Favorite Season Four Episode

Capt. Blicero
Season 4 discussion blah bleh!

Today's question (of death):
Favorite episode of season 4?

Link to poll right here!

Feel free to discuss and defend your favorite episode. Go crazy!

By the way, I've started archiving our discussions, and you can vote for old questions on the forum:
Underrated episode of season 4

(I'm still deliberating on the worst episode of the. I'll post my thoughts on that subject and today's sometime tonight.)

1 DAY AGO 6 LIKES

Dr. Clash
BHA, hands down. It's definitely the funniest episode, and DeanJeff is worth the price of admission alone. Yeah, Tritta development issues, blah blah blah, but that's a problem with the season and not with the episode. Loved this episode, loved every second of it.

I posted my season rankings in the forum thingy, if you're so inclined.

1 DAY AGO 6 LIKES

Capt. Blicero
I rewatched Human Anatomy last night, and now I can't make up my mind between that and the Thanksgiving/Jeff's father episode. The Shawshank storyline didn't matter, of course, but Jeff's story was poignant and well done and it actually mattered what happened. Human Anatomy was a lot of fun, and it somehow made use of the Britta/Troy romance.

Anyone want to help me decide? Got any further arguments?

1 DAY AGO 7 LIKES

Dr. Clash
Jeff's story is fantastic in CEFR, but there's an entire 2/5ths of the episode that just isn't "favorite of the season" material.

BHA, on the other hand, is just fantastic. All of the plots are connected thematically and event-wise (as opposed to just having an episode with 2 random unrelated plots), and each plot holds its own in humor and story. It's just an all-around fun and great episode.

It's easy to let love for CEFR's Jeff plot overshadow the opinion of the episode as a whole, but the other plot is substantially weaker, although it's not bad.

1 DAY AGO 6 LIKES

Semi-bored torontonian
CEFR: It did exactly what I wanted it to do, and it did it well. It even gave Jeff's previously unknown, frighteningly goofy brother dignity, pathos, and a fairly well-rounded arc. And McHale's delivery of "Britta's the worst" ranks among his best on the show.

The B story didn't work as well (largely because it was the wrong homage), but it was pretty good overall, bouncing nicely off the A story. I enjoyed Shirley's realization that sometimes the family you make can be just as important as the family you're born in (just ask Abigail Hobbs, or maybe not...). And Pierce got a surprisingly nice arc too.

Overall, it was the closest S4 came to the genuine article. Even the comic rhythm was there.

1 DAY AGO 5 LIKES

Capt. Blicero
WHY DID I HAVE TO GO THIRD?!

1 DAY AGO 7 LIKES

jmunney
Collapse
Uh, "Felt Surrogacy"

Do you guys want me to post the same thing again?

LIKE REPLY
1 DAY AGO 4 LIKES FLAG

roare
To me, there are 3 episodes of Season 4 that are worthy of standing with the rest of the show: Cooperative Escapism, Herstory of Dance, and Basic Human Anatomy. I call them the "elite 3" - they're really the only episodes that could fit into a previous season and not stand out as unusually weak.

I think Basic Human Anatomy is probably the best episode overall - it was a solid, consistently funny story from start to finish with some nice character moments and really nothing objectionable at all. CEFR had the iffy Shirley's Thanksgiving plot, and Herstory hit a few odd beats.

The Jeff story in CEFR is easily the season's best achievement, though.

1 DAY AGO 5 LIKES