Arrested Development (TV Series) Blockheads (2013) User Reviews

Blockheads

[lassegalsgaard · 8/10 · 7 August 2022]

So if I had to judge this, I'd say that Netflix's first round of "Arrested Development" was a success. It has largely been fun to go back to these characters and see what happened after it abruptly stopped after its third season. Some characters have had a little more focus than others, but that's fine. I've now finished watching the entire season, and am still trying to piece it all together in my head, but it's not an easy thing to do with this show. However, I really enjoyed this finale and thought it put a nice cap on a very intricate and entertaining season.

George Michael has always been an interesting case for me. I've never really liked him as a person, as I really just thought that he was a little daddy's boy with a weird crush on his cousin. This season, however, was really about him getting away from his dad, yet still trying to keep in contact. Which makes complete sense to me that he'd go for a storyline like that. He needed a little more. However, I'm still not sold on his relationship with Rebel Alley and how that whole thing turned out, as it just seems like he's being a bit too caught up in this weird aggressive sexual circle. Now, that has kinda always been how he was, but they went a little overboard with it here. However, I still think that the relationship being portrayed between him and Michael is an entertaining one and it breaks a lot of norms of a normal father/son relationship. I'm also not really sure how I feel about this being the season finale. I would have thought that they'd do a little more for the finale and actually give us some answers as to where it all begins and ends. I'm still trying to piece it all together and it is a little difficult. However, the structure has been fascinating all the way through, and I'm glad to see that Mitchell Hurwitz hadn't lost the touch that made the original show so special. Excited to see what they did with the fifth season coming up.

"Blockheads" is not a great season finale, but it is a great episode of "Arrested Development" overall, dealing as always with the complex family dynamics. George Michael is interesting and carries himself better here than in the original show, but the choice of making him the focus of the finale still feels a little weird.

Probably not excellent, but still really great !

[manutoo · 8/10 · 7 October 2014]

*** This is a review of the whole season 4 ***

So that's clear, this season was less good than the old ones. Still, this is just great and features a pretty original narrative way to unfold the story (I won't spoil anything, but the more episodes you watch, the better it gets!).

For me, the main downsides were that sometimes we got a bit too much narrator talk, a bit too much music, and not enough characters' action & dialogs.

So thanks to Netflix to have let us enjoy all these silly characters once more. Now, the only thing left to do is to bring us the Season 5 ! Pretty please ..? :-)

Goodbye, until Maeby the movie

[gizmomogwai · 9/10 · 18 September 2013]

And so season 4 concluded... on the same day it began, because the 15 episodes were all released on the same day. Like many people, I watched all of them (or almost all) on that day. Season 4 was like one giant episode, more intricate and elaborate than ever. Blockheads wraps it up, or starts it off (they said the season 4 episodes could be watched in any order, I heard one fan say they watched it backwards and loved it). This is a good season finale, but not the best moment of the season.

Here, Michael finds out George Michael is George Maharis, his girlfriend Rebel's "other guy." This revelation didn't surprise me in the least- I suspected "George Maharis" was just a smudged "George Michael." It's an extension of Shock and Aww's concept... George Michael would have slept with Ms. Baerly if he had been old enough in season 1. This kind of ties in with the season 4 storyline of Michael and George Michael growing apart, but being alike (can Michael feel his son is his brother?). This, of course, reflects similar themes of the series as a whole, and GOB totally guessing George Michael wants to make up with Michael about something or other is spot on. Interactions between the Bluths include George Michael and Maeby, and him firing her will likely hurt his chances of sleeping with her.

As usual, Blockheads offers some absurdity (twins casting half votes, until George Michael alienates them all and gets hit) and subtlety (it was only on rewatching the episode that I noticed how often they used the word "anonymous," before revealing... Anonymous).

It seems likely now that AD is coming back as a movie, though I would have preferred going straight to season 5. I was never thrilled with the idea of seeing the Bluths make a movie about themselves, which is what Mitch Hurwitz said the AD movie would be about. (Seinfeld already did this show within a show concept). But from how they end season 4, it appears the movie would now be more about the trial of Captain Hook- an idea with more potential. One thing's for sure, this episode can't be the end of the story. We need more.

Pretty fantastic 4th season

[Red_Identity · 1 June 2013]

I think despite some inconsistency, despite perhaps not being as hilarious as the show was at its best, despite the new formula (one episode for one character), the fourth season of Arrested Development managed to be intriguing and involving throughout. It's definitely not without its flaws, and a few episodes were never all that funny or interesting overall (Borderline Personalities, Indian Takers) but it got better as it went along, more focused, the story-telling seemed fluid. I've heard complaints that the pace of the show was slower, that it didn't move as fast as before, that there was too much narration, that it lingered in jokes for too long. I definitely saw all of this, but all of those elements, like anything, sometimes worked and sometimes didn't.

It's important to note that while this season is definitely a "different" Arrested Development in structure, it still "feels" like the classic show. The characters are definitely the same, despite what some might say. We just get more leveled, more even perspectives. For example, one might be inclined to say that Michael changed, that he's now like the rest of the family. But I think the new structure didn't change these people, it just made us more aware that yes, he IS a Bluth, and he always has been. Then let'stake someone like Maeby, who was perhaps always the least interesting and involving character in the first three seasons (although that's up for debate) and who became just one of the "Bluths", for better because now we see her on the same level as everyone else.

Overall, I don't think this was a "disappointing" season. If anything, the show is as ambitious as ever, in a different way, and what it sacrificed in some of its original pure-joke format it made up for in a long-running storyline and intricate web never-ending details and hidden agendas. It wasn't perfect, but there aren't many comedy seasons like this, and as far as I'm concerned it can stand apart the first three seasons yet still being on their level. What I am kinda fuzzy on is how the season ended, and how things like the Tobias/Mark explosion or Lucille 2 mystery weren't given definite ends. But of course, this means we get another season, or a movie! Right? Right!?

Season 4: Never as it was and has weaknesses from the approach, but it is still funny and a welcome return

[bob the moo · 1 September 2013]

Ever since Arrested Development got cancelled after 3 (well, 2 and a half) seasons there has been talk of another season on a different network, a film or something that would keep it alive. In the meantime everyone has gone on to continue their careers and thus making it harder to pull together. Personally I didn't have any great desire for this as I think things can often stand as they are and the original seasons are fantastic and are not less fantastic for being all there is; I also felt that the third season showed indications that perhaps it was the right time to draw it to an end even if the reasons and manner of doing it were wrong. Anyway, when this fourth season finally started happening I was looking forward to it but perhaps not quite as much as those planning to wolf it down the second Netflix made it available as a complete season.

Waiting a month or so then watching it at a reasonably pace without any breathless hype in my mind was probably for the best although I didn't feel good at first. The first episode ended with a great moment of physical comedy and it drew big laughs from us (and every time when we rewatched it - so much that our neighbors asked who we had had over as they assumed we had company due to the noise), but part of the laughter was maybe relief as we had spent a lot of the first episode waiting for it to be the thing we remembered and to be as hilarious as it should have been. It took a few episodes for this to happen but thankfully it did turn into something very smart and funny, even if never quite as great as it was at its best.

The structure of the season is part of the reason for the slow start but yet also something to be commended. The previous episodes always had stories that are contrived and fold into each other in ways that are as funny as they are nonsensical but they were always contained within one episode; the same idea is applied to the whole season while each episode focuses on a specific character. I cannot imagine how it was written but while it does mean a lot of things in the first few episodes maybe don't fly, the more you watch, the more meaning it has and generally that is very funny meaning. It work very well and in addition to being so funny it is also pleasing to see how well written it is in how it all fits together.

The cast does have a slight air of this being something they made an effort to do rather than something they are doing. It is hard to put a finger on but there is the sense that schedules were stretched and people were slotted into a tight schedule rather than freely available. This is to do with time on screen though not their performances; I just noticed that apart from one or two main scenes, they didn't have many involving a large number of the cast, whereas before it would have been easy to do since everyone was on the show. Anyway, the performances are pretty much as strong as before despite this. The changes in the characters of some of the cast don't totally work but otherwise it is fine. Bateman is great when given the material but his character seems too often used in leading the plot and at times I felt he could have had more to do. De Rossi is good and Cera responds well to his character. Shawkat is enjoyable but I wanted more of Arnett, Cross and Hale - all of who seemed to be quite sparingly used. Tambor also seemed on the edges apart from his couple of episodes but Walter makes a big impact no matter how much time she has. The cast is heavy with famous faces - mostly these work well but one or two of them are more distracting than adding value.

This fourth season probably won't live up to the hype for anyone and sadly nor does it live up to the high standards the show set for itself at its best; however it is still funny and very cleverly written. It is slow to get going and the weaknesses in scheduling the cast does show, but mostly I found it a welcome turn and, if it does make another return in some form, I will be there for it.