Some old friends (and Kate Berlant) can’t liven up a dull Archer

Given its baby-sized eight episode run—and the show’s long-fluctuating interest in serialization—it’s not surprising that Archer’s 13th season has had only two big running stories. The macro, of course, has been all the bullshit missions and manipulations that IIA and pompous boss Fabian Kingsworth have sent The Agency on, which hit a climax point last week with the reveal that Fabian had, of course, been playing our heroes as saps. The other has been Lana’s custody battle with her ex-husband Robert over who gets her (and, technically, Archer’s) daughter A.J. in the divorce that was set up in last year’s finale. “Distraction Action,” tonight’s penultimate episode of the season, largely ditches that former story to focus on the latter—and ends up kind of feeling like a collection of those same loose ends that Archer spends the whole episode yelling at his underlings not to get bogged down in.

We open with everyone going full-on stir crazy, with the crew in lockdown due to the whole “being (sort of) framed for destabilizing a once-peaceful regime” thing. Sadly, Pam’s laugh track shenanigans can’t distract Lana from the fact that she’s about to miss the final hearing for A.J.’s custody—and, presumably, lose her daughter in the process—because all the various espionage and law enforcement groups hoping to capture the team will be watching it like hawks. (Or, y’know: Hiring John Early and Kate Berlant to half-assedly observe it. More on that in a minute.) And so Archer (who’s still in the “time to step up” part of his season-long arc of whether or not he gives a shit) initiates a plan to distract the authorities, so that Lana can be there for her daughter.

One of the issues with “Distraction Action,” though, is that it can’t ever really settle on who our main character is supposed to be. Is it Lana, arguably at the center of the whole conflict—but who mostly spends her scant screen-time tonight making an ass of herself in front of the judge? Is it Archer, who leverages his contacts with his old sex worker pal Trinette to get some dirt on Robert in a show of shady but sweet support? Or is it, weirdly, Cyril, who gets a whole let’s-call-it-a-B-plot about whether he’s interesting enough to serve as a distraction for anyone, and ultimately gets to give the big episode-ending pep talk? Everybody splits focus, not in an “ensemble comedy” sort of way, but in more of a comedic tug-of-war.

That divided attention isn’t helped by all the focus the episode puts on Berlant and Early’s dopey FBI agents, the subjects of the various distractions. Kate Berlant and John Early are very funny people, obviously, but these two characters…kind of aren’t. Especially since, outside that ending action scene, the characters seem to be trapped in their own little “two cops quip in a car” sitcom, not interacting with our main crew in any meaningful way. Archer is perfectly capable of pumping out a couple of good one-shot, single episode characters for guest stars to inhabit, but they’re going to be a lot more successful when they’re bouncing off of the comedic energy of Archer and his pals. (See, for instance, security guard Susie last week.) Seeing how people respond to Sterling Archer’s rampant stupidity—and he to theirs—is one of the central pleasures of this show. As is, a decent chunk of tonight’s action just felt like a stealth pilot for FBI Dumbos: The Series.

As to the actual distractions, they’re all pretty boilerplate Archer stuff at this point: Pam does some kickass motorcycle stunts, Carol/Cheryl blows stuff up, Krieger’s got a new airbrushed van, and Cyril rollerblades (and, when that needs some supplementing, pulls out his infamously large penis as a back-up distraction; between that and Trinette showing up, there are a lot of early Archer callbacks tonight, actually).

Back at the custody hearing, Lana makes the novel suggestion of just asking A.J. who she’d rather live with, which resolves things with a quickness in her mother’s favor. (Meanwhile, I’m genuinely not sure if Robert’s lying or not about orchestrating the whole ordeal as some sort of bizarre motherhood mindgame; although Stephen Tobolowsky’s always great, the character has been written at pretty much every point on the spectrum between “well-meaning saint” and “racist deviant” at this point, so it’s hard to tell if he’s sincere or saving face.) If nothing else, these scenes serve as a reminder that A.J. (still voiced by Kimberly Woods) is a surprisingly good addition to the crew. Archer tends to work well with just a twinge of sweetness in the mix, and the kid’s combination of smartass and genuine affection works better than you might think amidst all the dick jokes and flying bullets.

In the end—and after briefly reminding themselves that they probably shouldn’t murder a bunch of FBI agents just because they’re in hot pursuit—the crew make their escape to Carol/Cheryl’s private plane. At which point that other plot thread from the start of this recap rears its aging-quite-handsomely head, in the form of CIA agent Slater. (You remember Slater: He was the guy who spent all of season 6 yelling at everybody for being morons.) (And also being Christian Slater.) It turns out that Fabian is hiding out in Manatina, the country whose leader he tricked the Agency into getting him blackmail material for last episode, and Slater wants him taken down. Also, Ray is there, suggesting that he’s turned traitor (or CIA informant, if the mention of an info source nicknamed “LEGS” in Slater’s dossier is anything to go off of.) And so, after an episode of loose ends, we’re finally ready for the finale: A classic Archer field trip episode, where our heroes will definitely, sort of, kind of fix all the things they’ve broken over the course of this year’s adventures—and hopefully have more fun than this episode was in the process.

Stray observations

• I didn’t talk much about the “sitcom sound effects” cold open because, well…it wasn’t very funny. (I do approve of Carol/Cheryl getting the Kramer applause, though.)
• Lana: “Pam, I get that you are incapable of living without extreme over-stimulation and/or violence, but we have bigger problems.”
  “What, where? I’ll kill ‘em!”
• Iron Spaiden gardening vs. Wed Zeppelin: You be the judge!
• Oh, hey, is that motorcycle slide that Pam pulls off a reference to Nope?
• Trinette, talking up the small business/brothel she paid for with Archer’s child support payments: “Shit yeah, we got real classy cooze here!” (Not to brag, but this is the first time in my life I’ve ever had to spell out that particular word; many thanks to Oxford Languages for the assist!)
• In my screener, Robert wasn’t actually wearing a bow-tie when Lana called him “a bow-tied ballbag.” A horrifying continuity error, to be sure.
• You know I’m struggling to say anything really interesting about an episode when I leave a troll like that Nope/Akira joke up above there in my draft.
• Okay, Krieger’s crappy hovercraft van was pretty cute.
• Whoo, civil forfeiture comedy!
• Cyril, triumphant: “Consider my panties unkinked!”
  “Was that in reference to something?”
  “Oh, that wasn’t you guys. Nevermind.”
• Cyril’s ready to start dating again. Watch out, ladies!
• Not a lot of references tonight, although the newscast at the beginning does suggest that Baby Lamont from “Cold Fusion”/Frisky Dingo has come to an unfortunate end.
• Line of the episode: Not exactly spoiled for choice here, but I have to go with the matter-of-fact judge. “Kid goes to mom. Honestly, she’s screwed either way.”