It’s the two-hour season finale tonight! This appears to be two one-hour episodes shown back to back, rather than an actual single two-hour episode. I think the question on everyone’s mind is whether Ellie is going to find out about Chuck’s secret agent life. My episode guide is silent on that:
The Ring closes in on Chuck and Operation Bartowski; Casey must protect his daughter.
Wow–a lot happened in the finale! I’ll avoid spoilers for now, but I really like the way they’ve set things up for next season.
One question about the story:
When Stephen Bartowski fell down after being shot, the camera focused on his broken watch. What, if anything, was the significance of that? Were they suggesting that he might still be alive? Or is the new storyline going to focus on Mother Bartowski?
you could hear the sound of the govener turnng powerering down, indicating (to me) that death had occurred
Anyone else notice the new store beside the Buy More? Underpants, Etc. ??
It also meant that Chuck couldn’t slip off his Dad’s governer to use for himself, since it was broken. (The episode ended 11 hours ago, so I think we can stop spoiler-boxing.)
Morgan mentioned earlier this season that he had once been fired from there. I didn’t notice it on-screen until an episode or two later. Not sure if they’d ever shown it before that.
[SPOILER]I thought it just indicated that Chuck couldn’t salvage his father’s governor, which kept up the tension in the story. Chuck had to get the watch that Shaw stole- he couldn’t just use his father’s watch.
I kinda thought the final fight between Chuck and Shaw was a little disappointing. I was really expecting to see Chuck get his ass kicked… but then basically get a “superflash”, with all sorts of combat moves, rather than just Kung Fu, which then allowed him to beat Shaw. After all, it was established earlier in the episode that Chuck was “special”, that he could absorb more knowledge through Intersect tech than the ordinary person could, without harm.[/SPOILER]
Nitpicky, I know. Overall, a really good episode. It’ll be interesting to see where the show will go from here. Obviously, they set this up to be a potential last episode, in case they didn’t get renewed. It’s nice to know we’ll be seeing more of Chuck.
Exactly. Just edit out that final bit with the message from Dad, and this would have been a perfectly good series finale. I’m glad it wasn’t, though!
So, any casting guesses for Mother Bartowski? My long-shot hope: Cindy Morgan.
Even if he could have salvaged it, he wasn’t given the opportunity to do so.
I thought that Chuck’s governor was designed especially for him, so I thought the plot point would be that it didn’t work well for Shaw, or actively worked against him. And since we don’t have a show if Chuck doesn’t return to the spy business, they have to come up with a reason why Ellie releases him from his promise. Perhaps Devin is threatened and Chuck has to rescue him? Or perhaps Mother Bartowski is the big villain next time?
So I figure Chuck’s Mom will be played by either Kate Jackson or Lynda Carter.
Well, Chuck promised to quit the CIA - he didn’t promise to quit being a ‘spy’ - and clearly his dad had been working ‘on his own, doing stuff the gvt couldn’t or wouldn’t do’ for the past 20 years -’
If Big Mike joins in, I think we have the makings of a A+ Team.
Do you think Casey and Sarah will join Chuck in his freelancing?
I think it was sort of naive of Ellie to think the CIA would let someone with all that intel in their head just walk away.
Besides that how could she expect him to keep that promise long term? Theoretically I know there are terrorists and murders walking around. But Chuck for a fact knows this. He knows their names and their histories once he flashes on them. I know I couldn’t just stand by. Sure he could call the CIA/NSA but eventually they will just pull him back in.
exactly, and as simWife said, “what are gonna do, watch Chuck clean the apartment? Chuck does the laundry?”
I can see this promise as sort of a reset button. This way we go back to the secrecy of what Chuck does.
Did Chuck say “Oh Boy” when he got the message from his late father? 
Yes, but he’d have to lie to his sister to do that, and I don’t see him doing that. He could, of course, still work for the CIA without doing anything dangerous, by being an analyst in an office someplace. But the show would be boring that way, so that’s not going to happen. No, I’m convinced that she will voluntarily release him from her promise.
This is what me and hubby thought about next season. Well, not exactly that. We figured they’ll* pick a file an episode to deal with and have the Momma Bartowski story be the arc that ties the season together.
I miss klutsy Chuck from the first season but not as much as I do not miss retarded Chuck from the second. In fact, I hated retarded Chuck so much I stopped watching until hubby informed me that retarded Chuck was ditched and replaced with a new, improved klutzy but flashy new Chuck.
*Who “they’ll” be will probably fill the first half of the season. How long will Chuck keep this a secret and from whom.
Why did he even make that promise to Ellie? He learned the 1st time he tried to give it up that it’s work that he loves doing & it’s what he was meant to do. He should have told Ellie “I’m not going to ask you to quit being a doctor, don’t ask me to quit being a spy. It’s what I do”
What I wish they would do is make all 6 of them, Chuck, Sarah, Awesome, Ellie, John & Morgan a big old spy team working together.
What they’ll probably do instead is have Chuck start lying to everyone again.
Oh but I think this is exactly what final set up was all about. And Chuck will start lying again-- at first. I think that will be a major arc in the first half of the season: who’ll find out, how they find out and what they do once they find out.
Of course this is only my opinion. Maybe the show will surprise me.
I assumed that Chuck Vs the Ring would be in part about Chuck proposing to Sara, that the title was a dual-meaning, as so many of the titles are. I apparently was very wrong.
I wish they’d greenlight a full 20-24 episodes early and let it go, instead of giving them 13 and increasing it incrementally eventually. I felt the two episodes had a lot of filler and could have been one episode.
I liked Morgan and Awesome finding out, but I don’t think I like Ellie finding out.
My guess on Mama Bartowski is Mary McDonell.