What’s Worth Watching: Community’s New Course
Community, “Ladders” and “Lawnmower Maintenance and Postnatal Care” (Tuesday, March 17, Yahoo Screen)
The motto at Greendale Community College might as well be “Never Say Die,” given the remarkable history of this studiously zany cult sitcom. Its niche ratings kept the show “on the bubble” for five against-the-odds seasons—including one where the show’s creator, the mercurial Dan Harmon, was fired (and eventually rehired)—until NBC finally sent Community to cancellation purgatory. Enter Yahoo, seeking a property to generate buzz for its streaming service, and a rare TV miracle was born. Community gets its sixth season (if not yet a movie) after all. And while the show is minus a few old friends—Chang (Ken Jeong), naturally, suspects a conspiracy against minorities—the rapid-fire jokes and self-referential surrealism are largely and merrily unabated.
A welcome addition to the campus: deadpan Paget Brewster as a frostily efficient, seemingly humorless consultant hired to put the school back on course. Naturally, she’s not exactly welcomed by Jeff Winger (Joel McHale) and his anarchic gang. “How much can you improve Greendale before it stops being Greendale?” he wonders. Not to worry. With a lunatic like Dean Pelton (Jim Rash) still calling the shots, when he’s not immersed in a virtual-reality bubble, achievement isn’t exactly on this institution’s agenda. Oddly, even by this show’s standards, Abed (Danny Pudi) greets the newcomer with an open, if curious, mind: “I can’t determine if you have any specific purpose, flaw, quirk, or point of view that makes you a creative addition to the group.” Ah, Greendale, how we would have missed you!
Check out all of our Community Q&As:
Dan Harmon & Chris McKenna |
Ken Jeong |
Alison Brie |
Gillian Jacobs |
Keith David & Paget Brewster |
Jim Rash |
Danny Pudi |
Joel McHale |