Arrested Development season 5 dropped last Tuesday, picking up on the plot threads from the end of season four– well, that’s not exactly right; a significant portion of the episode is taken up recapping previous events, leaving a fair bit less time for new content than I was hoping. The main thrust of the episode’s plot is that the disparate and scattered members of the Bluth family decide to head to Mexico for various reasons and in various pairings. (I am looking forward to more GOB/George and Lucille/Tobias action, anyway.) But the episode felt relatively thin on good material on the whole. (I’m also not sure where it is on the timeline– wasn’t Buster arrested at the end of season 4 as a suspect in Lucille 2’s murder? Does this take place before that? We get the header-image scene from this episode.)
Funniest moments for me: Tobias providing therapy to Lucille only to stop listening to run out and play on the beach; Lindsay in the “On the next…” discovering that her campaign promise of a wall already sort-of exists; and, especially, George Michael and Maeby discussing an old saying of Lucille’s, a conversation that quickly descends into absurd nonsense about rapists and murderers and rapist-murderers and murderer-rapists.
Weirdest moment: the Narrator announcing why George decided to stop hiding at the penthouse and flee: “George Sr. realized he wasn’t going to win any awards for his impression as a woman.” Seems like some sort of jab at Transparent, although for the life of me I can’t figure out what the actual jab is or how serious it is.
The episode was pretty middling on the whole. Sorry I didn’t have more to say about it, but there were really only a few jokes that landed for me and also I watched it like a week ago. If we keep going I’ll try to be more detailed in my analysis.
What’s everyone think? About any of this, including whether or not interest is sufficient to continue these reviews?