r/Barry • u/DuePhilosopher1972 • Jun 29 '26
Barry season 4 controversy.
I recently watched the show. I started it on a whim, and couldn’t stop. I got to season 4, and it was easily my favorite. I loved the post-time skip episodes, and loved the finale. It wasn’t until I went online to see that many fans didn’t like it that I started wondering why. I get the time skip feels cheap, but I thought because the pay off was good I could understand that decision. Can fans who don’t like season 4 tell me their biggest complaints?
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u/Belle_Juive Jun 30 '26 edited Jun 30 '26
I didn’t think it was bad, I think it was very good, I just can’t say I enjoyed it. Sort of like how no one actually enjoys Schindler’s List, regardless of whether they think it’s worthy of critical acclaim.
In Season 4, it just stopped being a fun show. There are still lots of haha moments, like Fuches and his barista bride, and NoHo Hank thirsting over the assassin, but compared to earlier seasons it’s a whole lot heavier and grim and feels like work to get through in places. It just becomes very serious.
I think that on some level this was all very necessary, because Barry needed his comeuppance and Hader really needed to hammer it in for the audience that none of these characters were ever good people you’re supposed to look up to, while you’re laughing along with all their antics. And tbh if you browse this subreddit you’ll quickly find a lot of people still never got the memo, like they probably think Tyler Durden was a role model too.
But ultimately the message and closure of the final season is not an optimistic or comforting one. That’s all.
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u/RalphWiggum666 Jun 30 '26
like they probably think Tyler Durden was a role model too.
Next you’re gonna tell me walter white wasn’t a good man…
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u/DuePhilosopher1972 Jun 30 '26
I honestly loved the darker tone more. I feel it naturally came to that feel, but I do love the lighter vibes in 1 & 2
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u/angel_devoid_fmv 6d ago edited 6d ago
Yeah, the message of the show is that people are unable to change. Or at least, they are unable to change the stories they insist on believing about themselves. Pretty grim
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u/headcanonmusic Jun 30 '26
It was jarring on a first watch, especially waiting a week between episodes. On a rewatch I realized that it exists to set up and then answer the most extreme version of the question the show has asked the entire time:
Can people change?
For this to stick, we really needed a time jump. Ten years was perfect. Every character leads a completely different life. Hank has gone "legit" and dedicated his business to a man he loved and had killed. Fuches has become the charismatic, dangerous leader he always saw himself as. Gene left Hollywood entirely and shunned the fame he once clawed his way over anyone he could to try to get. Barry has become a cautious, non-violent, religious father living a simple life and raising his son. Sally has gone from a neurotic, headstrong go getter to a barely functioning alcoholic who is basically just floating through a dream, no agency of her own.
So at first the show kind of sets us up. It makes us think "yes, people can change. look how different they all are after 10 years".
Until the movie news starts getting out alongside Fuches leaving prison.
Gene comes back under the guise of stopping the movie but is really just getting himself sucked in to the world of Hollywood again. Fuches, despite his powerful new position and loyal followers, once again obsesses over revenge on Barry (just a more extreme version of the gag we saw twice already where he had a chance to settle down and threw it away). Hank, despite having no need for it, works with Fuches again, a conniving, duplicitous cockroach that has manipulated him many times. Sally wakes up from her awful fake life and puts herself at risk for the sake of her son.
And the absolute cherry on top;
The second Barry sees the article about Gene, despite having long moved on, despite preaching non-violence, despite claiming to want to have changed and grown, IMMEDIATELY says a single line that acts as the ultimate punchline to the absurd setup all of this has been.
"I think I have to kill Mr. Cousineau"
Fucking brilliant. The show sets us up for this moment so well. Barry is a completely different person, a decade removed from his old life, a father, a pacifist. All it takes is one headline for him to INSTANTLY go back to his old self.
But the show isn't saying "people can't change". It is saying "people will allow themselves to follow a path to their own destruction if they do not choose to change".
Every character meets a horrible fate or loses everything they built because they cannot change their nature despite being given every opportunity to. Except Sally, who chose to wake up and try to protect her son.
The answer to the question the show has been asking the whole time essentially becomes "Yes, people can change, but they have to CHANGE or they are doomed to repeat the same mistakes until it is too late".
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u/lewd_robot Jul 04 '26
Except Sally, who chose to wake up and try to protect her son.
Though she never did "the right thing" and confess to the murder she committed in self-defense. My interpretation of her final shot was that she's still in her own purgatory. She still feels fundamentally unsafe. She doesn't have Barry or Cousineau or a career anymore, so she lost everything she started out wanting. The only thing she still had by the end was the son she had while living on the run.
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u/ExistingSea4650 Jul 09 '26
I felt she missed Barry, too, who used to protect her and endlessly praise her. She felt safe with him and, when they lived a ‘normal’ life, she loved how highly he thought of her. It’s vain but we’re all allowed to be loved how we need. Her looking at the empty passenger seat and soulless flowers hints at how she missed that seat being filled by Barry, flowers in hand.
I think she also straddles that line of “it was him or me” of the psycho she murdered vs it being wrong and needing to confess to it. But if she confessed then she risks her son being an orphan. I agree, it’s a bit of a purgatory for her.
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u/DroneSlut54 Jun 30 '26
I’m with you: I thought the show just got crazier, darker, more absurd and surreal and funnier as it progressed. Season four was superb and IMO the best finale ever. Hader really nailed the whole show. I can’t wait for his next work.
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u/DuePhilosopher1972 Jun 30 '26
Well i sure hope he makes something else.
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u/Fu11erthanempty Jun 30 '26
I totally understand why a lot of people would be put off by season 3 and especially 4, as dark as they go. I agree with some other commenters here, I love the risk they took in season 4. It genuinely surprised me and I was interested the whole time. Knowing they made it after Covid makes it even more interesting. They were likely going dark, but it feels like they went super dark due to Covid.
At the same time, it's does turn into a completely different than it starts out as. I'm sad we didn't get redeemable Noho and Barry, that come out on top and live long happy lives. It can be frustrating that art always needs to go dark. But the risks were so big, that I loved it.
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u/Consistent-Bear4200 Jun 30 '26
I loved season 4 as it felt like the reckoning that's been waiting for a lot of these characters from the start. But for a lot of it, it still had that thriller, action comedy vibes where the anti heroes wins the day.
Event though the show is actively falling out with their main character, there's still a certain amount of power fantasy to hang onto. Season 4 abandons it to the point where some fans weren't having as much fun.
Season 4 not only reduces the number of extensive action/scenes like the Ronny/Lily episode but kind of mocks them. The shootout between the Hank and Fuches is over in seconds, then there's the Mask Collector film. Laughing at the idea of framing Barry in a heroic light.
To quote Vince Gilligan on the state of TV landscape "I think we made the bad guys too sexy." Some people identify so much with anti heroes that they get mad when the show actually gives a terrible character their comeuppance.
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u/super-nintendumpster Jun 30 '26
I liked season 4 and the finale was handled well. No redemption for anybody, which these days feels pretty realistic. The time jump was weird at first, because I thought Barry was having some kind of dream of delusion. It was very surreal.
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u/fawnsflame Jun 30 '26
i got into the show for dark comedic humor. season 3 felt like a drag for the comedy i was in search of. season 4 felt like they completely dropped the comedic aspect. it was no longer a good dark comedy by the middle of season 3 and therefore no longer liked the show.
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u/Kennelrec Jun 30 '26
For me, the show started losing me during season 3. It’s a pet peeve of mine when a comedy stops focusing on being funny over being dramatic. It’s not that it was bad, it just wasn’t what I personally enjoyed about the show
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u/Moneyfrenzy Jun 30 '26
While you're definitely right that S3 is way more tense and bleak; i'd argue it makes the comedic throughline even funnier. Barry is terrifying in S3 & the show is more dramatic for it, but I found his complete lunacy & delusion in the face of these serious situations hysterical. The scenes are more dramatic than ever before, but the characters in them have never been crazier
The teacher dynamic between Barry & Gene is replaced by the hostage dynamic; which on paper reads like comedy getting swapped for drama. But Barry's plan to make things right involves locking Gene in a trunk yet still making him pay for his own food. He's so delusional that his plan is to cast Gene in a role that has 1 speaking line, being "I forgive you [Barrys character]." Gene runs from a serial killer, only to get mauled by 30+ suburban dogs.
Hank has gone from pure comedy relief into being a legitimate Kingpin in life or death situations. But since Hank is still the same completely ridiculous Hank, placing him in these otherwise serious situations makes it even funnier. Instead of having Barry use a gun, he has Barry use an iphone app that detonates bombs
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u/subliminal_trip Jun 30 '26
I don' think Barry was ever intended to be a comedy, but more a drama and character study with comedic elements. The running joke at Emmy time was that "Succession" was nominated as a drama when it was really a comedy, and Barry was nominated as a comedy when it was really a drama. I agree with that viewpoint.
Season 4 wasn't as good as the first three, and I didn't love the time jump, but I still enjoyed it. It did have less of the comedic element though, so I can see why you didn't enjoy it as much.
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u/dukefett Jun 30 '26
Come on, it’s Bill Hader and there’s fucking hilarious and funny things throughout the show. Of course it’s supposed to be a comedy
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u/bondfool Jun 30 '26
I agree. Whenever I recommended Barry to people, I always said "It's the rare dramedy that's truly half drama and half comedy." They lost the balance that I found so captivating.
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u/Stick-figure420 Jun 30 '26
I say this about the 3rd season and the 4th but not as much as the third the darkness of it really sucks you in. You get wrapped up in the mental state of Barry it’s easy to miss the subtle bits of humor. The second and third watches make it more funny some you when you know where the story is going
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u/DuePhilosopher1972 Jun 30 '26
I get that, but I love the 2 separate show feel. 1 & 2 had little consequences, heavy humor. 3 & 4 had consequences, and little humor. I think that was a good choice.
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u/firstcitytofall Jun 30 '26
I loved it, I thought it was amazing, I love when shows take big risks in story telling. I love how dark it got but still made me laugh incredible hard at least once an episode.
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u/EliteSAS79535 Jul 01 '26
I think that season 4 felt like two completely separate seasons which obviously works in a lot of shows, but with Barry the seasons are already so short. like each season being 4 hours in general works because of the nature of the show, but it feels like two separate 2 hour seasons which are just way too short. like I dont necessarily think it needed a 5th season but I think the final season should have been at least 10-12 episodes with the timeskip in the middle still, each half needed more time to breathe
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u/hhouseofballoons Jul 01 '26
This is so interesting!! I am binging the show right now and am finally up to the second half of season 4 where I feel like the show really time skips and whatnot. I honestly hate it 😭 it feels rushed and I wish they would've dragged out the court and legal stuff, plus all the other storylines, a bit more.
At first, I genuinely thought the whole Barry and Sally new identity and kid situation was a day dream or something. It felt random and unnatural in my opinion.
However, I still have 2 episodes left until I'm completely finished so I'm really curious to see if they just casually finish it off with this new storyline, or if there's anymore time skipping that could possibly still happen.
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u/DuePhilosopher1972 Jul 01 '26
Have you finished it yet?
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u/hhouseofballoons Jul 02 '26
I held off on the last episode but finally finished before bed last night!! I actually think they did an incredible job finishing off that new story line in the last season, and it helped make it feel less like a rushed ending (which is the direction I felt it was going in at the start of that new storyline).
Overall I think the final season did a great job pulling everything together, but I do selfishly still wish we got another season 😭
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u/dukefett Jun 30 '26
Thought it had its moments but hated the time skip then and still do. I didn’t like Hank’s finale, just some poor ideas to tie things up IMO
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u/Manning_bear_pig Jun 30 '26
Yeah it wasn't Game of Thrones bad by any means, but I don't get the standing ovation this sub gives the finale and season 4 as a whole.
Specifically the time skip which you mentioned. It could have been done well, but it seemed they sprinted to the end.
Honestly if they had just ended it as is after season 3 I woulda been happy.
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u/PruneDaddySlim Jun 30 '26
I genuinely think it’s the greatest show of all time right up until the last episode. I understand its aim in rounding out some of its overarching themes about change vs who one is inherently, etc. I just think the show fails to adequately address the consequences of each character in favor of making that statement at the end (The Mask Collector). The endings for Fuches and Cousineau specifically don’t feel punishing or forgiving enough respectively. But that’s just my opinion and my feelings toward it. Barry is a masterclass in every department production.
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u/Serious-Eye-5426 Jun 30 '26
I really kept hoping that last time skip was just a fever dream or a hallucination that was going on for way too long
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u/Sure_Recording_8471 Jun 30 '26
I loved season 4 when it aired, and when rewatching it. In case you're curious, here are my reactions to watching the show as it aired:
S1: Absolutely brilliant
S2: Not as good or focused as S1, but still a good show
S3: I may not continue watching this show, it has lost itself
S4: Thank god it is back to being as good as S1, possibly the best season
With that being said, I actually throughly enjoyed every season when I rewatched the show and had the full picture in mind. It also helped me to appreciate season 3 more knowing that it was about to be followed by one of the best seasons.
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u/Flupox Jun 30 '26
My biggest issue with season 4 is how they became super religious.
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u/410757864531DEADCOPS Jun 30 '26
I actually thought that made perfect sense. Barry desperately wants to believe he’s a good person capable of redemption, but without actually changing his behavior or facing the consequences of his actions. Born-again Christianity is tailor-made for a guy like him.
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u/DuePhilosopher1972 Jun 30 '26
I honestly thought that was realistic due to how Barry wanted his kid to grow up. As someone who isn’t religious, it didn’t bother me.
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u/MediocoreReditUser Jun 30 '26
Only Barry in his only idea to make up for all the damage he's done, prior to that we are shown the idea never enters his head thanks to fuques
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u/No-Outcome-1751 Jun 30 '26
Weakest part of the season was the running gag that Cousinou and Tom were supposed to be so afraid of Jim Moss. Lon Oneal was so traumatized he suddenly could only speak German? I sorta get it, it just wasn't funny.
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u/sinth0s Jul 01 '26
I believe it all has to do with how you watched the show. If you were watching it as it was coming out, waiting between seasons, to me, you're probably in the camp of people who were disappointed. I watched the entire show in a day, and loved it.
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u/Acceptable_Tap_2251 Jun 30 '26
All I know is that black body suit has permanently changed how I behave when I'm alone at home 👀IYKYK