(S02E06) "I'm putting my foot down...gingerly." -- Chuck

I'm now officially worried about Chuck Bartowski. It wasn't the injection of poison to create the antidote to the chemical agent in the hotel conference room that frightened me this week, or the previous episodes when he faced nefarious gunmen with evil intent. The fear is emotional. The return of Jill Roberts should be signaling DefCon 4.

This was one of my favorite Chuck episodes thus far this season. It's the way all the parts fell together. There was great balance between the character development and the action, as well as the funny stuff and the serious scenes. Also, I can't help but notice that Chuck is getting a lot better at handling his CIA chores.

But I'm still worried. More about that after the jump.

I liked Jordana Brewster as Jill, Chuck's ex-girlfriend. You could see exactly why Chuck melted when he saw her again. She was a nerd-boy's dream, brains and beauty. But when Ellie was telling Chuck to not go out with Jill again, she knew what she was talking about. Jill broke Chuck's heart and scarred him for life. While the episode ended with Jill and Chuck resuming a relationship, I see Chuck as the vulnerable one in this pairing. He's going to get hurt again. My fear is that more than a bullet, Jill's hurt will last a lot longer.

Wasn't it great the way the CIA made Chuck look like a major player? I want to go to that restaurant. Did you notice how Casey's soul beard was crooked? In typical Chuck fashion, he couldn't completely pull off the cool guy persona. But I related to him about righting the past. His compulsion to tell her that he never stole the tests at Stanford was human and real.

I couldn't help but notice that Jill never explained why she ended up jumping into a thing with Bryce back in Stanford. She also was way too impressed by superficial things. When she thought Chuck's Buy More career was his reality, she blew him off rather coldly. Then, when he revealed his cover, Jill took a shine to him again. How ironic that Sarah seems more impressed with Chuck because of his humble, Buy More/living with his sister side!

Meanwhile, the Buy More subplot following Big Mike's doughnut catastrophe was funny. I noticed that some critics really don't care for the Nerd Herd sideplots, but I do. Morgan breaking into Elizabeth's bedroom to find Austin's Awesome's emergency preparedness test was great, especially when he did that Raiders of the Lost Ark thing with his fingers before reaching through the stuff.

There was another movie allusion. In the flashback to Stanford, Chuck's calling up to Jill in her sorority house room was very Say Anything, only without the music playing. The whole street smacked of Animal House.

Back to the Nerd Herd guys, I loved how they finally figured out how to pass the test, silently getting Jeff to swallow the pen cap so Austin would do the Heimlich and, in turn, give them the information for the test. Awesome. Is there anything Jeff won't ingest?

The prospects for a happy ending with Jill doesn't look great and Ellie is probably right about Sarah being better for him -- although Ellie doesn't know about the real Sarah, so maybe her judgment is flawed. I see a triangle up ahead and how much you want to bet it's going to be Chuck who'll have to decide between Jill and Sarah. Wait and see.