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Matt and Jake’s awkwardness was out in full display in an episode almost completely outside of the office in episode 5 of Corporate’s third and final season. The episode, titled “The Winds of God,” begins with Christian telling Matt and Jake the story of the creation of Hampton Deville twenty years ago when his company merged with another. Hampton and Christian got into a squabble over a million dollars and now has tasked Matt and Jake with delivering a briefcase to Hampton, telling Matt and Jake not to fuck this up because it’s important. Jake asks what happens if they do mess it up. The opening theme instantly begins to play. Guess we know what that means!
Matt and Jake stop at a gas station on the way to the hotel to pick up snacks. When they arrive at the hotel, the bellhop starts to take the briefcase out of the car, but Matt stops her before she can bring it inside. They go to check in at the front desk and find out the room hasn’t been paid in full, requiring Matt to give his card begrudgingly to pay for the rest. Jake tells him to think of it like a vacation. The receptionist says someone named Hampton has left a note for them. They read the note and it says that Hampton has been delayed and will meet with them the next day in the hotel’s business center. They get scared when they realize their luggage is gone, but the bellhop has taken it and put it on a dolly to take up to the room.
They arrive at their room and Matt realizes he has to tip the Bellhop. He only has a 20-dollar bill and he realize that he has to give her the entire 20-dollar bill to his horror. Jake opens the window to a terrible view of the roof, and Matt replays the horror of paying a full $20 tip in his head. Jake asks if he’s going to think about it the whole vacation and Matt says yes. Matt tells a story about growing up he couldn’t buy popcorn because his family couldn’t afford it. They could afford it, but his mom raised them like they didn’t have money. He saved up his money from doing chores like clearing out a beehive which left him stung multiple times. Once he had enough, he went to buy some popcorn and dropped it everywhere leading everyone to laugh at his error. Now anytime he spends money he goes back to his trauma. Jake tells Matt he’s going to show him how to take advantage of everything a hotel has to offer. Matt takes a shower, using the free shower items and comes out a new man. Jake commends him for using every towel they had in the bathroom.
Matt and Jake go outside to take a dip in the pool at Jake’s suggestion. They talk for a little and another man joins them. Sharing the pool with this other guy, they make casual conversations which eventually leads to each of them showing off their bathing suits to one another. Jake’s is too big, but he doesn’t want to buy a new one since he only uses it once or twice a year. The other guy asks if they’re at the hotel for business and they tell him they’re dropping off a suitcase of money. He then has a proposal for them. Up in his suite, he orders room service for all three of them. He shows Matt and Jake what his business is. He sells “objects of power”. The guy shows them how it works and tells them, CEOs, world leaders, all the popes and Glenn Close buy them. They each have a powerful magical force inside. Matt is drawn to them. The guy gives Matt an egg shaped one for free. Jake asks how much the guy makes off them. The mood suddenly shifts, and the guy gets offended by the question, kicking them out of his room.
Back in their boring, smaller room, Matt and Jake make a deal with each other. If Matt orders room service, Jake will buy a new bathing suit. Matt orders food and Jake informs him that he’s going to have to tip again. His eyes bulge. Matt goes downstairs to try to break a $20. The bartender won’t do it unless he buys something, as is hotel policy. She tells him he can go 20 miles down the road to the store to break it if he wants to. Matt, being stubborn, chooses to walk down the road, avoiding cars in the road, just to break a $20. The bellhop shows up to the room with the food while Jake is looking at bathing suits. Jake tells her Matt will be back with her tip and he tells her she can wait in the room with him. She accepts and ends up giving him pointers on buying the best bathing suit. Matt comes back 40 minutes later with the tip and she tells him he could have just tipped her on the bill. Poor Matt! Jake finds a suit he likes, but when he clicks it to order, they don’t have it in his size. He slams his laptop shut.
The bellhop notices the egg on the dresser and asks about it. Matt tells her that it is an object which exists for the entire purpose of not being noticed. She says it’s like hotel art. In a hilarious moment, Matt and Jake suddenly turn to the walls in their room and now see how much art has been in the room that they didn’t notice before. The bellhop starts to talk with Matt and Jake about life and work. It leads her to state that Matt and Jake likely earn more than her. Jake gets upset when she asks how much he makes, just like the guy in the suite did before kicking them out. She says it will probably feel good to tell someone how much they make and they each whisper in her ear how much they make. She tells them they shouldn’t tell each other what they make because it would ruin their friendship. She then threatens to tell them how much they make if they don’t tip her $20 each. They pay up.
The next day, they walk to the business center in the hotel with the briefcase. Inside a man sits silently, and they present him with the briefcase. He unlocks it and inside is a single silver card with braille written on it. When Hampton reads it, it reads “Fuck You”. He silently leaves the room with the briefcase. Back at the gas station, now on the way back home, Matt notices they are selling Jake’s bathing suit. Jake figures he must have bought it at a gas station somewhere and realizes he can just buy the same one in a size that now fits him. Matt gives up and tells him just to buy it. Matt picks a bag of popcorn off the rack and drops it. On the floor, he finds $20 and goes to pay. It rings up $5.01 and Matt takes a penny from the “take a penny, leave a penny” bowl on the counter. After paying, he puts the egg he got from the guy inside it. Later in the day, as the cashier counts the money in the register, he notices the egg out of the corner of his eye. It suddenly begins to glow, filling the whole store with a bright light, and the cashier screams as they cut to the end credits.
This episode was a nice break from the bleak office environment we see in pretty much every episode. It was almost completely focused on Matt and Jake with the exception of Christian in the beginning. Matt’s neurotic tendencies were on full display and cracked me up as he kept reliving his youth and trauma. Jake was his normal cool and casual self that was stubborn in his ways. The part with the guy and the objects was a bit strange and was pretty much a way to make that end scene work with it’s out of nowhere twist. The twist with there not being any money in the briefcase was also out of left field and was a bit strange too. In the end it all worked together though! Only 1 more episode left in this hilarious series! Now’s the time to appreciate Corporate while we still have a new episode to enjoy!
Corporate airs Wednesdays at 10:30PM on Comedy Central. You can stream Corporate on Comedy Central’s website or app.
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