Chuck: Chuck Versus The Alma Mater

ORIGINAL EPISODE, MONDAYS @ 8PM ON NBC

This was probably the best quality episode of "Chuck" in its short life to date. Usually we only get corny lines and cheesy, predictable stories. Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining about the usual "Chuck," in fact I happen to really enjoy this show. Tonight though brought us an entirely new type of show and I definitely enjoyed it. We saw Chuck struggle with his past and confront the issues he's been dodging since the day Bryce had him kicked out of Stanford. Emotional depth, growth, and humor permeated the characters tonight especially Chuck.

The simultaneous occurrence of two events forced Chuck to return to Stanford for the first time since he was expelled. First, the professor that accused him of cheating on the exams was running for his life from spies hailing from Iceland. Yes, apparently they have spies too. Turns out, his professor worked for the CIA, recruiting college students to the organization. This put Chuck, Sarah, and Casey on the mission to find him. Second, UCLA was playing Stanford in a football game at Stanford. Captain Awesome and his buddies graduated from UCLA and wanted to head down to Stanford for the game. Chuck's first inclination was to stay as far away from that as possible but later events forced him to head down with his sister and Awesome.

What were those events? Well, we finally got the story behind Bryce's betrayal of Chuck back in college. It seems that the professor recruiting Bryce the year earlier and was planning on recruiting Chuck as well. Bryce found out but wouldn't let it happen. According to a video Chuck found, Bryce thought Chuck was too good of a person for that life and that it would ruin him if he were recruited. There was no way to stop the recruitment except to frame Chuck for cheating and get him thrown out of school. That way the Professor couldn't recruit him since he was no longer a college student. So, Bryce wasn't all that bad after all. This is probably why Sarah loved him so much. At the same time Chuck found out the truth Sarah realized that the whole time she's been angry with him for betraying the government she should have given him the benefit of the doubt. He probably had a very good reason for doing what he did, they just couldn't see it right now.

I think this changes a lot about the show and really puts it on course for discovering what Bryce's reason was for sending Chuck the intersect. It also sets everything up for a showdown between Chuck, Sarah, and Casey and whoever Bryce was trying to stop. I'm sure it won't be easy stopping that person or organization but with the knowledge Chuck has stored in his head, he's got a pretty good shot. I have a feeling that by year end these three will be on their own fighting against the government or at least a section of the government that's operating illegally.

I thought the action scenes and gun fights at the end were pretty cool. This show has done a great job making the action scenes look realistic and fun at the same time. The writers on this show are excellent at using Chuck to interject comedic humor into all these scenes. The gun fight in the classroom was especially cool. I also loved when the college girl saved Chuck from the spy/assassin. This guy needs to learn to defend himself a bit; I wonder why it hasn't occurred to anyone that a little self defense training may go a long way in making all their lives easier.

There's just a few things I want to bring up about this episode before we go. Tang has got to go! And not because he's an evil, dictating Assistant Manager but because he is damn annoying. I understand this story was supposed to be somewhat humorous but they've completely failed at accomplishing this. It has totally turned me off to anything that's happening at the Buy More. Given that this is a good portion of the show they need to fix this or the ratings are going to suffer even more.

Also, the "O.C." reference during the Fingers of Fury war between Morgan and Lester was great! Lester got the "O.C" and responded "O.C. Season Two - underrated." Josh Schwartz clearly had a hand in this and it was a masterful sneak in by this great creator/writer. Season two was actually underrated.

One thing that annoyed me was the security system at the Stanford library. What kind of library not only makes you scan your ID just to get in but also brings up a large photo on the computer to a sitting librarian waiting to catch people who haven't paid late fees? That was absolutely ridiculous and really annoyed me.

This was a great quality episode from "Chuck" and I'm glad we finally got some answers about what happened in the past. I wouldn't expect to many more episodes like this though. Chuck isn't the type of show that could compete with other natural drama's. It has its own niche as a quirky, outrageous drama and that's where it can be successful. For now though I'll enjoy what we got. Until next week, enjoy the review!