Review: Archer “Keys Open Doors”

Overview:

The Agency team, Lana included, find themselves in the depths of Ibiza to take out notorious drug runners. An unexpected taste of island life prompts a team-wide case of self-care and vacation mode, which Lana finds to be a greater challenge than a cartel’s assassination, and leaves her divided against her team.

Our Take:

Everybody needs a little self-care every now and then, whether it’s a ruthless superspy or a television show that’s been on the air for 14 seasons. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with shooting for the mainstream instead of cutting edge and it’s these less memorable episodes that make the successful ones work even better. “Keys Open Doors” tells a story about self-care while it engages in the television equivalent of such an exercise. However, Archer gets carried away in this department and winds up with an episode that’s too relaxed and comfortable at the expense of creativity and excitement.

“Keys Open Doors” is an Archer episode that really wants the audience to love it and not ask too many questions. It delivers on some low-hanging wish fulfillment ideas that set the episode up for success. There’s a fun mission that’s designed to be extreme, but it does feel like “Archer Mad Libs” to some degree. The Agency crew need to eliminate Ibiza’s new strain of super cocaine through the destruction of a drug operation, which will restore the country’s balance. Archer is used to placing its Agency missions in troubling grey areas, but “Keys Open Doors” doesn’t even pretend that there’s anything altruistic about this case. One needs to squint pretty hard at all of this in order for it come across as “good.” But hey, it introduces Super Cocaine Bullet Time Lana, so it can’t be all bad. A concept as wild as that is indicative of many of the decisions made in “Keys Open Doors.” They’re fun in the moment, but lack greater substance, like cocaine that’s dissolving in open waters.

There’s nothing that’s necessarily wrong about “Keys Open Doors,” but it’s just a very generic episode of Archer that falls into old patterns that the audience has grown to take for granted. There’s a classic Archer sequence where Sterling and Lana make their way through dangerous enemy territory and have a stark, emotional conversation while they nonchalantly take dozens of lives with their superior espionage skills. In a vacuum, this scene is perfect, but at this point there’s nothing special about these theatrics. It’s become the baseline for the franchise, which speaks to the show’s increasing level of excellence, but it also means that the series needs to work a lot harder. Archer’s final seasons have typically done strong work when it comes to taking these very pedestrian ideas and subverting them to original places. “Keys Open Doors” doesn’t connect on the same level and feels like the closest thing to filler that’s been present this season, right down to its convenient character pairings that don’t try to rock the boat. 

“Keys Open Doors” honestly feels like it could be from any season of the show and lacks the specificity of the rest of this season’s stories. If anything, it functions like a lost episode of Archer: Danger Island. This again reflects how this isn’t a bad episode, per se, but it’s just such a safe and forgettable installment, which is unfortunate in a season of only eight episodes. The episode’s writer has only written one previous Archer episode and it’s easier to see someone who’s fresher to the series turn to such familiar dynamics that have worked in the past, or this could completely be projecting. “Keys Open Doors” is an unfortunate letdown in a farewell season that’s been otherwise largely consistent. Fortunately, even episodes like “Keys Open Doors” that may be considered misses are only because of their lack of innovation rather than there being a deficiency in clever dialogue and strong jokes. Not unlike Lana’s rusty spy skills, even when Archer is off, it’s still very on.