Writers: Josh Schwartz and Chris Fedak
Director: McG
Episode Grade: A-
Meet Chuck and Morgan. We can’t actually see them, because they’re in a dark room (as in the room is dark, not as in they’re having fun with developing chemicals). Chuck thinks the plan is a bad idea. Morgan points out that they don’t even have a plan. As the two are working up to executing their mysterious non-plan, we hear... knocking. The door opens, and a really hot brunette walks in and turns on the light, revealing the glory of Chuck’s Tron poster. The hot brunette, whose name is Ellie and by the way she’s Chuck’s sister, demands to know what Chuck is up to. Chuck sheepishly admits that he is “escaping.” From his own birthday party, apparently, because his sister is a doctor, and she invited all her doctor friends, so Chuck (the tall funny-looking one) and Morgan (the short funny-looking one) are having a hard time blending in. Ellie points out that she invited “real, live women” (as opposed to what?) just for Chuck, so he better get his scrawny ass back out there and mingle. She prefers that Morgan remain dangling outside the window. I can’t blame her.
And let me take a moment to say that I like Chuck pretty much immediately, and a large part of that is because Zach Levi really understands words, and how to say them, and how to place emphasis on just the right ones, and even how to pause between them in just the right place. It’s shocking how few actors can actually do this, despite the fact that it’s a huge part of their job.
We’re back with Bryce! And it’s exciting! But all you really need to know is that he transfers information from the Fancy Futuristic Computer onto a handheld device, blows up the computer room, uses a bunch of cool spy-action moves to escape his pursuers, and then gets shot in the chest by someone named Casey, but not before using his spy-handheld to send all that stuff from the Fancy Futuristic Computer to his old buddy Chuck. And on his birthday, too! How sweet. By the way, Bryce actually addresses Casey by name, so they must know each other. This may be important later—later in the series, that is, not later in the episode. Oh, and Casey is played by Adam Baldwin, which is why I started watching Chuck in the first place.
And now the party’s over. Chuck and Ellie are chillin’ in the courtyard of their apartment complex. She gently explains to him that old girlfriend talk is a turn-off and, with a hint of frustration, that he needs to move on because “Stanford was five years ago.” “Do we really need to have this conversation again?” Chuck snits. And while Ellie is completely right that Chuck needs to move on, I don’t think the bevy of bimbos interrogating him about what he “really wants to do” was any more tactful or successful as far as getting-to-know-you tactics are concerned. Anyway, Chuck leaves, Morgan tries to put the moves on Ellie, Ellie ignores him.
Later, Chuck and Morgan play video games in Chuck’s room. More accurately, Morgan plays while Chuck pouts on his bed. And I must note that Chuck’s bedroom door is open, which is kind of hilariously, accurately guy-like. Girls can nonchalantly pee in the same bathroom stall, but I can’t tell you how many guys I’ve met who are terrified of being in the same room with another guy with the door shut.
Anyway, Morgan notices that an e-mail from Bryce has popped up on Chuck’s computer, which by the way is adorned with a Post-It with “I’m a professional nerd” scrawled across it, implying that Chuck is quite familiar with self-deprecation. Chuck opens the e-mail, and a text-based prompt pops up: “The terrible troll raises his sword.” So Bryce is gorgeous, athletic, really smart, and a total dork? How perfect can one person be?! Chuck explains to Morgan that the text is from an old game that he and Bryce played around with in college. “Wow, you guys were really cool…” Morgan says, and coming from anyone else, that would be clearly sarcastic, but given Morgan’s Chuck-stalker tendencies, he may actually be sincere. Chuck thinks out loud, trying to remember the troll-killing weapon from his “hero satchel.” Morgan: “You know what? You’re still really cool.” Chuck tells Morgan that it’s time for him to go home, because Morgan is annoying, and also because Chuck would probably like to be alone with whatever surprise his old nemesis gifted him with on his birthday. Maybe it’s porn!
After Morgan leaves, Chuck plugs the right answer into the prompt and is immediately overwhelmed with the images from the Fancy Futuristic Computer. So… not porn. His WTF expression quickly blanks out into a trance-like stupor and we see the entire night go by in fast-forward. His alarm goes off at
Welcome to the Buy More, where “when you buy more, you save more.” It’s sort of like Best Buy, but with a green and yellow color scheme and something called the Nerd Herd instead of the Geek Squad. The Nerd Herders wear white button-ups with light gray ties, which actually looks kind of snazzy. The regular employees wear bright green polos, which are hideous. Chuck is apparently the Nerd Herd team leader, and there are three other Herders—Anna, a cute Asian girl who looks like she’s taking make-up tips from RuPaul; Lester, a mildly cute, shaggy-haired Indian guy; and Jeff, who is just fucking creepy. It’s a good thing Bryce’s e-mail contained government secrets instead of porn, because Chuck gives them the details on some new computer virus named after (fictional) Serbian porn star Irene Demova. Keep that information in mind. Chuck is distracted by a news report playing on the many, many TVs in the store, and he gets a flash about some general or something.
Now we’re moving on to a sneaky meeting between a CIA higher-up (Candyman!) and an NSA higher-up. And at first I wondered why the hell they appeared to be meeting in a dilapidated warehouse, since it’s not like they don’t have offices and shit, but then I realized that this is supposed to be the Fancy Futuristic Computer room that Bryce blew up the night before. Anyway, Casey pops out of a corner and asks a bunch of questions, which the bosses answer. To summarize, Bryce was a rogue CIA agent and now he’s dead and no one can know what really happened. The Fancy Futuristic Computer that he blew up actually has a name—the Intersect. Apparently after the 9/11 attack, the NSA and the CIA had to “play nice,” so they combined all of their intel into one computer, which “mined for patterns in the chatter.” Casey heads to LA to find Chuck.
Back at the Buy More, a hot blonde pops up and starts walking toward the Nerd Herd counter. Morgan spots her and tries to tell Chuck, who’s on the phone, that there’s a “Vicki Vale” coming his way. Chuck is only half listening and starts falsetto beat-boxing with the name, “Vicki-Vale Vick-va-Vicki-Vale,” only to drop the phone when he glances up and sees the hot blonde. I fall just a little bit in love with Chuck. Chuck tries to explain himself (“That’s, uh, that’s from Batman.”), she teases him a bit, and then Morgan introduces himself and Chuck. She snarks on their names, causing Chuck to explain that his parents are sadists, and as for Morgan, “carnival freaks found him in dumpster.” That may sound mediocre in writing, but Levi delivers it to perfection, and my love for Chuck increases just a teensy bit more. The hot blonde’s name is Sarah, and she’s having trouble with her cell phone, but lucky for her Chuck’s a geek whiz kid. He fixes her phone within 20 seconds, and he even looks kind of hot wielding a screwdriver.
And then my own personal favorite type of customer shows up, the Dumb Fuck Who Doesn’t Read the Instruction Manual. The guy screwed up taping his daughter’s ballet recital, so Chuck gets to show us (and Sarah) how adorable he is by talking the little girl into performing right there in the store so they can tape it. Chuck’s Buy More nemesis, Harry Tang, shows up and ruins everyone’s fun, but while he’s bitching and yammering about the open Assistant Manager position and revealing that the Buy More boss is referred to as Big Mike, Sarah leaves her card for Chuck and disappears.
Also, Zach Levi kind of looks like a Dr. Seuss character in side profile.
Morgan comes home from work with Chuck because he needs to use Chuck’s computer—Morgan’s a perv, you see, and his own computer has a “case of the Demovas.” He nags Chuck about calling Sarah, but Chuck thinks that Sarah is way out of his league. And normally she would be, but this is TV Land. They enter Chuck’s apartment and are shocked to find… a NINJA!!! YES!!! When are the pirates going to show up?! The ninja is trying to steal Chuck’s computer, and since Chuck and Morgan are only good at fighting in video games, they end up forming a human pretzel on the floor. On the plus side, the ninja doesn’t manage to steal the computer. On the minus side, the computer is fried. The ninja hops into a sleek black sports car outside, and when the mask comes off, we see that it’s Sarah—and really, who could’ve guessed, considering that the stunt person was built like a football player and Yvonne Strahovski is built like a ballerina?
Back at the Buy More, Lester tells Chuck that his hard drive is “murdered.” Jeff’s contribution is to suggest that the ninja will return to strangle Chuck with “his” nun-chucks. And then Jeff winks at Chuck. Twice. Jeff is awesome! Understandably creeped out, Chuck hurries next door to the LargeMart to buy some new locks. As he’s wandering around Not-Costco, he runs into a guy who triggers some scary Intersect image flashes (except for the pie—it looks tasty!). Chucks tries to play it cool and fails miserably, escaping death-by-staple-gun in the nick of time.
Sarah’s sitting in her car watching Chuck walk back to the Buy More and talking on the phone with Candyman, who tells her that since Chuck’s computer was destroyed, the NSA, i.e. Casey, is taking over the operation. Sarah is not pleased. She calls Casey a “burnout” and worries that Chuck has a backup hard drive. Candyman knows that Sarah feels guilty for not knowing that Bryce was rogue (which implies that Sarah and Bryce were partners), but Sarah doesn’t want to hear it. She demands 12 hours to figure out what’s up with Chuck and immediately hangs up on Candyman. Because this is TV Land, she still gets to keep her job.
Chuck is sitting at the Nerd Herd counter murmuring about his sudden insanity with his head buried in his arms. Sarah sashays up and rings the service bell, causing Chuck to reach out and grab her hand and, without raising his head, snap, “Morgan, not now.” He realizes immediately that Sarah is, in fact, not Morgan, because Chuck and Morgan have spent so much time holding hands. Chuck trips over his own tongue to ask Sarah if she’s having phone trouble again. She responds with a charmingly sleazy pick-up line—“Um, yeah, I’m not sure I’m able to receive calls, ‘cause I never got one from you.” Morgan titters loudly in the background until Chuck glares at him to shut. The fuck. Up. Sarah continues, “explaining” to Chuck that she just moved to LA and was hoping he’d be willing to show her around if he’s not busy. Chuck is stunned, but Morgan is more than happy to accept on Chuck’s behalf and emphasize Chuck’s loser-ness by enthusing that Chuck “has nothing but time on his hands.” That’s probably one of the least offensive things Chuck could have on his hands in this situation. Casey ominously watches Sarah leave the Buy More.
Back at home, Ellie and Awesome, both wearing scrubs, are cuddled up on the couch watching TV when Chucks strides purposefully into the apartment and tells them that he has some news for them. Before he can elaborate, Morgan runs through the front door with a flying leap and glomps onto to Chuck, exclaiming that “Chuck’s got a date!” Ellie: “What?! Who?!” Captain Awesome: “Way to go, Chuck. That’s awesome.” Ellie looks like she might cry out of sheer happiness.
Next we get an extended sequence of Chuck and Sarah each getting ready for their “date.” Sarah, in black bra and panties, straps some knives to her ankle. Ellie picks out Chuck’s clothes for him, pointing out that, “I’m a girl—I know what girls like.” Sarah dips her hair needles in poison and carefully inserts them into her ‘do. Chuck makes out with his mirror—and really, I know it’s been a while, but Chuck… even making out with your own hand would be better practice than the mirror. Sarah admires herself in her own mirror. I would, too. She then straps on some body armor, so I take it she’s not planning on being a spy-whore this evening, because that would be difficult to explain. Then again, Chuck’s been out of the loop for so long he might think it was some new kind of body-shaping lingerie. Chuck’s in the courtyard getting ready to leave when Ellie runs out with some leftover flowers from his birthday party. Aw, Ellie, flowers? For a 27-year-old man’s birthday party? Really? No wonder Chuck was so intent on escaping. Ellie takes a good look at Chuck, reminds him not to mention Jill, and declares him “aces,” which is apparently something their dad used to say. Or possibly still does, but something about their manner indicates that their father is no longer in the picture.
Sarah chats with Candyman, who tells her the CIA can’t help her out tonight if something goes wrong. Sarah tells him that’s she’s not sure Chuck’s done anything wrong, to which he responds, “Nice guys aren’t sent government secrets.” Well Candyman, today’s your day to learn something new! As Chuck knocks at her door, she asks what she should do if Chuck runs. She opens the door as Candyman answers, “Kill him,” with a nonchalant shrug that only we can see. Pffft, whatever. You’re not the one getting hit with Chuck’s adorable grin upon opening the door.
Chuck and Sarah are on their date at a Mexican restaurant. Chuck tells Sarah that he lives with Ellie and Captain Awesome, and Sarah graciously chooses to ask about Captain Awesome’s nickname rather than ask why a 27-year-old man is living with his sister. Chuck tells her that “Everything he does is awesome: climbing mountains, jumping out of planes. Flossing…" It’s a nice touch that Captain Awesome is, indeed, awesome. Sarah flatters Chuck by telling him that he’s funny, but unfortunately, she herself is not funny. Chuck asks if that’s her big secret, because he’s been trying to figure out what “wrong” with her. Chuck’s thought process: “I was thinking, ‘Either she’s a cannibal, or she’s not that funny…’ And I was pulling for cannibal ‘cause I’d never met one before.” And that line is, believe it or not, delivered so charmingly by Levi that it pretty much sealed the deal for me as far as Chuck is concerned. If a guy said something that absurd to me on a first date, he would most certainly get a second one. Unfortunately, Sarah is not a cannibal, but she is coming out of a serious relationship with someone named “Bruce,” so she might come with baggage. Chuck unthinkingly offers to be her “very own baggage handler,” aaaand cue awkward silence……… and cue awkward change of subject. To Chuck’s credit, he teases her for making fun of his name when she went out with a “Bruce.” Sarah turns the tables and asks Chuck about his past relationships, and he starts to talk about Jill but remembers Ellie’s advice, cutting it short with a “the restraining orders are very specific.” Chuck is incredibly lucky to be able to deliver that line without being creepy. Just imagine those words coming out of Morgan’s mouth—see what I mean? Sarah tells Chuck that she likes him, which seems somewhat unnecessary given the true nature of their “date,” i.e. she’s just pumping him for information. But he is charming, so maybe she’s just being honest.
Later that evening, Sarah and Chuck are walking over a bridge discussing what to do with the rest of their night. Chuck asks Sarah if she likes music, and her response is, “I guess.” There you go, Chuck, a big, fat, glaring flaw in the perfect Sarah package. He even teases her about it, and just as she’s lamenting that this must be one of the worst dates he’s ever had, a train of screeching police cars passes under the bridge, momentarily distracting Chuck with an Intersect flash. He comes out of it and tries to reassure her that he had worse dates in eleventh grade, which isn’t actually very reassuring, but Sarah’s a good sport about it. They pass a car containing Casey and some other NSA guys—the NSA wants Chuck alive, but Casey makes a point of telling them that they can kill the “CIA skirt.” Aw, he’s such an old-fashioned fella.
Chuck and Sarah arrive at a club where Foreign Born is already playing, and something about the shy, happy smiles they shoot at each other suggests that Sarah might be forgetting that she’s on a job and falling into genuine date mode. It doesn’t last long, however, because she spots some NSA goons positioned around the club. She immediately clicks into Super Spy Mode and coerces a reluctant Chuck onto the dance floor. He wiggles around dorkily, she dances sexily, and he’s so distracted by her rubbing up against him and grabbing his ass that he doesn’t notice that she’s also throwing knives hither-thither and making use of those poisoned hair needles. After doing her best to incapacitate the NSA goons and spotting Casey across the room, she drags a loudly protesting and oblivious Chuck out of the club.
Outside, Sarah commands Chuck to give her his Nerdmobile keys, but when he cluelessly rambles on about company policy, she just uses a skeleton key to open up the car anyway. Chuck finally realizes that something important is happening when a ginormous black SUV comes barreling down the street heading right for them. Naturally, he gets into the fucking car. Sarah throws the car into reverse and drives backwards while Casey rams into the car from the front. She tells Chuck to be on the lookout for a turnoff behind them, but because Chuck is unfamiliar with stunt driving under extreme circumstances, he doesn’t think to differentiate between her left and his left and they wind up clunking down a few flights of steps before coming to a halt, possibly near a parking garage. And even though Sarah is totally kickass, she rather stupidly starts trying to explain to Chuck that the NSA folks in the SUV are after him, which sets Chuck off on an equally stupid babble-fest about why the fuck anyone would be after a guy who works at Buy More and isn’t even sure if he wants to be Assistant Manager. Excellent point, Chuck! But now is really not the time, because the aforementioned SUV takes the opportunity to come screeching down the street and slam into them so hard that I have no idea how they survive, even with the airbags. They stumble out of the car and try to run, but Chuck trips over some debris and falls down. Sarah backs toward a security booth, and Casey apparently decides that because they have the opportunity to run down Sarah without killing Chuck, they should take it, because he grabs the steering wheel from the driver and sends the SUV right at Sarah. Luckily, Sarah’s knife-throwing skills from earlier serve her well once again—she throws one at a big red “Emergency Blockage” sign, causing the security barrier to rise just in time to intercept the NSA vehicle, and by “intercept,” I mean “smash into.” Sarah whips out her cell to request an “emergency air evac,” then grabs Chuck by the hand and gets them the hell out of there.
As they arrive on the roof of a nearby building, Sarah asks Chuck how much he knows about Bryce Larkin. Chuck is like, “Huh wha? How do you know Bryce?” Sarah explains that they worked together for the CIA. Chuck is flabbergasted that Bryce is a spy, and a rogue one at that. He remembers Bryce’s e-mail and tells Sarah about the images that it contained, and she begins to realize that her initial instincts about Chuck were right, i.e. he’s really a nice guy who got sucked into a terrifying governmental conspiracy because he made friends with the wrong guy in college. She warns him that she may have to point her gun at him, so “Don’t freak out.” Casey shows up and claims that Chuck belongs to the NSA. Sarah whips out her gun and aims it at Chuck, causing Casey to train his own gun on Sarah. Sarah threatens to shoot Chuck if Casey comes any closer, to which Chucks responds, “Sarah, I’m freaking out…”
Commercials, and we come back to find Chuck hyperventilating. Casey is unruffled by the situation, musing that if Sarah shoots Chuck, he can shoot her and then go out for pancakes. Chuck is understandably terrified by Casey’s cold-blooded desire for post-murder breakfast food and starts to run for the edge of the building. Not thinking too well under pressure, that one, but I guess willingly splattering oneself on the pavement might be preferable to being shot. Chuck’s panicked suicide attempt is aborted when he gets a good look at a nearby hotel, which causes the Intersect to start the slideshow in his brain again. He begins to put together the various flashes he’s been getting throughout the episode and explains the situation to Sarah and Casey—he’s remembering things he shouldn’t know, such as the Serbian demolitions expert in the LargeMart, the NSA’s blueprints of the very hotel we can see in the background, and the CIA’s schematic for a bomb. It all adds up to a group of international terrorists (I think?) planning to blow up the hotel to take out someone named General Stanfield. Sarah quickly realizes that the Intersect is now in Chuck’s head, and only in Chuck’s head, since the Intersect got blowed up good. They try to talk Chuck into helping them stop the bomb, but Chuck says Bryce would be much better suited to that sort of thing, forcing Sarah to reveal to Chuck that Bryce is dead. Chuck is momentarily stunned, so Casey fires his gun into the air and reminds them that they have a bomb to diffuse.
Chuck says that the general is already on the stage, and we cut to the general blathering away to a bored-looking audience while the Serbian guy from the LargeMart pushes a covered dinner cart into the middle of the room. Chuck, Sarah, and Casey arrive at the hotel. They milk Chuck for info about the fastest way to get to the general, then order Chuck to stay put, but he impulsively runs off ahead of them. They burst into the ballroom where the general is speaking, and Chuck quickly points out the bomb, which is the previously-seen covered dinner cart. They open the cover and find a laptop with a countdown clock with less than a minute and a half displayed on the screen. Realizing there’s no time to evacuate, they try to brainstorm a way to disarm the bomb. Chuck gets a call from Morgan, who, by the way, is lying on Chuck’s bed. Oddly enough, Chuck decides to answer the call, but it’s lucky that he does because Morgan mentions the Irene Demova virus—hey, remember that?—and Chuck quickly recognizes this as the solution to the problem and hangs up on Morgan. Casey thinks Chuck is going to get them all blowed up like the Intersect, but Chuck explains that the laptop used for the bomb is the same kind they sell at Buy More and that it has a DOS overwrite. Whatever that is. Chuck opens a web browser to search for the porn virus, which fries the computer at :01 seconds. Chuck is elated for about five seconds, and then the reality of his near-death experience sets in. Casey: “Don’t puke on the C-4.”
Later, outside the hotel, Sarah and Casey argue over Chuck—Sarah thinks he could be a useful asset, Casey thinks they should “drop him in a psych tank and let him stare at four rubber walls for a decade” in order to get the info out of him. Sarah points out that they have no idea how the Intersect works with his brain, so locking him up could do more harm than good. Casey thinks worrying about things like that falls outside his job description, but Sarah is concerned about how having the Intersect in his brain will affect Chuck’s life—his job, his friends, and his sister. Chuck wanders up at this point and is none too pleased to hear them mention his sister, so he firmly tells them that his friends and family are not to be involved. When Casey tries to dismiss Chuck’s wishes, Chuck points out that they need him for the info in his brain, and therefore he’s going home. Nice to see that once the adrenaline rush is over, he’s able to appraise the situation and stand up for himself.
We cut to a shot of the
Chuck asks what’s going to happen to his friends and family. And now the back-and-forth editing starts—it works pretty well on the show, but it’s a bitch to recap, so bear with me. We switch to a shot of Chuck arriving home to a worried Ellie and Morgan—Ellie wishes he would’ve called if he’d planned to be out all night, while Morgan thinks this means Chuck got laid. Chuck doesn’t say a word, choosing instead to draw them each into a group hug, one on each arm. Back on the beach, Sarah orders Chuck to tell them nothing so they will be safe. At home, Captain Awesome wanders into the room and nonchalantly joins in on the group hug. Hee! On the beach, Sarah asks Chuck to trust her. He responds with a hard-to-describe expression, something like a mixture of exhaustion and sadness and bitter amusement. Whatever it is, it’s a beautiful facial expression. Now Sarah’s back in her hotel room in her skimpy PJs—we see her looking through her camera phone at pictures of herself with Bryce. Cuddly pictures which happen to be in a folder titled “Cabo 2005,” so we can confirm that “Bruce” is indeed “Bryce,” and that they were together for at least a couple of years. The beach scene then closes with a very sweet shot of Sarah lean-bumping into Chuck affectionately, as if she’s trying to cheer him up. Awwww.
At Buy More, either the same day or the next day, Chuck slo-mo’s his way to Big Mike’s office to turn in his application for the Assistant Manager position. He is accompanied by what I want to call “matador music,” because a) it sounds like something you might hear in an Almódovar film, and b) Tang makes a “mess with the bull” gesture before aggressively shoulder-bumping Chuck. Chuck’s look of seething disgust is magnificent—so magnificent, in fact, that when Chuck turns the remnants of this look on Morgan, Morgan sheepishly cuts the music. Cute. Though it probably doesn’t translate well on the page. He places the application on Big Mike’s desk, much to Bid Mike’s surprise. Chuck starts to babble about knowing what the job means, but Big Mike tells him to save it and go train the new guy. As it turns out, the new guy is Casey. That’s going to be so fun! Chuck then spots Sarah with a shopping basket, and the chunky blue ring on her finger triggers a flash from the Intersect of her in kickass spy mode, taking out a bunch of bad guys and shooting out the camera. Yowza. And we end the episode on Chuck freaking out while telling himself, “Don’t freak out.”
