Chuck vs The End

This is a story about a girl. This is a story about a girl who started watching a TV show one day and fell hopelessly in love with the TV industry. It is also a story about how that show managed to start the process of turning the girl into a TV addict.

I am that girl, and Chuck is the show. So let's get started.

It was the summer of 2008, the writer's strike had just been lifted four months ago, and I was working at Diner's Club as an admin office worker, waiting to enter college.

YouTube had become popular about a year ago, and many shows were subsequently uploaded onto the site, and then deleted after it was found that they infringed copyright laws. As a result, many similar sites were spawning up all around the Internet - sites on which those shows were uploaded to.

So a dull combination of having a boring job and no goal in life at that moment led to me looking for new shows to watch. I wasn't really into TV at that moment, the only two shows I could recall watching on a regular basis were Heroes and The OC, which had just ended that spring.

I started watching Chuck because a friend had recommended it to me, and long story short, I saw the first episode on Megavideo, finished the first season of 13 episode within 2 days and then started obsessively reading up on every piece of news about Chuck I could get my hands on.

So in between ending the first season and waiting for the 2nd to premiere, I read excessively. I learnt about the regular TV broadcast season, about Comic-Con, about press tours, about TV ratings and the TV industry in general. I found TV critic's Alan Sepinwall's blog and became an immediate fan of his episodic reviews and also grew to trust his judgement in choice of shows.

Indirectly, I would say that discovering Chuck and subsequently, Sepinwall's blog has brought me even higher up into the throes of TV addiction. In fact, 90% of the shows I watch now - irregardless of whether they still uphold to the standard they had when I first started viewing them - were through his blog.

By the time school started, I had already caught up to around 8-9 shows that I was eagerly waiting for the premiere in September. Shows that I've mostly stopped watching because of the drop in quality (case in point: House, Gossip Girl, Desperate Housewives) - or because they got cancelled (case in point: Pushing Daisies, Ugly Betty, Heroes). But never Chuck.

Through all the crazy number of TV series I got addicted to and then fell out of love with, Chuck was always there. It has never been as good a drama as Mad Men has been. It's not as good a comedy as Parks and Recreation is. It's not even in the same genre as Bones and Castle or White Collar - shows that I enjoy watching for kicks, but often falls short of quality. In fact, I'd go so far as to say Chuck has been mediocre at times, but that has never faltered me.

No, what I like about Chuck is that above all else, Chuck is fun. From the absurd premise to the comic relief minor characters, I don't think you could find a show that is more fun than Chuck is. It has other things that other good shows have too, good relationships between characters, funny pop cultural references, good character development, but the degree of which the producers and directors put into making the show fun has always been its strongest suit.

From the exaggerated parodies of other shows, to having Sarah kick ass in all sorts of weird surroundings, to having Jeffster perform an over the top rendition of Mr Roboto, to having Chuck himself just punch the living daylights out of all his opponents by using the Intersect, nothing bores you and everything entertains.

And that is one thing I have to give credit to Chuck for - it is never lazy when it comes to fan service. True, the story might have fallen short somewhere after season 2, and the graphics along with it. But with the creators unafraid to pay tribute to shows like Die Hard, James Bond, the pride they held in their work was evident.

Which is why when I sit down on my bed to watch the final season tomorrow morning, it'll be with a tinge of reluctance because I don't want this wonderful journey to end. I am eager to see where the beloved characters end up and how will the latest conflict resolve itself. But I can't imagine what it would be like for this show to end.

So for the rest of my life, I will forever be grateful to Josh Schwartz, Chris Fedak, Zachary Levi, Yvonne Strahovski, Adam Baldwin and the rest of the Chuck team for giving me and the rest of the world this show.

Plus, you know what? Chuck made it okay to be nerdy. Chuck played Final Fantasy when he was young and loves Star Wars. He still got an awesome job and a hot girl.

And if I ever miss it, it's okay. I have the DVD box sets after all :D

P.S. Please continue eating Subway. Thank you Subway and the wonderful Chuck fandom for saving it from cancellation, to give us 3 more unlikely seasons of this show.