Barry recap: Barry and Sally go method in the middle of nowhere
As the show doubles down on darkness, Barry and Sally lose themselves and find meaner pastures
TV Reviews Barry
It’s been eight years since Barry and Sally escaped Los Angeles for the desolate plains of Wherever The Hell They Are, U.S.A. Cutting themselves off from Hollywood, their families, and the ghosts haunting their waking life, Barry, who now goes by Clark, has committed himself to the idea one character calls “clean living.” On the prairies resembling the same vacant stretches of undeveloped land where Barry spent his childhood, he, Emily (a.k.a. Sally), and their son John (Zachary Golinger) live a solitary, humble life free from the outside world. Picking up mere moments after last week’s abrupt conclusion, Barry and Sally attempt to disentangle their own “tricky legacies” by trying to convince themselves they’ve changed by becoming someone entirely new. The result leads down some of the bleakest avenues the show has explored.
Both Barry and Sally have gone full method with their latest roles. When we first meet Clark, he pushes John to apologize to their neighbor over acute Call Of Duty ignorance. Clark tells the neighbors that video games are a no-no in their household and instructs John to make peace. “I hope we can be together next time in harmony,” John says. “We’ll look into that,” replies the neighbor, doing his best with the weirdest apology anyone has ever received. Barry wants to right the wrongs of his past through his son, but John has violent tendencies like Barry. Well, Barry used to have them; now he’s changed. He can control his anger while knowing he can’t control anyone else’s actions. Barry learns from the greats, notably Abraham Lincoln, who Barry seems to have recently discovered. Sally, after all, didn’t learn about George Washington until much later. As he and John watch YouTube videos of Honest Abe, Barry sits with his mouth agape. President Lincoln, it seems, is a good role model, promoting “pragmatism, optimism, and compromise.” With skills like that, maybe John can be a lawyer one day.
Sally, too, has a new role with a new hairdo. The camera introduces her from behind as she adjusts her brunette Emily wig like Norma Desmond from Sunset Boulevard, recalling Kristen’s monologue from “you’re charming.” Framed by the window to her left, John and Barry plant fence posts as she sits at her vanity, radiating alienation and resentment. Sally can’t even face her family, later passing Barry and John as they watch YouTube without even offering a goodbye; how can we expect her to face the camera?
Emily works at Lynette’s Country Diner, serving short stacks and warming coffee for a distinctly not-L.A. crowd. As a working actor, Sally certainly has service experience, but the irony of doing it as an immersive theater experience for an audience of herself must be disorienting. Still, the scene is a brief respite from the crushing despair of the episode. But within moments, the atmosphere changes from a friendly greasy spoon to her co-worker Gina (Emily Spivey) needing “a fuckin’ xanny” in less than 30 seconds. Gina doesn’t even bother hiding it from the customers—this is a world where drug use is a common requirement to get through the day. It’s not hard to see why. The job stifles and deadens Sally; she begins committing petty crimes, tapping the till for a few bucks and teasing a hookup with local scumbags like Bevel (Spenser Granese) out of sheer boredom—or exerting some control of her life. At least at work, Sally can escape binging Natalie’s hit television show, Just Desserts. That was Sally’s show. Now she watches her former assistant make bad jokes on TV as she gulps wine and gives off a vibe that says, “She’s living my life.”
Sally doesn’t have the energy to put on a happy face. Not Barry, though. Having recently learned about Lincoln’s pragmatism, optimism, and compromise, Barry has integrated these principles into his everyday life. He created a wholesome new reality for his family, where the secular pleasures of Call Of Duty and baseball are trumped by live streams of church services and retellings of “Feeding Of The 5,000.” God provides the family with what they need, which somehow doesn’t include a blanket for his son. After finding contraband in his son’s room, the baseball mitt the neighbor gifted John, Barry sits the boy down to watch several of the funniest videos on YouTube, exorcising John of his sinful ballpark dreams. Of course, the gleefully and explicitly violent videos give John nightmares (“I don’t want to get killed by a baseball”). John is growing too old to sustain this lifestyle. The boy doesn’t understand why he can’t play baseball or why his mom wears hair on her hair, and he’s on the cusp of asking too many questions.
Barry and Sally can’t provide for him emotionally, socially, or financially. Living in the middle of nowhere, the family eats undercooked potpies or cereal for dinner in the dark as John shivers himself to sleep. While they’re not living like kings, there’s no reason to think they couldn’t afford the comforter, nor does Barry offer a sufficient explanation. But their failures extend to past material goods. Sally, for instance, can barely bring herself to touch the boy. When John comes crying to her after his baseball nightmare, she lays next to him and stares at the ceiling as he clings to her for warmth and love. In this instance, Sally looks totally detached. The closest she comes to showing John compassion is when they’re squeezed into the bathtubs as Barry fights the shadowy ding-dong ditchers outside.
Even with such wide open spaces, Barry and Sally keep running up against their old lives. Despite his enthusiasm for the 16th president, Barry falls down the YouTube rabbit hole and learns of all the “messed up shit Lincoln did” from the Heroes Exposed channel. Lincoln’s is a “tricky legacy” that recalls another maxim Barry once heard: You’re more than the worst thing you’ve ever done. It turns out you’re more than the best thing you’ve ever done in the case of Lincoln or Gandhi. It’s as if Barry is still reconciling the bad guys and good guys dichotomy Fuches imbued him with and almost grasping the concept of nuance. It’s easy to see why Barry finds comfort in the complications of Lincoln’s life. If Lincoln could come out the other side of this as “Honest Abe,” maybe there’s hope for the hitman.
But as Barry attempts to relate to history’s giants, Sally sits and seethes. She looks for ways to let out the aggression and lands on Bevel. The next day at work, she takes advantage of Bevel’s crush on her by interrogating him about his life of crime. Relayed as he sips Nesquik through a straw, Bevel’s description of his brother’s murder conviction is consistent with much of the show’s violence. When Sally asks how the killings made his brother feel, he seems confused, as if he’s never thought about the victims. He chalks the bank robbery casualty up to simple, unfortunate statistics. “What do you mean, ‘how’d it make him feel,’” he asks. “You rob a fuckin’ bank. The probability of someone getting jacked is high.” When the conversation turns to Bevel, he sees it as an opportunity to make his wet dreams come true. Bevel brags to Sally that blasting fools made him feel like a “god,” which Sally translates into “a bad boy god.”
Sally’s testing him. Bevel isn’t the bad boy god he believes himself to be. He’s probably never even killed a guy. But Sally has. She invites him into the bathroom to give him a taste of the math he so proudly bragged about, choking him too aggressively until he rips her wig off. After he promises to keep her secret, Sally tells the boss that Bevel is tapping the till. Sally will do whatever she can to get out some aggression that vodka and wine can’t quench.
Barry, too, tiptoes back into old habits. After learning that Honest Abe isn’t the best role model for his boy, Barry begins mining his history for lessons. When he and John bring packages into the house, he plants a shadow box of his old Marine medals and photos like Darren McGavin at the end of A Christmas Story. Barry directs these precious moments, deciding at the last minute to move the formation of this idyllic memory on the swing rather than the steps. It’s all a fabrication, so he might as well make it as much like television as possible. Regardless of where it takes place, Barry can’t help but make the past accessible, offering John breadcrumbs that will lead to the truth. By the end of the episode, he’s rewriting his history. Barry’s traumatic experiences in Afghanistan, particularly the incident that got him discharged, become a proud war story. In Barry’s new version of reality, he was a medic who saved Albert’s life.
But that past is catching up with him. One night, a mysterious knock at the door sees Barry reaching into a wall and pulling out a pistol. He stands guard in the patch of dust that goes on forever all night, waiting for the knocker to emerge. The sounds of footsteps in the oppressive darkness characterize the atmosphere of “tricky legacies.” The following day, the episode does one of many slow fades that can’t help but feel like No Country For Old Men from the endless stretch of flat land to a Hollywood backlot. There, a long-haired Gene Cousineau has re-emerged from hiding. He received word that a movie is being made about Barry, and he wants in. Barry drops the act when a Google Alert warns Sally of what’s coming soon. Clark dies at that moment because Barry has to kill Cousineau.
After last week’s clearing of the board, “tricky legacies” doubles down on darkness, depression, and duplicity. The doubling of characters and resetting identities through a filter of filth and decay evokes Twin Peaks’ final episode, when Dale Cooper (Kyle MacLachlan) awakes in Odessa, Texas, in a seemingly different reality. Barry and Sally have changed superficially, but ultimately the past remains a part of them, a trauma they cannot escape, no matter how much they try to outrun it.
Stray observations
- I know John takes “you’re good enough to play right field” as a huge compliment, but as a retired little league right fielder, we all know that’s where they stick the sucky kids.
- I think John is named after Barry’s dad. I couldn’t find an instance of anyone saying Barry’s dad’s name in those first two episodes, but IMDB lists two characters as having the name: Detective John Loach (John Purrccello) and Barry’s dad (played by Gloria).
- The shot of Sally at her vanity also reminded me of the childhood segment of Citizen Kane, a memory of parent-child bonding in the background as the child’s fate is determined in the foreground.
- YouTube video title: “Little League Breaks Neck Colliding With Wall!” Description: “In the middle of a little league game, the first baseman runs to catch a foul ball, but hits the fence and breaks her neck, dropping to the ground motionless.”
Title: “12 Year Old Pitcher Killed By Line Drive!!!!!!! (MATURE CONTENT)” Description: “A 12 year old pitcher from Indiana throws a fastball which is hit directly back at him, striking him in the head and killing him instantly.” - The suggested videos aren’t much better: “Child will Never Walk Again After Horrific Tackle In Junior Game!” “LITTLE LEAGUE PITCHER PARALZED AFTER DIRECT HIT!!” “Parents Straight Up Murder Each Other After Little Game!” “7 Year Old Boy Gets Grisly Injury in Outfield – TERRIFYING.”
- The sound from the videos is perfect, too. “Noah. Noah! He’s not breathing!”
- Hader’s line readings still crack me up, no matter how dark the show gets. “You like your dinner, John? Pretty good, right? Chickenpotpie!”
- John’s was the only potpie not fully cooked. By the looks of things, Barry and Sally had no problem finishing their dinners.
- “We’ve got to honor mom.”
“She cries a lot.”
“Oh, yes, yes she does. You know what, like I’ve said, there’s happy cry, and then there’s sad cry, and then there’s, uh, well, there’s mom cry and that can be very loud and scary.” - Kristen, who had a small role in the first movie, is now the star of “Megagirls 4.” Sally’s coaching really helped.
- Pray we see more of “Larry Chowder: The Magical Boy” starring @Tyler #FeelTheMagic.
- “It’s just so crazy to go from a chubby little kid who loves cupcakes and all of a sudden, the President of the United States is quoting our show at the State of the Union. How did we get this lucky? Did you know we almost fired you season two? You weren’t good yet. You were a kid, so you were bad.”
123 Comments
There was a moment, when Barry was standing in the light in front of his house, listening to footsteps and giggling from the darkness around him, where I legitimately thought Barry was going to shoot a prank-playing kid.Jesus, this show.
I had the same thought seconds earlier when Clark was fully illuminated in the house, and with each step toward the door he got darker and darker until it was Barry.
Thought they were going to have Barry killed off (especially after the fade to black) – of course, they went in the even Weirder direction of him seemingly standing alert throughout the entire night
Feels pretty disgustingly relevant that some gun-wielding maniac took his frustrations out on a 14 year old playing hide and seek in his yard by shooting her in the back of the head in the news recently. This show couldn’t have predicted this, but it’s getting to be a daily happening at this point that someone gets shot in broad daylight for no reason in this country.
“The doubling of characters and resetting identities through a filter of filth and decay evokes Twin Peaks”Oh, man. You took the words right out of my mouth. I felt a ton of Lynch influence all over this, but none so much as the Odessa coda of Peaks. Also kind of like the the Deer Meadow prelude to Fire Walk With Me. So dingy and gross and filled with grim stillness and self-loathing. I have a feeling that a lot of people are going to be kind of ambivalent about this, but I thought it was brilliant. One day, Hader is going to make the sleaziest midwestern crime noir of all time. Mark my words. It will be glorious.
Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian: A Bill Hader Joint.
So, apparently a sizable amount of fans were legit expecting this episode to start by saying “Just kidding!” and reveal that last week’s ending was a daydream Barry was having. What level of contempt do they have for this creative team to think they’d pull that?
That’s a weird take. The show plays fast and loose with reality/perception and had already had a fantasy sequence with the wedding party marching through the exact same field directly into a banquet hall. It isn’t THAT crazy to think it was another creation of Barry’s fracturing mind. Saying it somehow reflects “contempt” for the creative team is bizarre.
It’s a valid take. The ”It Was All a Dream” trope is a notoriously tired device. It’s different if the fantasy is presented as such, as with previous fantasy sequences we’ve seen on Barry. This was different. (Just how unreal was that beach sequence in season 3 though? No matter, much less tired if the apparent fantasy turns out to be reality rather than vice versa.) That’s not to say we aren’t still watching a dream unfold but I’d be surprised and disappointed if that’s where this is leading.As far as I’m concerned the only person allowed to pull the Surprise It’s a Dream card in 2023 is David Lynch. However if Berg and Hader, likewise, found a way to freshen up that trope, I suppose I’d be on board. If anyone else could pull it off, it might just be them.
So you come here to share your asshole opinions because nobody in your life wants to listen to your shit, right?
I think the shot late in Episode 4 where John opens the fridge and there’s only six bottles of wine, six beers and a donut with a bite out of it kind of lent itself to the idea that it was a dream/fantasy because what family would have nothing but that in there. Turns out it now seems to be the reality of the situation which makes it all the more disturbing.
I wanna see the Venn with them and people who still think David Chase would choose to purposely NOT purposely end a long running and beloved crime drama.
They’re in Hell. (You thought Kim Wexler had a rough go of it–meet Sally.) I’ve never rooted so hard for Barry to go back to being a hitman. He talks about responsibility and thinking about others here to his son, but he’s just as selfishly monstrous sans the violence. He knows his wife and son are miserable, but, poignantly too, thinks this is the only way to curb his violent tendencies. The show here seemed to be saying you shouldn’t escape your nature. Of course, fleeing and changing identities does not do the very hard work of actual changing behavior and outlook. I’m really curious now what Barry’s fate will be at the last episode.This was outstanding writing and direction by Hader. Reminded me of a Coen brother’s film. Just as I think the show can’t get any darker, Hader goes all the way. Sally’s scene with her scuzzy co-worker—Yowsa!
A few relieving drops of comedy in the great darkness: Favorite line was probably Barry telling his son that Lincoln killed “hundreds of people at Shiloh and Antietam;” “Larry Chowder”; Natalie’s sitcom.So I guess Gene did in fact kill his son. Darkness!
I was totally getting a Kim Wexler vibe too!
But I think the“trailer park goth” look kinda works for Sally.(Sips Nesquik)
So I guess Gene did in fact kill his son.Still have my doubts about that. Don’t think he’d resurface after eight years in hiding to consult on a biopic if he was fleeing a manslaughter charge.
Same impression I got. More self-exile than incarceration vibe from his Howard Hughes look.
He talks about responsibility and thinking about others here to his son, but he’s just as selfishly monstrous sans the violence. He knows his wife and son are miserable, but, poignantly too, thinks this is the only way to curb his violent tendencies.And keep their secrets. Barry’s quite clearly trying to purposely isolate John, which cannot turn out well. Barry showing John the Little League injuries on YouTube was insane / insanely awful / insanely funny, depending on your perspective. Fuckin’ Father of the Year right there.
He is also teaching the kid how popular heroic figures like Lincoln and Gandhi have “tricky legacies” while bragging about his own military career. As Hank hinted previously, Barry is a narcissist, and many narcissist need excessive admiration and attention (aka “narcisstic supply”) from their codependents.
Great Kim Wexler comparison!
While the comparison is apt, I wouldn’t say Kim was having a rough time. She seemed to be very content and happy with her new life like how Barry is now. Whereas Sally is more like Jimmy McGill as far as being in a quiet, miserable, drunken, stupor; remembering and taking glimpses of their old lives while trying to figure out ways to at least experience and go back to it without blowing their cover. And like Jimmy, she may eventually do that. I can see her taking acting classes at the local community college or something behind Barry’s back. And like Jimmy, that’s when the past will catch up and the cover gets blown.
I thought of Kim too, but she was decidedly less miserable. The scene where Sally just gets up from Barry and the kid and walks into the other room, I thought there was a 50/50 chance she just gonna blow her brains out.
Weird, I don’t get a “Barry is running from himself and the show is saying he needs to embrace being a hitman” vibe so much as a “this guy is selfish and broken, and there’s no running away from that.”
No, I agree with you. This episode showed that creating a totally new identity that suppresses who you’ve been for a long time doesn’t work. You just make life more miserable for yourself and loved ones. It’s an instant solution that isn’t one. Barry, in order to change, must do the very hard work of actually changing himself. With only a few episodes left of the show, I highly doubt he will (there could be another big time jump, but nah).
Remind me, do we know about Gene’s grandson’s mom? If he killed his son, and then abandoned his now orphaned grandson that’s super fucked.
I thought the Cohen Bros match was a bad one. But in retrospect…. Barry is A Very Serious Man and the oncoming tornado is karma catching up to lay to waste everyone in Barry’s wake.So, all in all, maybe you have a good point.
At the start of this episode, I was thinking maybe it was too much darkness without enough humor. Then Barry showed his son videos of kids dying in little league, and I just fucking lost it.
Worth the darkness for that, as well as Gandhi’s hypocrisy (Gee, Mahatmah whiffed it). Was silently hoping he was going to google Mother Teresa next.
Definitely needed that! lol
That was truly hilarious. I know it’s dark, but Barry’s flat affect really sells it.
This show has really crawled up its own ass this season. It seems to expect us to care, but the characters and situations are just self-satisfied, film school bullshit.
No one will ever convince me that Hader didn’t choose that dinner specifically she he could rattle off “chickenpotpie” like he was still on SNL.
Fucking BLEAK.
At least it’s a new(ish) flavor of bleak. And it might be the first episode of Barry where no one died, so…yay?We’re really going to see bleak when we catch up with Hank. That poor guy.
Any predictions on who the show will revisit in these last few episodes? I’m still furtively hoping for indicators of a Mitch spin-off (single, stationary camera for 30 minute oners of Mitch fielding off-screen pleas for guidance. The end credits would play each week over the receipts of this week’s customers).I would also accept a Chief “Big Cat” Krauss movie review show, delivered each week standing at his press conference stage, beginning with a 90-minute overview of Kurosawa.
I loved that Sally’s dark roots were showing when she had the wig off. She is continuing to dye her dark hair blonde, then putting on a dark wig to ‘play’ Emily. Very method.
I think the whole idea of showing how Clark denies John basic comforts & connections implies that he’s constructing his son to be someone who can disappear instantly and no one would really notice. Or perhaps the darker take is, constructing his son to be a psychopath who can continue Barry’s work so Clark can live vicariously through John’s atrocities.
The disappearing part actually does make sense, especially with not getting too attached to anyone around them or any outside activities. I’m more doubtful on the darker interpretation because I tend to think that Barry is just such a fucking delusional mess of a person that he thinks you can raise a kid this way, trying to instill values in him while also making sure he can’t do anything that might give up your life on the run, and he’ll turn out all right.
I’m more doubtful on the darker interpretation ||But about denying him basic comforts – none of that makes sense. Why not allow John a blanket for relief from the cold? If anything, it makes their situation more likely to be outed, because John has all these things he would complain about to whomever would listen. Would someone with tactical awareness like Barry put himself in danger like that, over an item that might cost a few dollars? Something else is going on there…
Nah, more like Barry is a narcissist, as Hank hinted at previously, and he requires endless supply of admiration and attention (aka narcissistic supply), which he could get from a kid who has no friends or hobbies (like video games like Call of Duty or baseball) or role models other than Barry because everyone else has “tricky legacies”.
Man I’m so blown away by how this show has gone from a mostly really funny, occasionally uncomfortable dark comedy to a mostly extremely dark and uncomfortable, occasionally funny dramedy 😛 I was just talking with a friend the other day, of all the male antihero shows I’ve seen, you got your BoJack Horseman and Better Call Saul which are really concerned with the inner lives of their main characters and the question of whether redemption is possible, and what it looks like, and then you get your shows like Breaking Bad (and probably Mad Men but I haven’t seen that) and Hannibal where the main character (Walter White and I’m including Hannibal as the main character even though he’s not THE protagonist) are obviously terrible people but like it almost kinda glorifies it? Not in the text at all but in the way it’s presented as exciting and riveting to watch, even when they do something horrible it’s like you just can’t look away. But Barry is the one show like that I’ve seen that doesn’t feel like it’s glorifying its main characters’ shittiness at all. Maybe it did at first, but all of season 3 and 4 have been really good about not giving people any excuses to make for Barry. I appreciate that about it.
It’s interesting how the show has always made a point to avoid glamorizing violence. I think a lot of the action scenes are ‘cool’ from the standpoint of the choreography, but never really within the context of the show itself. This episode had no action, but it still felt like it was doing what you’re saying, showcasing how terrible the character(s) are without making it seem like something you want to emulate.
I like that you brought up the “glorification” thing. In my opinion, writers and directors do not glorify their dark, twisted characters. The media and the fans do. The Soprano crew were portrayed as slovenly, uneducated buffoons whose language was violence. Most of them got theirs in the end, as did Walter White. It’s the douchey fans that hold the conventions, recreate the sets, and publish the Italian cookbooks.
Absolutely horrible episode. This show can’t end soon enough.
then don’t watch it
I have a feeling Barry’s raising John somewhat the way he was raised. Remember, in addition to being a killer Barry’s just a weird guy with no social skills. He thinks a brand new Macbook is an appropriate gift for an acquaintance.Curious why Fred Armisen’s hitman/gadget podcaster was featured in the recap. I guess just to show that people are gunning for Barry?
As Hank hinted previously, and what this season has been getting at is that Barry is a narcissist, and many narcissist need excessive admiration and attention (aka “narcisstic supply”) from their codependents. He is teaching the kid how popular heroic figures like Lincoln and Gandhi have “tricky legacies” while bragging about his own military career. He’s also preventing his kid from having hobbies where he could make friends. He is isolating him, so Barry is the only friend or role model the kid has. He’s turning their relationship into a codependent one, which is what a narcissist like him needs, and it might be what Barry had with Fuches.
“THOMAS EDISON MURDERED AN ELEPHANT”
No one should miss the Bob’s Burgers episode about this very subject.Tina Belcher singing: “They’ll say ‘aw Topsy’ at my autopsy…………….
That shows music is so good. I listen to Boys 4 Now sometimes.
I am right there with you my friend.“Will you be mine? COAL MINE………..”
Excuse my city-mouse ignorance, but do places like Barry’s house exist? What looks like a completely modern factory home plunked in the middle of nowhere, not even a farm or anything, just miles of flat emptiness… what market do homes like that serve? How does even get utility coverage there? I expect he could have his own well and septic tank, but I didn’t see any power lines or solar panels, and they clearly have good internet (good-enough, anyway)… I dunno, I suppose I can explain the individual pieces, but it still felt like something out of a Tim Burton movie.
America is BIG. And in the Midwest a lot of it is flat. And obviously, that wasn’t shot on a soundstage. There are a non-zero number of residences that appear, if you frame it right, ‘in the middle of nowhere.’ But there’s also probably a paved road within a couple hundred yards, leading to a main thoroughfare a couple miles away, which leads into ‘town’ within 10 or so miles.And that family their son is interacting with lives within walking [or at least tractoring] distance
basically it’s framed in a lightly surrealistic way; like the whole show. but yeah it’s not difficult to think Barry and Sally bought and decorated the house to their urban standard of living.
I agree. While it’s sparsely furnished, it’s not at all rustic. They’re not exactly living like sod busters. My theory is they bought the land for cheap. The mobile home is off a lot somewhere and it looks like everything in it is bought through e-commerce—Amazon, Walmart, Wayfair, etc. Maybe Barry had some cash and/or precious metals tucked away for a rainy day to make the initial setup and now their living off what Sally brings in from the diner.
I thought they were in Witness Protection, after Barry gave up the Chechens and Mexican gangs to the Feds. And don’t the Feds give those people money to survive, since they can’t really work without being exposed. I cannot believe they had Gene kill his son. So what did he do with the body? And where’s his Grandson? The manufactured home in the middle of nowhere is so surreal, at times I wasn’t sure if this was their actual reality or another of Barry’s fever dreams, like in previous seasons where he’s on the beach surrounded by people he killed.
There’s still plenty of sparsely populated land in the U.S., especially in the West. Eastern Washington is almost a lunar landscape and you can drive hundreds of miles in Montana without seeing another car. The high desert is also pretty isolated. So yes, there is no shortage of space in the middle of nowhere.Also, there are many people who live off-grid in remote areas and still enjoy modern conveniences. It’s actually pretty easy to get modern luxuries in whichever middle of nowhere you choose to pitch your tent.We only see the front of the house, so it’s possible electricity is connected on the back side. Or they could be off-grid and using solar and/or wind—again, mounted behind what we see of the house. Their Internet connection could be coming from a dish. Water would come from a well and sewer would be a septic tank. While Barry and Sally don’t seem to own a television, if their homestead is within 50 miles of a decent sized town they could get at least a couple of channels over the air.
Sorry, but if this was anyone’s project other than the beloved Hader, the usual commentariat here would be excoriating this show for going completely off the rails because its braintrust had not thought out at all how they wanted it to end. It’s an obviously flailing wrap-up because, while it was it was a fun premise, it had no overall plan or vision for follow-up. We’re seeing that now.
i think the reason we aren’t reacting that way is because we like it and think it’s good.
We’ll see about that. Shows that Lindeloff like this one is (wait til next week) tend to not have much rewatch value and their ‘legacies’ die on the vine post-hype. I’m looking forward to Hader’s next project *after* this experience.
well i’ll be honest and say ‘legacy’ and ‘rewatch value’ aren’t really factors that i base whether or not i like something on. i’m still really enjoying the show, full stop. it’s entirely possible i’ll hate the next few episodes, but even that won’t change the fact that i loved the majority of it.one thing we can all agree on – hader has the sauce and i can’t wait to see what he does next.
I’ve rewatched The Leftovers a couple times, I’d probably rewatch Watchmen if someone wanted to, and the only reason I haven’t rewatched Lost is because it’s too damn long. If you’re referring to Damon Lindelof (or that’s just a hilariously coincidental typo haha).
Lindelof deserves a severe ass-kicking for Lost. After protesting that they weren’t in limbo the whole time……..it turns out they were in limbo the whole time and the entire things wasn’t real. Worst final episode ever.
i mean i rewatched barry leading up to this season. i know his point is it might not work after this part of the series, but certainly the first 3 seasons have already proven to be rewatchable.
who gives a fuck about “rewatch value”?? it’s not a videogame
its braintrust had not thought out at all how they wanted it to end.I actually think it’s the opposite problem— they know how they want it to end; they’ve just stopped caring as much about the details of how they get there, and that can make the plausibility of the story beats suffer. For example, this episode— if Sally has a Google Alert set for any news about Barry, surely the two of them would’ve found out about the biopic before Gene got involved. (The way Gene talks about it elliptically— “If your boss is doing what I think he’s doing, he’s gonna want to talk to me”— suggests that maybe it’s not public knowledge that this project is in development, but that just raises the question of how Gene would’ve found out.)I think increasingly, to use a phrase a buddy of mine uses, the show is less concerned with being dramatic than being Prestigious. What made the show great in its first two seasons is that even when everything was getting extreme or out of this world, it was still plausible, and the show was driven by the actions and consequences, often arriving sooner than anyone expected. (Barry having to kill Chris and then Moss in season 1 is a great example of this.) Even when the show did something as bonkers as “ronny/lily,” it came from what had come before— Barry killing Moss lets Loach blackmail him; Barry’s refusal to just do the job (and somehow not notice all those trophies of Ronny’s) leads to this insane chase sequence of the “feral mongoose” of Lily. Now it feels like the show doesn’t It seems like the last two seasons, especially this season with Hader directing every episode and this episode in particular, the show has become more about showing off the acting and directing and less concerned with the details of the story. And it’s good, and those elements are good, but the show is great when that stuff is in service of the story instead of being the reason for the show existing. (I’ve often said that the Oscars awards Most Acting and Most Directing, instead of Best; I feel like Prestige TV often works the same way, being praised for the showier elements and the expensive production values instead of the story.) So the show that once told practically an entire season’s worth of plot in a twelve-minute epilogue at the end of season one (Moss finding out about Barry and their inevitable confrontation) has become a show that spends almost an entire episode on Acting and Directing before getting to one plot beat at the very end.
For example, this episode— if Sally has a Google Alert set for any news about Barry, surely the two of them would’ve found out about the biopic before Gene got involved. (The way Gene talks about it elliptically— “If your boss is doing what I think he’s doing, he’s gonna want to talk to me”— suggests that maybe it’s not public knowledge that this project is in development, but that just raises the question of how Gene would’ve found out.)Forgot to mention— does it even matter that Gene is involved? Does he know anything about their current life or location? I can’t see how he would.I guess I can see why Barry would think it would matter, but not necessarily more than the making of the film itself, and I shouldn’t have to guess. Glossing over details like that hurts the story. Now it feels like the show doesn’tWhoops, forgot what I was going to write there. Probably something like “Now it feels like the show doesn’t care about the details that keep its story plausible.”
Your points are well articulated, and I enjoyed reading them. I disagree with some of them, but especially your thoughts on Gene’s involvement not mattering and the failure of the show to provide those details hurting the narrative.Gene’s involvement in this clearly matters to Barry because he feels betrayed by his mentor. And the foundation for his wanting to kill Gene as soon as he sticks his nose back in was laid both by the phone call between the two from jail and when he was screaming at the reporter to keep out of his business. There are some rational reasons then and now why Barry would want Gene to keep his mouth shut, and I guess you could argue that his strong feelings before were only because the case against him was pending.But I think the show made it pretty clear that Barry feels (irrationally) completely betrayed, and that is what is fueling his anger. He might give Sally and himself a bunch of reasons why he needs to go get his former mentor, but it is always going to boil down to the pleading and then anger he displayed during those two scenes in prison.Barry’s decision making is not rational, but at least in the case of GC the show has let us know exactly why Barry is going to go after him IMO.
I thought about that, and I suppose it does follow, but it doesn’t feel as necessary as some of the other horrible things Barry has done, I suppose. Like I mentioned from season 1, Barry kills Chris and then Moss because his options are effectively “kill them or go to prison a long time for committing many, many homicides.” Here, Barry has other options— like simply not getting involved. I suppose I’d never call Barry rational, but I just feel like the storytelling is more powerful when it puts him in impossible dilemmas based on his prior decisions— he has to kill Chris because he refuses to kill Taylor, for example— rather than having him instigate something like this when he doesn’t have to.(Plus, as I said, it’s still strange to me that they wouldn’t be worried about the movie when news of it first being made would’ve come out; if that hasn’t become public knowledge, then how does Gene know about it?)What I love about Barry is when it puts its characters in impossible situations, when it delivers the consequences for its characters’ past actions much sooner than they’re ready for them, and when it draws out the reactions of “Holy fuck!” / “What happens now?!” from me, the viewer. It still does sometimes, but I don’t think it’s been as consistent in doing so or as consistent in its plotting the last two seasons. The early stretch of season 3, with Barry and Gene in their entirely untenable détente, was probably the best part of the season, for that reason— it’s another example of Barry trying to get out of killing someone and having it still blow up in his face before he expects or is ready for it.And as an aside, the storytelling has also split up the main cast more and more, and I think they’re so good together that the show suffers when it does that.
I agree with a whole lot of this, especially the last paragraph. One of the joys of this show was the main cast bouncing off each other, and we get much less of that now. I also enjoyed seasons 1-2 more than the last two, and that is partly because Barry made much more focused, rational decisions. There were some flights into the surreal on the show, but mostly Barry was making decisions based on what was necessary to keep himself free rather than going off the rails. And I think he was a more compelling character in that situation.My only point is that we are way beyond that Barry now. Ever since he stormed the monestary looking for Fuches, his decision making has been more and more erratic. The whole “I’m going to make it up to you” storyline with Gene was clearly insane, and now all his choices are completely off the rails and have been for some time.So, while I still think Barry the show is high quality and I look forward to the final episodes, I agree with you that the first two seasons were better. I don’t think Barry as a character is as compelling this way as he was. But I don’t think we can accuse the writers of cheating when it comes to Gene. Whether we agree with the direction the story has gone, they have been laying the foundation for Barry’s curdling hatred of Gene for quite some time.
Thanks, and I appreciate your comments; they’ve helped me fill in some things I’ve overlooked or gaps in my reasoning. I think I may be being a little too harsh on the show, because I think it’s still good, but it hasn’t been delivering as much on what makes it great the way it did those first two seasons, if that makes sense. Its baseline is always going to be a good show, but it was capable of rising to a level few other shows on TV were, and since those first two seasons it feels like it’s been doing that less and less. I also enjoyed seasons 1-2 more than the last two, and that is partly because Barry made much more focused, rational decisions. There were some flights into the surreal on the show, but mostly Barry was making decisions based on what was necessary to keep himself free rather than going off the rails. And I think he was a more compelling character in that situation.Yeah, I think this is spot on. I think it’s telling that, according to an interview I have a vague recollection of, Hader said they pretty much wrote the first two seasons by the seat of their pants, and they had a lot more time to plan out the third season. You’d think this would make the third season better, but I’ve found that, paradoxically, the opposite can be true: When you have to write by the seat of your pants, you often write to the next plot beat in the story that is necessary to happen. When you have time to plan out a whole season, you can engineer it to deliver a specific result at the end of it, but sometimes that means you don’t have enough material to get you there, so you have to take digressions and side paths that slacken the tension of your plot.(This reminds me of Breaking Bad season 3, which was my favorite season, and as far as I know the only one the writers hadn’t finished writing when they started filming. The big dramatic moments and conflicts often came much sooner than was expected because that was what was necessary for the story, rather than being parceled out so that the season could end on a specific moment. For contrast, my least favorite season of Better Call Saul was season four, and that one felt clearly to me like they wanted to end on the “S’all good, man” moment, even though they didn’t really have enough story to get there. So they filled out the season by basically stalling out Jimmy’s story and giving us a bunch of stuff with Gus building the superlab. But then, I was never that invested in the cartel side of the show, especially since we already knew exactly where Gus and Mike’s stories end. I said more than once that BCS increasingly felt split into two shows— Better Call Saul, the transformation of Jimmy McGill into Saul Goodman; and The Breaking Bad All-Stars: All your favorite criminals are back for more zany adventures! And I found the former much more compelling than the latter.)
On point analysis is made much more difficult when a show veers into the surreal as Barry now has. 🙂 I thought the time jump was going to be another dream, for example. Your posts helped me too, and I enjoyed reading them.
In interviews about this episode and the time jump, Bill Hader has said it’s more interesting to him to think about Barry and Sally’s life in the future, and Barry getting his dream of having a kid with Sally, than it would be to spend time on the details of how they escaped L.A., got set up with their new life, etc. Of course anyone would wonder about those details, but I guess that’s where his mind is. I may be completely naive about his choices being motivated by acclaim and awards, but when I’ve heard him talk about the show, it sounds like he’s just enjoying the creative process. Good question about how Gene would have found out about the biopic before Google did. Hader said we’ll find out more in the next episode about where Gene has been, so maybe we’ll see how he gets that information. My first thought about Barry saying he needs to kill Cousineau was that he didn’t want to be in the news again and have such an increased risk of being recognized by locals and then located by his enemies. If this were realistic, imagine all the true crime fans who would get to work finding them after the biopic came out! But you’re right, that would happen just bc of the movie, regardless of Cousineau’s involvement. Once Barry decided he didn’t want to be a hitman anymore, weren’t his hits only so he and Fuches wouldn’t be killed or caught? Unless this is coming from his anger, which we’ve seen but not very often. Again I’m thinking we’ll find out more in the next episode.
I don’t get your point at all. This show has never been much grounded in reality; and that’s what makes it good. Yes it has become much darker but it always had a surreal quality. This episode was incredible, it’s not about showing off or whatever; it tells an incredible story on its own.
“Reality” and “plausibility” aren’t the same thing. I never said “reality.” This episode was good for what it was, but what it was was a much more ordinary Prestige TV Product (and one that’s aping Better Call Saul’s ending, to boot) than what made the show special and great, IMO.Like I said, even the big decision at the end doesn’t totally make sense. Why does Gene being involved with the movie matter more than the fact that the movie is being made at all? And why do they think that Gene being involved somehow threatens their current lives, when there’s no indication he knows anything at all about where they are or who they’re pretending to be now?
Since it’s not over yet maybe we wait and see if Hader and Co stopped caring or maybe they actually know what they’re doing.
It’s always weird seeing complaints that the show isn’t “fun” or “charming” anymore, when it’s been pretty bleak since the middle of season 1.
It does feel like past seasons had more gags sprinkled in, though.Part of it, maybe is that NoHo Hank used to be comic relief and no longer is. I still chuckle thinking about that random aside where the two women are breaking up and the one is like “you have too many dogs!” and the other is confused “Who? Me?!” I don’t know why but that kills me.
“You have too many dogs!” is a perfect button on that scene. It’s funny watching Gene in the background getting chased by a preposterous number of dogs… then it explodes when we get it bluntly that, yes, he is not the only one in the scene thinking this is a preposterous number of dogs.
They re-wrote season three because they came up with an ending between writing and filming it.
It’s practically a prestige TV trope where you follow a criminal in a fun show that glorifies and justifies their acts, but once you’re hooked in, the writer’s start to explore the darker realities of these situations. Breaking Bad was practically a wish-fulfillment show in its first season, where it made you feel like making meth would solve all your problems and turn you into a badass. But Barry’s appeal is that it’s a prestige crime show AND a sitcom. And it has neglected the latter part of the show. As far as the story is concerned, this seems like the natural progression. Its what Dexter, the show avoided for years but eventually relented: being found out by others, getting caught and running away from the society. But, the comedy and the balance it struck with the dark crime drama aspects of the show, is what made Barry great.
Honestly, this reminds be of the penultimate Breaking Bad; he’s made it out. He’s won. Barry’s got Sally and they’ve escaped, they have their happily ever after. Barry even thinks he’s changed; he’s got religion; why, he’s just like Lincoln! And yet, they’re clearly *miserable*.
We get that ending, we see what it would be like, and it’s also rejected as insufficient. This isn’t dithering, it’s committing to a much more kinetic ending. A Hollywood ending— and being Barry, it’s inevitably Hollywood that sucks him back in.
The really interesting bit is doing this mid-season, with three episodes to follow.
Currently, in the real world, @Tyler on Twitter is Tyler Winklevoss. Who knows what will happen in 8 years, though. Made me chuckle.
Damn. First Facebook, and now he even gets Winklevossed out his Twitter handle.
I can envision the writer saying, “Okay, I’m gonna do a Twitter thing here… hm, I need to come up with an account name. I wonder who has @tyler? *checks* Winklevoss? Heh, fuck him.”
“…And Barry escaped prison, and found Sally, and she took him back, and they went under the grid, and had a baby, and lived happily ever after.”- Me, pre-season 4“Don’t worry, bruh. I got you.”- HBO
“Barry’s dad (played by Gloria)“
Who is Gloria?
“Take that, Gloria!”
Ah, always love a good Franklin Sherman reference.
Maybe “She invites him into the bathroom to give him a taste of the math he so proudly bragged bout.”
John Gloria, the actor who played Barry’s dad in episode two. Sorry for the confusion!
She invites him into the bathroom to give him a taste of the math he so
proudly bragged about, choking him too aggressively until he rips her
wig off.
I think you’re reading this whole interaction as more sexual than I took it as being. I don’t think Sally wanted Bevel to follow her back there and was legitimately toying with killing him for doing so and then whipping it out.
It was definitely subtle, but Sally goads him with the “bad boy god” line, feeds into his ego by claiming his junk is “impressive,” and then strokes his shoulder as she’s leaving for the bathroom.She wanted to give off enough of a sexy vibe for him to follow her, but it was all a vicious act to fuck with him as filtered through her depressive haze.
She left the door open and wasn’t in the least surprised to see him. You’re right that it wasn’t sexual. It was anger. Sally is explosive.
Don’t forget the caressing of his shoulder as she passed him. My lord people, she goaded him. Did we need to see her pull out a handkerchief and put it dangling in her back pocket to get the point?
she wanted him to follow her and she wanted to exert some violence toward him (and probably wouldn’t have mind killing him).
Wait. Not a word about Barry’s apparent conversion to, or at least aping of, evangelical Protestantism? The prairie skies sang the praises of Heaven
“Barry’s dad (played by Gloria)
And “Gloria” is who exactly?
Wow — absolutely everything is tainted with Barry’s past no matter what he tries. Following his dreams, finding a father figure, having a family with Sally, catching up with friends. Everyone around him suffers while he frantically tries to hold things together. So relatable on one level, and so distant and unimaginably terrible on another.I thought I was going to hate the time jump, but I think it works. No matter what part of Barry’s desires he tries to follow up on, it all ends up as shit. And we needed to see that being incognito with Sally was never going to work.
Really disliked this on the whole time jump cliche stinks . As for a last scene in a series its fine but never liked them in a show .Really fucking up that kid .It makes little sense he wouldn’t have cameras around the house
…
Barry more like Middy (this show is bad)
Barry/Clark doesn’t have enough money for his son’s blanket, but had boxes of purchases all over the living room. The kid couldn’t get through his frozen dinner. They are torturing that little boy.
Jesus Christ!!!! Those videos!!!! What the fuck is going to happen to YouTube in 8 years!?
Barry is predicting a retro comeback for Youtube, gloriously recreating their early days.
If it’s got what amount to snuff videos on it, I’m going to guess that Elon Musk buys it at some point.
The Sally wig stuff really annoyed me. It’s not hard to spot a wig especially if you see someone every day. Meanwhile, few adults are truly blonde and it’s likely that the actress dyes her hair to begin with. Anyone on the run and concerned about being recognized would color their hair rather than wear a wig 24×7. And I also wonder about that kid – is he really theirs, or did they have to kill some people between LA and that house and ended up taking the kid in???
That’s a good point, but I personally think Sally chooses to wear the wig. Like she’s trying to recapture the life that she feels she was robbed of.
You should have added the Hollywood report writeups as well, which – in a perfectly-timed comment on the stakes of the writer’s strike – announce the first fully-AI made film!
small detail on the webpage at then end “remember the amazon: a documentary”
Did Sally actually take money from the cash register? I thought she was just cashing out, taking tips, etc.? Yes/No?
Stealing, for sure, judging from her physicality.
I just watched this today because I get HBO through Prime and for some reason it dropped late. I just wanted to say: I have been watching pretty tense, violent dramas for a long time. Deadwood is my favorite show of all time. My wife and I would gather to watch Sopranos every Sunday. Breaking Bad was filmed in my home town, so we had to watch it religiously etc. etc.This is one of the bleakest half hours of television I have ever sat through. The utter despair radiating from Sally was hard to take. Neither of them really deserve good lives, but it was still hard to watch especially with a kid involved. This show is so well done, but it is not exactly a joyride. Much like last week: I acknowledge the quality, but you will probably not see me watching that episode ever again.
Do you think their kid goes to school, is being home schooled, or is having his education completely neglected? I got a distinct sense that the kid has absolutely no life outside of the house and whatever time he spends with the neighbor.
He’s definitely being home schooled, when Sally as calling Barry he talked about his plans for teaching him (if I recall, he wanted to get into long division). The problem is he definitely isn’t being home schooled well. Ever since hearing Bill Hader say on one of the Ringer podcasts that Barry is just a really dumb guy with poor impulse control, I’ve viewed all of his actions significantly differently. Another thing to add to the pile of child neglect.
I’m surprised no one has said anything about Clark Kent yet.
A lot of influences here, but I feel a sense of the Superman comic “For the Man Who Has Everything” in this. Barry, who is now Clark and has a faint spit curl-type thing in his hair, has gotten everything he wanted and it’s terrible, just as Superman’s Black Mercy vision of a Krypton that didn’t blow up turns out to actually be pretty terrible, with Kal a husband and father but in a world that’s depressingly coming apart at the seams societally.
Wow, do I feel stupid about how long it took me to realize… to create a new heroic identity, Barry puts on a pair of glasses and calls himself “Clark.” It seems so painfully obvious, but how many people noticed that?
I sincerely doubt it means anything, but the flat-as-fuck flyover country vibes, combined with those names . . . Clark and John are the names of Superman and his son, from Smallville, Kansas. With Barry playing a funhouse mirror of the all-American life, I wonder if that was intentional at all.
Y’all are Stockholm Syndromed by this show. This episode was really bad, and really boring. Time jumps are often viewed as big creative swings, but I think they’re almost exclusively lazy writing. Hader as a main creative force (ie writer and director) is very, very interesting but in need of an editor. Season 3 was characterized by a ton of disjointedness, with high highs, low lows, and questionable character/plot choices, and Season 4, though it started strong, has fallen into those same tendencies.
I hear you, and this episode may have been less than stellar, but it’s close to the end and I’m willing to bet it will fit once you can watch it all. Sopranos had its “Pine Barrens,” Breaking Bad had its “Fly,” and now Barry has its “Tricky Legacies.”
Love “Barry”, but not this episode. It just sucked the momentum out of it as we were hurdling towards the finish. It looked and played like one of his earlier fever dreams that overstayed its welcome – then it turned out to projected reality. Just didn’t enjoy that much with so few episodes remaining. One of the only misfires I feel they’ve made during the entire run.
While I have faith in the eventual destination, taking the journey of this episode lost me a bit. I can live with the time jump, and the starkness of focusing on Barry and Sally pretending to be other people in the middle of nowhere, but I’m having a hard time witnessing how bad both of them are as parents.I see David Lynch and the Coen Brothers mentioned as influences, but if you consider John the protagonist here, this episode had a very strong The Truman Show vibe. This is John’s story of being a real boy, surrounded by actors playing the role of his parents. It was interesting to see Sally with her hair concealed at the end of the previous episode; as in Down with Love, that usually means a hair color change is being kept under wraps. If she were truly method, she would have dyed her hair. But no, she is still blonde, literally wearing a wig to portray Emily, and retaining her Sally-ness in private. Emily has two jobs as a working mother, and Sally doesn’t seem to be into either one of them.
Barry-as-Clark is harder to figure. One of the best/darkest laughs of the episode, if you look closely, is his YouTube search query: “Little League deaths”. It’s the direct approach, so very Barry. You would think that he would be living the domestic existence as he’s fantasized, but he’s bad at it because the fantasy is about broad strokes, while real fatherhood is about the details. It would be easy for most of us to order a comforter, or provide a warm(ed) meal. But just as Sally is detached as a mother, all Barry can offer John is coldness.When we see Bevel leaning on his car, the license plate is not entirely legible, but the state is two words, probably South Dakota. I can’t say for sure that it is South Dakota, and it doesn’t look like a real South Dakota plate, but it would be amusing to see Barry-as-Clark do an Abraham Lincoln deep dive without actually visiting Mount Rushmore.