This is more of a review of S3 up until this point but I can't believe how interesting this show has gotten. To me it's the total inverse of Atlanta, a show that Dave will inexorably be compared to for obvious reasons. I loved S1 and S2 of Atlanta but it was like they lost what made the show special (imo at least) and got too high on their own stuff, ultimately feeling disjointed and uneven with moments with some very high peaks but a lot of low troughs. That's how I would describe Dave S1 & S2, the Benny Blanco stuff for example, I found hard to watch at times it was just boring. Same with the Kareem episode which felt like Dave got Kareem to agree to work with him so he had to shoehorn something in.
S3 of Dave, however, has just been all highs, culminating with this strange but brilliant episode. The horror vibe of it and everything with Gata, I would say the only downside is that sometimes episodes like this seem like they could benefit from 15 min more runtime...but then again they did that with Ted Lasso S3 and it's been a pacing disaster so who knows. Either way, Dave S2 to S3 has been one of the biggest jumps in quality I've experienced with a show in a long time season to season, usually the change is what we saw with Atlanta when the stars get too big and the writers lose the thread of what made them special but here it's been just the opposite and I never thought I would say this but I like S3 of Dave MUCH more than S3 of Atlanta (1 & 2 are still sacred though).