S04.E05: The Blood Boy

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Quote

Cracks in Richard's latest partnership become more apparent when he's forced to deal with an unexpected interloper. As things get more serious, Dinesh scrambles to find a way out of his new relationship. After learning of surprising developments afoot at Raviga, Monica has trouble deciding which horse to back.

Promo:

[riprock]

I want character development for Monica so much, as she's the only regular who doesn't get anything to do. But am I really supposed to just go with the fact that she's so bad at corporate politics that she's taking Erlich's advice on how to deal with her boss? She has almost no agency. Laurie is so right when she says she hasn't given her any actionable advice. 

"Fourth child?"

jared erupting all over the blood boy stole the entire episode. 

Gilfoyle has really been reduced to walking snark and meta-commentary, and it's getting stale.

[Traveller519]

Did everyone get a (small) win here? It seems like competence prevailed across the board, and it wasn't falling ass-backwards into luck that got them there.

Unfortunately,  the result is the 567th series re-set

[ElectricBoogaloo]

I've disliked Gavin for what feels like a really long time so I thought seeing him leave would make me happy. Instead I was kind of disappointed. I mean, realistically it's good that he's realized that he needs to work on himself and he's taking the time to go do that. I just thought he would go out in a blaze of glory.

[chocolatine]

26 minutes ago, Traveller519 said:

Did everyone get a (small) win here?

It may look that way on the surface, but there are also a lot of challenges/unknowns. Richard has publicly promised a large-scale launch, and now has to deliver without any funding or other help from Gavin.

Spoiler

I'm guessing that's why Russ is in the preview for the next episode - Richard must have gone to him for money because no VCs will touch him. We know from last time that Russ's deals are structured terribly and Russ as a voting board member can do more harm than good, so that's a very questionable "win".

Monica has the offer to jump ship with Laurie, and while that's promising, she's butted head with Laurie before on strategic matters, so whether the two of them can work together in the long run is not certain.

Dinesh quit Periscope, thereby forfeiting any of the Hotdog/Not Hotdog buyout money, and now Richard's company has no funding, so best case scenario Dinesh will be working for free for the time being, worst case scenario Richard rescinds the job offer because he needs to hold on to the equity to attract investors. I'm also not sure that that was the last we've seen of his crazy hacker ex. If she goes free I can see her keep stalking him and potentially even find out that he'd turned her in.

I really hope we get scenes of Gavin "working on himself" in future episodes.

[lucindabelle]

I would have loved to see Gavin's brain. Kind of like when ehrlich revealed he could do some math during finals of season one. Let's call it d2f.

[henripootel]

8 hours ago, Traveller519 said:

Unfortunately,  the result is the 567th series re-set

Yeah, I'm expecting Lucy to pull the football away again - it's apparently their 'vision' of what makes this show 'funny'.  

That said, I actually kinda thought they were getting their swing back a little.  Just enough Gavin, very little Jian-Yang, Erlich is actually competent, Richard doesn't make the worst decisions possible, and I even liked the hacker chick who got busted.  I'm reminded that a little bit of Gilfoyle goes a long way and I want to see more, and Dinesh was also fun.  Heck, they gave Monica something to do.  By the last two season's lights, a solid episode.

Please please please move things along and don't just go back to seeing all these guys being plot-stupid and endlessly shit on.   That got old in season two, and that was two seasons ago.  Please make it easy for me to like this show.  

[ottoDbusdriver]

12 hours ago, riprock said:

jared erupting all over the blood boy stole the entire episode. 

That was pretty funny, but how come Blood Boy knew Jared as 'Donald' ?

Not even Richard did a WTF about that.

[Rinaldo]

1 hour ago, ottoDbusdriver said:

That was pretty funny, but how come Blood Boy knew Jared as 'Donald' ?

It's been established that his real first name is Donald, and everyone knows that, but Gavin once decided he was "Jared," and it stuck. It's easy to forget this, so I'm glad the writers remembered.

[ottoDbusdriver]

7 minutes ago, Rinaldo said:

It's been established that his real first name is Donald, and everyone knows that, but Gavin once decided he was "Jared," and it stuck. It's easy to forget this, so I'm glad the writers remembered.

Thanks @Rinaldo, I completely forgot that.

[ChipBach]

16 hours ago, riprock said:

Gilfoyle has really been reduced to walking snark and meta-commentary, and it's getting stale.

Just before the episode my 16 year old son was watching "Freaks & Geeks" on Netflix.  It was hard to watch Martin Starr play Bill Haverchuck and then roll into the same mono-tone intonations as Gilfoyle...

Edited May 22, 2017 by ChipBach

[Spaceman Spiff]

I liked the quick turn around on the whole blood boy thing. At first I found it incomprehensible that Jared and Gilfoyle would just sit there while they explained another one of there ideas in front of an unknown. I expected another "stealing the idea" storyline, but this was better. I liked the blood boys rant to Richard, and then Richard's return after realizing he's nothing but a pot head. Dinesh is cold ratting his girlfriend out to the feds.

Gavin just signing the patent over was unexpected, as well as his leaving. Now did the giant head shot of Gavin with the formula have any changes on it, or was Gavin just returning it to Richard (along with a giant headshot of himself)...I couldn't tell.

[Cramps]

I'm really disappointed they sent Gavin away so quickly. I LOVED the plot of them doing a startup with their long time nemesis. There was so much to play with. Instead we're now stuck dealing with that annoying VC guy, who is a much less interesting character to explore than Gavin.