The Return of Community

On Thursday, March 15, the most consistently brilliant show on TV, NBC's Community, returns from its hiatus. The show was shelved due to poor ratings, and the second this happened, the show's diehard fans have been staging flash mobs and other protests demanding the show get put back on the air. Thankfully, NBC heard the outcry. 

Community is a show for our culture, but for some reason, not a lot of people seem to have caught on to that yet. It's a show that transcends beyond being a simple television program by surrounding itself with so much pop culture that it can use this knowledge to reflect and step outside the confines of what a normal show can do. 

Community started as a show that followed Jeff Winger (Joel Mchale), a lawyer kicked out of his practice due to a lack of a college degree and his attempts to obtain a degree so he can return to being a lawyer at his local community college, Greendale. But now the show has evolved beyond that. 

Jeff found a study group in episode one, and it is made up of Abed (Danny Pudi), Troy (Donald Glover), Annie (Alison Brie), Sherri (Yvette Nicole Brown), Pierce (Chevy Chase) and Britta (Gillian Jacobs). Now, three seasons later, each of these characters has developed to the point that they have grown to be major characters now that all stand next to Jeff in their levels of importance. Various other characters like Chang (Ken Jeong) and Dean Pelton (Jim Rash, who is a newly minted Academy Award winner for Adapted Screenplay for The Descendents) have moved in to fill the supporting roles and add a nice dose of insanity.

Pointing out the brilliance of Community is a hard task. There are so many moments that exemplify why this show is so smart and funny, but a greatest hits list will have to do. The best way to start is the little things, such as the episode where Abed somehow gets involved in the lives of a very pregnant woman and her husband and eventually ends up helping her give birth. This sounds normal, at least for a sitcom. But then you have to realize that this takes place in the background of the actual episode. For example, we see two other characters having a conversation that pertains to the plot, but if you look closely in the background, there's Abed helping a pregnant woman give birth.

The show has also taken cliché sitcom episodes like a greatest hits episode where old clips from the show are flipped as the characters reminisce. Instead of the old flashback clips, we are instead treated to completely new scenes that we've never seen before, presented as if they had happened and we just weren't there to see it. 

Then there are the brilliant paintball episodes that end the first and second seasons. The first season's paintball episode pays homage to various action movies, with the second season's paying homage to westerns. Other movies that are referenced through the shows are classics like Goodfellas, various zombie films, anime and Pulp Fiction, the latter of which is put together with the art house film My Dinner With Andre to form "Critical Film Studies", which is arguably the best episode the series has ever produced.

Where Community has taken flack is with its constant use of pop culture, and it's understandable to a degree. It feels sometimes that the characters are given the short script in order to make these plots or references work. But then we have episodes like "Remedial Chaos Theory" where we are given six alternate timelines of one different member of the group leaving to grab a pizza the group ordered. It at first seems like a gimmick, but it is used to give insight into the characters and their affect the group by showing how events would transpire in their absence.

While a show like Community can be claimed as groundbreaking in terms of television, it's often that it loses people. Its attitude of self-awareness is a turn off for some people. However, even if you don't catch every reference, there's plenty of things to grasp onto. Troy and Abed's relationship is arguably the most developed relationship on TV right now, and their interactions during the show and little skits that play at the end of most episodes are constant highlights. Plus, each character manages to evolve and grow in ways you never expect. Britta, a character that was annoying for most of the first season and beyond has now become a loveable goofball while Troy, at first a jock, has now embraced his inner nerd through his relationship with Abed.

It's tough to say jump right in with Community. So much has happened for a show that has only been on for two and a half seasons. However, now more than ever would be the time to try. The show is likely to be canceled if the ratings don't pick up. So dive in, and if you like it, dig back, catch yourself up, and watch every Thursday at 8 P.M. on NBC. Regardless of whether anyone knows it or not, people deserve this smart, brilliant show, and the longer it is on the air, the more chance it has of catching on and gaining the recognition it deserves.