B99's third season was a solid improvement on the first two, doing a decent job of juggling its drama and comedy. However, its fourth season leaned way too heavily on the drama, leading to my least favorite season of the bunch.
Season 4 of Brooklyn Nine-Nine tries to be a full-on dramedy, which I've always felt doesn't fit the show at all. B99 is at its best when it's manic, funny, and comforting, so Season 4's dark and dramatic arcs just aren't all that enjoyable to me. Not to say that none of the darker material this season is good this season, I really like the emotional storyline about the precinct being at risk of shutting down, along with Terry's episode that deals with racism in the police. However, that's pretty much it. The three-part opener with Jake and Holt in witness protection suffers from splitting up the cast, though it does have a strong ending. On the other hand, the "dirty cop" arc that ends the season with Jake and Rosa falsely getting arrested is awful. Not only is it pretty lacking in humor (Charles's rapid aging isn't funny), but it takes one of my least favorite storytelling cliches (character gets falsely accused) and devotes the entire two-part finale to it without anything for the rest of the cast to do. And worst of all, it's hard to even care since you know that everything will be resolved at the start of Season 5 (which is, in fact, the case). I criticized B99's season finales in the past, but Crime And Punishment is by far the worst of the bunch As a whole, I don't think much of this season's attempt at drama works, and makes Season 4 a low point for the series as a whole.
Thankfully, Season 4's comedic episodes do work pretty well, resulting in a pretty solid middle section for the season. The token Halloween and Pontiac Bandit episodes are probably the best ones yet, and even weaker episodes have pretty memorable segments like the painfully short New Girl crossover, Holt screaming "BONE", and Gina getting hit by a bus. Despite having some of my least favorite storylines, Season 4 does also have some of my favorite episodes in the series to date. I also think the character work is generally pretty great (aside from one person) as well. I already mentioned that the more personal storylines like the night shift, the precinct almost closing, and Terry's profiling were excellent, but so was more goofy stuff like Jake and Amy's apartment bet, Pimento and Rosa's relationship, and Charles's new son Nikolaj. The only character I really had problems with this season with Gina, particularly with her sudden pregnancy in the finale. While Gina's pregnancy was probably intended to be a big "season finale event", it just left me baffled why the show runners decided to write her actress's pregnancy in when not only was she not dating anyone, but the pregnancy is barely mentioned for the rest of the series. This isn't a massive gripe, though, it's more of an oddity that made the finale feel even more odd.
Despite my gripes with the season, though, its high points were really high:
Halloween IV: Continuing the trend of Halloween episodes being better than the last, this fourth one delivers on the premise that pretty much anyone could win, because Gina ended up becoming the winner this time! Even as someone who doesn't like the character that much, Gina's win was insanely clever and probably the most effective and least telegraphed surprise in any Halloween heist to date.
The Last Ride: Until Season 5, this was my favorite episode of the series, because even if you know that the precinct isn't closing down (this wasn't even a finale!), The Last Ride is a genuinely emotional episode. The acting really sells you on the fact that the characters think their job together could be over, and what we get is an episode that gives all the bittersweet vibes you'd expect from a series finale, let alone some random episode in the middle of the season.
Moo Moo: As of Season 7 (and this is definitely going to change come Season 8), Brooklyn Nine-Nine has two episodes that deal with serious topics, and while I like both of them, Moo Moo, which deals with racial profiling, is definitely the most impactful. Even with how lacking in humor it is, Moo Moo works because of how genuine it is, particularly when it comes to Terry Crews's great acting and its intentionally unsatisfying ending.
Overall, Season 4 is the weakest season for me because of its shaky attempts at drama and pretty bad ending, but the show's best still shines through when it focuses on comedy and its characters.
2/5 Stars
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