One two-episode story arc involved Archer getting breast cancer. Men getting breast cancer does happen.
Pam's bamboo repeating crossbow in Comparative Wickedness is based on a real weapon used by Sun Tzu of all people. Historically, it is believed to be one of the first semi-automatic weapons, although Sun Tzu's version had a lever instead of a traditional trigger.
Arc Fatigue: This is ultimately what spelled the doom of the Myth Arc of the identity of Archer's father. Way back in Episode 6 of Season 1, Nikolai Jakov (head of the KGB) is established as Archer's father, but then the finale backtracks on this and has him as only one possible candidate of three. Then in part one of Season 2's two-part finale, Archer flies to Russia to get a DNA test with Jakov, but Boris ruins the test, so we still don't know if it's Jakov. Then in Season 3, Malory brings up a completely different guy to any of the other candidates that she believes might be the father. And then (still in the same season) Jakov gets killed off by Barry in a way that leaves no DNA behind, so if Jakov was the father, Archer and the audience would never know. Then in Season 4, when Archer is bitten by a cobra, he flashes back to a memory of meeting his real father when he was a kid, only to forget who it was immediately, and since we never saw his face, we don't who it was either (the only clue is that it doesn't seem to be any of the pervious candidates, and that is if the memory was even real). After three and a half seasons and five candidates, you will probably be more annoyed than you ever were intrigued. This is what lead series creator Adam Reed to abandon the arc as he felt that the fans no longer cared to find out the answer. After the Season 4 episode, the question is never brought up again until the very last episode. However, Archer by that point no longer cares who his father is.
In "Legs", Archer survives being trapped inside a vent for over two days with the furnace blaring the entire time and without food or water, somehow. Even if the heatstroke didn't kill him (which it would have), he definitely would have died of dehydration.
Archer's Made of Iron tendency strikes again in the Season 7 finale. Considering Archer was shot and left bleeding out facedown in a pool for what was probably hours, it's amazing Archer even survived to slip into a coma.
Despite still having been blacklisted by the CIA when Archer went into his coma, the show chooses not to explain how they are back to doing spy work as an independent agency.
Audience-Alienating Era : Seasons 5-10 feature a premise change every season, forgoing the original office comedy and spy agency setting for gimmicky storylines. It gets worse for the dream seasons, since they only have eight episodes, need to spend about three episodes introducing the new plot, settings and characters, and are ultimately done away with entirely by the next season, making it hard for fans to get attached to the new changes. Season 11 goes back to the original setting.
Awesome Ego: Archer. He's a smug, idiotic, alcoholic, narcissistic ass who is totally in love with himself. But just happens to be able to kick enough ass and screw enough chicks to back it up.
It's safe to say that every song that Cherlene sings is pure, unadulterated awesome.
Cherlene's singing is actually voiced by Jessy Lynn Martens, who was (expertly) chosen for her vocal similarity to Judy Greer.
"OUTLAW COUNTRY!"
The Dreamlandversion of the main theme in more of a jazz style.
The Danger Islandversion of the main theme is tiki-style awesomeness.
The Season 11 opener plays "You've Got Another Thing Coming" by Judas Priest over a mission.
Badass Decay: Invoked with Cyril in Season 11. In the three years Archer was in a coma, Cyril improved as a field agent so much that he is considered the world's greatest spy, or at least enough to be targeted for assassination. By the end of the season, however, Cyril has regressed to the point that he can barely look at a dead body and he's back to firing his gun with his eyes closed.
Cyril. To fans, he's either a lovable and sympathetic character who easily fits with the rest of the cast as an intelligent straight man when needed or an insufferably inept and spineless whiner. While he can be both, it's his supposed flaws that make him quite polarizing among fans.
Barry. Either he's a witty and intelligent villain who's justified in his hate for Archer, a fun bad guy we Love to Hate, or just an annoying drag on an episode. Katya post Face–Heel Turn gets a bit of flak for the latter, too.
Slater. The characters in-show can certainly agree that he's an insufferable prick. As for the fans, they either Love to Hate him or they just plain hate him for stealing Mallory's role as Mission Control, resulting in Mallory being Demoted to Extra for the entirety of Season 6.
Pam in Season 5. While some fans didn't mind Pam's thinner appearance, her increased Character Focus and found the cocaine jokes hilarious, other fans felt that her humor was unfunny and jokes about her cocaine addiction got old really fast. In Season 6, Pam returned to her original, pre-cocaine personality.
Archer actually lampshaded this in "Southbound and Down", saying that everybody liked Pam more (or, at least, hated her less) before she got addicted to cocaine. Perhaps even the creators were aware of this problem.
Better on DVD: The Running Gag and Call-Back quotient gets higher and higher the longer the show goes on, so you're going to miss a lot of jokes if you don't watch them in order.
Broken Base: Most fans agree that Barry became a Knight of Cerebus in the Season 2 finale. Whether this was the right idea is debatable-either he became a great Love to Hate character and recurring villain, or he just made the show uncomfortably dark and serious.
While Dreamland ends with the identity of Woodhouse's killer revealed, it doesn't really do much in the grand scheme of things: Archer is still in a coma and with no signs of getting better or waking up, which is a jarring contrast to the several Cliffhanger endings of the previous seasons, since it not only gives no clue as to how the next season will go down, it barely even solves the problem that started in that one adding nothing to the Myth Arc outside of the death of Woodhouse. And since everything is just a coma-induced dream, none of these events are even relevant in the following season.
All pretenses of investigating who Archer's father is were seemingly dropped back in Season 3, with the last mention to it being a repressed memory flashback in "Once Bitten" of Archer being visited by his father in his fifth birthday, which doesn't reveal his identity neither to Archer nor the audience (and which may or may not even be a real memory). After that, Malory is uninterested in telling the father nor is Archer interested in finding out or both have seemingly forgotten this was an issue.
Dreamland: "Dutch" Dylan is a psychopathic enforcer to gangster Len Trexler. Having killed Archer's partner just to watch him die, Dutch enjoys performing hits and dissolves his victims' bodies in acid to sate his blood thirst. After being crippled and having his limbs replaced with mechanical ones, Dutch takes vengeance upon Trexler for the surgery by killing all of his underlings to pose their corpses in a grisly parody of The Last Supper, and later tries to murder Archer and all of his allies to avenge his injury.
1999: Barry-6 is an upbeat and sociopathic robot, slaver, and pirate, leading the Dri'n in terrorizing the galaxy while casually murdering or sacrificing his men. Raiding transport ships and either killing or selling the occupants into slavery, Barry-6's forces also try to commit genocide against the endangered Grimalkian race in their attempt to skin them alive for their fur coats. Holding a particular grudge against Archer for sleeping with his fiancée years ago, Barry-6 sells his friends into lethal Gladiator Games where they are forced to fight to the death, tortures Archer with electricity, and endangers his entire team with destruction to force him into a final duel to the death.
Crazy Is Cool: Cheryl, the filthy rich pyromaniac secretary who spouts non sequiturs at any given moment, eats glue and rubber cement, and somehow becomes a successful country singer despite her insanity. She becomes a successful country singer due to her belief in herself (and the placebo effect of thinking she has a chip implanted in her brain).
Creator's Pet: A non character example: the season past Season 4. The creator actually likes changing the premise every season and doesn't seem to wish for them to end, despite some fans considering that, since then, the show has entered its Audience-Alienating Era.
Critical Dissonance: Archer Vice received critical acclaim, but the fanbase has a much more divisive reaction to it.
Crosses the Line Twice: Malory's entire character. She's openly abusive to her son and granddaughter, she had an affair with the head of the KGB, drinks like a fish, had a very inappropriate relationship with her dog, and uses ISIS as her own personal servants. In Season 6, where she thinks AJ (an infant) is too fat and hopes she learns about cigarettes soon.
Designated Hero: Invoked. Discounting the year they spent as drug dealers, The Agency is more or less on the side of good. However, that doesn't stop them from being selfish, greedy, petty, crazy, or just plain stupid. Even the nicer ones like Pam and Ray have bad moments.
That being said, Lana Kane is a bit more of a typical example. The show often tries to have Lana take the high ground, but between a list of Jerkass actions and her often coming across as unsympathetic (especially against Archer), it's sometimes difficult to take her seriously as the Token Good Teammate.
Diagnosed by the Audience: Numerous hints throughout the series suggest that Archer has some form of autism: he is often the only character to count bullets during gun fights, including multiple automatic weapons; this coupled with his ability to identify the make and model of firearms allows him to ascertain when enemies are reloading. He is able to identify the make and model of a blender in Fugue and Riffs just by hearing the sound it makes through the phone, and he has an unusual affinity for animals and is able to 'converse' with Babou and Kazak. Archer also shows an inability to pick up on social clues and a lack of empathy on the cognitive level, rather than being void of it entirely, eats baby aspirin, and seems to be unable to dress himself without help from Woodhouse. Another characteristic is his voice, which stays very monotone and changes only in response to strong emotions, particularly rage. The possibility of Archer being on the autism spectrum is directly addressed in the episode Coyote Lovely; when asked if he is autistic, Archer first mocks Lana for suggesting it, but after identifying Border Patrol's Ruger 6s and realising they were out (after being shot in the back) he remarks, "Holy shit, maybe I am autistic?" before collapsing.
Barry Dylan gets about a thousand times cooler after turning evil. Especially after the revelation that after being shot twice, buried at the bottom of a barn which was then set on fire, and then hit by a car, he's still alive and conscious.
Krieger, from performing successful brain surgery while high on acid, to disposing of a dead body with minimal traces in "Lo Scandalo".
Mallory Archer. Further reinforced by the way she regains ISIS in "Arrival/Departure": she first tries to bribe the CIA operative with a painting worth $40 million and a canister of nerve gas, both "confiscated" from the island, noting that taking these to his handlers would probably earn him a promotion. When that doesn't work, she simply threatens to throw the operative out of the plane and take the offer to his partner.
Fan-Preferred Couple: Archer/Lana and Pam/Cheryl were this for much of the series' run, but now Archer/Pam seems to be the strongest example of this trope for this show due to their strong chemistry, Archer admitting that Pam is his best friend, and Archer and Lana's relationship being extremely dysfunctional and unhealthy even at its best.
Fetish Retardant: Cyborg Katya. Archer learned the hard way that her genitals are detachable. Krieger also mentioned that her skin was made from dead hobos and the sight of robot parts peeking out from her wounds after fighting Barry are all gruesome reminders of how little of the original Katya remains.
Franchise Original Sin: Archer and Lana's status as Unintentionally Sympathetic and Unintentionally Unsympathetic respectively. A lot of the humor in the early seasons relied heavily on Archer's being the the king of a World of Jerkass, making it easier to laugh at his antics and when he suffers for them (especially Lana's revenge on him for being a terrible boyfriend and work colleague). Unfortunately, the writers kept introducing various Freudian Excuses for him, ostensibly to explain why he acted as he did, but they worked too well and gave him plenty of opportunities to demonstrate Character Development and Jerk with a Heart of Gold. The climax of which involved performing an extremely noble Heroic Sacrifice for Lana with no ulterior motive. So by the time the show entered its Archer Vice age, the audience was more-or-less firmly on his side, and all of the suffering he went through stopped being funny, and Lana's flaws became too big to ignore. There was just nowhere left for either character to go, leaving the writers no choice but to contrive reasons for Archer and Lana to backslide into the old status quo, though thoroughly less entertaining now.
Every episode is littered with really obscure literary and cultural references; for example, Pam has "The Destruction of Sennacherib" by Lord Byron tattooed on her back. This is a trademark of Adam Reed shows, since Frisky Dingo and Sealab 2021 are similarly littered.
Most of the offhand references to spy lore are actually historically accurate.
In the World War I flashback in "Double Deuce", Reggie is shot by a German sniper after Woodhouse wastes three matches lighting his cigarette during night time in No Man's Land. This is a reference to a superstition that lighting three matches in a row is unlucky that supposedly got its start in WWI because it allowed enemy snipers to spot, aim at and finally fire at each of the lights, much like the sniper does in the episode.
In "The Archer Sanction" Archer assumes that Crash McCaren is an assassin because his last name is Irish along with some other flimsy logic. Crash corrects him that his name is Scots-Irish. It is a nitpick, but they are technically distinct groups.
Lana's (knockoff) "Fiocchi" underwear is actually a Shout-Out to Fiocchi Munizioni, an ammunition manufacturing company that produces ammunition for, among others, Lana's signature TEC-9 handguns.
In "Skytanic", Malory refers to a bartender as "Judge Crater" when she notices he's abandoned his post. Judge Joseph Crater disappeared after he stepped out of a restaurant in Manhattan in 1930 and became the "Missingest Man in New York".
In at least one scene, an ISIS agent makes a "10^100 search" on a computer. Ten to the hundredth power is a googol, the intended namesake of Google.
In "Robot Factory," Cheryl tells the story of how her "horse butler" went crazy, set fire to the house and murdered her family with a hatchet as they ran outside. This is based on the massacre that occurred at Frank Lloyd Wright's estate Taliesin, in which seven people were killed by a servant in the same manner.
In Archer's book, How to Archer..., and a video Q&A, Archer explains his choice of a Walther PPK in .32 ACP, claiming "if whatever you're shooting doesn't die after pumping eight .32 caliber slugs into it, it's probably a dragon." In Dr. No, wherein Bond is ordered to switch to a PPK, Bond writes a snarky letter to M criticizing the effectiveness of the PPK against Dr. No's "dragon" (a flamethrower tank).
The "space ocelots" in Archer: 1999 are officially called grimalkians, and are cat-like aliens with pseudo-mystical powers and, when Archer sees them use these powers to save him and the others, he's terrified and calls them demons. "Grimalkin" is an archaic term for cats and, particularly, is associated with cats as witches' familiars.
Dr Sklodowska (pronounced skwo-DOV-ska) from Season 6's "Drastic Voyage" is actually named after Marie Curie, whose maiden name was Skłodowska (pronounced the same way).
Mallory: That was the mayor of Paris, who was just as eager as I am to know why ISIS agents were terrorizing Paris!
This exchange from "Skytanic", before the real-world terrorist group ISIS became popular:
Archer: God, who would want to put a bomb on that?
Captain Lammers: Well, that's what we're hoping ISIS can find out.
In the Season 2 episode "Movie Star", Rona Thorne loses control of an automatic weapon at the firing range and accidentally shoots Brett. A few years later, an instructor at a Nevada gun range was shot to death under similar circumstances.
This line by Archer in Season 6, after it's revealed in Season 8 Woodhouse died offscreen: "Unless you came home you little scamp. Woodhouse?! Woodhouse! Seriously I hope he didn't die." Also when Mallory tells Archer he won't have Woodhouse to kick around forever.
He's Just Hiding: Nikolai Jakov, whom the creator has confirmed multiple times as being dead, is still theorised to have survived somehow, or been revived as a cyborg.
During the Season 1 finale, Archer has a microchip implanted into his brain that causes Archer to dive into homicidal rages when in the proximity of ringing cellphones. Four years later, enter Kingsman: The Secret Service, a spy film where the Big Bad plots to send a large portion of humanity into homicidal rages using certain frequencies sent out by cell phone microchips. Three years later, the sequel has a trailer where Archer crosses paths with the protagonist, Eggsy.
In "Double Trouble", the Season 2 finale, Ray reveals he is a defrocked priest but can still legally administer weddings, but ironically can't get married himself. A few months after it aired, New York legalized same-sex marriage.
While it was already funny, the lyrics to Archer's 'Mulatto Butts' ringtone ("black ass momma, white ass daddy") take on a whole new meaning once it's revealed Archer is the father of Lana's baby girl.
Archer's insistence on wearing a turtleneck sweater on missions became a bit funnier when James Bond was shown wearing one for Spectre.
Boris hitting on Katya after she takes over the KGB in "Viscous Coupling" is even funnier when Barry reveals they're a couple in "Edie's Wedding".'
One of the kidnappers in El Secuestro describes Pam's face as "rock-like". In Archer 1999 Pam's entire body is rock-like.
Mallory serves the role M does in James Bond. As of Skyfall, M's real name is Mallory, too.
Ho Yay: "Honeypot," "Double Deuce", the very end of "Bloody Ferlin", and "The Wind Cries Mary" are drenched in it.
Archer, and considering the childhood he had, it's clear he has a hell of a Freudian Excuse. He was essentially abandoned by his jet-setting spy of a mother and consigned to 12 straight years of boarding school. Flashbacks to his childhood are always to traumatic experiences of loneliness and neglect. Even in his adult life, he's suffered some horrible physical ailments and lost several people close to him.
Cyril who can be arrogant, neurotic and a whiny coward. Like Archer, he's the product of poor parenting and low self-confidence.
Jerks Are Worse Than Villains: The episode Edie's Wedding parodies this when insane cyborg Barry Dylan, who is in the process of murdering the title character, expresses disgust at Edie for her cruel behavior to her sister Pam.
Magnificent Bastard: "Robot Factory" & "Best Friends": Aleister is an assassin hired to kill the ISIS agent Cyril Figgis. To get close to his target, Aleister exploits a job opening to be Sterling Archer's valet, using his skills and charms to win over everyone in ISIS and get hired. Aleister discreetly plants traps for Cyril and later tries shooting Cyril while he's at the haberdashery before subduing and binding Sterling to bait Cyril. Successfully luring Cyril to his trap, Aleister only fails to kill Cyril due to battling with Sterling, where Sterling declares Aleister to be the best valet he ever had before killing him.
"Double Trouble" marks Barry's crossing from good to evil when, after being revived as a cyborg, his attempted murder of Archer results in the death of Archer's fiancee Katya. Not only does he not show remorse, he actually boasts about it to rub it in to Archer immediately afterwards.
Googling "earballs" brings up an Urban Dictionary entry claiming that Cheryl popularized the word; however, Dr. Timothy Leary used to say it when he was still alive.
The "Black Mexican" cocktail Archer creates in "Sitting" — tequila mixed with Kahlua — is actually called a Brave Bull and dates to the 1950s. It's apparently quite tasty. Adding cream or milk makes it a Colorado Bulldog, not a "White Mexican".
In Season 1, while Archer seems to be under the impression that Lana is still in love with him despite them having broken up, Lana hates Archer enough to shoot him in the foot twice and waiting until Malory OKed it to remove a knife from Archer's back.
Season 2 has the pair warm up to each other somewhat. They also almostnote Its confirmed much later that they never quite got far enough to actually sleep with each other have sex when Archer is diagnosed with cancer. However, Archer ends up finding his true love Katya only for her to be killed by Barry in the following episode.
Season 4 has Archer and Lana closer together than ever, with Lana even kinda considering getting back together with him in "Viscous Coupling" before he abruptly ends the conversation after getting a call from Katya. In "Sea Tunt, Part II", they have some actually civil, if not outright caring, interactions after Lana reveals that she is pregnant, and Archer agrees to give her the underwater breathing equipment in his place. And as he drowns, his last words are "Lana! I... love... you..."
Season 5 gets heavier still as the Ship Tease is near-constant throughout the season, especially considering he's the only one who's shown concern regarding her pregnancy, culminating in the season finale where it's revealed that Lana's sperm donor is Sterling. She decided to use his sperm (without his knowledge) as she realized, over the years, that she really loved him.
Season 6 maintains their frosty relationship until Pocket Listing, where they finally deal with all of their Unresolved Sexual Tension, and the following episode features them being straight up Make-Out Kids. By the end of the season, they settle into being committed to one another despite still driving one another crazy.
And then Season 7 happens; Archer spends the entire season chasing after Veronica Deane, eventually driving Lana to declare them "on a break" by the end of the season.
Seasons 8 and 9, being set entirely within Archers coma dreams, effectively boot his relationship with Lana right back to the beginning at the start of each season. Archer is nevertheless besotted with Dream!Lana on sight, but they simply do not interact very much during the seasons. During Season 9 Dream!Lana even spends more time having sex with Dream!Cyril than she does talking to Archer - not that this stops Archer from claiming he was "...This close!" to banging her.
Season 10, despite still being a coma dream, puts an interesting spin on things by having Archer and Lana be divorced co-owners of the ship the season is set aboard. It's somewhat telling that, when under the influence of inhibition-removing alien eggs, all they want to do is have sex with each other. Although keep in mind that this is all happening in Arher's head...
Season 11, finally returning to reality, puts this relationship into an awkward position; Archer has awakened from his coma dreams certain that he is in love with Lana, but finds that she has married the considerably older billionaire Robert (a mere 8 months after Archer was shot) and she subsequently shoots down his every attempt at reconciling hard. But Lana's relationship isn't as stable as it could be; age gap aside, there are quite a few arguments between her and Robert - who is quite the Nice Guy, if a bit smug and not as open about his past as he perhaps should be, which clashes with the Hot-Blooded Lana. Furthermore, Robert seems to have some alarmingly good chemistry with Mallory.
Romantic Plot Tumor: Archer and Lana's relationship is the main focus of Season 6, and glossing over several other plots of the episodes. Unfortunately, it takes up so much time that the other characters are often relegated to a few scenes in a B-Plot.
TV's Michael Gray, where he is portrayed as a flamboyant, irritating Manchild.
Zara Kahn, introduced in the final season, has caught massive heat from fans for not being portrayed as having many flaws, and being too similar to Lana, without any of the humor or charm.
Season 4 had lower ratings than the first three seasons. While Season 5 changed up the formula of the show, it did draw critics who didn't like the change. Season 6 had lower ratings, and many long-time fans were turned off to the focus on Archer and Lana's relationship.
Seasons 7 and 8, much like Season 5, had overarching plotlines tying their episodes together. Both times these plotlines ultimately get resolved anti-climatically with several questions left unanswered; Longwater was just an insurance scam, Woodhouse was killed by Dutch on a whim. Elements of the fandom have not received this apparent trend into Anti-Climax and The Chris Carter Effect well.
Season 9 had by far the worst reception of any season. Before it even aired, it was met with contention from fans who did not approve of the coma dream concept being dragged on for another season. When it did air, it was met with a chilly reception from both fans and critics for wasting too much time on exposition and world building (it wasn't until the third episode that the main plot thread was established), the majority of the cast outside of Pam and Archer being left Out of Focus, and an ending that only served as setup for yet another dream season.
Downplayed with Seasons 10 and 11. The damage from the previous two coma seasons made less people watch this season than the previous ones, but those that did watch it generally liked it for the character dynamics resembling the first seven seasons more than the previous two coma seasons even with the changes in setting and some of the character details (Archer and Lana being a divorced couple, Malory being an AI, Pam being an alien, Cheryl being a fighter pilot, Krieger being an android, and Ray being a gigolo), less heavy on continuity (although some have felt that Archer is better when it's more serialized), splitting time more equally among each of the main characters than Seasons 8 and 9 did, and for finally awaking Archer from his coma at the end of the season.
Season 11 is another downplayed, but still significant example. It was critically acclaimed by professional reviewers, but fan reactions were more mixed, with common criticisms including Adam Reed no longer being involved as a writer (and Ray appearing in less episodes as a result), the writers of the season flanderizing Archer's negative qualities to make the rest of the agency look more competent and ethical by comparison, and the general feeling that they were imitating what they thought made fans like the show without really achieving it in the writing for the season. That being said, a few episodes, such as "Cold Fusion", were considered a return to form and successfully captured the spirit of earlier seasons. It was enough of a success that the show was renewed for Season 12 a week before the season finale aired, with fans hoping that the theme laid out by Archer at the end of the season will become more prominent in Season 12, and that the show will take a deeper look at how little help from Archer the Agency's members need to be terrible people.
Season 14 (the final season) has been seen as a poor final season among fans, due to the writing being lower quality, as well as the hated Zara being introduced.
Shipping: Since pretty much every member of the main cast has at least some Ship Tease with someone else, this is inevitable.
Squick: There is a lot of often-disturbing sexual activity/references in the show. This is bound to pop up at any time.
Sterling's attitude towards any sexual implications involving his mother.
Cheryl's reaction to hearing Malory say "We'll just see how tough Sterling is when he can't suckle at my teat!"
The fact that Malory used to have Sterling check her for lumps.
Pray that you never learn or figure out what Lucas Troy revealed to Archer at the end of his episode. The final seconds of the episode are spent with the characters driving away with blank faces.
In Heart of Archness: Part II Archer has just had a threesome with two women. He then comments on how he's "slathered in every bodily fluid known to man". Most of those fluids are yellow and brown...
In the pilot, Kriger is stated to have sexually violated his coworkers' lunches in the break-room fridge.
The extremelyGorny deaths of Trexler's Mooks at the end of "Waxing Gibbous".
This line from Captain Murphy when he is crushed by the vending machine. And even if he is being hyperbolic, there is still the blood coming out of his mouth and nose and a huge area of blood on the wall behind him.
Captain Murphy:Forgive my candor, I just felt my spleen slip out of what was my anus.
Strangled by the Red String: Barry and Katya get together because they're both cyborgs despite the fact Barry tried to murder Katya before. Deconstruction as later episodes show that their relationship is dysfunctional and Katya still holds Archer in higher regards than Barry, while Season 6 reveals Katya left Barry for good.
They Changed It, Now It Sucks!: The show's critics towards the fifth season and ISIS being shut down and becoming a drug cartel.
In "Crossing Over" Archer bonds with Jakov, who's one of the potential candidates to be his father. As the episode progresses, Jakov is murdered by Barry while Archer is off goofing around. Archer is horrified to learn that Jakov was killed because he was screwing around instead of protecting him like he was supposed to. You think this might lead to an existential crisis like what he went through after Katya was killed, but he's back to his usual jackassery by the next episode.
The Season 4 premiere and finale are too short and take too long to set up the plot, so they don't have enough time to properly develop the plot or the new characters. The Belchers — of whom only Linda has any lines, despite Kristen Schaal and Eugene Mirman appearing in the finale — are barely seen in the cold open and are almost completely forgotten afterwards, while Captain Murphy has only a few minutes of screentime before being crushed by the pop machine. Both feel like they're each missing a part, as if the premiere was meant to be a two-parter and the finale a three-parter.
In "Skytanic", Cyril and Lana push a timebomb off the zeppelin, accidentally bombing Wales in the process. Despite her and Archer visiting Wales in "Archub Y Morfilod" and interacting with Welsh terrorists, this was never brought up once. Unless it really was Ireland as Cyril claimed.
"Edie's Wedding" could have either been an exploration of Pam's backstory, or a final showdown with Barry, but the episode splits the difference and doesn't do much with either ideas.
In "Papal Chase", when the Swiss Guard trying to kill the Pope are revealed to be hired Camora gunmen involved in a False Flag Operation, the real Swiss Guard warn Archer that him killing members of the Camora would not go unnoticed. Nothing ever comes of this.
Len Trexler. Being the head of a rival spy agency, an on-off fling for Malory, and possibly Archer's father, there was plenty of potential for plot-lines to be explored with Trexler. Instead, after the faulty Soviet mind control device is implanted in his brain, he disappears from the show and is never mentioned again (not the real him anyway).
What worse is with his disappearance, ODIN is also dropped entirely. Despite them being the perfect foils to the agency, they show up one more time with Barry, and another time in Season 4, then never again. This is made even more jarring in Season 11 when a brand new rival agency called JUNO appears, with no mention of ODIN. It isn't until Season 12 where it's finally explained what happened to them (they were absorbed into another spy agency called the International Intelligence Agency, or IIA)
Katya. Before her death in Season 2 finale, we don't know anything about her background other than working for the KGB and her motivation for defecting (it would have been much more interesting if she defected for other reasons rather than falling in love with Archer) as well as the fact that she didn't have any meaningful interaction with ISIS employees and KGB agents other than Malory, Archer and Krieger. Instead, what we got is a Satellite Love Interest overly romantic plot that wasn't even executed well (she literally plans to marry Archer in her second appearance) and ended quickly with her death at the end of the episode. Her death would have been more impactful if we could see how her relationship with Archer develops and how the other ISIS employees react. One got a feeling that she was supposed to be a recurring character in either Season 2 or three to develop her character and plot but was later dropped for some reason.
Nikolai Jackov could have had a lot more character development prior to his death. His secret relationship with Malory and being a possible candidate for Archer's father was never developed beyond one-off jokes. They could have also done more with him defecting to the United States after Barry usurped his position as the head of the KGB resulting in him hiding in an ISIS safe-house only to shortly be murdered by the former.
Tough Act to Follow: Season 3 received acclaim from both critics and the fans, being considered one of the best seasons of television that year. Season 4, although still considered a good season, received criticism for less interesting, creative plots, and humor that didn't land quite as often.
Unintentional Uncanny Valley: The jerky animation and semi-photorealistic designs can invoke this trope for some. Especially the Bob's Burgers characters Archer-fied, it's not that bad if you watch both and are used to the Archer animation (Even less if you've never seen Bob's Burgers) but watch an entire season (or more) of Bob's Burgers, then watch that Season Premier intro again. It's extremely jarring.
Happens all the time with Archer himself. Because the show in general devotes a lot of time to his traumatic childhood, gives him a few scattered Pet the Dog moments, and drops heavy hints that he suffers from some undiagnosed mental problems (which could range from depression to autism), Archer comes off as way more sympathetic than he probably should be in a lot of scenarios. No matter how much of an asshole he is, it's pretty hard to outright hate him since you understand why he acts the way he does, and the show displays that he's ultimately a good guy once you get deep down enough. In-universe, people who hear about Sterling's issues will remark "that explains a lot."
While Archer has slept with at least one married womannote and even then, he did that while he was still mourning his own fiancée who was murdered in front of his eyes at his wedding only three months prior, Katya getting together with Barry is played as Laser-Guided Karma to Archer for sleeping with Barry's fiancée back in Season 1 specifically. The thing is, the show forgot two very important details. First, Barry wasn't actually engaged to that woman, only "engaged to be engaged". And second, Archer did not know that she was with Barry when he slept with her. In fact, if anything Archer was coaxed into sleeping with her by Len Trexler, who didn't know she was with Barry either. If anyone is to blame, it's her for choosing to sleep with Archer. It's hardly fair to blame Archer for what happened.
In the Season 6 premiere, Archer is supposed to be seen as the bad guy for heading to Thailand to escape being a parent. While it is wholly irresponsible of him, Lana did steal Archer's sperm to make a baby, and didn't even tell him until after the baby was born.
While Archer is meant to be sympathetic in the Season 11 premiere, it comes off as even more than they meant it. Specifically, while granted Archer was being a dick about Lana's new husband's age, considering that he has been awake for three months and only found out about Robert while meeting him on his first mission back, it is hardly surprising that he doesn't take it very well.
Downplayed with Randy Gillette. While he had been given several warnings and roping Ray into it under false pretenses is inexcusable, Ray's flippant insistence that he could have simply gotten a job as a miner can ring hollow considering how grueling the mining profession can be. It is true that Randy is a criminal but the show's stance that him being a Lazy Bum is the only reason he wouldn't want to work in the mines can be a bit hard to swallow.
As mentioned under Designated Hero Lana can often fall under this, mainly because the show often doesn't hold her to the same standards as the rest of the characters, especially when it comes to her love life:
While it was wrong for Cyril to cheat on Lana (though it seems he has sexual addition by the end so he can't control himself), Lana was an absolutely terrible girlfriend. For perspective, she shot at him, punched him in the face, almost broke his collar bone, prolonged her own mission to avoid him, and worst of all implants a tracking device in his body. If a man had done any of the above to a woman, it would be treated as aMoral Event Horizon.
Lana's baby plot showcases her at her worse. Lana, on the suggestion of Malory, impregnates herself with Archer's sperm without his consent and without breaking up with Cyril first, as the latter is told he's not the father weeks after she became pregnant and the former only learns he is the father after the baby is born. It only gets worse as Archer offers to help her at every turn and she's often been rude to him, even stating she would rather lose the baby than marry him. She attempts to shoot him in the face during birth, but is only stopped because her rifle was empty. While Archer is a goofball, she's been even very nasty to him after AJ's birth: she hired an actor to kidnap AJ and prove his worth as a parent, which got Archer shot. And she expresses no remorse over anything she does. What's worse is that a small line from Season 4 suggests that Lana purposely impregnated herself to get Archer's attention.
In general, Lana constantly berates Archer for not being involved enough in AJ's life, whilst being incredibly disdainful of him whenever he does attempt to be involved. It's made even worse in Season 11, where it is revealed that Lana has sent five year old AJ away to boarding school in Switzerland! Despite years of complaining about Archer's dysfunctional personality, at least some of which can be traced to parental neglect and being sent away to school at the same age by Malory, Lana seems hell bent on repeating the same mistakes. Even though Lana is now married to a billionaire who could most definitely afford the best tutors and schools closer to home.
History Repeats as, just like in Season 1 with Cyril, Lana's marriage to her husband Robert ends with her walking in on him sleeping with another woman. As before, it was wrong of him to cheat on her and her reaction is actually quite heartbreaking, but when one takes the bigger picture into account, Lana has only herself to blame for her marriage falling apart. Throughout Season 12, Lana acts distant and rude towards Robert (to the point that Archer was nicer to him than she was in the episode Lowjacked), and heavily flirted with other men. She went as far as to sort-of cheat on him during a mission in Japan and likely would have cheated on him earlier with Prince Fawd had he not passed out. While Robert shouldn't have cheated on her, Lana was very clearly a nightmare of a wife.
Just about the entire team (Pam being the major exception) falls into this in the Season 11 premiere when they get annoyed at Archer for making them unfocused and disorganized while on mission and more or less wish he stayed in his coma. The thing is, Ray and Cyril are the ones who chose to fight about space in the break room fridge while on mission. All Archer did was correctly point out that Cyril has been using literally all the space in the fridge for his protein shakes long before the mission started. And as for Lana, since Archer can hardly be blamed for not taking the news of her marriage very well (see Unintentionally Sympathetic), she or one of the others really should have broken the news to him in an easier way instead of on mission.
Ditto for everything else that happened in the real world during Archer's coma. Almost every single drastic change in Archer's personal and professional life is dropped on him unexpectedly, often in the middle of a mission. The rest of the team remain surprised and even annoyed that Archer is upset to learn that, for example, Barry, his arch nemesis, is now a valued friend and colleague of ISIS.
Viewer Name Confusion: The characters sometimes refer to Cheryl as "Carol"; this extends to the closed captioning, of which a few episodes refer to her as "Cheryl/Carol".
Win Back the Crowd: The common consensus on Season 11 (the season after Adam Reed stepped down from writing) is that it's a great improvement on the previous seasons, even if not quite in line with the first three seasons. The comedy is sharper than the coma seasons, and new ideas are explored.
Woodhouse is the subject of a great deal of abuse by Archer, despite having raised him for much of his early life.
"Sometimes I think I should just run away! ...But who would take me in? No one, Woodhouse. No one."
Archer is this in his childhood flashbacks. In particular the one in Season 4 when it's shown that he used to love alligators... but grew to hate them after receiving a stuffed version from his biological father, whose face is never shown, and that memory got repressed (assuming it wasn't a hallucination).
Pam in the episodes where she is unappreciated and viewed as an Abhorrent Admirer by others.
Brett Bunson gets shot numerous times throughout the series until his death at the hands of the FBI (actually the CIA), and is usually treated with disdain by his co-workers in spite of this.
, the latter of which is a snippet of Mel Young's "The Killer".