Chuck, 3x17, “Chuck vs. the Living Dead”

Episode Title: Chuck vs. the Living Dead
Writers: Rafe Judkins and Lauren LeFranc

Director: Jay Chandrasehkar

Originally Aired: 05/17/2010
Grade: A

I didn’t care for the “Ellie as a spy” storyline before, but I thought it worked well here. It gives her something to do besides whine and pulls her into the larger story without revealing Chuck’s secret (yet, anyway). Granted she’s unwittingly working for the bad guys, but that’s cool, too, because we know she’s not a bad guy (as evidenced by her whacking Casey with a frying pan rather than shooting him).

As fun as Ellie’s storyline was, I was considerably less happy with Chuck and Sarah breaking into Shaw’s penthouse because it made little sense. We saw his digs in “vs. the Fake Name”—that’s where Sarah told Shaw that her name is Sam, in fact—and the place they broke into here was not it. Shaw had two apartments, and Sarah knew about them both? Not even fanwanking can make much sense of that, so it seems like a pretty big goof on the part of the writing team.

Other Stuff

-Devon detailing a day in the life of Ellie’s Awesome Husband was adorable.

-I loved Sarah being such an axe-throwing badass that Papa Bartowski thought she might have an Intersect of her own.

Quotes

Morgan: “Wait, you dreamt Shaw was alive? Chuck, you saw him die! You checked for a pulse, right?”

Chuck: “Well he fell into a river…”

Morgan: “He fell into a river?! Of course Shaw is alive. Haven’t you ever seen a John Carpenter movie?”