Sometimes I wonder how Adam Reed explains his ideas for Archer episodes to FX brass. Like this week’s episode. What did he say? “So, I want to do an episode where the Prime Minister of Italy is killed in Malory Archer’s apartment in a sex outfit with something shoved up his …”
Yeah. Not sure how he gets this stuff approved. But the end result is a show that has me both reaching for the brain bleach, and laughing out loud.
The basic storyline of “Lo Scandalo” is pretty simple (and no surprise): Ms. Archer calls her son and Lana because she didn’t murder the dead guy in her apartment, and the entire ISIS crew pitches in to keep her out of trouble, only for us to realize that Malory is the guilty party and they just helped her cover it up. It’s not shocking because she’s already done some pretty horrible things (although this one is sweet in a twisted sort of way: seems way back when, the Prime Minister’s people killed a guy who may have been Archer’s dad.)
What’s great about the episode is how everyone involved realizes the ridiculousness of the situation, and isn’t afraid to comment on it and/or revel in it, be it Archer interrogating his mom about her sexual preferences or Krieger taking a picture of himself with the corpse before he goes to dispose of it. I certainly wouldn’t be able to handle something this weird with a straight face, so I’m glad the show is just as irreverent.
From a faux dinner party with Lana in a conveniently on-hand French maid outfit, to Cyril announcing “I hate you all so much,” to Krieger instructing the team to drop off their packaged pieces of the corpse in specific places so that the pattern forms a smiley face, there’s so much in this episode that’s as hilarious as it is uncomfortable — and that’s pretty much what Archer is about.
So to quote Pam, “Thanks for dead guy in a box.” It was awesome.
Clacked by Brittany Frederick 
on Feb 17, 2012 @ 08:43 EST5EDT
