Episode Report Card DeAnn Welker: A | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Volkoff. Alexei Volkoff.
By DeAnn Welker | Season 4 | Episode 7 | Aired on 11.01.2010
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.When the episode begins, Chuck's mad at Sarah and still believing in his mom with all his heart, despite his better judgment. Casey and Sarah cover for him to General Redhead, but no one really talks to him. Instead, Chuck blabs to everyone else about their fight: Morgan, his mom, his mom's handler Timothy Dalton... He breaks into his mom's cell, and she tells him that the only person who can give him evidence to prove her innocence is her MI-6 handler (she had to cut off ties to the CIA when Volkoff was onto her, so she joined up with MI-6). Chuck takes off to meet the handler, Tuttle, played by Timothy Dalton. He's not a field agent, so he's terrible at everything, which is glorious and funny, especially for a former James Bond. While Chuck and Tuttle are flying around on a plane that ends up taken over by Volkoff agents, Casey and Sarah (with an assist from Morgan) are trying to get Frost to reveal where Chuck is. She will, she says, if she can see Ellie. She and Ellie have a wonderful meeting, the most important piece of which is her reminding Ellie about the '68 Mustang her dad used to drive her around in (which Ellie's been reading about in the classifieds; she realizes it was her dad's final coded message to her). Then Sarah, Casey, Morgan, and Frost find Chuck and Tuttle. But so do Volkoff's agents, and Tuttle ends up shot.
Chuck and Sarah leave Volkoff and take Frost back to Orion's secret underground base so they can run the disk to clear Frost's name, but the disk comes up blank. Frost finds something in a box and runs it in front of Chuck. So far, it seems to have wiped out his Intersect, but I really do think there must be more to it, and we just don't see it yet. Just then, Tuttle shows up, all Bond and healthy and clean. But he's not Tuttle; he's Alexei Volkoff. He planned this whole thing with Frost to get himself into Orion's base to destroy it and anyone who knows about it. He also can't quite figure out why Chuck cares so much about pursuing Frost or doing what Orion started, so even though Frost told Volkoff about her husband; she obviously has never told about Chuck. Volkoff and Frost tie Sarah up and leave them in the Orion base with a ticking bomb. But Frost slips a razor blade into Sarah's hand and asks her to protect Chuck. They get out just in time, but every last piece of Orion/Bakula is gone. Or so we think. Until we remember the car. Awesome and Ellie show up to get it, and she reads the note he left her about their secrets and how she deserved better. And, he says, he left her this car for a reason; he's sure she'll know what to do with it. We see a bright green light under the hood; could it be Orion as K.I.T.T.? All I know is it was awfully nice to hear Bakula's voice again, so if his soul has taken possession of this Mustang, that's all right with me.
Watch the episode below, then discuss it in our forum. Then see some of our favorite Chuck guest-stars.
Want to immediately access TWoP content no matter where you are online? Download the free TWoP toolbar for your web browser. Already have a customized toolbar? Then just add our free toolbar app to get updated on our content as soon it's published.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!Here are a few things Chuck would like us to know: Morgan was Casey's bad-guy magnet. Casey realized Chuck's mom, Frost, was a big fat liar. Chuck set up a meeting with his mom and Ellie, but Sarah kidnapped her. Then Chuck told Ellie their mom's a spy. Indeed, in this episode, Frost is looking very much like a spy in her cell at Castle. General Redhead monitor-speaks to Casey and Chuck that they were right: Frost stopped being CIA twenty years ago and works only for Volkoff, and they did the right thing. She says the next step is to transport Frost, but it won't happen until the next day, so they'll have to keep Chuck away from her. Sarah assures her they will. Which we all know means they won't. General Redhead asks how Chuck is handling all of this, and Casey lies that he's fine. Calm, even. Cut to Chuck yelling: "Calm?! How can I stay calm?" Then he asks Sarah why she'd go behind his back instead of trusting him. He asks how that was, and Morgan says it was passionate, but he wouldn't use the F-word. Which he didn't, since this is network TV, but Morgan thought he heard it. Morgan asks if Sarah didn't have proof that Frost was working with Volkoff, so Chuck asks whose side he's on. He says this is their first fight, and Morgan hears it, since a couple's first fight sets the tone for future arguments. He would know. He's going through it right now ... with his girlfriend's dad. So he's taking some time away from Casey to let it cool off and thinks Chuck should do the same with Sarah. They look at a super-old ancient computer in the Orion basement that only takes triangle-shaped disks. Morgan wonders if Bakula might have left something for Ellie, too.
Cut to Ellie asking what he would have left her, and Chuck says he'd like answers. Ellie hasn't seen any ads in the classifieds since their dad died, and since they can't waltz right into a CIA base and ask their mom, she guesses they won't get answers. So, first Chuck's too dumb to think to ask Ellie without a nudge from Morgan, then he's too dumb to think to talk to his mom without a nudge from Ellie? He's losing his touch. But now he knows what to do, so he heads to Castle, commenting to Casey on all the new employees in an awkward attempt to not seem awkward, I guess. Casey just heads to look at guns, though, so Chuck sneaks toward his mom's cell. Sarah's trying to sneak into their apartment to talk to Chuck, but Morgan's hiding behind the door to talk relationship stuff with her. He tells her that their relationship is in crisis, but that both he and Ellie think she was just looking out for him. Sarah's a little disappointed Chuck talked to Morgan and Ellie but not her. She wants to talk to him and asks where he is.