe this is what was meant when JS/CF implied that Sarah might still be keeping things from her past from Chuck. From her perspective they are over and done with it so let’s leave the past alone and move on with our life, maybe she is about to realize that life and especially life with Chuck don’t work like that.
I really liked it, but when Matt Barber said on twitter that LaJudkins wrote the episode i cant wait.
Should be a good one. I don’t even care about confronting the past stuff, the murky depths of past sins I find profoundly boring; but I do think it should be a good dynamic, with the show’s two strongest writers at the helm! I particularly like the theme Sarah proving to herself (and ghosts from her past) that she’s a different person now.
Some of these types of episodes can go either way for me. It’s that light/dark thing. However, knowing who wrote it quells any worries.
Good choice for casting.
I like that Dave: Sarah proving to herself that she’s not who she was. And it will be good to get our girl baggage free … as long as the baggage isn’t tooo heavy.
Just keep in mind, based on the placement in the season (cough – hero’s journey – cough) let alone past experience these are likely to be the angsty “we could lose everything” episodes. The initial trial (usually eps 6-9-ish) deals with the hero’s failings and overcoming them, and the final trial (eps 10-13) is the hero overcoming the external threat. It’s probably going to be rough on Sarah.
Ernie – I tend to agree with you. One of my reasons for wanting the show to end, is that I am tired of the only way to create drama on this show is by using Sarah. I don’t trust the writers, and would like other characters be the object of the writers need to create angst. Kill Morgan for example. Have Ellie and Awesome cheat on each other. Have Awesome or Alex or Kathleen be a double agent, something, anything, other than Sarah did or didn’t do or said or didn’t say or was forced to or was kidnapped or had amnesia or was blackmailed or was …..
But, most of this stuff is measured by how long the misery lasts (12 hours and 55 minutes is too long), and how it gets resolved. My guess is 5×8 will be more like 25 minutes of misery with a very satisfying resolution, Lefranc and Judkins style. But then again, another ep that ended with an 8 (3×8) had a fairly popular writer and was possibly the creepiest, most ill conceived episode of tv ever written – so who knows?
My expectations for episode 5.08 are set astronomically high (that’s probably a bad thing).
From the looks of it, episode 5.08 will have the ability to make or break the entire series for a lot of fans (read: me)
Sarah’s past can be used to generate tension – sure. But Sarah’s past (like her real name WAS) is VERY important to most fans and any story going there needs
AHHHH!!!!
…… needs to make sense.
Shep, hopefully by now TPTB know how much Sarah means to fans, and since this is a love letter to fans, they should be a little more respectful than they were over the name issue. At least that’s my expectation until I see otherwise. So, here’s to high expectations. 🙂
Interesting. Love the casting of DeKay and hopefully LeJudkins is writing the episode since they get her character better than any other writers. But I do wonder how her past will be used on the show. If it’s used for character growth that’s good but I can’t help but think they’ll throw use it as a source of angst without any resolution.
And if they can get DeKay on the show, I’m crossing my fingers for Bomer and a Bryce flashback.
According to Matt Barber, Lejudkins is writing the episode with Sarah’s mom, Emma–episode 8.
I believe that’s the same episode with Ryker (Dekay).
And aren’t they both potentially recurring characters … or just Emma?
I hadn’t heard that about Ryker, only Emma.
What would be the point of a Bryce flashback unless it has some relevance to what’s happening in the present? I think we’ve pretty much explored Bryce’s past as much as necessary. Chuck’s college years. Check. Relationship with Sarah. Check.
DKD I can imagine interesting things that could be said between Bryce and Ryker concerning Sarah. But the main point is its high nerd appeal; to have Bomer and Dekay do a scene together on Chuck would be a hoot. As I said, the only thing that remains is for Yvonne to do a cameo (or even better, a real guest spot) on White Collar.
“Nerd appeal” was the main focus of the Greta thing and that turned out to be disappointing. I often find such cameos to be ultimately disappointing. One ends up wishing there had been some real substance to it. If there’s no real reason behind it, it ultimately feels hollow.
Whatever. Some of us watch to have fun. Thanks for the lesson though, I’ll remember that, characters should have a point. Interesting.
Since Chuck’s life has supposedly been part of some grand conspiracy, a flashback with the man whose actions gave him the Intersect in the first place and also happened to be working for Chuck’s father the creator of the Intersect might have some relevance.
Good call JC.
Chuck – Episode 5.06 – Chuck versus The Curse – Casting News ——– Joseph Gatt will play Agent Hawk.
Taken from: SpoilerTV http://www.spoilertv.com/2011/10/chuck-episode-506-chuck-versus-curse.html#ixzz1a2zA1WP6
Everybody’s mileage varies. I realize a lot of fan fiction is written just for the reasons said, but I don’t read(or write) such things.
I understand a lot you read and write fan fic, so I can see why it would appeal to you and not me.
I’m assuming we’re back on the Bryce subject again. Fan fiction is a pretty small sub-set of this community, and JC has never expressed any interest in it as far as I recall. But Bryce is a hugely important character both in the back-story, and personally to both Chuck and Sarah. I think many of us have been mentioning for a long time how nice it would be to see him make another appearance (via flashback, I don’t think anyone really wants another resurrection). Given how much of this show celebrates pop and nerd culture I think a pairing with Dekay would be perfect. It would make sense both for the story, and be a good source of meta-humor.
Its okay if you’re not interested, but I disagree with your assessment on pretty much every level. I think it would make sense, be fun and completely satisfying. Its kind of funny you chose to compare the idea to the Gretas; which was clearly just a failed idea that didn’t even go off the way the writers originally intended (loosing the first actress unexpectedly led to the rotating Greta idea). One of the signature elements of the whole show has been playing around with pop culture, this just seems like a golden opportunity to do so while honoring the show’s own history too.
I don’t know if they’ll manage it, but you’re right that a lot of people have said they’d like to see Bomer back again as Bryce … and a lot of people (probably even more) have said they’d like to see Bacula back as Stephen. The overwhelming majority of all of those want the returns to be by flashback, not resurrection. Stephen flashbacks could be worked in almost anywhere, but if Bryce is to make an appearance via flashback, this would seem like the best episode to do it.
I’m fine with it, especially a conversation between Ryker and Bryce. We could learn something about Sarah from their perspectives (and it would be a cool visual to see Bomer and Dekay in a non White Collar scene). A Bryce/Sarah scene would be OK (or Bryce/Chuck scene, for that matter) as long as we learn something new. Oh, and please, no more Bryce/Sarah tonsil hockey! Don’t need any more of that, thanks.
You know I agree with the last part especially!
“But Bryce is a hugely important character both in the back-story, and personally to both Chuck and Sarah. I think many of us have been mentioning for a long time how nice it would be to see him make another appearance (via flashback, I don’t think anyone really wants another resurrection).”
Bryce was a “functional” character. He performed the function of being the the guy Chuck wasn’t. The guy who Sarah dated before. He performed functions within the narrative of doing important things that propelled the storyline, but, on his own, he’s not that interesting a character. His last key function was dying so that Chuck could download Intersect 2.0. The end.
There is a practical and pragmatic aspect of TV production. The reality is that Bomer is now a star in his own right and paying him to come back has to have a reason that’s important enough to the current storyline to do.
Clearly, there is an importance to this Ryker character. But, fans finding it “nice to see another appearance” by Bomer doesn’t really cut it–pragmatically–as a reason to bring him back if that is not important to the story we are about to see.
Fans want to see a lot of things that don’t make any pragmatic sense.
I don’t see how fan fiction has anything to do with having return Bryce in the form of a flashback. The setup for this season was someone or group has been pulling the puppet strings on Chuck’s life going back years maybe even pre Stanford. That leads me to believe this season will be heavy on the mythology and no character on the show up to this point other than Orion has more impact on that part of the story than Bryce. And even if its not I see no reason why they wouldn’t try and bring him back for the show’s swan song.
A Bryce flashback could be a good idea. A Bryce flashback to when Dekay’s character would have relevance to the story seems a lot more dicey to me. Presumably Sarah would have only had a handler before she became an actual agent (like say when she was in college), and that would have almost certainly been long before she ever met Bryce. So they are from two different times in Sarah’s life (or should be, at least) and trying to force Bryce where he doesn’t belong/make sense would just not work.
Of course, this is true only as long as the show more or less follows its own rules, and well, we know how well it does that. So I guess anything is possible.
You’re right about that Mxpw and if Cat Squad showed us anything Sarah’s spy past is very timey wimey.
The only reason I brought up Bomer was I thought the filming schedule with White Collar didn’t allow for him to return but casting DeKay says otherwise. I’d much prefer a Bryce flashback with Orion.
Presumably? You can’t really know the time frame of their association. Depends on how they play it. Bryce was recruited at Stanford, so they would have all been players in the same time frame. Initial years after collage might also be fair game. Our knowledge of Sarah is nil during that time, so they’ve got a good bit of leeway.
Of course if Ryker is just considered Sarah’s “handler”, then that part of their relationship would presumably pre-date her time as an agent. But I could easily see Ryker being the agent responsible for pairing Sarah and Bryce (and he may feel she’s traded down now!). I also see no reason to think Sarah’s relations with Ryker would need to completely end after she made agent; he still may have been regarded as a mentor and someone who’s judgement or abilities she respected, admired, or feared.
I’m not sure right off how big the CIA is, but I think two new agents entering the Company at the same time could easily have a shared connection with a senior training officer.
So this all lead me to Wikipedia…
Per “Agent Handling” on Wikipedia. The term is fairly generic and can be applied to any Case Officer. So an agent handling another agent is a handler. In fact, it looks to me like field agents almost always have a senior agent or administrative agent who is their handler. It doesn’t matter if the person in the field is a willing or unwilling agent, or even if they are a knowing or unknowing agent; their work is likely overseen by a handler.
As near as I can tell the “Asset” distinction is likewise vague. Given that an “agent” is simply someone who works on behalf of another, any asset could be considered a small “a” agent. Presumably, a capital “A” agent is an employee of The Agency.
Sarah is a year older than Chuck and Bryce. She should have already been in training for a year before Bryce even graduated. And I can’t see why they would have the same person be the handler for agents on opposite sides of the country. Is the CIA that strapped for personnel?
Dave – Come on. Using real world information to justify something on Chuck? Really? This is a show that has turned the CIA into a gang or organized crime family. Sarah’s position in the CIA doesn’t even exist in real life. The only connection the CIA in the Chuckverse has to the CIA in real life is the name.
JC – I wouldn’t mind seeing a Bryce and Orion flashback too. I’d like more explanation of their relationship and how that came to be.
Mxpw, Agent training is done at The Farm (Fort Peary); apart from or in addition to whatever academic training is done at a university level. So wherever candidates are being drawn from they will all pass through Fort Peary at some point, it is a completely logical setting for candidates from all over the country to meet each other. Just as the FAA draws controllers from multiple colleges (or the military) and sends them all to Mike Monroney Aeronautical Center in Oklahoma City (“The Academy”). It doesn’t matter where you come from or where you are going, you will take your screen course in OKC; in addition, most controllers will revisit The Academy on occasion for further training during their career. There are a little over 10000 controllers nation-wide, and we all know controllers all over the country from our time in OKC together. I am certain CIA agent training similar, and likely a much smaller professional community with closer ties.
And I’m sorry, I mean no disrespect, but your refusal to accept “real world” information is untenable. I will edit or remove this and your previous post if you would like, call it a Mulligan. I’m sure you have enough passing familiarity with fiction to understand that real world rules will generally apply unless a universe gives specific reason to doubt them. And what I found actually explains some Chuck oddities, like why did an experienced Agent like Frost have a handler? (even if the claim was bogus, no one raised eyebrows at the mere suggestion of it. It wasn’t until Tuttle/Volkoff showed his true self that we knew it was bogus). But now I get it, even a veteren agent like Frost could have had some office puke case worker (handler) over-seeing her field work.
At any rate, I still think the most likely scenario is Ryker as handler for Sarah the trainee. Bryce easily could have been another trainee during the same time frame. Again, I’m sure you loath my ATC comparisons, but even our OJT (on the job training) can take 1-4 years after the Academy. I imagine CIA training could run even longer, which allows plenty of time for trainees a couple year apart to overlap. And whoever said they both had to be trainees? We were just kicking ideas around, Sarah could be the newly minted Agent Ryker introduces to his promising candidate Larkin. Sooooo many possibilities to make it work.
Now forgive my getting snarky for a moment here mxpw, but do you really have so little imagination and inability to consider alternatives? No wonder you find so much to criticize about Chuck. You’re not even allowing for any attempt at a reasonable explanation to an idea you’ve already decided against. This is almost comically rigid. Its fine if you want to say you have concerns about something, or make a case against something you don’t think played out well. But you’re arguing against very reasonable suggestions for no rational reason I can see. You’re clutching at straws to rebut reasonable and fun suggestions.
I’m sure you have enough passing familiarity with fiction to understand that real world rules will generally apply unless a universe gives specific reason to doubt them.
Yes, Dave, that was my point. Nothing about the CIA in Chuck has any connection to reality, so EVERYTHING about it causes doubt to crop up. Or it should, at least. But I see we are not going to agree on this and that’s fine.
I will point out that Sarah should have been in the CAT squad right around the same time Bryce would have started training. Otherwise her timeline really starts to get murky.
As for the rest of your comments, I have no problem with leaving my post as it is. I’m not gonna sit here and discuss with you whether or not I have an imagination. Frankly, considering my background, which I realize you might not be party to, I found your suggestion more amusing than off-putting. Suffice it to say, I do have an imagination and more than a passing familiarity with fiction, and I have no problem imagining a whole host of different ways that Ryker could have a connection to Bryce and Sarah. However, imagining different possibilities is not the same thing as those possibilities making any kind of sense. Which I question. You don’t agree; again, that’s fine. But while I believe that a show should stimulate your imagination, I don’t believe it should make your imagination do all the work in order for it to make sense. When it does, that’s when you start moving into fanwanking territory.
Also, since you decided to get personal, let me respond in kind: you find my stance “almost comically rigid”, and I find your blanket acceptance of almost everything this show does to be nothing more than outright fanboyism. Nearly everything this show does is genius or great to you, and that’s fine if you feel that way, but not everybody does and the fact that you think I criticize the show simply because I lack an imagination and just want to harsh somebody’s buzz is ridiculous.
I’m not going to get into a debate with you about what is reasonable and what is not. That’s generally a matter of opinion and so there is no real right or wrong answer. I would appreciate it, however, if in the future, you refrained from implying motives to somebody you don’t know. Thanks.
I know well your background in the Chuck community mxpw which is why I find your inability to imagine possibilities staggering. I think you make far too big a deal out of a time line issue that could easily be a single 30 second event from 10 years previous. “CAT Squad” is not an all-consuming event, however long the unit was together they likely met and worked with other agents during that time, may have had a trainee or two monitor for a while, and perhaps even had time off. No one had suggested adding another 20 years to Sarah’s career; but rather in the spirit of fun, an encounter between two men from Sarah’s past, who happen to be played by actors who now work together. We all know its unlikely to actually happen, but the reasons why not likely have more to do with actor scheduling issues than anything required for the characters themselves.
I still find your comment about rejecting reality as having any bearing on the show to be outrageous. Are we to reject 1 + 1 = 2 because it hasn’t been spelled out in Chuck cannon? Or perhaps the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor in the Chuckverse? Of course not. They chose to call Sarah’s agency the CIA because it immediately brings a certain number of associations to the viewer, and they don’t have to explain all that boring detail stuff about who the characters work for and what they do. We immediately get certain ideas. Now we also know, being fiction, that those things we know may be subject to change as the story unfolds. Obviously the writers have taken any number of liberties with reality, in some cases that works better than others. But unless they spell out a change I think its completely reasonable to assume something like reality applies.
Now fanboy is funny. I mean first of all, oh yeah! I mean, this is a Chuck site, I’m an unabashed Chuck fan, I’ll happily defend the show. With a few notable exceptions I am used to enjoying every minute Chuck is on the air.
But you obviously know very little about my history if you think I won’t cry foul when a story or idea doesn’t work for me. Have you missed our contentious S3 discussions? Man I do not want to get started on that now; but believe me I will speak up when something doesn’t work for me. But as a fan, I do try to give the writers the benefit of the doubt, right up until I know they’ve let me down. I’ll say for the record I’m very excited for S5, I have a few small concerns, but I’m eager to have my fears assuaged. And I expect to love whatever they come up with in the season ahead. I will speak up if I don’t.
Sigh. I quite clearly said that I could imagine many possibilities where such a storyline could happen. What I also said was a contention that such a connection would be unlikely and/or of questionable place in the timeline.
It may very well be kitschy fun to have Bomer and Dekay on Chuck at the same time. I’m sure a lot of people would enjoy it. I’d probably even be amused. Then again, these are the same writers who thought it’d be kitschy fun to cut out potentially good dramatic material between Chuck and Sarah in Cliffhanger for the sake of a juvenile sight gag, so you’ll excuse me if my faith in their ability to handle things well is not exactly high. For them, what’s “funny” or “cool” tends to outweigh logic and basic good sense.
I have never really liked when this show goes back into the past because, quite frankly, in my opinion, they are not very good at it and end up just making things worse. Sarah is a frequent victim of this, though she’s at least usually fared better than Casey (at least she never spontaneously changed service branches, for example). Are there ways for Ryker to somehow have some kind of connection to Sarah and Bryce? I suppose so, but I’d prefer the writers not try, because they can’t screw up what they don’t try.
You don’t feel the same, great. You have faith in the writers, great. I hope you enjoy what they do. I’m not expecting much, myself. I continue to watch because I still more or less enjoy the show and because of Yvonne (okay, mostly because of Yvonne). But the days when I expected this show to really surprise or impress me have long since passed.
Thanks Dave. You’ve gone the extra mile in your research and presented many logical reasons that a conversation between Bryce and Ryker would be plausible. No one said Ryker had to handle Bryce and Sarah at the same time, or even have a concurrent association with both of them, or even “handle” Bryce. It merely has to be plausible that Ryker could have been involved with both of them at one time or another. And that is, as Dave showed, not only plausible, but likely.
Take Orion and Bryce, for example. We learned in Ring that they had an association, dating back to Chuck’s Stanford days. Later in Ring they had a conversation. Oh my–fowl! … Uh, not! We had learned that they had known each other and had an agreement, which made sense with the canon we already knew.
A conversation, based on a prior association is quite common in the real world, and thus in fictional worlds as well. So, at some time in the past Ryker could have had such a conversation with Bryce based on a very plausible/likely prior association. We don’t know if Ryker is part of the overall conspiracy or not. There’s nothing in canon to either preclude it or demand it.
We also have no idea at this point if Bomer will make an appearance, just that many fans would like to see it; and that if he did return, a conversation between him and Dekay would not be contra-canonical.
Mxpw, you appear to be a “former” fan who contemns those of us who still like the show. Your opinions are your own, and you’re entitled to them, but you have no grounds for claiming superiority for them. They are no better reasoned than the opinions of the authors of this site who still like the show. On this issue you’ve presented only circular arguments to sustain a negative opinion of the show and a view that a Bryce/Ryker conversation would be ridiculous. But then you seem to think everything about the show is ridiculous. Whatever, man. Enjoy the misery.
Mxpw, seriously thank you for spelling all that out. I still don’t agree, but I do appreciate the more thoroughly explained POV. I do agree another scene in the hospital in Cliffhanger would have been a better use of time than a sight gag that is only maybe funny once. But I don’t think the two could ever have been equal (that is, a better hospital scene would have likely required a minute or more of screen time while the church events board was a 2 second bit). I also see it as only a minor disappointment, not a big deal. There’s a lot of scenes I would have liked to see better developed, but 43 minutes requires many sacrifices!
Thinkling good point about not knowing if Ryker is a part of the conspiracy or not. We really don’t know who’s side he’s going to end up on.
I don’t think we should be commenting on what type of fan someone posting here is or should be, everyone is entitled to their opinions & everyone is a fan, heck we have a couple of regular posters who don’t even watch the show any longer – I mean what is that all about?
I think the condescending manner that shippers got treated in s3, in many ways has ruined this fandom permanently causing an us vs them mentality. Shippers have been as guilty of this as the dramatic fan, since s4 went entirely the shipper’s way, the arguments just shifted 180 degrees, things such as let the showrunners tell their story, little slip ups are fine since everything else is so good, guests who were ‘off’ were so as part of the plan, I loved that ep, etc.
I am not a huge fan of looking back because looking back is often the source of drama on Chuck, but I think I have enjoyed all looks back when played for laughs. I agree with the notion that this writing team does not always write well vs other tv I watch. I think it is perfectly logical to be a fan of the characters when written one way, and not a fan when written another way. I like Chuck when he is smart, I really cringe when he gets weak, whiny, has to ask Morgan how to do everything, etc for example.
But, we don’t know how this ‘VS the Baby’ ep will be played in those terms, it might be a cute, romcom, shipperish ep or it might be a dark, dramatic ep where Sarah’s backstory does damage and her past actions have punitive consequences that Sarah (and Chuck) must try to overcome. Interestingly, we might not know until long after the set has been torn down, and the writers and actors have moved on.
Hence, I have a bit of a meh attitude about specifics, they are what they are at this point. But, whatever happens, even if it does not go my way, I am excited that this is TPTB’s attempt at being great. This is their love letter to the fans. I want to know if TPTB’s best shot at being great leaves me impressed.
Jason it is a bit of a sore spot with me when someone who admits to longer being a fan tries to lecture or dismiss those of us who still are. I admit I over-reacted, but its probably safe to say I would do so all over again in another similar situation. I guess I’m setting myself up to be baited by someone, maybe I just was. Oh well, its not like I’ve never repeated myself before!
I think most of Sarah’s backstory episodes have been quite good, although learning something else really ugly about her past might not be so much fun. But I’m mostly optimistic (like I said, I’ll expect the best until they actually blow it!).
Thinkling and Dave – Wow, really? You both make personal comments about me, make assumptions about my thoughts and feelings, judge me because I dared to disagree with your opinions, and I’m the one who is acting superior and “lecturing” you about how you’re wrong and I’m obviously right. Seriously? I made a personal comment to Dave, but that was only after he got personal with me. I did not get personal with anyone else, nor did I ever imply that those who liked the show were wrong, nor did I ever comment about what kind of fans people are (I’ll admit to implying Dave can be and is a fanboy at times).
Whatever.
I honestly don’t care if you still love the show or not. Nor do I care if you think I’m no longer a fan. I’d appreciate it if you cut out the hypocrisy and double standards though. That would be nice.
Jason – Thanks, I really appreciated your comments.
Sorry, Mxpw. We’ve had a number of people dropping by this summer who, like Dave said, admit to no longer being fans and proceed to contemn and dismiss those of us who still are. It always hits me wrong. If I misinterpreted your remarks and wrongly painted you with that brush, I apologize.
mxpw I got personal first and I am sorry about that, it was inappropriate for me to do so. But yes, your statements about not using real world information as part of defending a speculation still strike me as outrageous. You took a superior tone for a nonsense position. And I DON’T mean that as a personal attack. You said,
“Dave – Come on. Using real world information to justify something on Chuck? Really?”
Your comment is mocking and intellectually dishonest, especially the latter. Perhaps I wouldn’t have been offended had you offered your quip as a clear joke. But you try to belittle me for trying to do some real research on terminology? Especially research that potentially explains mistaken impressions we all had (including me, my post immediately proceeding contains factual errors based on what I had just learned). Again, Chuck does indeed take liberties, it is fiction and comedy after all; but when reality serves to actually explain some situations and terminology we’ve seen on the show I think its completely reasonable to do so.
And I am a fanboy. I object more to your assumption it is a pejorative than I do to your pointing it at me. I am also a Chuck/Sarah ‘shipper, a Chicago Bears fan, a happily married man, a history buff, a model builder, a strategy gamer, and many other things we won’t go into here. I don’t object to any of those labels when applied to me and do not understand why you think one of them would.
I am sorry if I assumed incorrectly about your enthusiasm for the show. I can tell you it is based on the observation that in the last year or so you have made almost entirely negative comments at this site. I suppose that could be an unfortunate coincidence. You do of course have the right to an honest opinion, and believe me I understand being unhappy with an extended story or arc. I will try to stop filtering everything you say with the assumption you are looking for trouble, but that is how I have perceived you for quite some time and it may not be easy.
dave, read on a spoiler site matt barber tweeted there is an actual baby on the set of 5.08. rumor is it’s clara.
Thanks army, that’s good news. Probably a baby-sitting sub-plot or something else good and silly. Perhaps we’ll see Sarah get over her fear of kids this season!
Dave, little help here. i have this link for the second 15 sec promo for chuck. don’t know if its been posted and can’t figure out where to do it. help?
http://www.spoilertv.com/2011/10/chuck-season-5-promo-2.html
@Jason,
Your comments about an us and them mentality in the fandom are spot on. I spent most of S3 trying to ignore the haters and wishing they would go post somewhere else if they had nothing constructive to say. I now find myself posting only rarely because I’m trying (not always successfully) not to fall into the same trap with S4. The division within the fandom makes me really sad and it’s one of the reasons why I’m glad S5 is the last. Being a Chuck fan has been bruising over the last couple of years.
Hopefully the knowledge that it is the final season will bring that sense of unity back and the show can go out on a high. It deserves no less.
I looked at the edit page army and I don’t get how to embed a video; sorry, I’m pretty computer illiterate. Maybe one of our more web site savvy authors will take a stab at it later. Hey at least the link works, that’s better than my last effort!
Believe it or not Kev I totally agree about the divided fandom, I am so tired of it. I’m still not nearly ready to hope for the show to end, but I’ve thought many times about removing all my bookmarks back here.
Probably not the most appropriate place to say this, but it’s bothering me. A cannon is the thing you shoot, canon is the source material for any given fandom. This public service announcement has been brought to you by the people that twitch every time they see it spelled wrong. Carry on, folks.
PS – if they’re not going to call attention to the fact that Big Mike and Mary were in Terminator 2 together, which brings serious nerd cred, then I’d rather they leave Bryce out of the equation with Sarah’s handler, no matter what show DeKay is on.
Oh gee, Frea. You’re on a hopeless quest!
My own hopeless quest is to make known that “to beg the question” does NOT mean to bring up a point of interest. “To beg the question” is to raise a question that answers itself. The classic example is “Are you still cheating on your wife?”, where both the answer ‘yes’ and ‘no’ get you in trouble. 😉
But will people listen to me? Nooooooo!
While we’re on crazy quests, my biggest one is “nauseous.” THIS DOES NOT MEAN YOU ARE ILL. It means you are CAUSING nausea, aka you smell bad and the other people around you are throwing up in their mouths a little. “Nauseated” is ill, “nauseous” is causing illness.
Amusingly, Joe, I think I knew that about “begs the question.” Because I figure the phrase actually comes from “begets the question.”
My personal favorite was when people would write about Chuck and Sarah running from the CIA and going “rouge”, I had visions of them putting make-up on each other.
Ah the joys of blogging in an auto-check, auto-correct age. The age old question, are these or aren’t they misspellings. I like to consider them typos that the spell check doesn’t catch, but that’s a bit self serving on my part since as a scientist I deal with canonical things and should know very well cannon isn’t canon. But then I am the guy who wrote for weeks about the heroes journey before finally correcting myself.
But hey, at least I use
capitlecapital letters at the start of mysentancessentences and punctuation, and feel a bit of shame every time I type TPTB or IMHO.I’m good on canon/cannon, but apparently I know nothing about “begging the question.” Thanks, Joe. For anyone else that’s interested (because I seriously didn’t know) here’s a link.
Herder … going “rouge” … hilarious.
The one that makes me cringe, grammatically is the proper use of I/me/him/he etc.
Dave, Kev…I doubt the divide in the fandom will ever be resolved because people keep it going. i’m saying this in broad terms, people come to sites and they praise season 3 because they liked it. people who didn’t like it say they didn’t and add comments like it had no redeeming qualities.
the person who liked 3 but didn’t like four says season 4 was boring or had no bite. so the person who said that 3 had no redeeming qualities but likes season 4 gets upset (can’t find a word that makes sense) that they didn’t like 4 and fires back. it then escalates from there. people start to get personal and all bets are off at that point.
i don’t think either side will ever give in, its human nature to defend what you like and attack what you don’t.
the other problem is the written media we use. the written words are open for interpretation the writer may not have intended because some people are just better at putting their words down in print. what is said as a joke may sound good in conversation may not come out as intended in print because we can’t see the facial expressions or body language of the person writing it.
everyone’s fixation on punctuation – grammar – spelling – phrase use or misuse, etc surprises me> i have no such compulsions for other people, to me it is their business & feels to me like an unfair attitude to hold toward others, since the educational background of folks blogging is so diverse ….. but to each his or her own on that one. Much like one’s ability to write or speak well, Lord help us if we start to worry about how other people think!
I’ve never been one to worry too much about the specifics of grammatical correctness, I think partly because I spend so much time with much older material and am well aware of how so many of our silly rules (especially punctuation, but spelling too) have shifted over time. I figure the point of all language is communication, if you make yourself understood the rest is sort of trivial. But that said, some of the word mis-usage is funny. I know I was correct on canon for very long time, but having recently observed I was in the minority, I figured I was spelling it wrong and switched to “cannon” a couple months back. I guess that’s one I actually should have looked up! It really is the homonyms that trip us all up more than anything, spell check is of no help on them at all!
Jason, I understand allowing for people whose education level isn’t on par with college english majors or even people educated when they still taught things like grammar or composition. In addition we often have people here whose first language isn’t english. We all make allowances. That isn’t what gets to me.
As Dave said the main point is communication, so if that is accomplished, fair enough and I won’t quibble for the most part. But to me that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t strive to improve, or follow the rules we are familiar with, especially in a forum where you aren’t limited to 140 characters, where things like “ttly gr8” have some functional purpose. My peeve is about courtesy for the reader.
Things like punctuation, capitalization, paragraph breaks and using the proper spelling of the proper word all make it easier for the reader to read your post. On the other side one thing that also bugs me is when pre-formated text with line breaks is pasted into the reply window, making the reply a mix of variably spaced lines with seeming random breaks and paragraphs, so this isn’t about old outmoded rules that don’t apply anymore in an internet age.
Now this isn’t intended as a specific criticism, though I’ve undoubtedly singled out people who practice what I preach against. I’m also guilty of some monster paragraphs and really poor use of the comma, and obviously I have the occasional homonym problem, so I understand a lot of this is the product of limited time to get your thoughts down and posted. But the reverse is that you are asking your reader to spend more of their time and energy to read your thoughts, so I think it reasonable to make it as easy for them as you can, especially with the length of the posts we often have here. It’s a minor quibble, and I usually don’t let it get to me, but since we were on the subject…
Ernie you hit on the number one reason for trying to use somewhat standardized rules, that is making your actual meaning understood with a minimum of fuss for the reader. But I’d add that leads directly to the next issue, misunderstandings elevate blood pressures and undermine the goodwill of the setting. Sometimes the problem is just a matter of being too brief; a too short comment can come across as rude or snippy. Sometimes it’s poor word choice, or maybe an attempted joke that doesn’t read quite as cute as it sounded in the writer’s head. I’m sure we’ve all been guilty of these sorts of snafus on occasion. But proof reading and paying some attention to structure do help reduce these sorts of mistakes. It seems me loosing my temper two nights ago may have been partly caused my misreading a writer’s intent, and ultimately that comes back to being MY mistake. But when we post it serves us well to take some responsibility for how our comments may come across to others.
@Ernie
The notion of writing better as a courtesy towards others is a great explanation. I will try to comply. No guarantees of success can be made, as I am by nature a sloppy writer.
@Kevin
I am mildly optimistic that the fans will watch and discuss (at least on this blog site) with a far better mindset than the last two.
First off, the writers have a pretty decent idea of how to be successful. I am guessing the actual content will not be inflammatory for any length of time toward Chuck and Sarah much like S4. But, I also am guessing that great care will be taken in writing the conspiracy ‘twists’ to make sure that part of the season makes use of the writing team’s best work. If those two things happen, the season will more than likely be great for a large percentage of our fans here.
Plus, many of the most radical Chuck fans on either side of the divide seem to have left the show or at least have stopped blogging. Of those Chuck fans that have stayed, we have had an opportunity to learn how different POV’s think, react and feel about TV, which seems to have fostered empathy for others in many of us. Although that might not be 100% representative of the total fan base, it is indeed a snapshot of a kind I have noticed on this site.
I am hoping this all will lead to a feeling of esprit de corps among fans, such that watching and discussing the last season TOGETHER in spite of different POV’s will enhance the final leg of the journey. At least that is the story I am starting the season off with!
Hi, all.
I’m sorry to have been so quiet (again) of late. This time my excuse is that I’m fighting off a bad cold and the sinus drugs have left me feeling spacy.
[Drugs? Spacy??? WOO-HOO!]
Um, no. I’m just this side of feeling miserable.
But I come with news. The CBS show How To Be a Gentleman has been effectively canceled. That doesn’t directly affect Chuck and it’s chances for an extension of course, but I find it interesting that NBC is not the only network experiencing some sort of schedule upheaval.
I happened to see the show because it followed TBBT on Thursdays. I don’t want to speak ill of it, but I wasn’t impressed. Is it just me, or is it that the same-ol’-same-ol’ isn’t cutting it anymore?
When Chuck is over there is going to be a big hole. Something will fill it eventually, but it’ll be a while.
Yeah Joe there doesn’t seem to be anything waiting in the wings that can replace Chuck! It does seem like ratings are significantly down across the board for everything. I’m not quite sure how all of this works, is it just that total viewership is down? Or is it a function of viewers being fragmented across more channels than ever? Perhaps this is the real significance of that Mayan calendar, its the television world we know will end in 2012! Leaving nothing but reality shows. Makes me so mad, maybe I’ll just go spend the day in the park…
Get better soon Joe!
I suspect total viewership in the desired demographic is down, Dave. Of course it is! If I was part of the “Pepsi Generation”, the 20-somethings are the Internet Generation. They’re not watching TV (or wearing wrist watches, I hear).
I’d like to think that the vastly greater number of outlets has diluted talent (or something), but I’m not sure I believe that. First, every time I go to the theater, I realize that there’s a huge amount of acting and entertaining talent that we never see. Perhaps “the system” is just not letting them get in front of television viewers. Second, have they really expanded the outlets that much? There’s so much of cable that’s either re-runs of old network stuff or QVC clones, I wonder. Certainly, if the majority of what’s really new is reality shows, then yes, it’s the end of the world as we know it, just as the Mayans predicted.
My dream is that the old Hollywood Studio method of entertaining us is crashing down and about to be replaced by something better. My nightmare is that “The X-Factor” is it.
I think we’ve seen a lot of both the good and bad of it in recent years. Various cable channels are doing more original content than ever; SyFy and USA have been joined by FX and AMC. There is a lot of variety which gives me more hope for finding things I’ll actually like in the future.
But the major networks seem to have less interesting than ever. I generally blame reality programming, but I’m a bit of a dinosaur and I don’t care for the dark/cynical soap operas that are so prevalent either. I just hope that’s mainly cyclical and we’ll see more upbeat scripted content in the near future.
I think the system is entering an alien atmosphere, and it’s breaking up.
Seriously, people just don’t watch the way they used to, what with DVR and 200 channels and internet sources. I wonder if at least partial recognition of that is why Chuck’s still alive. And I wonder what changes will come about for the industry and the advertisement model of funding production. Any theories?
On a side note, a question: do the cable networks rely on the same ratings system as the regular networks?
The networks HAVE to find a way of getting revenue from DVRs. So many viewers I know, especially those who are actually more serious about what they watch, view almost everything except live events via DVR. I’d add to that as Ernie has mentioned before, they need to look at various streaming video revenue streams too. I’m certain that the viewers who are considered “most desirable” (educated, affluent, tech-savvy consumers) are doing a huge percentage of their viewing on their own schedule.
Thinkling the cable channels do pay attention to ratings and calculate their advertising rates the same way broadcast stations do; but, they get most of their revenue from cable and satellite fees. So their revenue stream is a little more complex and actually allows for some cushioning from pure ratings. I think it makes it a little easier for the cable stations to let a show build an audience. Although total revenues still tend to be a bit less, and some of the niche channels have extremely low numbers. Last I knew Fox News Channel averaged less than 1 million viewers an hour during prime time; and it had more viewers than all the other cable news channels COMBINED! While bigger events, like the Burn Notice season finale a couple seasons back pulled over 6 millionn viewers. And Monday Night Football on ESPN beats most broadcast shows.
Now some real news, I think.
Episode 5.09 is entitled Chuck vs. the Kept Man.
Mmmm… Interesting. I hope the Kept Man is an unknown character and no Orion… I mean, I love him, but he’s dead! He has to stay that way (the same goes for Bryce) Damn spoilers! Every time I read some, my expectative raises… I really, really hope they don’t crush them…
I’m pretty confident Amron that they wouldn’t go there. We’ve heard Fedak acknowledge they made a bit of a joke out of the non-deaths. I really doubt they’d go there again.
Actually, I have a fear about this one, Amron. I don’t want “The Kept Man” to be Chuck. That’s more than a bit of a slur that doesn’t bode well.
If it is Chuck, then I expect that it’ll be resolved quickly and with humor. We’ve seen that before. I do wish they’d keep away from any cliché marriage troubles, though.
I hadn’t thought about that, Joe, but I agree completely. No marriage clichés. I had enough of them in telenovelas…
My first reaction was that Chuck has blown through all of Volkov’s money and Sarah, while reconciling with her mother gets her inheritance making Chuck a kept man.
I also vote no on marriage clichés. I think they used their tokens for relationship issues in S4 (and relationship angst in S3). I liked most of it in S4 (not S3, obviously), but it’s time for Chuck and Sarah just to be … be the awesome spy couple by day, passionate married couple by night, and the core and driving force of TeamB.
I agree (from Rac below) that a “kept relationship” excludes marriage, at least in the traditional sense. Herder’s idea of a Sarah inheritance is funny, and could be played for laughs … making Chuck a kept man (maybe Emma has a bigger piggy bank than Jack). But to me that only works if the theme is elsewhere present in the episode, because CS in no way fit the “kept” scenario in any real way.
That said, the only other time a “kept” arrangement was mentioned was in Coup, when the Generalissimo said Frost was Volkoff’s kept woman. If I had to guess, I’d say that the kept man is the heavy of an evil woman.
I think someone other than Chuck is the most likely answer. But I could see a scenario like herder mentioned being how Chuck FEELS briefly, and Morgan might be just the one to point it out!
Dave, to my mind the one to point it out forcefully and frequently would be Casey. Can’t you see the fun he would have if Sarah had to put her money into the Buy More to keep it afloat? “How’s it feel to be a kept man Bartowski?” and when Chuck tries to justify himself with all the things he’s doing to make a go of the business Casey grunts and walks away.
Hah, yeah I can see that Herder. Especially if Sarah inadvertently shows up and defends her guy, leaving Chuck feeling more inadequate than ever. Only if it’s played for laughs though, I’d hate to see this season wasted on silly angst story-lines.
I hope the Kept Man is Casey 😉 Probably not, but lol if it was.
What a hoot!
Well he is getting a love interest this season, so you never know!
Can you be a Kept Man and still be married? That term usually means the woman he is sleeping with provides for him. That doesn’t include marriage.
Thank you for clear that! Damn idioms…
I don’t know I think you can be married and be “kept.” It all really depends on who earns the most in which case the derogatory connotation or teasing comes from being kept. Of course traditionally you’re right, “kept” is most commonly used with sugar daddy or mama.
Try using proper english, capitilation and spelling on an Iphone. It’s no easy task. I find it rude someone cos me for misspelled words. I don’t write for a living and it’s been years since college. I also don’t look at a dictionary to ensure that I use the correct word for each sentence. For example all my life I have nevet had nurses, PHD Anatomy teachers and Doctors correct me. What about those with learning disabilities. Are those people exempt from the criticism of the literary elite. I am sure I made a slew of gramatical, spelling errors so fire away. But you know what posting on a forum should be fun. Not stressful on did I use the correct spelling of the word. Reply to the content of the message not if an inconsequential word was mispelled. I managed to get a Masters Degree with my improper spelling and Grammar so in the grand scheme of things it’s nice to have but lets not beat each other up over it.
Wow talk about bad grammar., Sorry about everyone who had to read that. lol
Ha, I thought that you were trying to make a point. Personally I don’t use spell check as a means to force me to make more of an effort to say things correctly, I’m sure that I make mistakes from time to time and the lack of an edit function ensures that my errors are saved for posterity. Having said that sometimes mistakes are unintentionally funny, like going rouge ( I saw that a number of times on the NBC boards at the end of season two – sorry Faith – and other places) but I don’t take it as a personal slight but funny is funny.
Truth is I have never thought of the difficulties of using different methods of posting and in any event I usually try to respond to the idea or the opinion being posted rather than the actual words. That said, sometimes the post is too opaque to figure out the opinion or idea and the post gets ignored.
In general I think using someone’s grammar, syntax, diction, language, whatever as a form of criticism is pretty weak. But I must admit there are times when it bothers me too.
Oh and I must say I quite enjoy Mac Lion’s new auto spell system. Makes me dumber by association because I don’t have to think as much but what are you going to do? Not use it? Yeah, that’s going to happen ;).
I agree that using grammar or spelling to try to dismiss the logic or force of someone’s argument is one of the oldest and lamest of internet phenomenon. But when things get genuinely difficult to understand I think it’s fair to ask for a bit more effort from someone if they are in a position to set things out more clearly. Obviously people who aren’t native speakers and writers of English have a harder time, and asking for patience or a little effort on the reader’s part isn’t out of line either.
Now the big question, can Lion’s auto-spell distinguish between canon and cannon? Its and It’s? There, they’re and their? The execute intended instruction (i.e. do what I meant, not what I told you to do) subroutine is the holy grail for programmers. Until then computers can only enable or mildly mitigate our mistakes, not save us from them. 😉
Ugh posting on an Iphone I give up. Randomly deleting words no spell check.
You have my sincerest sympathy. I often get frustrated with trying to fight and/or turn off the “default” formatting, autocomplete and autocorrect in OpenOffice (Linux Word equivalent). But then I learned to type (poorly) on an actual typewriter so I have this silly expectation that I’m the one doing the typing.
I was typing and my cursor was possessed it was deleting everything. I understand some peoples frustration with grammar. I try to have good grammar. However if I have to go out of my way to ensure I have correct grammar or else, that is when people lose me.
BTW posted on Firefox not on Iphone. 🙂
It looks like there’s a bunch of bloopers, deleted scenes and fun stuff from the about-to-be released Chuck S4 DVDs, starting here.
These comments are already taking too long to load, so I won’t put them in-line, but boy is this fun to watch!
New promo from Kriswatcheson
They’ve cast a child for 5×08 http://www.spoilertv.com/2011/10/chuck-episode-508-chuck-versus-baby.html
Please tell me that is not Sarah’s 5 year old daughter that she gave up to her mom. Because that will break my love for SWB.
hmmm I wonder if Molly could be a cutie childhood flashback for one now grown up beautiful Sarah Walker? Add a little footage of Cheryl Ladd from days gone by – and I think it’ll be ready to serve up… ~ just say’n.
I’m wondering if Molly could be a flashback to Sarah’s sister in a re-enactment of the sunburn incident at the beach mentioned in Vs The Wookie.
That’s a possibility, Gringo.
http://twitter.com/#!/GrayJones/status/124110137395912705
😥
Some promotional pics for 5x01http://www.seat42f.com/chuck-season-5-episode-1-chuck-vs-the-zoom-photos.html
More details about 5.9 here. Courtesy of ChuckTV. I’ll put it up above after everyone’s clicked on their link :D.
So, if 9 airs after the holidays, which is our Christmas episode? Or did the schedule get messed up with the delay?
I think, if I’m keeping track correctly, 5.07 is the Christmas episode. So they must be running a couple weeks into December this year. Maybe a schedule more like S2, with two episodes running after Thanksgiving.
Ah, OK. Thanks.
Yup. Sarah’s mom’s episode (5.8) is slated for January so 9 has to be around that time too.
another promo found on a spoiler site. i think it’s from the show zac was just on.
Pleasant way to start my day, I presume that the secret that he is trying to keep from Sarah is the Zoom and that it is somehow supposed to be a suprise for her. He said no to Belly dancer Sarah and presumably to seductrice Sarah too, I guess this is why they call this fiction, as I can’t see a regular guy saying no in either situation.
Obviously, we have to wait 2 weeks to find out, but I don’t know if he’ll resist this time. Great scene. Both playing it to perfection. Man they’re good together.
At any rate, it makes me hopeful about the way they’ll write married Chuck and Sarah.
Yeah herder, Chuck obviously has quite remarkable self control. This sure looks like a scenario that will be played for laughs, whatever the “secret” is I expect it to be something Sarah will like.
I read somewhere a few weeks ago that Chuck enlists Morgan help to surprise Sarah, this snipet of awesomeness. From the video, it appears Sarah found out something was afoot. Would most men here agree if that is the penalty for keeping secret surprises, Chuck ought to make surprises to his new bride one of his priorities in life!
Anyhow, how about a dozen ten second spots of the key parts of that video on Sunday night’s NBC football, with its 22 million viewers, might help NBC get Cringe / Gruesome / sorry I can’t recall the name off the ground & wouldn’t hurt Chuck either.
ChuckTV lets out what the secret is. I really need to avoid that site. They always blurt out the suprises.
correction ChuckTV was just quoting EW.
—^v—^v—^v————————————————————
I have so little self control when it comes to spoilers, I’m so disapointed in myself, won’t spoil it for others though, it’s kind of cute.
#SEXYTIMES #SEXYTIMES #SEXYTIMES!!!! FTW!
Dave, you asked me once why i came here when i no longer watch the show. seeing peoples reaction to a link/ video i provided just makes me feel good. i guess that’s part of it. glad you all enjoyed it!
army that’s great, and thanks for the clip. You are still a bit of an enigma to me for remaining in the community of a show you no longer support, but that doesn’t mean you are not welcome here. And we do appreciate the clip and occasional spoiler you’ve hunted down for us!
Dave, thanks. most people think i’m bat crap crazy anyway. why else would i keep going back to the desert every other year, lol. i’ll be heading back again next summer, so its all good!
Spoiler and Speculation Warning…. well – ok, its much more speculation than actual spoiler – but if you’ve been lurking through enough websites – hunting for clues, I think there are enough of the pieces to put together. Zoom [ I’m guessing] is the term Morgan chooses to use instead of Flash when his Intersect kicks in.
The surprise for Sarah – apparently is a dream house [ Toes In The Sand] ~ that Chuck and Morgan are trying to keep Sarah from finding out about – until the real estate deal goes through…. I’m guessing things go sideways though.
This thread is so slow. I”ll give S5 a chance, 2 or 3 eps. Not a fan of Morgansect. sigh..
What I’m really looking forward to is syndication. Really like the idea of watching the show on TV every day! I wonder when and if that will happen. I suppose it will, but when? 1, 2 years from now? And on what network/channel. Will it be day time or night time? I prefer night time.
It seems the first 3 episodes are spreading to the press so we should be getting more details on them soon. Meanwhile 2 articles containing spoilers came out today:
1. Be warned this one is heavy on Morgansect: EW Ha. I’m exaggerating ;).
2. But this one’s really good 😉 I won’t say why lol.
Is it the 28th yet? 😉 😀
Thanks Faith! Some very exciting stuff there. This is flat out, the most I’ve been excited for a season premier since last year!
There’s a new teaser from Ausiello out this morning that may or may not have anything to do with Chuck. If it does, it’s major.
Please go to the top of the page to get the synopsis and link.
I honestly can’t see it being Chuck, but hmmmm…… Would certainly go against Fedak’s claim that season 5 would be a love letter to the fans by killing an original character.
after the season aired didn’t they say something about a possible death in the final season as well? i think i remember something like that and they said it would be huge, so my money is on chuck having the death.
Fedak said someone would get killed off–or words to that effect–at Comic-con in July.
We remember, DKD. It’s also true that Fedak is considered very trixtie about these things.
If the two are related, then I consider that even more proof that it’ll amount to nothing. Sort of like those “7 times out of 10 it amounts to nothing – maybe 6.”
I could see it being Chuck, although I hope not. Casey would make the most sense for a heroic death sort of scene; but I would much rather they let the main cast just ride off into the sunset together.
I vote for neither Chuck nor Sarah. That would just be wrong! Seriously, it would dampen my Chuck experience beyond repair. Like you, Dave, I would rather a sunset ending for all of them, though I could probably take any death but Chuck or Sarah. The next biggest deaths would be Casey or Ellie. After that, Morgan or Devon. At comic con when they said that there could be a death, and it would be big, I thought of Big Mike.
I don’t know if it figures in at all, but I guess they have to consider whether or not they ever want to do a reunion episode or movie or any future feature or spin-off. Killing off Chuck or Sarah would make the appeal of any future features almost nill.
If it eases your mind a bit, like most of the voters, I think Desperate Housewives is the one to pull that stunt. It’s perfectly in keeping with the way that show’s been going for years.
When it comes to being “over the top”, they like to keep raising the bar. 😉
to clarify chuck the show not the character.
Yeah, no doubt Thinkling it can’t be Chuck or Sarah; that would ruin the whole five year experience. I still think Casey would be the most plausible, but really any other character death could be made to work.
Now hopefully Joe is right, and it won’t actually be on Chuck at all!
I don’t think it can be either Chuck or Sarah because the spoiler says this happens before the finale. There won’t be a finale without both of them involved, and it would be far too dark an ending, even allowing that I’m wrong about the goal of a happily ever after. Killing off one of them also does not mesh with making the season a love letter to fans. And no, TPTB aren’t that clueless, and no I don’t need a discussion of how they proved themselves clueless and vindictive in season 3.
Morgan would make some sense given the number of clueless and nearly suicidal things he has done on missions, but I think TPTB like him too much to risk not having him around for even an incredibly unlikely backorder, unless the fact that they are going forward with it means they’ve confirmed there is no backorder. Same for Casey. If it is Chuck that has the original character death (notice they didn’t say main character) my money is on one of the BuyMorons wandering into the spy world at the wrong time.
Now that I think of it Anna Wu was an original character. Maybe the CIA did recruit her after all… Then there’s Harry Tang, who has been waiting for an assignment in Hawaii for all those years. Hmmm both Anna and Harry in Hawaii… Suspicious.
ernie they didn’t say main character but this line to me kind of rules out a minor character, “And I’m told the exit will be a dramatic one, impacting multiple characters and story lines.” the minor characters would not or should not have that big of an influence on multiple story lines or characters. that’s just me though.
I have long been a fan of offing Morgan, but that is more payback for my arthritic thumb as result of pushing the FF button so hard whenever he appears on screen.
The real dramatic punch would come from CAsey’s death. His reaction to Decker in season 4 makes me think a Casey Decker showdown would be really great tv. My fanfic would have Casey killing Decker much like he, Mary, Orion, and Sarah have killed before, then dying himself from his wounds. But, b4 he dies, he tells Sarah (and maybe Chuck too) to take care of Alex, Kathleen, and Morgan, as well as her (their) family. Maybe he could also provide the impetus for CS to leave the business, telling them that they do not belong in the spy business any longer, that the spy business is for cold hearted killers like him, that Walker is no longer that person, and that she deserves a real life, the one she always dreamed of.
I think that if it were a major character he would have said major character rather than original character. Major character death has more punch and would likely get more hits. Also the BuyMorons have often unwittingly had an impact on the spy-world so I don’t see any problem with one or more of their deaths affecting multiple characters and storylines.
Sadly however, a heroic death does seem to rule out my dream of Jeff, Lester and Loretta (Jeff’s van) pulling a genuine “Thelma & Louise” exit from the show.
Now Ernie you’re just messing with us; you know it has to be the Thelma and Louise scenario, they even foreshadowed it back in Suitcase (4.02)!
But seriously you make a good point about how it could be a minor character. Big Mike could actually have some dramatic impact. I still think Casey is the most likely (loves danger and has a strong heroic streak). It would impact everyone, and likely be very dramatic, without ruining the show for anyone (although he would be badly missed for any later Chuck projects!). Ditto most of that for Morgan, but I can’t see them going that far downbeat for Morgan. Ellie and/or Devon is possible, but that seems a little too depressing for this show and I hope they don’t go there.
And for the record Ernie, I don’t for a second believe they would be so clueless as to kill off Chuck and Sarah and have the nerve to call it a love letter to fans. They are clearly NOT that clueless.
Well Dave I suppose Jeffster pulling a Thelma & Louise could be seen as heroic in a Darwin awards sort of way. Removing themselves from the gene pool certainly could be seen as a service to humanity if not heroic.
And for the record I didn’t think you’d consider TPTB clueless enough to kill off Chuck or Sarah as part of a love letter to fans. But there are those out there whose hatred of Schwedak for season 3 knows no bounds. 😉
You rang?
Hola Amigos – wow – things are really heating up…. [ not only due to fishnet stockings]
I like the idea about teasing a real character death – but, I have a feeling they wouldn’t be leaking that info about Chuck before the season even starts.
I’m surprised that so many find a character death so hard to grasp… There have been plenty of deaths – and many of them somewhat startling. Harry Tang, Bryce, Stephen B, – and those are only some of the good guys. So to kill one of the other characters is not really so much of a stretch… I guess it depends on how serious they are about the season finale… or if they are still hoping for a late pickup [ encore episodes so to speak]
In any case – the death of a fictional character can be an incredible motive within the story ~ just say’n
I had figured out that Morgan was in line for some hospital time this year, after all Chuck was going crazy in the end of season three and was having his brain wiped in season four. Casey spent all of Push Mix as a patient as a result of his fall, Sarah spent most of Cliffhanger in the hospital so I thought that it would be Morgan’s turn this year.
Don’t know about killing either Morgan or Casey, I can see that if they did then at the end there would be a flash forward to a scene with Chuck, Sarah and their child little Casey or Morgan. If the item applies to Chuck there are some weasel words like “original character” and ‘the death will definitely stick”, there is the possibility that it could refer to either Bryce or Langston Graham both original characters. Although resurecting them just to kill them again seems a bit of a cheat.
I agree Joe, Desperate Housewives is the sort of show you would see something like that happen. Having said that, even if it were true for Chuck, what about Beckman perhaps she’s leaking info to Chuck and is subsequently killed off in the end.
Yeah. That would be tolerable. For my money, Casey would be a distant second, and Big Mike third (but only because he’s not really one of the principles).
Poor Bolonia!
As an aside, for many years I thought that if there was ever a Hollywood couple I wanted to have dinner with, I would pick Danny DeVito (Taxi & many movies) and his wife Rhea Pearlman (Cheers). They’d be a hoot.
But since Chuck started, I’d now rather share a meal with Bonita Friedericy and her husband John Billingsley (Dr. Phlox on ST:Enterprise). I’m crushing on Bonita and hey! It’s age appropriate for a change! 😉
Maybe Morgan goes psycho with the new intersect in his head and Chuck has to put 3 rounds into Morgan to save Sarah. Then Morgan will fall into a river and Chuck wont be able to check for a pulse.
You know what that means – of course he’s still alive – haven’t you ever seen a John Carpenter movie?
But of course! That’s the one thing the show has lacked; a Zombie Morgan.
😉
According to Mel of Chuck TV the first episode of the season was co-written by Fedak and Wooten.
Wow, Carrie Ann Moss, Rebecca Romjin, Cheryl Ladd and now Bo Derek playing herself. Lots of beautiful guest stars for this final season according to The Hollywood Reporter.
I sense a little bit of sarcasm…do we really care if pretty men or women come onto Chuck anymore? I mean seriously? I think Chuck fans are just happy to have the pretty Chuck and Sarah…
Actually come to think about it…were there any really good guest actors (I mean the ones in the love triangles)? I mean take out the romance parts and did the actors really have any pop? I mean I think Cole was ok, so was Bryce and Hannah,,,but Routh and Cohen were awful…better to get actors who are just actors for storyarcs..
Dale I don’t think any of those actors/characters will be coming on to Chuck or Sarah. I think its safe to just sit back and enjoy the show!
here’s the link.
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/nbc-chuck-bo-derek-guest-stars-249895
i worry about this line…
“What I do know is that she’ll play herself on the upcoming season’s Episode 10 and her arrival will reveal stunning secrets, as well as a forbidden romance with one of the characters.”
Hmmmm, forbidden romance? Sounds like Jeff to me!
Dave, certainly Lester is more forbidden than Jeff, right?
I mean, it’s gotta be! 😉
Or how about Big Mike? Then when Morgan finds out his mom has been wronged he will unleash the righteous fury of the Intersect on Big Mike and Bo Derek! Oh yeah! I like the sound of that!
Big Mike? Together with Bo Derek?
Now that’s forbidden romance! And it’s mostly forbidden by Bolonia, I’ll betcha. Big Mike’s got a history of philandering, you’ll recall.
This theory I like!
This whole thread is just WRONG!
I may need therapy. More than the usual, I mean.
Oh, c’mon, VV. If forbidden luv is wrong, you don’t wanna be right.
Right?
😉
In the height of bad taste might I suggest Bianne (Bo and Dianne), I’m sorry Ernie but I just couldn’t resist.
And Diane can actually get away with that now…
Well Herder, Anna Wu had a colorful past too, so as long as Bianne was just a phase she went through after the heartbreak of Droan and before Duck, I say spice up Dianne’s past love life a bit. The only thing I need is for it to make sense and move Duck forward in the final season so we can FINALLY get those two crazy kids together in episode 13.
My money is still on Big Mike from his Earth, Wind, Fire and Rain days.
I’m surprised nobody has mentioned the only cast member even resembling a ringer for Bo’s one night LI in her famous ’10’ role, Morgan Grimes starring as Dudley Moore. Anyone else shipping Boorgan? Now that is a forbidden romance.
Although, if Orion comes back, Bo’s character and a Orion could form a ‘Borion’ (isn’t he the Badger’s basketball coach) romance. This might allow TPTB to reveal secrets required to finish off the epic and twisty conclusion????
Hmmm… Well Morgan would have been -2 when “10” came out. I guess we can’t get much more forbidden than that.
Another possibility is Casey of course. I hear Bo Derek is a Reagan fan too.
Jason, I think it was Neils Bohr who showed that Borions cannot emit Charah particles in the presence of an intersected Malex, even in a twisty universe.
QED.
Or something like that…
😉
Don’t we really, really, really need an Earth, Wind, Fire & Rain “reunion” on Chuck before the end of the show. I mean, faded sex goddesses and second string Charlie’s Angelses and sf movie stars and Luke Skywalker 35 years later is one thing. But Earth, Wind, Fire and Rain playing a comeback date at the BuyMore. Now that would be must-see TV…
Oh, absolutely, Nobody. An Earth, Wind, Fire & Rain reunion would be classic. Perhaps they could open for Jeffster!
Joe, there is forbidden, and then there is that which is a violation of the laws of God, Man and Euclidean Geometry.
I would say that Jeff or Lester would qualify for the latter category.
And thank you all so very much for a truly unsettling series of mental images. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go give myself a swirly in my 50 gallon drum of brain bleach.
Also from tv guide on ep 1…
Chuck is almost back. What will we see for Chuck and the gang this season? — Erin
NATALIE: Playing second fiddle to Morgan won’t be easy for Chuck, especially since Morgan has developed a habit of hogging all the glory and screwing up their missions. Instead, Chuck will turn his attention toward finding Sarah her dream home, but that’ll be a financial challenge as Carmichael Industries isn’t as successful a venture as Team New Intersect hoped it would be.
Not that I don’t love all the kick ass, statuesque and geek cred-ful women, but how about some hunky men? I’d personally like to see Tom Selleck in an episode of Chuck… 😀
I thought “beefcake” was why Justin Hartley was cast!
Ah yes, green arrow mmhmm. I want more? 😉
We have a bit in the way of new spoilers from Ausiello. Something about “toes in the sand”:
Well, I know a lot of people here would like to see a dancing scene in the premiere. And it looks like you’re going to get your wish. The dancing just isn’t between Chuck and Sarah. Heh.
Interesting interview with some decent spoilers/insight into how they are going to play the Morgansect. At least initially. Can’t say I’m crazy about it, but I’m not surprised either.
http://zacharylevifan.com/gallery/displayimage.php?pid=55499&fullsize=1
Hola Amigo, thanks for posting that link to the scan from the magazine – very cool!
It would appear that our dynamic duo have carried their personal lives onto the screen… ~ this should be very entertaining, as we watch those two clown around. I’m getting the feeling that’s the reason why Morgan has the intersect – only good reason under the current circumstances and situation to have Morgan and Chuck side by each – fumbling their way toward …errr [my apologies to Sarah McLachlan]
i would have preferred they stuck with the idea that chucks brain and outlook on life made him able to handle the intersect. despite them saying that this year would show why chuck was special, according to the scan, its something embedded in the intersect that causes problems for morgan. that’s what causes the change not morgan not being able to handle it.
I don’t think it sounds all bad. I can honestly say this wouldn’t have been my first choice, but I expect it will be a lot of fun anyway. It will be interesting to see, whatever the flaw in the Intersect code is, if its a new problem in Morgan’s Intersect of if it was there all along and Chuck was just able to deal with it. I think that will be the most interesting part of the story, why was Chuck the better Intersect?
dave i would say that too if ellie hadn’t fixed it last season. that’s what the main argument was for morgan and others to be able to use it at all. plus after the hartley fiasco i don’t think orion would have left that flaw in. by adding in that variable you will not get a true comparison, it can be blamed on the code not morgan’s brain or his outlook on life. that’s why i said i wished they would have left it out. so fans could actually see why chuck was special.
While I also wish they’d let the Intersect just go away at this point. I don’t think we know anything yet about may or may not have been done to the program. There could easily still be a flaw neither Orion nor Ellie knew anything about. And its passed through enough hands its hard to know exactly what version of the program Morgan got. Perhaps Ellie made coding changes that made the program accessible to a far larger number of candidates (like ADHD electronics store managers) but an old flaw in a completely different sub-routine has never been discovered. Maybe it never interfered with Chuck because he is “special”, but it will drive Morgan stark raving mad (or… stark raving madder…)
Or perhaps it was new bug added deliberately as part of the grand conspiracy to make a Chuck (now Morgan…) a worthless agent.
There’s just too much we don’t know at this point to be sure of anything.
very true i suppose. we don’t know enough now but it’s fun to guess. i see it more of the cia putting it in vs orion making a mistake. i figure all his versions would have come from the one he downloaded himself, thus not having that flaw. it being put in after makes the most sense to me. and that’s the variable.
dave, i know this is the wrong place for this link. i figured with all the discussions about the direction of network TV you might be interested in it. it talks about the way dramas could be on the way out.
http://www2.macleans.ca/2011/10/19/tv-drama-passes-the-millennium/
Interesting article army. I think what it mainly comes down to is the foolishness of the networks pushing overly serious programming during an economic downturn. It used to be Hollywood understood hard times demanded light entertainment. But I think we currently have a generation of self important and utterly clueless execs and writers who are determined to force feed us their vision of what we SHOULD want. I think more comedies and mixed genre shows like Chuck would be better received than the constant stream of depression. Don’t get me wrong, there will always be some market for more serious programming; but right now I think there’s way too much of it.
Dave, i agree on all that. those could be the reasons for the reality TV/idol type shows doing so well. just a guess.
I think one thing to keep in mind is that the broadcast network model itself is in it’s death throes. Something like 70% of viewers get their TV through cable. Current law puts the broadcast networks at a disadvantage as far as collecting fees. Local cable companies are required to cary all local broadcast stations UNLESS they ask for a retransmission fee. Then the cable provider can refuse to cary the station. The national cable networks generally have both advertising and fees for revenues, and the premium channels like HBO have it even better. It’s no mystery why most of the best television being made right now in on cable or subscription channels. They have the money and time to invest in quality productions.
The big change, and the one cable providers are resisting, is a la carte TV, where the consumer can purchase individual channels rather than packages. This might help the broadcast networks if structured right. Of course there is another area opening up for studios to provide content and be paid for it. Apple sort of started it, but Amazon, Netflix and Hulu Plus are really leading the way. With a $70 set top box and high speed internet, the need for cable TV is coming to an end, or at least to their subscription model.
What I’m hoping for is for some enterprising content provider (Nerd Machine) to cut a deal with Roku or Apple that essentially bypasses the networks and cable providers and establishes a direct to the consumer channel for entertainment. Some studios are already pre-releasing pilots on iTunes as a way of pitching directly to viewers. How far can bypassing the broadcasters completely be behind?
To add to that Ernie, the only real edge the broadcasters still have is sports and local news/weather. But of course those are mainly the arena of the local station, NOT the network. And to make things worse, sports are being taken over by regional cable stations; and local weather can be accessed easily on-line. So some venue for local news might be the only strength broadcasters have going forward. As you said, they all may be doomed unless something changes in the landscape we can’t currently foresee.
i’m not sure if the a la carte is being resisted or just won’t work. and i’m not sure about what you mean either so bear with me. my bill for basic cable which includes espn and the local sports channels is 55 dollars a month. if what you are saying is i buy say the big 4 at 5 dollars a month for 20 and that’s all i get, why would i? then i need to add 15 more. i watch about 20 channels a week so i’d pay about 100 or twice what i do now. so you can see my confusion on what you mean. i do agree that for a number of people that watch a small number of shows it would benefit them but on average and for those that watch a lot of channels it may not be worth it compared to what they get now.
now add the 48 dollars i would need to get the modem and internet again more. now granted there are a lot of people that already have the internet factored in but many seniors i know don’t. that’s a large market they would need to consider as well.
i do agree that changes are coming, i think that the networks and providers are looking at it and have been. the bottom line for me is they keep the same format because they haven’t found a way to make more money than they do now. once they find that way we will see it.
Army, it’d all come down to the fee per channel and the individual consumer. I maybe watch 5-6 channels regularly. I’m actually more likely to use my Roku box for Netflix or Amazon than I am to watch TV. Say those 5-6 channels were available at a fee of $2.50. That would take my cable bill from ~$60 a month to about $15. As far as why the networks and cable providers don’t want to change, I think you’re probably right. They make more money selling advertising and subscription packages than if they had to compete for customers against online providers or had to sell channels individually.
My point is that there are other players in the game who could benefit from not having to go through the networks and cable providers to get their product to the consumer directly, and those avenues haven’t really been explored yet. Warner Brother’s is a good example. A studio not affiliated with a TV Network (OK it sort of is, but a really small one) could benefit from having a WB channel on Roku that you could buy for say $6.95 a month (a significant portion of which would go directly to WB) and have access to WB’s library of movies and TV shows. Once something like that is bringing in enough money it may make sense to start providing original and exclusive content to draw more viewers to that site, and you basically have an internet network competing against the broadcast networks but with a completely different revenue model.
yeah ernie i get all that and can see the point like i said for a select group. families with varying age kids would be a hard sell. i agree they need to expand and that other venues are available and they will i suppose.
we agree until they can make more money than they do now i’m afraid we’re stuck.
I knew it! I said they’ll going to go with Morgan turning to the Dark Side because the Intersect and other manipulation issues… Let’s see how well they do that
Sheeeeesh. The Morgansect. May it die a quick and painlessdeath.
https://twitter.com/#!/MattMitovich/status/126775189693403136
I’m pretty sure this means Yvonne Strahovski – Carrie Ann Moss hand to hand combat. FTW!
lol, a matrix style fight could be interesting.
It could be Carrie Ann vs. Yvonne. But, it also could be Chuck vs. Morgan. Or Casey vs. Morgan. The latest TV Guide spoiler indicates that Morgan goes to the dark side in a helicopter scene. The helicopter is in episode 3, according to “behind the scenes” tweets and photos. Beckman was also around for that shoot.
I’m going to go out on a limb and hope that Chuck gets the intersect back (from Beckman) and it leads to a Chuck vs. Morgan battle, which Chuck wins and they remove the intersect from Morgan.
If I’m wrong, better to be wrong going out on the limb. Can you tell I really want the intersect out of Morgan ASAP?
ummmmm, yes
You’re not alone, but there’s good news. Matt MItovich (see Army’s link below) preaches payoff for those turned off by Morgansect. And I quote, “despite a start that I fret might polarize a few fans, my advice is to be patient, because there’s good payoff for the twist involving Morgan acquiring the Intersect.”
To me that makes it official, I’m going to hate the focus on Morgan and Morgansect, at least in the beginning but I’m encouraged by his encouragement.
Are we taking bets on what might polarize fans?
Morgan in the first couple of episodes masters the 2.0 and shows up Chuck? Which leads to a mopey and insecure Chuck?
If we are, my bet isn’t even that specific. Just the fact that all our fears are coming true is good enough. And by fears I’m referring to increased role, devaluing “specialness,” whiny, etc. Pretty much all the things we talked about in Morgansect Malfeasance.
JC, i’m not sure it’s even about chuck. i feel it’s like faith said morgan just having it. putting all the bits together you have a cocky morgan who screws up missions.
While it would not surprise me at all if these writers made Morgan better at using the Intersect than Chuck (I think they pretty much stopped caring about Chuck being special after S2), my guess is more like what Army and Faith are saying. Morgan gets cocky and becomes a jerk. Gomez himself said that Morgan becomes “douchey” in that TV Guide interview he did with Zac.
That’s probably what the guy meant by polarizing fans. A good portion of the fanbase doesn’t like the idea of Morgan with the Intersect. Add to that a much increased role/focus and being a jerk, plus apparently Chuck becoming insecure and whiny yet again, and you can see why he would say it’d polarize fans.
That’s what I’d put my money on.
I have never liked Morgan as much as most in this show, ever. But for some reason, Morgansect does not bother me much as some of you based on the spoilers. Sort of the devil you know vs one you don’t. IN this case, I understand exactly how Morgan will mess up the show.
If it wasn’t Morgan, then I don’t know how Fedak would mess things up, maybe amnesia, or kidnapping, or blackmail Sarah to force her to leave Chuck to save Chuck. To me Morgan’s role as the brown nosing teacher’s pet who is getting inordinate amounts of screen time for a couple of eps, who cares, as long as Chuck and Sarah are written with that ‘love letter to the fans’ thing in mind.
I have every indication, Chuck and Sarah will be written possibly even better than I expected, so I am good. I am going to deal with these wasted Morgan scenes the same way as I do in nearly every episode, with the FF button. I think I am more upset that Chuck is such a dolt that he blew 871 million dollars in a few weeks, I like Chuck smart.
Wow, thay are already pleading with Chuck fans to be patient with Morgansect promising a big payoff. It must be truly awful. After putting up with Shaw in S3, I’m not sure I’m willing to go through such crap again.
In s3 the payoff came in episode 13, so I guess I should just wait for that episode and forget about the others. Although after seeing that clip on Leno, I will have to watch at least half of the premiere episode to see Sarah in her fishnets. LOL
I’m just excited. Morgan aside, this is gonna be great.
Gord, reading between the lines here I don’t think we have to wait until episode 13. Maybe as late as episode 3 but it’s fairly soon–at least when it comes to “Morgansect.”
A very nice, friendly review of the first 3 eps, I found this not to have real much new stuff, but the writer should be congratulated as she packed the material in a manner which seemed more upbeat than most Chuck spoilers I normally read, enjoy:
http://chucktv.net/2011/10/20/chucks-triumphant-return-an-advance-review-of-season-5/
That was a very exciting review, thanks for the link Jason. I knew I was looking forward to this season, now even more so!
another in the same venue for the first three.
http://www.tvline.com/2011/10/matts-inside-line-scoop-supernatural-csi-ny-chuck-secret-circle/
pictures courtesy SWFangirls…
http://www.swfangirls.com/new-photos-chuck-vs-the-bearded-bandit
There are clips they’ve released for “Zoom” (5.1) on NBC.com. I’ve also embedded them up top (under sneak peeks) in iOS friendly youtube, courtesy of ZacharyLeviFan.com.
thanks! mrogan is a tool in the zoom one, lol.
I feel Chuck’s face at the end of the second one full of emotion. It kind of reminds me Sarah’s…
Morgan Sarah tango, who wants to see that?
Stop…stop, Please just STOP!!!!
Dear Lord, no don’t do this to me. You know I just FF Morgan, but how can I fast forward if SHE is in the scene?
AAAAAGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Morgan’s ‘zoom’ face…… Hahaha!!! Sigh.
so that’s why it’s called Chuck vs The Zoom. lol