Note: Full spoilers for Arrested Development: Season 4 follow.

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I’m well aware that for those of us who binge watched Arrested Development: Season 4, it seems like a pop culture eternity since it debuted – even though it’s been less than a month. But with so many people already writing their thoughts on the whole thing in the first couple of days after it debuted, I decided to try a different tactic. I did indeed watch it all in 24 hours, but then, as I wrote individual episode reviews , I re-watched the entire season at a slower pace. I was curious if this would give me a new viewpoint on the season and help me re-evaluate my initial reaction. The answer was no, not really, though certainly there were some interesting moments gleaned from the re-watch.So let’s get it out of the way… Arrested Development: Season 4 is not as good as the show was in its previous run. That doesn’t make it terrible or underserving of being called Arrested Development or any such hyperbole, but when weighed against what came before, it’s lacking. Still, if you could get through some rough patches, Season 4 also offered plenty of highlights.There were some limitations series creator Mitch Hurwitz had to deal with re-launching the show that were unavoidable. There was no changing the fact that many of the cast members had other commitments, ones that contractually superseded Arrested Development – in fact, I’m sure it’s the love for the show within the industry that helped get producers on their other films and series to allow them to sneak off when they could to film their material for the new season. With those limitations in place (and, Hurwitz has said, a wish to catch up on everyone on their own), we got character-specific episodes, with the entire ensemble almost never appearing together and some characters having minimal or no interaction.But accepting those terms is easy enough and Arrested Development has one of the best cast of characters ever and every single member of the Bluth/Fünke clan has proven capable of being hysterical. Unfortunately though, this didn’t always translate to great spotlight episodes.Some of these episodes were clearly weaker than others and the highs and lows this year were far more notable than ever before, considering how consistent Arrested Development had been in the past. George Sr. and Lindsay’s first episodes were the biggest misfires here. Yes, the idea was to catch us up on what each family member had been up to in the years since we last saw them, but George Sr. and Lindsay’s stories felt the most aimless and meandering. It’s one thing to say “it’s one big story” and another to ask people to watch over a half hour of material about a character that feels like a series of random sketches thrown together, some good, some not so good.Thankfully, there were characters like Tobias and Buster, whose episodes were far stronger and had a much better focus. Perhaps it’s because, even though they too went from one scenario to another, there was more of a through-line – whether it be Tobias wanting to be famous or Buster wanting a mother, any mother, to love.As for the structure to the season and the interweaving threads, yes, a lot of situations get more fully explained in Season 4 as you see later episodes – as you come to understand, for instance, that it was Maeby in disguise speaking to Lindsay or that the computer simulation of George Michael kissing came from a specific test he did. But it felt like there was too much of a belief that those discoveries would add a tremendous amount of comedy or layers, which often wasn’t the case. There were times when filling in the blanks did make things much funnier, such as understanding that the party for George Michael wasn’t a company party but a bunch of sex offenders (re-watching that scene I laughed much more the second time) but often it was more “here is some additional information for you” that couldn’t make up for the slow pacing or off feeling that occurred in the lesser points of the season. When I re-watched the episodes, there were only a handful of times that the information later episodes provided helped notably improve the episode itself.The original Arrested Development run was also known for amazing running jokes or set ups to situations occurring in sly ways – think about the “Save Surely Fünke” signs or the “loose seal” warnings that foreshadowed major plotlines to come. The difference though was that nearly ever comic situation was funny on its own and going back and watching the episodes again and noticing these set ups just added to the brilliance. Here, there was a lot of dependence on these long-term connections to make the situation really work at all – and sometimes, it wasn’t funny enough to justify the way it was drawn out.But when this season was working… man, was it working. The Gob episodes are the clear MVPs. Perhaps it’s something about the character, but the comedic scenarios were tightly focused, incredibly well constructed and had genuine pay off. This was especially true for the second Gob episode, “A New Attitude”, which ranks among Arrested Development’s best episodes ever. Focused on the Gob/Tony Wonder vendetta going to weird and awesome places, as they pretended to be attracted to one another, it had a strong central storyline that was perfectly executed and escalated in a highly entertaining, incredibly funny way. It also benefited from a guest star, in Ben Stiller, who was extremely well-used and integral to the story, in a season that suffered from several gratuitous cameos (Hey, John Krasknski! Oh, that’s it?), wasted opportunities for large guest roles (John Slattery, Mary-Lynn Rajskub) and sometimes failed to serve beloved returning guests like Judy Greer as Kitty Sanchez. Thankfully, that wasn’t the case for Ann (Mae Whitman), with the Gob episodes not only getting even more mileage out of her biggest trait being how forgettable she is, but gave her a really nice revenge arc. We also saw Lucille 2 (the still very game Liza Minnelli) more than ever this season. While she had some good moments and obviously was present so much to set up the murder mystery aspect around her character for the future, it did seem to be a bit more screen time than needed for this character.Other highlights included those aforementioned episodes focused on Tobias and Buster, who both proved their eccentricities could actually work at the center of a story, and Maeby and Lucille's stories. This season certainly wasn’t afraid to go very dark and whether it was Tobias making life far worse for DeBrie, a woman he loved, or Maeby deciding to be her mother’s pimp, much of this was very shrewd, very funny material.The prominent new characters were a mixed bag. Marky Bark (Chris Diamantopoulos) was given a lot of quirks, with his activism and his face-blindness, but never really felt fully formed, while Herbert Love (Terry Crews) had some amusing moments with Lindsay, but didn’t quite “pop” as much as it seemed was intended, given the build up he was given. The easy standout though was DeBrie Bardeaux. This was a pretty out there character – a drug addicted, failed actress who’d dabbled in soft core porn is not your cookie cutter sitcom character. But Maria Bamford went all in on the character, making her bizarre, funny and sympathetic in equal measure to the point that you could laugh at DeBrie moaning “Let me die” and also feel really bad for her.The new character with the most notable role though was Rebel Alley, a new love interest for Michael… and, whoops, George Michael as well. Isla Fisher is an innately likable actress who’s been very funny in other roles, but Rebel felt notably undeveloped for a character with as much screen time and story significance as she got and Fisher seemed understandably confused how to play her. There were some amusing moments with her to be sure, such as the PSAs, but she wasn’t especially funny or interesting in a way that would make her seem like the woman who would lead to Michael and George Michael having such a huge rift. Sure, you could say the same for, say, Marta, in the original run, but the difference was the situations around her and the comedy her presence inspired for Michael and Gob more than made up for that character’s relatively blank slate. Here, the Michael and George Michael episodes were pretty hit or miss with a lot of bits that went on too long or just never took off.Pacing was often an issue. There were quite a few dead spots throughout the season or sequences that lacked energy – or a good sequence initially that went on a bit too long. It’s hard not to feel like Hurwitz, given the freedom Netflix offered of not having to be limited to 22 minutes, wasn’t as brutal with editing as he could have been to make the episodes tighter and stronger. There was a notable amount of bloat going on here, with individual scenes dragging on too long or sequences that could have been cut entirely staying in. Promoting Season 4, Hurwitz described it as Act 1 of a story that would be finished eventually – at the time, Hurtwitz said he hoped in a movie, though now it seems more episodes are a strong possibility. But the specific way these episodes were structured made it seem like less definitely would have been more and that nearly eight hours was too long for “Act 1.”Arrested Development has established one hell of a high bar for itself; there’s a reason IGN named it the funniest TV show ever a couple of years ago. Ultimately, I am glad the show returned and that we got several really funny episodes and some very memorable moments from it in the process. Season 4 however was a notably weaker endeavor than what the show delivered in the past. It’s certainly still good TV, it just wasn’t up to this show’s notably high standards.Unlike when the show ended in 2006, it’s now very likely we’ll see the Bluths again, and hopefully it’s in a more tightly constructed, better paced situation. Because they’ve certainly proved they can still make us laugh.Same.

Eric Goldman is Executive Editor of IGN TV. You can follow him on Twitter at @EricIGN , IGN at ericgoldman-ign and Facebook at Facebook.com/TheEricGoldman