(Note: This post is not movie related, however, if there is any justice in the world, it will be when Community: The Movie debuts in theaters worldwide)
Let me state from the get go that I completely understand that what I'm feeling is ridiculous. I understand that regardless of my devotion to any artistic endeavor, be it music, film, literature, television, or stick figure puppetry (RIP Horsebot 3000) that I have a wonderful and amazing life that is completely independent of that devotion. That having been said, this is a first for me. I have never mourned the cancellation of a television show before.
Sure, there have been T.V. shows that I was sad to see go. M*A*S*H, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, The Cosby Show, Friends, Futurama, The Office and many others were brilliant shows that left an emptiness on the tube when they were gone. However, these were shows that had a long run and finished with a strong sense of closure.
There have been shows that I have become a devotee of after their early cancellation. Had I been watching Freaks and Geeks, Better Off Ted, or Pushing Daisies from the beginning, I would have been feeling the same way I do today. You see, today Community was cancelled and I'm devastated.
There's a reason that Community has one of the most vocally devoted fandoms in all of television. It's a show that's not afraid to get messy in the name of creating something different. When you tune into Community you always know you're going to get the funny, but you never really know what subgenre of funny it will be. You see, in spite of the fact that it is, on the surface, a one camera comedy about a lovable group of misfits at a horrible community college, it manages to also be a satire of just about every type of film and t.v. show there is. There are musical episodes, animated episodes, horror episodes, and puppet episodes. The list of widely diverse films and television shows that it directly spoofs includes Goodfellas, My Dinner With Andre, Pulp Fiction, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Glee, M*A*S*H, Scrubs, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, The Shawshank Redemption, Dawn of the Dead, The Ring, The Hunger Games, Apollo 13, Shutter Island, Die Hard, A Fistful of Dollars, Star Wars, The Conversation, Mean Girls, Terminator, RoboCop, The Color of Money, The Shining, Ken Burns' The Civil War, Scarface, The Matrix, 28 Days Later, Ghost, Dead Poets Society, Indecent Proposal, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Hearts of Darkness Freaky Friday, and that's just touching the surface. The miracle of this is that Community manages to directly spoof these things with such a deft hand that all of the spoofs actually fit in the basic premise of the show. Not only that, but key character developments have been brilliantly handled in these "spoof" episodes.
Community is more densely layered than any other network comedy other than possibly The Simpsons. There are hilarious surface jokes, multi-episode character arc developments, tons of background jokes that make re-watching episodes extra fun and even jokes that take multiple episodes to pay off, rewarding the patience of the sharp eyed viewer. One example of the latter is the "Beetlejuice Joke." As you know, In the film Beetlejuice, the way you get the titular specter to appear is to utter his name three times. In season one of Community a character said "Beetlejuice" once. In season two, another said it again. In season three, during the Halloween episode, Annie mentions "the Beetlejuice soundtrack," at which point Beetlejuice strolls by behind her.
So, in honor of my favorite t.v. show and the hopeful saving of it by Hulu or Netflix, I give you my ten favorite episodes of Community:
Honorable Mentions:
The Science of Illusion (Season 1) - If for nothing else, Annie's accidental self-pepper spraying. Best line: "These are not tears! This is self-inflicted friendly fire!"
Epidemiology (Season 2) - The Dawn of the Dead episode in which Community manages to pull off actual zombies in a semi-realistic comedy about a community college. Best line: (as a psychotic cat continuously jumps across the room in the basement) Troy: "What about the zombies?!?" Jeff: "Backburner, Troy! This cat must be dealt with!"
Abed's Uncontrollable Christmas (Season 2) - Abed has a psychotic break and sees everyone as stop-motion animation a la Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. Best line: Annie: "I'm taking a relaxation course next semester and I was going to use the break to do all the reading in advance."
10. Regional Holiday Music (Season 3) - After the college glee club has a corporate mental breakdown, the study group is recruited by a creepily charismatic, sweater vest-wearing Glee Club adviser (terrifically played by SNL's Taran Killam). They resist, but are one by one drawn in to the Glee-fulness. This episode is a brilliant spoof of Glee by way of Invasion of the Body Snatchers. The songs are catchy and hilarious and the cast has a blast with the premise. Best line: Troy: "Who hates glee? Listen to how that sounds. "Glee" literally means....glee."
9. Basic Human Anatomy (Season 4) - The best episode of the much derided, Dan Harmon-less fourth season, this episode was written by Oscar winner Jim Rash (who also plays Greendale's dean). In it Troy doesn't want to deal with breaking up with Britta, so he pretends to switch bodies with Abed, a la Freaky Friday. What could have been a throw away movie spoof turns in to a truly thoughtful character study about friends, relationships, and how difficult it is to to face hard truths. Best line: Dean Pelton: "Uh, I'm at Greendale , stuck in the body of a man that could be Gollum's shadow. So yeah, I'd say it's half past suck."
8. Modern Warfare (Season 1) - a.k.a. "The Paintball Episode", this is the first time Community did a full-blown movie spoof as Jeff is forced to channel his inner John McClane in order to win a school-wide paintball competition with a highly desired grand prize. Directed by Justin Lin, the director of the last three Fast and Furious movies, Modern Warfare feels wonderfully cinematic and gives each character moments to shine. Best line: Abed: "To be blunt, Jeff and Britta are no Ross and Rachel. Your lack of chemistry and sexual tension are putting us all on edge, which is ironically, and hear this one every level, keeping us from being Friends."
7. Digital Estate Planning (Season 3) - One of creator Dan Harmon's least favorite episodes, I think this one is just brilliant. After the death of his multi-millionaire father, Pierce is instructed to invite seven of his friends ("Levar Burton was a maybe") to a warehouse where his father had developed a 8-bit video game which will determine who inherits his fortune, Pierce or one of his friends. Most of the episode is the video game, with each of the characters scanned so there are little 8-bit versions of them playing. On a visual level, it's one of the most fascinating episodes, but it also contains some pretty terrific character work and a high level of hilarity. Best line: Jeff: "When you die you go all the way back to the study room, so don't die." Shirley: "Yeah, I used to really love dying, but that speech really turned me around."
6. Foosball and Nocturnal Vigilantism (Season 3) - One of the under-nourished relationships on Community was Jeff and Shirley. In season 1 there was Social Psychology, but it basically dealt with how little these two characters have in common. Here, not only do we discover that they share a passion for foosball, but also that when they were both children Shirley was a bully who motivated Jeff to be the hard and shallow man he became. Their differences explode in an epic game of foosball that transforms into an anime extravaganza. In the end, their friendship is stronger because of their honesty. This episode also has the sweetest ending shot of the entire series. Best line: Jeff (to the Germans loudly monopolizing the foosball table) "Gentlemen, my name is Clarence Thaddeus Foos. My grandfather, Fletcher Morton Foos, invented this game for one purpose - to have the loudest, dumbest thing happen. Now it has. The game of foosball is completed. You're free to return to your undoubtedly hearing-impaired families."
5. Geothermal Escapism (Season 5) - Another epic episode in which the whole school plays a game of "The Floor Is Lava", turning the entire campus into a Mad Max-ian dystopia after Abed announces that he's giving a comic book worth $15,000 as the grand prize. In the end, Abed had designed the game so he could show his friends the literal lava that he's seeing as a result of the impending departure of his best friend, Troy. The Troy/Abed friendship had really been the center of the quirky nature of the show from season 1, so dissolving the duo because Donald Glover, who played Troy, was leaving the show, needed to be epic. This episode did not disappointment. Plus, it ends with a terrific Levar Burton cameo and a wonderfully poignant Aimee Mann remake of Styx' "Come Sail Away." Best line: Magnitude: "I'm actually British!"
4. Paradigms of Human Memory (season 2) - Best...clip episode....ever. Why? Because none of the clips were from any previously aired episode. The clips used were from non-existent high concept episodes, including the gang being trapped in a haunted house, the gang visiting a ghost town, the gang fighting bed bugs at a cheap motel, the gang being institutionalized when they experienced mass mercury poisoning, the gang encountering drug runners and Pierce almost being executed for racism....every clip is a gold mine. Plus, it's the episode that gives us the fan mantra, "Six seasons and a movie." Best line: Troy: "You can yell at me all you want. I've seen enough movies to know that popping the back of a raft makes it go faster!"
3. Advanced Dungeons & Dragons (Season 2) - One of the most emotionally difficult episodes, AD&D, deals with Jeff trying to save the life of a suicidal student by inviting him to play D&D with the study group. He leaves Pierce out of it to avoid any mishaps, but Pierce finds out, forces himself in the game, and officially becomes the villain of season 2. This is a consistently funny episode, but it also has some moments of discomforting cruelty as Pierce tries to undermine the suicidal Neal for appearing to replace him in the group. Thoughtful, smart, and emotional, AD&D is Community at its riskiest. Best line: Troy (about the game): "Shouldn't there be a board or pieces or something to Jenga?"
2. Remedial Chaos Theory (Season 3) - The source of all the "Darkest Timeline" talk. In this episode, the group tries to decide who to send to get pizza for a apartment warming party for Troy and Abed. Abed posits that if they choose by means of dice, they will actually be creating six different timelines. The episode then shows the different outcomes of different people being chosen. The results are everything from everyone happily dancing together to different couplings beginning to Pierce getting shot and dying. This is the type of episode that makes Community a favorite of the MENSA crowd. Best line: Troy (to Pierce after Pierce decides not to give Troy a mean joke housewarming gift): "I demand to be housewarmed! You're bad at gift giving!"
1. Conspiracy Theories and Interior Design (Season 2) - Jeff and Annie work together to discover a deep-seeded conspiracy while Troy and Abed bring the joys of blanket forts to the entire campus. I know this is an unconventional choice for best episode, but I seriously can't stop laughing through this entire half-hour. The Jeff and Annie plot involves some really terrific jabs at the conspiracy thriller, while the blanket fort subplot is purely delightful. Then, when the two plots intersect as the conspiracy plot erupts in a chase scene that careens through the emerging blanket city, comedy gold explodes. Best line (or rather favorite out of an endlessly quotable episode): Dean Pelton (rocking back and forth, pulling his hoodie around his head after thinking he had witnessed multiple murders and then finding out they were fake) "Would that this hoodie were a time hoodie!" Runner-up: Jeff (blocked by a group of people during the blanket fort chase): "What's that?!?" Troy: "It's the Latvian Independence Parade. Don't look at me, they had the proper permits!"
So, with that, I say that I hope this is merely a tribute to a show in transition. If there was ever a fan base capable of shepherding a series from one network to another (or possibly to a streaming service), it's the Communies.
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