- No longer working for the government, Chuck enlists Morgan's help to search for his mother. Sarah and Casey must infiltrate a mysterious Russian company, and Ellie has important news to tell the family.
- ENCINO, CA - 1994
We see the familiar bedroom of Charles Irving Bartowski, replete with action figures, robots, and a Tron poster. A woman, Mary Elizabeth Bartowski (Linda Hamilton), is reading young Chuck a story about the Frost Queen, who defended the land and returned to her family. Young Chuck asks his mother if she is going away again, but she said she would be back in a few days. They say their 'I love you's' to each other and Chuck goes to sleep.
ENCINO, CA - 2010
Chuck (Zachary Levi) looks over the file in the basement of his parents' old house. He is distraught his father spent the rest of his life trying to find her. She was a spy who disappeared. Chuck is determined to find her, and he needs help. From Sarah? From Casey? Nope, from Morgan. Morgan (Joshua Gomez) is more impressed with the laser barriers and gadgets and tons of files in the basement of the former Casa Bartowski, but Chuck doesn't want to tell Sarah or Casey, whom he thinks will stop him from searching for her. Morgan agrees to help and shakes hands with Chuck. ("Are you...flexing?") Chuck makes sure Morgan knows they can't tell anybody, especially Ellie.
MORGAN: No, I get it. She clearly cannot know about our own rogue spy team that we're gonna start here. Outside the government, secret to the spy world. Team of two, army of one. Highway to the Danger Zone. Live Free or Die Hard...
CHUCK: Buddy! This is not the opening of a TV show. This is real life.
I disagree with Chuck. We don't get slow-motion sequences of hot CIA agents getting dressed for missions in real life. Which is where we find Sarah (Yvonne Strahovski) as she gets ready for a mission. Fortunately, Chuck found her gun before Morgan interrupted them with his huge backpack. Sarah and Casey (Adam Baldwin) are heading to do spywork, and Chuck is looking forward to job interviews and a go-kart racing league with Morgan...as far as Sarah knows. Sarah says goodbye ("Nothing is going to keep me from coming back to you," for those of you worried about relationship angst this season.) and Chuck and Morgan head out on their adventure. They go to dozens of places, based on the Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)-style map we see. And their jetsetting (which incuded stops in Greenland, Seattle, and Chicago for some reason) gets them to their final destination...Los Angeles. But Chuck finds the secret door with the electronic lock in his mom's safehouse to find out where his mother is...
...and it's empty.
Needless to say Chuck is depressed, but Morgan is even more depressed about the amount of money they spent over four months. Although Morgan thinks the menu for a Chinese restaurant he finds is a nice consolation prize. However, unbeknownst to the spy duo, their efforts were not completely in vain. A camera picks up their visit to the safehouse in Los Angeles, and Mary Elizabeth Bartowski monitors them.
MARY: Oh, Chuck.
As if things aren't bad enough for our favorite nerd-turned-spy, someone comes to collect on Morgan's car: the Millennium Falcon. The Repo Man (Harry Dean Stanton-awesome casting idea to have him be the ACTUAL Repo Man (1984)) takes the yellow Pacer, even though it only costs $900. Morgan also takes it upon himself to tell Chuck they are $43,000 in debt. This doesn't happen to real spies.
Real spies go to Hong Kong and chase after the bad guys, like Sarah and Casey are doing with Marko (Dolph Lundgren), an operative for Volkoff Industries. They are trying to take possession of a handheld EMP generator, which Marko demonstrates by using it to black out Hong Kong. Which, as they are on the roof, knocks out the elevators and traps Sarah and Casey. Casey agrees Sarah should drop her gun...and knock Marko out. But even Casey is sentimental for the moron, since he needs Chuck to break into the computer systems of the building and escape. Fortunately, he planned for this, and Sarah and Casey escape by base jumping off the building with the EMP generator.
And as if Chuck's day can't get any worse, Morgan takes pictures of him shirtless and encourages him to "sext" Sarah with them. Although he needs to put on baby oil and really work the 'pec deck.' Chuck vehemently rejects the idea, which naturally means Morgan sends the pictures to her without Chuck's consent. The good news is, we find out where George Costanza works at. Vandalay Industries moved to L.A. although they're not looking for a latex salesman. It's Chuck's fifth interview, which is going better than the first four, where the interviewers fell asleep, threw up, had convulsions, and walked out without returning. Chuck begs the man not to answer the phone because he thinks the interview will be over. The interviewer answers the phone...and the interview is over, complete with a security escort out of the building.
Morgan takes him back to the Buy More. The new Buy More looks quite shiny, and everybody in it looks like a supermodel. Naturally, Chuck and Morgan don't recognize it. However, the new manager recognizes Chuck. It's General Beckman (full-time cast member Bonita Friedericy). No Big Mike...at least not this week. As it turns out, ridding the CIA of Daniel Shaw changed the Intersect's grade from an F last year to an A, as the President himself sprung for the new store. (Insert your own bad economy joke here.) Beckman tells Chuck in no uncertain terms he is back to working as a spy for the government and working in the Buy More as a cover. (She tanked Chuck's interviews.) Chuck is equally adamant about not returning to the government. Next thing you know, Chuck falls down a tunnel, The Running Man (1987)-style, into the new Castle underground facility. But at least Sarah is back and more than happy to see Chuck. And she got the photos he (Morgan) sent.
SARAH: Chuck, do you want to sext with me?
CHUCK: Aaah, no! I don't...I mean...I...no, no no! This was not my idea. Clearly not my idea. This was Morgan's idea.
And Sarah is actually a little disappointed. (Chuck, seriously. Reconsider.) Meanwhile, Morgan is hitting on one of the salespeople, Greta I (Olivia Munn), who has to head to Thailand the next day but is willing to show Morgan something...like Castle, in the same manner Chuck got to see it. Sarah has to leave again to trace the EMP to its source in Venezuela, courtesy of Chuck flashing on it. Chuck is disappointed they won't get to celebrate their six month/nine month anniversary, but she promises to return and celebrate in style. She takes the briefcase with the EMP with her, which contains the same logo Morgan found on the menu in Mary Bartowski's safehouse. They go to the Repo Man to get the car back. He pulls a gun on them (again), but Morgan simply gets the menu from the car and they try to go. Only the Repo Man really likes Chinese food and demands the menu. They decide to do what they did in Tangiers...run like hell.
Back in the Encino Underground Lair (sounds like Dr. Evil's hangout if he was on a tight budget like this show is, doesn't it?), Morgan sees an unusual item on the menu: Shimira Chicken. Chuck flashes, as Shimira is a Russian submarine navigation system. The menu is really an order form for weapons. They borrow one of Stephen Bartowkski's encrypted phones to call Volkoff Industries. Charles Carmichael pretends to be head of security for The New Ring and gets a meeting with them in Moscow. As they head to Russia, Sarah and Casey head to Venezuela. Casey's advice to Sarah on long-distance relationships ("I either leave or they die") isn't helpful, so Sarah decides to become the hottest insecure woman on the planet by taking racy (as racy as you can get on a plane in a business suit) pictures of herself on the phone. Unfortunately, Marko and his assistant have the plane hijacked and gas Sarah and Casey. They're now heading to Moscow.
Sarah and Casey wake up in the basement of a cold nuclear weapons lab, and Marko wants them to think of all the terrible things he'll do to them. Casey is defiant.
MARKO: I work for Volkoff. I must break you.
Chuck and Morgan (or Charles Carmichael and Michael Carmichael) try to go in the front door and decide it would be faster to pull a Tangiers after Chuck flashes on the blueprint of the building. In the basement, a thug looks at Sarah's pictures on her phone and leers at her. Not a good idea, obviously, and he is on the floor. Sarah reaches with her foot (and almost goes Catherine Trammell on us) to get the phone to signal Chuck. One tiny problem: Morgan + hot Sarah picture + 'need u' = Three's Company moment. Chuck's too busy trying to download information on his mother to respond, and Morgan thinks Sarah's trying to sext. He replies for Chuck, and Sarah sends an SOS. ("Skin on skin?") This goes on...
MORGAN: Wow, kiss your mom with those thumbs? Oooh, Daddy likes.
Finally, Casey tells Sarah to text sub-basement 4, and Chuck finds the name "Frost" in the computers. The Frost Queen...his mother. He has to download it quickly, as Morgan finally figures out Sarah and Casey are actually in Volkoff industries. Morgan wants him to call the Marines, but Chuck decides they'll do it.
He better move fast, as Marko stops Sarah from texting, but Marko isn't looking to kill Sarah and Casey. Apparently, he has pictures of two agents who got closer to Volkoff Industries than anybody else. Yup, Chuck and Morgan. And Marko's thugs find them quickly. Sarah tells Chuck over the radio he has to flash, but all she gets in reply are gunshots. Sarah and Casey think Chuck and Morgan are dead, and Casey wants to kill Marko. But Chuck apparently did flash and took care of the ten men who surrounded him (which we didn't get to see...damn budget cuts). He threatens to come down the stairs, and Marko's men go to wait for him. Chuck jumps down on the other side and frees Sarah and Casey. Chuck tells them he has to go back to the computer lab to get the files on Mary Bartowski. He confesses to Sarah he came to find his mother and didn't tell her because he thought she would stop him. He was right; she didn't want to risk losing him. She's mad at Chuck for lying to her, but he claimed he was just keeping a secret. Now their rule is no more lying OR keeping secrets from each other. Time to get out of the building, but Marko tells them the building is completely automated and the security system is activated.
MARKO: If you die, you die.
Chuck suggests setting off the EMP to disable the systems, but Sarah protests he'll lose the data on his mother if he does.
CHUCK: Yeah, well it's not worth losing you. Any of you.
He sets it off, and Casey lets loose with the 'best Commie rifle ever invented-the AK-47.' They get out, but it takes a moment for the getaway car to arrive: a Moscow city bus.
CHUCK: Happy Anniversary.
Back in Burbank, the Bartowski Four is reunited, and everybody agrees to help Chuck find his mother...unofficially, of course. He has to go back to being a spy, but the question remains: does Chuck tell Ellie about it? He is determined to, until Ellie (Sarah Lancaster) finds out he's back at the Buy More. He confesses he didn't get any of the job interviews she set up, but she understands the economy is tough, and she's just happy he won't be a spy...because she's pregnant.
And soon-to-be-grandma Bartowski runs into Marko and his thugs. They tell Mary that her family is looking for her. She asks if they said anything to Volkoff about Chuck. He didn't, and she goes full Terminator on them, shooting the lot of them.
MARKO: (bleeding on the ground) Please, I have a family.
MARY: So do I. (pulls the trigger)
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