Ongoing Community Discussion Thread

[Aldo]

They did say we were going to get a more 'grounded' show before the season started, but is that even what we want? I'm curious to what they are planning for the paintball episode.

Speaking as a huge fan of Season 5, I thought I'd be ok with a more grounded approach. I just didn't think it'd be this grounded. I guess I figured they'd still do a high concept episode here and there but now seven episodes in (I've only seen the first six though) it does feel pretty low-key.

Again, I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing, the episodes have been quite funny, but they all feel pretty much disconnected from each other. I know a similar argument could be made of Season 5, but they at least paid lip service to the 'Save Green Dale" committee and had the first arc where they wrote Troy off the show.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

I don't have a problem with the show being more grounded, and I don't think that's the problem. Season 1 had a lot of fantastic grounded episodes. The pool episode, the pottery class, the football team. These episodes really deeply explored the characters' emotional state and didn't have all the meta-commentary.

Frankie and Elroy are individually good characters but they have no chemistry with the other characters. They're also older with more established personalities and values so have less room to grow. The remaining original characters also now have such established relationships they have become static and stopped growing as well. In season 1 where there was such untraveled territory in Jeff/Britta, Jeff/Annie, Annie/Troy, Abed/Troy, etc, they could do a grounded episode and have it pack an emotional punch, but now they can only do it with a strong theme. One of the reasons season 5 worked is that Buzz Hickey had lots of room to grow.

 

[Karzak]

I did appreciate Abed's self-aware comment that he "Hasn't tried" as much since Troy left. Partly because it was funny, partly because it felt true.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

That episode just kinda sucked. Just wall to wall self referencing.

And it's becoming more and more obvious most of the sets are gone. Other than the study room how many scenes this season have taken place in places we've ever seen before? And there aren't interesting new locations either, just these dusky claustrophobic spaces.

Chang has to be the Ryan of Community. He plays a different character in every season. They did a parody of bad scifi but didn't do anything that interesting with it and then the catharsis at the end had nothing to do with the rest of the episode. In season 5 it was obvious they were trying hard and still tapping into what made the show great, but season 6 seems more and more on autopilot.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Ok, I'm watching 'The Psychology of Letting Go' right now. I just noticed, in the background of this one random scene there's a woman apparently giving birth in the back of a car behind Shirley, while Pierce is listening to his mother's message about her death.

I'd never seen that before. Mind blown.

Have you guys still been watching the new ones? I guess the lack of discussion in this thread suggests it's not going over well.

It's still Community but I don't think it's been very good most of this season. And I loved season 5. It's hard to say what's wrong with it, it's not like season 4 where the characters and the logic were just kinda wrong. The ideas just aren't really clicking. And they're leaning so heavily on the meta stuff it's lost its charm.

Wouldn't it be crazy if when the show ended, we found out everything after season 3 was Abed still doing his show about the group from season 1?

 

[Aldo]

I'm like four episodes behind. The fact that I can watch them anytime doesn't really push me to watch them when they're first released...and well, I just kind of stopped I guess.

Next episode is the Paintball one, so maybe I'll just binge watch all the episodes I'm behind so I can be caught up for that episode.

 

[Aldo]

I just binge watched 3 of the four episodes I was behind on (Advanced Safety Features, Intro to Recycled Cinema, and Grifting 101).

Out of those three, I really enjoyed 'Intro to Recycled Cinema.' It felt like the kind of batshit insane episodes that made up the majority of Season 5, and I loved it. The other two had good points too, but they didn't tickle my funny bone as much as 'Cinema did.

 

[Corran Horn]

Ok, I'm watching 'The Psychology of Letting Go' right now. I just noticed, in the background of this one random scene there's a woman apparently giving birth in the back of a car behind Shirley, while Pierce is listening to his mother's message about her death.

I'd never seen that before. Mind blown.

I believe that's the episode where Abed has a storyline that's in the background the entire episode. I'm sure the compilation is on youtube somewhere.

yeap.

 

[Aldo]

OK I'm caught up with Season 6 now. I really liked the most recent episode, sure it was another variation on the Bottle Episode format, but it was done well, and I loved how Abed kept trying to flash back trying to change things, when in reality that just doesn't work.

I'm excited for the Paintball episode tomorrow, and eager to see what they do to wrap this season up with the next two episodes.

 

[bigdaddy]

There is almost no chance of the show coming back for a season 7, (But maybe a movie right?!) so I'm wondering how it will all end. No ending will be as grand as the season 5 finale. Yahoo saved us from death by comet.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Maybe, at the end of season 1, Abed convinced the rest of the characters to act in the show he was filming about them, and that's what we've been watching ever since.

That would be the meta-ending, so would not be at all surprised. But I would like to see Jeff finally escape Greendale and find a way to be a lawyer again without being an unfeeling manipulator.

I wonder if Frankie is going to wet blanket the hell out of the paintball episode. Like "So let me get this straight. There's always this great prize that everyone wants but nobody has ever thought about cheating? It's not like there are any referees."

They don't seem to be trying too hard to develop Frankie and Elroy. Buzz Hickey got much more development in just as few episodes.

 

[Aldo]

They don't seem to be trying too hard to develop Frankie and Elroy. Buzz Hickey got much more development in just as few episodes.

I never cared for those two episodes where he got a lot of developement because I felt like it was the writers telling us how much we should like this new character rather than showing us. It kind of detracted from a few episodes in Season 5 because they spent too much time on it.

On the other hand Frankie and Elroy have edged into the group nicely and we're getting a lot of fun plots that involve the whole group and not just a few characters.

I'm starting to be OK with how Jeff is being utilized this season, because his arc make sense. He realizes he probably won't leave the school so he's pretty much just given up and gone with the flow. A very Jeff thing to do.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

They should have shown how he went from having fun teaching kids how to beat prosecutors to not giving a crap though. It felt like there was a missing episode between his first teacher episode and the prisoners episode.

I disagree about the Buzz Hickey episodes. If they didn't have such a great actor it might have felt like they were shoving him down our throats but I think Jonathan Banks did an incredible job with it and made it feel natural. D&D 2 was one of the strongest episodes of the season. I guess the one where he handcuffed Abed to the cabinet wasn't as good. And he was hilarious in Floor Is Lava.

I don't think Frankie and Elroy have much chemistry with the group. Elroy just seems annoyed with them all the time (Even though the actor is doing a good job), and Frankie hasn't really socialized with them outside her job. She's also taken the 'Sane person' role so much to herself that it makes the other normally sane characters take all crazy roles.

 

[Aldo]

When I'm talking about the Hickey episodes that I feel drag the show down a tad are the one you mentioned, and the one where he helps Annie get the bulletin board hung back up (ultimately doing it himself). I don't have an issue with these episodes now, as I quite enjoy them, especially for reasons you cite (Banks' performance, for one) but when I first saw them they felt off to me.

I gave Season 5 another go when it dropped on DVD and ended up loving it, and I hope you do the same with Season 6 (though I think you will). I totally get the issues you have currently, it's just that I'm not having them. In fact I'm really digging how insane this season has been.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

I liked the paintball episode. It fleshed out Frankie more. Though conceptually it was a little bit of a retread of the season premiere.

 

[Guy Gardener]

"What's paintball?"

Okay, is Frankie Annie from the future?

Anne Frank! it's a blatant clue!

If Anne Frank is from the past, then Frank Anne is from the future!

 

[JirinPanthosa]

So you're suggesting that Annie came back in time to save her friends from being childish forever?

That would be hilarious if it were true but I don't think it's what Harmon is going for.

I think Frankie is Harmon's way of reconciling the original intent of the show with what it turned into. Frankie's job seems to be to drag the show back to the relative normalcy of the beginning. Here we see her reversing the show's first true high concept episode which is symbolic of that.

 

[Karzak]

This is encouraging:

"Holy shit. That's what I always would've guessed, times two or three'. I always knew there was like way more people watching this shit than what ever that .9 represented."

...

"Everybody in the world watches Community, now we know, now that we're not being measured by Nielsen [ . . . ] Surprise surprise you know, Yahoo knows how to count the clicks, and guess what? Holy shit! Jesus christ! Like you always knew!"

Dan Harmon

http://www.harmontown.com/2015/04/episode-141-the-jews-abide/

 

[Campe]

This week's was fun. But honestly? I don't know how much more of this I can do. I don't think the quality has been nearly as good this year. To add... We've lost Pierce, Troy, Shirley. Ken Jeong has a new show coming up in the fall. Will he have time for Community? I know he says he'll never leave. But will he have time? While Danny Pudi's pilot wasn't picked up, that's a good indication he's ready to move on. Either this is it. Or it might as well be if we lose anyone else.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

I would be sad to lose Community but I've been mentally prepared for three years. I came to terms with the show being over during the gas leak season, the last two seasons have been bonus.