Monsters of Television

“Is this you being me-TA?”

Oh, Community. I missed you and our wily knowledge of sitcoms (and of my funny bone).

A common trait for shows, of any genre, is to ramp up the things that seemed to work well in the first season and just keep doing it. Lost decided that it needed a lot more crazy mystery stuff because that’s what people were talking about, so ramp it up to 5 or 6 hatches and some creepy microfilm (and more survivors!). Veronica Mars went with a more layered mystery and more looks into Neptune, ramping up the noir Naked City (not as gritty, of course).

For its return to the screen, Community keeps the meta humor running full blast, and while I do find meta humor very funny and engaging, it does crowd out the less meta and more humane, emotional beats that I’ve always felt the show excelled at.

There’s no doubt that Community gets sitcoms and their history and their structure and their tropes. Indeed, the thrust of the episode, that it speeds up the whole “will they?/won’t they?” triangle to such an absurd and logical conclusion (take care of it in one episode, including a wedding), is so in love with the genre that it often feels like both an ode to and an eulogy of the relationship conceit. The episode handles the entire structure with finesse that you know where it’s going, but almost can’t believe they’re willing to go that far. It upends our expectations while still confirming them, and there’s a great deal of humor to be found in that.

There’s nothing new in Britta and Jeff pretending to be in a relationship, or that it crushes poor Annie. Or that Troy and Pierce had issues living together (or so it seemed). Or that everyone bands against Jeff. That it all happens so quickly allows the show to essentially reset itself to a status quo, like how sitcoms work from episode to episode: the end makes everything okay again. Indeed, what would take other sitcoms a season or half a season to resolve, Community

And Community loves structure. Everything tends to get resolved at the end, with a moral lesson. Now, you all know I love the moral lesson the show passes along because it helps ground the show’s wackiness. It keeps the meta in check, essentially. I think this is ncessary to keep the show funny but also prevent it from becoming too self-absorbed, too interested in just being a meta show instead of telling solid stories with smartly written and acted characters.

The climax of the episode, the ever increasingly brilliant whirlwind that is almost always centered around the study table, was just the write speed and degree of humor. Like with the previous ones, the study table scene doesn’t allow you to catch your breath between humor and character beats, since they become so intertwined with one another, tugging at you because we care about these characters and their situations but it’s just so damn funny that you can’t decide what to do, so you just keep laughing.

I do feel like that the message of respect amongst the group does get a little lost, though. While I loved the crossbow gag, and Betty White sells the hell out of it (largely because she’s Betty White), it deflates the moral a bit. Pile it on with Chang’s plan to destroy the study group (in a very tired reference) and the lessons get lost. Community doesn’t make a habit of this sort of thing, so I’m not all that frustrated by it. And I like that Chang will continue to be an antagonist for the group, even in his new capacity (and it’s organic, too), but I just feel like the conflict and character beats fell flat at the end while the jokes soared, and I like balance.

Quibble aside, Community is streets ahead of pretty much every comedy on TV right now. And it’s highways ahead of Outsourced.

FINAL THOUGHTS

• Allison Brie is amazing. Hair twirling. Little girl doe eyes. Running punch. Brilliance.
• Yay for another excellent rap!
• “In TV, we have likable leading men. In real life, we have you.” I like that line a lot.