SPOILER ALERT: The following contains spoilers for Chad Powers Season 1, Episode 4.

With Halloween just over two weeks away, Chad Powers attempts to do an episode worthy of the holiday. At least that’s the impression given from Episode 4 of the Hulu series, which is one-part horror comedy and one-part buddy adventure. Sometimes this mashup works, and sometimes it’s an incomplete pass.

Musical theater buffs will appreciate the episode’s use of The Phantom of the Opera as a metaphor for the dynamic between Russ Holliday and Danny. The idea may be unexpected, but it’s not that farfetched; Russ just hides behind prosthetics instead of the Phantom’s mask. The playing of the ballad “All I Ask of You” as Danny and Russ make new molds of Chad’s face is pushing the joke a little bit, but the utilization of the dramatic title track as a musical bookend works much better.

“4th Quarter” also finally illustrates why the friendship between Russ and Danny works. It’s overdue because Danny as an individual character has been lacking in development; he’s come across as purely there for snarky comic relief, and that hasn’t always worked either. But in this episode, Danny puts Russ in his place—and just as importantly, Russ does the same for him. Their fight is a mutual wake-up call. That’s an example of how uneven Episode 4 is: sometimes it nails its opportunities to move the story forward, and other times it just goes for the most obvious joke, like Coach Hudson briefly thinking Chad and Danny are a gay couple.

The horror-esque element comes in because the duo have to sneak out of the team hotel in order to get more glue for Chad’s prosthetic face. Everything is amusingly ominous, from the car they steal being broken into, to an angry Tennessee fan in full face makeup chasing said car, to Russ and Danny slinking up to the thieves’ house hoping to get their stuff back. All that’s missing is some kind of serial killer on the loose. The inclusion of a Spirit Halloween store is the icing on the cake, given the endless amount of Spirit Halloween memes that now exist.

Elsewhere, other moments almost land. The biggest one happens after Danny says that Ricky wouldn’t like Russ if she met him normally. Naturally, “4th Quarter” has to deliver on that, so Ricky bumps into Russ without all of his prosthetics as they’re both waiting for the elevator. The conversation between them proves that Russ can, in fact, connect with Ricky as himself—but it’s too short a scene. It does its job of getting Ricky curious about Russ Holliday, yet there’s so much more that could’ve been accomplished if it had gone on just a little longer. That’s a beat rife for further character development, especially as the show (via Danny) keeps reminding everyone that Chad and Ricky are love interests.

It’s also curious that Chad Powers includes zero in-game scenes this time around. To follow an episode almost entirely happening within one game with an episode that plays the entire game off-screen is jarring. From a logistical standpoint, that screen time is needed for Russ and Danny’s off-field hijinks. Yet when the series is trying to build up this myth of Chad Powers the star quarterback, it doesn’t hit the same to just have the coaches talking about his impressive stats on the bus ride home. “4th Quarter” is an effective show piece for Russ and Danny, and it’s great to give Glen Powell a break from all of the prosthetics and a chance to play Russ more. Yet it could have added a few extra points to the final score.

Chad Powers streams Tuesdays on Hulu. Photo Credit: Courtesy of Hulu.

Article content is (c)2020-2025 Brittany Frederick and may not be excerpted or reproduced without express written permission by the author. Follow me on Twitter at @BFTVTwtr and on Instagram at @BFTVGram. For story pitches, contact me at tvbrittanyf@yahoo.com.