Review: Chuck

It’s a strange name yet there’s a martial arts expert (Chuck Norris), a kick ass author (Chuck Palahniuk), two recent movies (I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry, Good Luck Chuck) and now a TV show that all share it.

The Plot: Josh Schwartz (The OC) brings us the story of slacker inadvertently exposed to a subliminal message that encodes his brain with all the information from the recently destroyed US super computer. Now Chuck has all of the US governments secrets and classified information lying dormant in his head and is suddenly America’s no.1 security concern.

The Good: This is a fast paced quirky action comedy. The lead Zachary Levi is charismatic and likeable and he is surrounded from a great support cast. Plus Adam Baldwin is in the show (which would mean something to you if you’ve heard of Firefly or Serenity).

The Bad: None of the jokes are laugh out load funny. They are more of the – think quietly to yourself, “well that’s worth a chuckle but not out load” kind of variety.

The Ugly: Nothing, really this is one of the best new shows. Some may argue that the show is cheesy and far-fetched but that’s exactly what it’s meant to be.

The Verdict: It’s in a tough time slot having to deal with Dancing with the Stars, the How I Met Your Mother/The Big Bang Theory comedy block, and Prison Break. Plus it’s the lead in for Heroes, which has seen its ratings dropping rapidly. In TV world when a new show is the lead in for a hit and the hits ratings starts to drop the new show is often blamed. As much as I love this show the ratings have been steadily dropping from 6.0/9 to 5.1/8 to 4.5/7 after three episodes, if this continues the show is toast.