Archer's fifth season deserves credit for sheer ambition alone. After a fourth season that saw the show spinning its wheels a bit, the show completely rebooted its premise in Season 5, shutting down ISIS and turning the gang into cocaine dealers. They certainly didn't have to do this. While Season 4 was Archer's weakest season, it was still solid enough that it could've easily coasted on that level of ambition for the remainder of its run and still remain FX's biggest comedy hit and a general fan favorite (if less of a critical one). Just look at Modern Family - what was once heralded as a fresh take on the family comedy format is now a hokey stalwart that still manages to beat most shows on TV in the ratings each week. Archer could've spent in its middle age churning out the same tired dynamics that Season 4 beat into the ground and still managed to succeed, and even thrive in some ways. So the fact that Adam Reed rejected this notion, the fact that he wanted Archer to remain a show people actually gave a shit about, is admirable enough, and is, quite honestly, a feat that I hope more showrunners take in the future. Luckily, we don't have to give Archer Vice a participation trophy, though, because it was a pretty great season of television - even if it wasn't the season many were expecting.
I think Archer Vice's greatest misstep, honestly, was that action-packed montage in its premiere episode. It promised a season that was much more of an exciting drug heist than it wound up being, which I think tempered a lot of peoples' excitement and blinded them to the fact that what the show was doing was pretty sensational, even if it wasn't quite what they expected. Admittedly, even I am slightly disappointed that some of those promises in that montage were never fulfilled (where was that tiger on Archer's desk?!), and it took me a few episodes to adjust my expectations for what Archer was doing this year. But at some point - probably around the time that I realized they were going to lose all of the cocaine - I realized that this season was not at all about the drug trade, and was instead about analyzing the relationships between the characters on this show. Just look at how many episodes this season were basically bottle episodes that trapped all of the characters in the Tunt mansion and forced them to interact with each other. And even the action-packed episodes - like the season-ending arc that had the gang trapped in Mexico - sort of confined everyone to one place and forced them to work out their shit, rather than sending them off on crazy missions like past seasons did. Considering the plan all along was apparently to get the gang back to ISIS, I think this was the best decision. Archer Vice put interesting spins on just about every relationship on the show this year - from Archer and Lana's renewed respect for each other (and their DIVE INTO PARENTHOOD), to Archer and Pam's growing compatibility, to Cheryl's realization of her own weird, country singer ambition, Archer Vice put a lot of things together than I didn't expect the show to. Archer is a show that's primarily about the laughs (and some genuinely great cartoon action), but its treatment of its characters and their relationships as real - no matter how fucked up they are - is what keeps it one of the most interesting comedies on TV, as well as one of the funniest. So for all of Archer Vice's missteps and broken promises, it succeeded in keeping Archer fresh and renewing my interest in a lot of these characters - which was, really, all it needed to do.
Final Grade: B+
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