First off, let me apologize for the latency here on the site lately.

It seems our hosting company had a major meltdown of some storage devices and the system is limping along right now while they transfer some data around.  It may lead to some more downtime and slow going here for a day or so.  Sorry about that.

With that out of the way — We’ve added 40 new screen captures to the gallery from Episode 2.05 — “Chuck Versus Tom Sawyer.”

It was a pretty Yvonne Strahovski lite episode, but there were still a few gems to be had.  The Buy More outfit was to die for, and her smiles at the end when Chuck gets the kill screen are some of her most beautiful smiles to date.

No Chuck next week, but I’ll wrack my archives to see if I have some stuff that isn’t in the gallery yet.  I’d hate for a week to go by without an Yvonne Strahovski fix when we’re in the middle of the season.

Enjoy!

Here we are fifth episode of the season and the writers are finally shaking things up.

Although it isn’t quite as conducive to seductive shots of our favorite Yvonne Strahovski, it’s a real treat to have a ’spy story’ that also ties in some of the minor Buy More characters.

I also enjoyed getting a little more Ellie.  I don’t want to detract from the beauty of Yvonne, but Sarah Lancaster isn’t exactly hard on the eyes.  I’m happy to see her integrating more into the main plot.

It was also pretty fun to get into some hardcore geekery with Atari and Missile Command.  I played that game on my Atari 2600 when I was a kid so that was instant nostalgia at the very mention of it.

But let’s get to Yvonne — Yvonne Strahovski in Buy More hotness?  Yes please.  Of all the outfits they’ve put her in for these many episodes, I think this might have been the biggest fulfillment of nerd fantasy… except maybe the Princess Leia outfit.

Anna is usually the sole champion of nerd hotness, but now Yvonne has slid in to show her what’s up.  I say Sarah ditch the Orange Orange gig and join the Nerd Herd.  Sarah Walker + Anna Wu = for the win.

(And not to digress again, but hula skirt?  Can we get Yvonne in that please?)

It’s true that it wasn’t an Yvonne Strahovski heavy episode, and those who primarily watch the show for the romance may be a tad disappointed, but this episode is distinguished for its departure from the formula.

Our spy of the week took a back seat to some old fashioned geekery, leaning on some of the traditionally more minor characters to help develop things just a little further for all involved.

Also, those who love music should appreciate that the entire episode revolved out of a single Rush song.  Though I’m not a fan, I’m sure there were lots of Rush afficionados out there dancing in their living rooms.

Most importantly, the episode ends with a major plot advancement in Chuck’s degree.  That could ultimately change the whole direction of Chuck’s life, and Sarah got that for him. Superb.

Sounds like no Chuck next week due to the election, but screenshots for this week should be up tomorrow afternoon.  Until then, check out our forums and discuss the keen fashion sense of Sarah and Anna here!

We’ve added 50 new screen captures to the gallery from Episode 2.04 — “Chuck Versus the Cougars.”

As I said in my review, this is absolutely one of my favorite episodes of Chuck ever.  I feel like it’s the first time we really got a full-fledged Sarah episode which means more Yvonne Strahovski to go around!

I would have liked to have snapped some more shots of the shower fight scene, but the motion was all too fast.  I only got blurry images.  Nonetheless, I think you’ll be impressed with the results.

Also, Rob has thrown up a couple of new interviews in the Interview section of the site.  One is with TV Guide and the other is with BuddyTV.  Some good info can be found within, including info about a 3-D episode of Chuck coming up later in the season!

Enjoy!

Wow.  Absolutely wow.  This has to be the best episode of Chuck to date.  Not only was it funny, but it also puts our girl Yvonne front and center for some backstory on her character, Sarah Walker.

Not only that, but we were treated with not just one, but two guest stars in Nicole Richie and Ben Savage.  I realize some people may consider Mr. Savage a bit player, but I was a total “Boy Meets World” fan in my younger years.

Who would have thought that Sarah was such a nerd in high school?  I was impressed with their ability to take someone as beautiful as Yvonne Strahovski and make her so awkward.  No doubt, Yvonne’s acting chops kicked in on that one as well.

So much of the mystery and intrigue of Yvonne is finally melting away.  From a previous episode we learned that her middle name was Lisa.  So there we have her full name, right? Jennifer Lisa Burton.

But no! So close.  Had me fooled right up til the end.

Nicole Richie actually did an admirable job much to the relief of many a Chuck fan, I’m sure.  Hopefully her appearance has brought in a few viewers to up the ratings.  It seemed pretty clear she was a bad guy from the beginning, but that didn’t make the reveal any less fun.

I also applaud the writers for getting away from the Chuck/Sarah relationship for an episode to really delve into something entirely different.  I can only hope that we get similar backstory on Casey, Awesome, and a few others in the gang (I still secretly hope we’ll find out that Awesome is an undercover secret agent; so deep that not even the Intersect knows of him).

Oh and one more tiny little thing.  Yvonne Strahovski.  Shower.  Fight scene.  I thought a fight with Michael Clarke Duncan would be the best of the season, but I’m in love all over again.

Screen captures should be up tomorrow afternoon.  Until then, hang out on our forums or talk about this episode by commenting on this post.  I know I could talk about it for ages.

Go Cougars!

It’s been exactly one year since our first post here at Strahotski.com, and Lykaon and I thought we’d write a quick self-indulgent post to share a few interesting stats.

Over the past year, we’ve had almost 145,000 people come to Strahotski.com, and have served up nearly 2 million page views. More than 60% of our visitors are from the US, but we’ve had visitors from 159 other countries as well. The forums have become a great place to discuss Yvonne and Chuck, with 124 members participating in 220 threads.

Not surprisingly, the most popular feature on the site is our photo gallery, where we have over 1,000 photos of the beautiful Ms. Strahovski, most of which are screenshots that Lykaon has painstakingly captured and uploaded.

To make it easier to find the best pictures out of those thousand, and to celebrate one year of Strahotski.com, Lykaon and I have created a “Hall of Fame” album. We’ve carefully selected the best 30 or so pictures of Yvonne, no easy task when they are all so lovely, and put them all in their own gallery. We’ll periodically upload new Best of Yvonne Strahovski pictures as we come across them.