To say I was excited for the 4th season of "Arrested Development" would be an understatement. The original 3 seasons of the show compromise my favorite comedy series of all time. There is no series that I have watched more times on purpose than "Arrested Development." The series even ended well by coming full circle with the story and wrapping up most of the major storylines. I didn't need anymore. But if the creator and the entire original cast is going to come back and do the show, you better believe I'm going to get excited and pay attention.
The 4th season takes a different approach that embraces the spirit of "Arrested Development's" classic setup of jokes that will pay off many episodes later. Each episode focuses on one character where we get their story and a lot of setup for everyone else's story. This makes the season feel like an 8 hour movie instead of a 15 episode TV season. And that really is how it should be treated. It was made for binge viewing. Maybe finishing it off in 2 to 3 sittings of 5 episodes each. In fact looking back their are definite storylines that could be separated. The creator has long wanted to do a movie version of the show and you can almost feel that desire in this new season.
So how did it work? Well there is definitly some rust that takes a few episodes to shake off. The first 3 or 4 episodes are slow setup episodes were you don't get the payoff to the jokes until the last episode of the series. That's fine but there is a little too much setup and not enough funny. But once we get past those episodes things really start to click and the season really hits its stride during the last half of the season where it feels like every episode is a winner. The last 5 in particular were fantastic and I couldn't stop watching them, devouring them all in one sitting. "Arrested Development" was always slightly darker than most of the comedy available on TV and this season brought it to another level. They really embrace how awful some of these people are. I almost feel bad for laughing at some of things they end up doing to innocent people. Almost.
After getting through the entire season my only problem is with how it ends. As I mentioned already the original 3 seasons ended great with no need for a followup. Not so here. Now if there is no more "Arrested Development" in my future I will be very upset. There is some interesting stuff going on here and I want to see how it all plays out. This new season scratched an itch I didn't realize I had and has left we with a serious need for more. Hopefully I won't have to wait 5 years this time. Overall Season 4 gets 4 out of 5 stars.
Wednesday, June 12, 2013
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