"I can't believe how fast they rebuilt it."
Chuck Versus The Anniversary is the first episode of Chuck's fourth season.
The CIA gains control over the Buy More, Chuck and Morgan go in search of Chuck's long-lost mother, and Casey and Sarah hunt a Russian operative to investigate the mysterious Volkoff Industries.
This episode provides examples of:
- Actor Allusion
- Harry Dean Stanton plays the role of a Repo Man who goes after Chuck and Morgan to confiscate their car since they're deep in debt.
- Dolph Lundgren as Marco drops several of his lines as Ivan Drago from Rocky IV.
Marco: [preparing to torture Casey and Sarah] I must break you. - Aloof Dark-Haired Girl: Greta is a brunette secret agent with an aloof and cold personality, to the point the only emotion she shows is vague disdain for Morgan's flirting.
- Arms Dealer: Volkoff Industries, a Russian arms dealer company that Sarah and Casey are investigating and build the handheld EMP they're after.
- Badass Boast: Chuck gets a beauty over the walkie.Chuck: Clearly you have no idea who I am, because you only sent ten men to take care of me.
- Badass in Distress: Sarah and Casey are kidnapped and held hostage by Marco and his men, and need Chuck's help to be rescued.
- Battle Discretion Shot: Played With. Sarah and Casey discover (through the villain's walkie-talkie) that Chuck and Morgan are surrounded by ten enemy guards, armed with weapons. Gunfire and screaming commences, but we only hear it through the walkie-talkie as we focus on Sarah and Casey's expressions. While they believe that Chuck is dead, we then hear Chuck talking through the Walkie-Talkie, and see all ten guards strewn about all over the place.Morgan: You were limber!
- Chair Reveal: Done to reveal General Beckman, or "Diane," as her Buy More name tag would suggest, in the manager's chair, revealing how the new Buy More is now an asset to the CIA.
- Covert Group with Mundane Front: The Buy More has rebuilt and entirely taken over by the CIA and is a full-fledged CIA-NSA secret base, complete with an Elaborate Underground Base.
- EMP: Sarah and Casey retrieve a powerful handheld EMP device, created by Volkoff Industries. note
- Fake Kill Scare: A variant appears in "Chuck Versus the Anniversary": Sarah and Casey have been captured, and Chuck and Morgan are surrounded as they attempt to save them. Sarah begs for them to be let go over the radio, and Marco orders his men to kill them. Gunshots and a scream are heard.... and then Chuck's voice is heard.
- Feet-First Introduction: Greta has introduced with a slow pan up her rather nice stems.
- Giant Mook: Marco is a gigantic Russian henchman that works for Volkoff Industries.
- Handy Feet: After being captured and tied to a chair, Sarah manages to untie her feet and tries typing in her cell using her toes, asking Chuck for help. But her brief messages are misinterpreted by Morgan (who has Chuck's phone) as Sarah is sexting.
- Have You Told Anyone Else?: Mary asks Marco whether or not he told Volkoff about Chuck searching for her. He's predictably killed when he answer that he didn't yet.
- I Have a Family: A rare villain example of this. When Chuck's mom, Mary, is motivated into killing the men with her and escaping, Marco tries this exact line on her. She simply replies, "So do I" and shoots him.
- Head-Turning Beauty: Both Chuck and Morgan are very taken by Greta when they see her for the first time.
- If You Ever Do Anything to Hurt Her...: Chuck tells this Marco when he learns he has Sarah as a hostage.
- Knockout Gas: Marco kidnaps Sarah and Casey by flooding the room with knockout gas.
- Mistaken for Badass: When Chuck and Morgan's search for Chuck's mom has led them extremely close to Volkoff Industries, the Arms Dealers that Sarah and Casey have been tracking on their own. The Volkoff agent Marco assumes that their use of public transportation and tourist disguises were effective ploys to avoid being tracked, and believes them to be super-spies even better than Sarah and Casey, who he had just kidnapped with plans to torture them for information on the former two. In truth... their cheap car got repossessed hence the public transit, and that's actually how they dress when going to different countries.
- Ms. Fanservice: The very first shot of Greta (Olivia Munn) is a very slow pan up as she does a Supermodel Strut (in slow-mo) towards Chuck and Morgan upon their entering the Buy More.
- Noodle Incident: Chuck and Morgan keep alluding to a certain incident they had in Tangiers.
- Shout-Out: One of Chuck's job interviews is at Vandalay Industries.
- Supermodel Strut: As is tradition, Greta's introduction at the Buy More shows her doing an assertive hip-swaying strut, complete with slow-mo, bombastic music, and Male Gaze gaze shots of her body.
- Terrible Interviewees Montage: Chuck's search for a job goes like this. Inverted in that it is the interviewers who are bad, but only because of CIA sabotage, since Beckett wants Chuck as a spy.
- This Is Reality: At the episode's opening, while discussing their secret mission, Chuck tells Morgan that this is not the opening to a TV show.
- True Companions: Morgan, Sarah and Casey show a complete lack of hesitation when Chuck asks if they'll help him find his mother. Casey even says he's only annoyed Chuck didn't ask sooner.
- Villain of the Week: Marco, who's under the employ of Volkoff Industries, to smuggle a powerful EMP device until he was thwarted by Chuck and his crew.
- Wham Line: Chuck attempts to tell Ellie that he has rejoined the CIA as a spy and is searching for their mother, but she interrupts him by revealing she is pregnant, making him postpone his own reveal so not to ruin the moment.
- Working the Same Case: This episode features two plotlines: Chuck and Morgan searching for Chuck's mother, and Casey and Sarah investigating an Arms Dealer, which leads them both to the same place.
