The War

Since I won't review a series (usually) till it's all over, this serves as a half-season review check in. So far: great! All episodes are an 8 or a 9. Reserving that 10 for an all-time classic but this series is fully capable of achieving that.

I don't know if you've noticed, but good comedies are on the wane. They give the comedy Emmy to that show about the restaurant that isn't even funny at all.

Well The Studio is laugh-out-loud howlingly funny. The cast is great, especially Kathryn Hahn and Ike Barinholtz, whose visage appears to be composed of a highly malleable form of plastic to be contorted into every comic form imaginable. Marvel should have cast him as Mr. Fantastic.

The only note I can give (more of a suggestion!) is...what the heck happened with the Kool-Aid movie plot? So far, the episodes are self-contained. Hoping for a bit more serialization in the future. Maybe all the jangling plot threads will be tied up by season's end.

Note to Apple: go ahead and blow a billion a year on your shows. You're finally clicking. Now about that Waterloo movie...

This previous episodes of this show were so much fun until this awful one. A bully plots to destroy and force herself into success by cheating, and that's the whole plot. Not one thing redeeming. Fastest and worst drop off in writing in a long time. Personal vendetta is sometimes fun to watch, but only when it is deeply deserved. Quinn is not loveable in this one and Sal is not that hated as the writer was hoping. It's too dark with no redeeming or lightening comedic moments. It feels like the episode was written out of hatred and a personal vendetta and that is depressing to watch. At least we got to see Roderick in a short scene! I don't really care if the real Hollywood is like this...this episode puts a dark mark on the series.

In episode 5, "The War," Quinn and Sal bring competing low-budget slashers to Matt's attention, forcing them to work together to figure out a direction for their project. Their polar-opposite tastes and sensibilities clash as they try to figure out a direction for the project. Quinn wants to make an artsy horror film, while Sal just wants to make a Smile rip-off. In this episode, the Hollywood satire takes a backseat, and The Studio becomes more of a straightforward workplace comedy about tensions in the office. The classic sitcom storytelling trick of introducing a conflict and constantly escalating that conflict with increasingly farcical twists and turns is used, with Matt playing the periphery. The episode rounds out Quinn and Sal's personal lives outside the studio, including their relationship, Quinn's focus on her career even when having sex, and Sal's relationship with his teenage daughters who are glued to their phones and have no interest in spending time with him. The bickering between Quinn and Sal yields some of The Studio's funniest lines to date, such as an enraged Sal calling Quinn a "D-girl" and pointing out that he ripped off an insult from Christopher Moltisanti in The Sopranos. Although some main cast members are absent for entire episodes, Quinn and Sal make for a compelling comic duo, and "The War" has some huge slapstick laughs with Sal's antics, from the chili tray spilled all over his suit to the thrown burrito that starts a chain reaction that destroys a film set. While "The War" might be The Studio's least satirically focused episode yet, it's also one of the show's funniest installments. "The Studio" is a series that explores the absurdities and narcissism of Hollywood studio culture. In Episode 5, "The War," two corporate giants, Quinn Hackett and Sal Saperstein, face off in a battle for power and influence. The episode, directed by Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg, is the most stylish and tightly-knit episode yet from the series. Quinn goes on the offensive with Owen Kline, while Sal does the same with Parker Finn. The chaos quickly turns into lateral competition, with both executives having to settle to some sort of status quo. Sal loses his esteemed parking space and face but agrees to support Quinn's vision, while Quinn only halfheartedly promises to offer some respect to Sal. The episode features a darkly humorous relationship between Sal and Quinn, with Sal ripping on Quinn to his heart's content for a ruined suit he's owed from the fight. Ike Barinholtz shines in this episode, oscillating between sharp bitterness and slapstick humor to brilliant effect. Chase Sui Wonders remains great as Quinn, who is interistically chaotic and dryly witty in her ambitious insecurities. The episode is stylish visually and is in the top tier for this season, with long takes as the confrontations in the office turn into cinematic spectacles reminiscent of Scorsese. The show targets the absurdities and narcissism of Hollywood studio culture, revealing a more profound truth about the entertainment industry's ego rifts: that creative choices are made not out of artistic value but for self-preservation and influence. The episode also offers a sharp critique of workplace hierarchy with its human resources storyline, where'real' accountability amounts to little more than the offer of a designated parking space and a weak apology. It's a sharp jab at how the industry often handles conflict: smoothing over deep-seated issues with symbolic gestures. By ignoring the actual filmmakers and putting them into the argument about Wink, the show demonstrates how much corporate environments focused on image disregard creative input. The satire works because it never feels over-the-top; it just feels one step more absurd than the real world. "The War" is The Studio at its smartest and sharpest, with stylish direction and performance perfection, turning an office turf war into a hilarious and mind-blasting commentary on modern Hollywood.

This episode tanked every expectation of comedy or tongue in cheek reference to the movie business. I don't know what happened but things really got out of hand and derailed in the worst way possible. Maybe it was AI or some other non human form of intellect, in any way shape or form it was just bizarre and corny in the same time. Compared to the previous episodes it just pales...

Trying to understand even the simplest most human connection seems presumptuous at times and characters we love and understand are just caricatures of themselves. Hopefully this show will recuperate as it is near and dear to movie fans!

I agree with most of the rewiews, this is actually the weakest episode of all.

It's not funny, it's not interesting, it's just cringe and shallow and almost like wtf?!!!

Am I still watching the same show? I was wondering.

4/10

And also the sex scene was unnecessary and way too long.

Didn't like this episode. I am disappointed.