Community, the tv show

Leonard fought for North Korea, huh

Yeah, that was a nice touch.

Later on, Troy would say the war was awesome, but also... not awesome?

Holy shit, Keith David

Wow, could this show have picked a less timely object of satire? I don't know if that made it funnier or less funny but my wife thought it sucked. I guess I'm on the fence, but there was a lot I loved, but the meta in this one was pretty meta.

Oh, the Rambo joke was dead-on. It totally technically should be "Rambo II: First Blood Part III."

Ken Burns documentaries are always timely ffs.

Hard to believe, but "The Civil War" was almost 25 years ago. Time flies when you're timely.

"North Korea" was my fav gag...
so who thinks that was actually Chase in the pillow suit?

On the s1 DVDs, they say that he does all his own physical pratfalls etc so I can believe that it was.

Still on the fence about this one. Might need to watch a second time again. This is OTM:

the meta in this one was pretty meta.

Having said that, this show's genre parodies have never been that timely. My Dinner with André was 30 years old, surely; Goodfellas 20 years old; 1984 65 years old, etc.

Well, "1984" is a perennial, and explicitly referenced in the episode. "Goodfellas" is iconic and oft parodied. "My Dinner with Andre" I thought was being willfully out of date. "The Civil War" ... I dunno. Ken Burns's style is iconic and oft-paradied, but this was pretty specific. Which is why I'm not sure if it was intentional enough. It would have been funny if it was it was a "Jazz" parody.

Did cynical folk roll their eyes and hand-wring about Kane homages in early Simpsons episodes when they came out?

probably!

Tbch, I didn't know there was a Burns documentary about the US Civil War that this was directly parodying. I just thought it was a spoof of PBS historical documentaries more generally.

Do you think the Christmas episode could have worked as a Jazz parody? The parody of Glee, while timely, was pretty weak as parody.

Tbch, I didn't know there was a Burns documentary about the US Civil War that this was directly parodying.

― EveningStar (Sund4r), Saturday, April 7, 2012 4:51 PM (16 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

How on Earth...

not everybody lives in the U.S.

(i did not know that either)

b-b-b-b-b-but ken... BURNS... does this THING. A THING that he DOES.

i've seen his baseball ones tho, if it makes you feel better. (they bored me to tears)

Wow, could this show have picked a less timely object of satire?

I don't these things in Community as satires--more as borrowed frames to plug the characters into. The episodes aren't really critiquing "My Dinner With Andre" or Ken Burns. What would be the point?

lol i never knew this was a direct parody, i just thought it was 'general war documentary types'.

Ken Burns Civil War is all-time

If you don't get down with that, I dunno what to tell you

Different if you don't know it at all, but if you saw it & are just blowing it off then omg jaded much

It would have been funny if it was it was a "Jazz" parody.

Are you serious?

No.

Same thing with that NYT profile a while back; these aren't parodies, they're genre exercises, but we're not used to a thing explicitly adopting genre tropes for an outing without being a parody of said genre.

I totally get that, and it's really not a deal breaker for me, but this was more than just making fun of documentaries. It was specifically making fun of Ken Burns's "The Civil War." Which makes it a parody in my p=book, and is perfectly cool, if that's your thing. I just get this feeling I've seen it made fun of a lot. Unlike, say, "My Dinner with Andre." In a lot of ways the pledge drive thing at the end sort of saved it for me, especially since this show (and its cast) has a history of making fun of PBS/NPR.

I didn't know it was a specific thing either. Still loved it.

http://www.twitvid.com/TPEJC

ken burns is a genre

remember how some people last year were criticizing that 30 Rock episode last year that parodied Bravo housewife shows TOO closely, making it unenjoyable? that's kind of the vibe i got from this, that the humor got watered down because they stuck to the Burns tone a little too much

still, some good laughs in this ep no doubt. keith david 4eva!

wait what that was the best 30 rock episode

HAM

Dan Harmon painted cameo

I would have been down with this ep going all in and only featuring still photos with panning and voiceovers.

I would too, for the most part. (Missing Pierce's secret weapon in action would be the dealbreaker.)

Would have lost the moment where the pillow fight dissolves to just Troy and Abed, though, and I wouldn't want to have gone without it.

Civil War is streaming on Netflix for anyone looking for extra comparison lols

Some of these 'very special' Community episodes do roughly what Wet Hot American Summer tried to do. It's not necessarily parody, and it's not necessarily 'spot the reference' pastiche. It's basically taking a thing that was barely a thing (like summer camp comedies or My Dinner With Andre) and treating it as if it were a genre, with all of the attendant tropes and signals and codes of an existing genre (except as derived from one or very few sources)...while at the same time wryly tweaking the non-genre in question? They're operating on a lotta layers, and I'm glad most Community viewers are savvy enough to appreciate the effort.

blank pastiche blah blah impending apocalypse blah blah 2012 blah blah capitalism

bad epi

You don't need to spot the exact reference to get that this was riffing off a particular kind of historical documentary, really.

This reminded me more of the Heart of Darkness episode than any of the other warfare eps actually.

Bears pointing out that the Dean is absolutely fucking hilarious when he's completely lost control of the school and doesn't know what to do.

"Jeffrey, find me!"

You don't need to spot the exact reference to get that this was riffing off a particular kind of historical documentary, really.

I think we all got that.

it was very specifically that ken burns doc that it was sending up, tho of course that's not like sui generis or whatevs.

i enjoyed this, i liked the parody, i didnt find it a partic funny episode tho.

i am unfamiliar with the ken burns thing and with larger traditions of american documentary-making, and as such i got not a whole lot out of this. ho hum

the larger traditions really helped me understand those jokes

"Jeffrey, find me!"

I remember when I had to go watch a decade's worth of British news programming so I could fully appreciate Monty Python.

if you're american you don't actually appreciate monty python, just saying

just saying nonsense