Community, the tv show

though I guess the hundred or so episodes of Harmontown in the past month make up for it

xp Yeah - Harmontown is great, Harmon being a character in his own right. He manages to be very magnetic and sorta... repulsive? overbearing? relentless? simultaneously.

Liked him detailing how he's essentially derailed at least one of the three shows he's incubating right now.

not that i have any hope for the new season but that NYT article is annoying me. complaining about britta not remembering the history of inspector spacetime? goes beyond giving a bad review and sounds like catering to the rabid avclub fans. (and then he gets the info about pierce leaving wrong and implying that there might be hope for a season 5, which, o_0). and isn't happy endings a really well-liked show?

but if it's truly dumbed down, i don't really get the point. if NBC was going to strike the set months before the first episode even aired why didn't they just keep harmon on board and let him do what he wants. they're in might-as-well-burn-the-season-off mode now.

Seeing Harmontown live last week was certainly something.

NBC didn't fire Harmon, Sony did

YUP. i think i made that correction itt like half a year ago, whoops

but if it's truly dumbed down, i don't really get the point. if NBC was going to strike the set months before the first episode even aired why didn't they just keep harmon on board and let him do what he wants. they're in might-as-well-burn-the-season-off mode now.

― Alice 2 Chainz - "I Luv Dem Bones" (zachlyon), Wednesday, February 6, 2013 9:18 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I think there was some hope on Sony's part that they could still get a hit out of this, and that to make it a hit, they'd need to keep Chevy, who they likely figured wouldn't stick around for another Harmon season.

I got seasons 2 and 3 for Christmas and rewatched them. S2 really was all that great: I even really enjoy the more straightforward episodes that I didn't like as much the first time around, such as "Accounting for Lawyers". In fact, those can sometimes stand out as the funniest. (See also: "Urban Matrimony and the Sandwich Arts" from s3). A lot of s3 is great but "Contemporary Impressionists" and just about everything after Chang takes over the school have not gotten better. I actually skipped "Virtual Systems Analysis" this time around.

I think it was mainly to get enough Chevy-episodes for syndication. If they failed at that (they have close eighty episodes, right? is that enough?), then this will probably be seen as one of the dumbest moves by a studio ever.

I think there was some hope on Sony's part that they could still get a hit out of this, and that to make it a hit, they'd need to keep Chevy, who they likely figured wouldn't stick around for another Harmon season.

― Tarfumes The Escape Goat, Wednesday, February 6, 2013 11:09 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah. it sucks that it all seems so pointless now. i've never been a giant fan but the commercials so far and that review have me thinking i shouldn't even try.

eh, i've stuck it out this long, might as well watch it end

http://www.hitfix.com/whats-alan-watching/new-community-producers-moses-port-and-david-guarascio-preview-season-4

longish interview w/ the new showrunners. they mostly say the right things but they also kind of come across as the pod people of showrunners.

I get why the whole 'Britta forgetting Inspector Spacetime' seems like a trivial complaint on the surface, but this is a show that's gotten a lot of mileage out of callbacks to small details, and if the new showrunners are that inattentive to detail, it certainly doesn't bode well for the tone of the show.

OTM. Plus, for all that "Inspector Spacetime" sucked, it was a big part of s3. It is pretty weak, then, for the new creators/writers to overlook that Britta introduced Abed to it in the first place.

can't wait for the thinkpieces

I can imagine Britta forgetting what DST is.
But I don't see what the problem with that NYT piece is. The writer was pretty accurate in describing Happy Endings (obviously also referring to stuff like New Girl and HIMYM) Those shows are also more popular than Community.

But the changes in “Community” feel like a total surrender. What the new episodes often resemble is the type of post-“Friends” sitcom that is defined by a jokey solipsism, in which the humor comes not from anything we’d recognize as real life but from the barely distinguishable characters’ constant battle to one-up one another. As it happens, Mr. Guarascio and Mr. Port worked together on one of those shows, “Happy Endings.”

this is super hilarious to me because the escalating gonzo banter on "Happy Endings" closely mirrors the way I interact with my friends

also, if you can't tell the characters on "Happy Endings" or "New Girl" apart, you have issues

xp those shows are also critic-approved in a way friends never was. well not HIMYM but i don't think HIMYM really fits in with new girl/happy endings/ben and kate/whatever that show with maya rudolph was

Xpost where did anyone say that?

I can definitely tell the characters from New Girl apart from the characters on Happy Endings

also not sure how “Wow, there are 50 years of these, huh?” = not knowing anything about it, maybe there's more to it but that's a weird quote to single out for your review cause that's not at all unrealistic given the situation

wait, so previously I was supposed to view 'Community' as something I'd recognise in real life?

i don't know what anyone's point is anymore

OH THIS THREAD, MISSED YOU SO MUCH

Sepinwall not convinced by new episodes either.

Cue fan backlash against chubby tv critics

Imo Sepinwall can be really dumb when it comes to comedy, so I'll watch the new episode with an open mind.

Xpost where did anyone say that?

But the changes in “Community” feel like a total surrender. What the new episodes often resemble is the type of post-“Friends” sitcom that is defined by a jokey solipsism, in which the humor comes not from anything we’d recognize as real life but from the barely distinguishable characters’ constant battle to one-up one another. As it happens, Mr. Guarascio and Mr. Port worked together on one of those shows, “Happy Endings.”

It's directly in the text you quoted, which you then went on to say also applied to New Girl.

My argument is that if you can't get past the common friend language of the characters in these shows to see how they are different and distinct from each other, you have problems.

But you said i couldnt tell the difference between characters on new girl and happy endings

No, I didn't. "And" is not the same word as "or".

And neither means the same thing as "from"

Welcome back communtiy

There's always so much hostility in this thread! You'd think we were talking about tipping or something.

also not sure how “Wow, there are 50 years of these, huh?” = not knowing anything about it, maybe there's more to it but that's a weird quote to single out for your review cause that's not at all unrealistic given the situation

Yeah, tbf, that quote could make perfect sense. I haven't seen the episode yet and wasn't thinking that critically about the actual quote tbh.

Xpost i was joking about how i misread your post, but i never expected my reward would be a pissy grammar lesson

my entire existence on this board is defined by dick jokes and pissy grammar lessons

Well Britta directly chose Inspector Spacetime because of it's overwhelming amount of episodes, following the bleak ending of Cougarton Abbey after only six episodes. So that there was 50 years of them should probably be the only thing she knew.

It depends on the context. It could make sense in e.g. the context of "Wow, this is stupid. They made 50 years' worth of these, huh?"

I can see this episode is going to require line-by-line close reading. Maybe we should tweet Gillian Jacobs and get her perspective.

U&K

not terrible so far i give it an 8.1025 let's see if minutes 9 through 22 can keep it above panic level pink

Is it better than "Loveless"?

I think that even if I hadn't read 2 or 3 articles that had told me I wouldn't enjoy it I still wouldn't have enjoyed it. Of course, there have been past episodes I didn't like very much for similar reasons. I'm not giving up just yet.

I thought it was fine. I get the feeling people/critics are wanting this to fail (and in a way, it already has, given the sets being struck and all).

How does it stack up compared to previous season openers, bearing in mind that they previously haven't been very good either?

i thought it was imperfect but still plenty funny.

"our student records are stored in a microsoft paint file."

I get the feeling people/critics are wanting this to fail

Fwiw I'm more invested in a Community that continues to be funny than I am in Dan Harmon claiming a pyrrhic victory really. I want it to succeed, at least on a qualitative level.

nah this was rly weak, felt like a cover version of a song that fails to either understand what makes the song work or put an interesting reinterpretation on it

even though it was (credited as)* written and directed by returning ppl. same editors?

chuckled three times


*Sepinwall's interview with Guarascio & Port makes it clear what a huge hand they had in shaping the "new version"