Sarah: Okay, I know that you don't trust them. But do you trust me?
Chuck: ...Yeah.
Sarah: Good. Then I promise you, we're going to find him.
Desperate to find his father, Chuck turns to someone unexpected for help: Jill, Fulcrum agent and Chuck's ex. She agrees, but wants a deal that Chuck is not authorised to make. Meanwhile, there's trouble at the Buy More with an upcoming inspection from Corporate. Although the staff's initial reaction is to act up and make Emmet look bad, he persuades Morgan that, by instead making him look good, the Buy More staff will get rid of him as he's promoted away.
Jill's best guess for who will know Orion's whereabouts is her Uncle Bernie, a family friend who first recruited her to Fulcrum. However, he's under heavy guard and will only come out for family events, so Chuck and Jill manufacture one with a fake engagement. Uncle Bernie is understandably confused by Jill's engagement, and furious when she tells him about her deal. He chases Chuck and Jill through Jill's parents' house before dropping dead of a heart attack. With their only source dead, things seem bleak, but then a call from Fulcrum to Bernie's cell summons him to a location Jill knows and the mission is back on.
The Buy More employees successfully make Emmet look good for the inspector, but it's not enough: Emmet tells Morgan that, to guarantee he gets promoted out, Morgan must get Big Mike on tape praising him. Morgan does, but when the tape is played for the inspector, he's in for a shock: Big Mike was being inspected, not Milbarge, and the tape results in Big Mike being demoted while Emmet takes his job.
Team Chuck infiltrate the Fulcrum location, which is a leadership seminar fronting for a recruitment centre. Intercepted on their way to the cells, Chuck and Casey end up taking the entry test, which Chuck aces and Casey flunks. Meanwhile, they're made by Bill Bergey, head of the office, who has Chuck brought to his office at gunpoint. Sarah comes to the rescue, reluctantly bringing Jill, but when they're pinned down by gunfire Jill makes a break for it. Casey saves Chuck and then goes to help Sarah while Chuck looks up his father's location on the computer.
Jill has a crisis of conscience and goes back to help Chuck. They go to his father's cell, only to find he's already been moved. However, Jill heard some Fulcrum guys talking, and knows he's been moved to a place called Black Rock. The name triggers a flash, telling Chuck exactly where his father is going. Chuck admits to Jill that he lied about getting her a deal, but that she held up her end so he's letting her go anyway. He cuts through her ankle monitor and gives her the engagement ring from the party.
Back at Castle, General Beckman has made a decision: the human Intersect project is over Chuck is coming in. Sarah is sent to lure him to Castle for Casey to subdue. Catching him about to leave for Black Rock, she tells him his father has been recovered and is being taken to Castle, then draws him into a hug and tells him it's all a lie. On her advice, he drops his watch on the way out the door as they go on the run to save Chuck's father.
Trope Flash:
- Ask a Stupid Question...: When the Buy Morians plan to make Emmet look bad, Lester speaks for customer-facing staff everywhere when a woman asks him if he works there.Lester: No, no. I just wear this ridiculous outfit so people like you will ASK ME IF I DO!
- Big Eater: Uncle Bernie. It kills him.
- Call-Back:
- Following on from Chuck Versus the Dream Job, the CIA are searching for Chuck's father a.k.a. Orion.
- Chuck is sceptical that General Beckman really wants his father found, as she doesn't want the Intersect out of Chuck's head as she admitted in Chuck Versus the Predator.
- Jill turns up again for the first time since Chuck Versus Graviton.
- When Chuck goes to the CIA prison to visit Jill, Fulcrum agents from previous episodes Chuck Versus the First Date and Chuck Versus Tom Sawyer can be seen glaring through their cell windows at him.
- Destination Defenestration: Inverted: Casey goes to Chuck's rescue using a window cleaner, entering through the window. Played straight later when Chuck deploys The Morgan against Bill Bergey, who then trips and flies out the window.
- Freeze-Frame Bonus: The questions onscreen as Chuck takes the Fulcrum test (all are YES/NO):
- You tend to sympathize with other people.
- You value justice higher than mercy.
- The more people with whom you speak, the better you feel.
- You easily empathize with the concerns of other people.
- You enjoy being at the center of events in which other people are directly involved.
- You avoid being bound by obligations.
- You are strongly touched by the stories about people's troubles.
- I Know You Know I Know: When Morgan and the Buy Morians discuss how to handle Emmet's upcoming inspection.Morgan: Think about this: Emmett asked us to behave because he knew we would do the exact opposite. We'd misbehave. But Emmitt, he's no fool. He would know that we would know that he knows us. So obviously, we need to behave.
Jeff: Ok, so we behave.
Morgan: Pay attention! It's the exact opposite! Emmett would also know that we'd know that he knows we know, because he knows that we know that what he knows, is that we know he wants us to behave!
Lester: Right! Yes! Yes, I don't know how we did it but we are geniuses, my friend.
Morgan: Thank you!
Jeff: So, what are we doing again? - Not Completely Useless: The Morgan, a move invented by Morgan when girls beat him up in High School. It mainly involves cowering while covering the face and groin, and both times Chuck uses it in this episode, someone dies. First Bernie drops dead of a heart attack, then Bill Bergey falls out of a fifteenth-floor window.Jill: Two kills in two days, Chuck! That move really is killer!
- Parental Sexuality Squick: Emmet uses Morgan's disgust over Big Mike dating his mother to manipulate him, implying that if Emmet leaves, Big Mike will have to work and have less time and energy to date.
- Power of Trust: This episode is all about trust. Who can be trusted? Who can't?
- Morgan is wrong to trust Emmet when he says that looking good for the inspector means he'll be promoted away. In fact, he wants Big Mike's job, and Morgan helps him take it.
- Chuck trusts Jill in the face of all logic and good sense. This turns out to be a good move, as she passes up a chance at escape to help Chuck find his father.
- Sarah will betray the CIA before she betrays Chuck.
- Running Gag:
- Chuck using the Morgan when cornered by a Fulcrum agent, who then dies. First Uncle Bernie, then Bill Bergey.
- Chuck being held at gunpoint by Fulcrum agents, resulting in this exchange:
Fulcrum: Are you wearing a wire?
Chuck: That's preposterous!
Fulcrum: [Pulls gun] Are you wearing a wire?
Chuck: Yes, yes I am. - Shout-Out:
- Jill's cell number is 101.
- After Uncle Bernie dies, Chuck and Casey walk him out the door pretending to onlookers that he's still alive, as in Weekend at Bernie's.
- Lester says "Oh Captain, my Captain," to Emmet, as in Dead Poets Society.
- After being demoted, Big Mike gives Morgan the kiss of death and tells him, "I know it was you, Morgan. You broke my heart. You broke my heart!"
- To Be Lawful or Good: A recurring theme.
- Chuck letting Jill go, knowing he's not authorised to do so but reasoning that she kept her end and deserves a second chance.
- Sarah running away with Chuck instead of bringing him in.
- Wham Line:
- After Jill escapes, General Beckman has come to a decision:
Casey: Permission to drop the twerp in a deep, dark hole, General.
General Beckman: Granted.- When Sarah goes to bring Chuck to Castle to be sedated, she draws him into a hug and tells him, and the audience, exactly where she stands in four simple words.
- What You Are in the Dark:
- Chuck lying to Jill that he can get her a deal to get her help.
- Morgan tricking Big Mike in the hopes of getting rid of Emmet.
- Jill goes back to help Chuck, passing up a chance to run.
- Chuck lets Jill go and gives her an expensive ring rather than turn her in or even just not help her.
- You Do Not Want To Know: Said almost verbatim to Jill by Chuck when she asks how he knows about Black Rock. She, of course, still doesn't know he's the intersect.
