It's not the funniest nor the best episode they've made. I didn't laugh the most nor was it the most dramatic. But what makes me think about it a lot is how it portrays how much the show was always willing to subvert convention with its writing.
The majority of the episode sets up a conflict for the guys to circumvent, having to find a way to build the user platform when Jack (the CEO) wants an easy to sell a glorified storage box bc it'll net the quickest profit.
And it goes into depth to show how they can't fight him head on and they have an extended montage basically summing up the Skunkworks company they'll be building in secret.
In any other series, movie, story, etc this would be the storyline. For at least the rest of the season it should set up a narrative that can lead to pitfalls and tension. And it would be a good story too with high stakes.
And then after they devise their plan, Richard's clumsiness causes him to slip and accidentally drop the entire strategy on the floor in front of Jack. Therefore ending the entire Skunkworks plot.
It throws away an entire storyline for a joke. More than that, the entire point was to trick you into thinking this was the stroyline and then pull the rug underneath suddenly.
I have rarely seen a show have the chutzpah to put so much effort into setting up something just to immediately and unceremoniously say "nope". It isn't just the climax subverts the expectation, but that it happens in the same episode is so unique to me.
All as a joke. I've seen dramas do things kind of like this for dramatic twists but for syndicated comedy is something else. And the entire show is like that where they'll do a lot of the expected plot beats but then just throw it away. (If you've seen the entire series you know esp how far they take this).
The majority of the episode sets up a conflict for the guys to circumvent, having to find a way to build the user platform when Jack (the CEO) wants an easy to sell a glorified storage box bc it'll net the quickest profit.
And it goes into depth to show how they can't fight him head on and they have an extended montage basically summing up the Skunkworks company they'll be building in secret.
In any other series, movie, story, etc this would be the storyline. For at least the rest of the season it should set up a narrative that can lead to pitfalls and tension. And it would be a good story too with high stakes.
And then after they devise their plan, Richard's clumsiness causes him to slip and accidentally drop the entire strategy on the floor in front of Jack. Therefore ending the entire Skunkworks plot.
It throws away an entire storyline for a joke. More than that, the entire point was to trick you into thinking this was the stroyline and then pull the rug underneath suddenly.
I have rarely seen a show have the chutzpah to put so much effort into setting up something just to immediately and unceremoniously say "nope". It isn't just the climax subverts the expectation, but that it happens in the same episode is so unique to me.
All as a joke. I've seen dramas do things kind of like this for dramatic twists but for syndicated comedy is something else. And the entire show is like that where they'll do a lot of the expected plot beats but then just throw it away. (If you've seen the entire series you know esp how far they take this).
