bestest place on the earth

I used to be able believe this show in earlier seasons. It was unusual, but didn't leave me shaking my head every 5 minutes. I loved Hank, he could make me laugh every time. Now I think they are going to reveal the entire season was a fever dream as Barry detoxed from heroin. I give this one more shot and if it's not better I quit.

All the character are behaving entirely different from the way they started. None of the changes are well explained in the show. They really have made me hate nearly every character I liked. Root and Winkler are fine to watch work, but I don't like what they are doing.

Cristobal and Hank are the goats. There's a scene with the two of them talking loudly about their illegal organized crime activities in a public restaurant with some of the most feared criminals in the state. The humor is discreet and dark. It's clever and some of the lines might fly over your head if you're not cautious.

The cinematography is so impressive. The diner scene with the two gangs is a great example of a great continuous shot. This show is putting out revolutionary cinematography for television. Take last season's GTAesque scene with the bird-POV with Barry on the motorbike. It's impressive stuff.

Credit where it's due: the writers remembered to bring the comedy in episode 2 of this fourth season.

Cristobal and NoHo are recruiting their new gang like it's a multi-level marketing seminar. Fuches tries to recruit a new prison gang during TV time by laying it on thick about being The Raven. And Gene Cousineautells his story to Vanity Fair in a way that only he can. Winkler is so good in this role that the average GenZer would hardly believe the saame man was previously most famous as pop culture phenomenon The Fonz.

Barry is still in prison, day-dreaming of the way he wishes his life had gone. By the end we get the idea he's had a moment of clarity and is prepared to manipulate the system to his advantage.

The sole drawback of this episode is that Sally is still crying and throwing fits. My nerves are shot watching Discount Bin Meryl Streep pull faces. This character should have been written about at the end of Season 2. The show doesn't need Sally to get Barry to wherever he's going. Fuches is a much more interesting "love interest" for Barry than Sally could ever be.

Wow.

Dropping these first 2 episodes together was a fantastic choice, as the first episode was dedicated mostly to tying up loose ends, whereas episode 2 goes deeper into what lies ahead. Barry as a series thrives off of keeping momentum from explosive moments, and leads them right into more plot lines and story, and this is no diversion from that strength. I genuinely am surprised by how this series continues to subvert expectations, leading the audience to question what's real and what isn't. The cinematography is masterful as ever, Bill Hader deserves all the hype for their directing work, this show keeps being an utter triumph.

Another great episode with amazing performances and Henry Winkler once again proves why he's the best actor in this show.

The camera work is impeccable as always and the transitions are amazing. The way they decided to visualize Barry's childhood flashbacks and "what could've been" fantasies in the desert and transitioning from the prison cell to there and to other places is just brilliant and shows how much care and love went into writing and making this show.

The cinematography is never boring. Even when there's a long 2-minute meeting with only dialogue, the camera is always moving and captures interesting shots instead of having a long stationary shot focused on a boring dialogue. Though some could argue that the camerawork might be often distracting and too obvious and immersion-breaking, which is a valid nitpick to some degree, but I think it's refreshing to see that they carefully craft every scene to make it as interesting and entertaining as possible. So I think the cinematography, direction, and camerawork of this show as a whole are just brilliant and they take advantage of cinematography in the best way possible.

Even though it's not (yet?) as obvious as say when they took a jab at Netflix's algorithm that just cancels shows on a whim in the previous season, I think we can see that they are kinda hinting at how social media and the media and people in general react to news like this how they just judge, jury, and execute even though they even don't know half of it.

And now for this final season, we have Gene Cousineau big braining to achieve... a goal I guess? I'm still not entirely sure why Gene is doing what he's doing and what his end goal is, but he's doing a good job at accomplishing it because we all know Gene is a great actor!

And the comedy of this episode is just gold and it's somehow even funnier than the first episode.

The plot line of Hank and Cristobal also gets more interesting and intertwined with Barry's at the end of this episode and we'll have to wait to see what crazy events this is gonna lead to.

I also appreciate them not wasting their time and our time with cliché prison stories we've seen a million times before, and just being a little realistic about Barry's situation and executing new ideas and inventive ways of storytelling.

Overall, this was aother great episode into the last season. Twice the funniness of the first episode and plot lines moving actually fast and shifting gears left and right . I just wish the episode were half an hour longer.