Community (Season 3): POP POP POP! - Page 19

Ugh this show has lost the rights to do a paintball episode. It's insanity has to be earned. Make me care about the characters before you have everyone shoot each other.

Besides, how can you top a Die Hard inspired paintball episode from season 1? Die Hard with a Vengence style with the AC dean taking on the terrorist role? Who would the Dean's brother be revealed to be?

Easily, but Harmon couldn't pull it off now. I do hope the hiatus puts some sense back in him again.

Quote:

This is kind of a weird comment to make after seeing the last paintball episode, which was essentially a 2-part resolution to Pierce's season long arc as the show's villain.  It was some of the best character work the show has ever done and Harmon has earned the right to do whatever he wants as far as I'm concerned, even if it means going back to the paintball well again. 

 

Uh... we don't know if they're doing another paintball.  It was just a bit of speculation on Fuzzy Dunlop's part.

Quote:

Yeah, this too.  

 

Sarius just doesn't like Community very much.  And while this is an open forum and all viewpoints should be tolerated so long as they're expressed with tact and yaddasoforth, I really wish he'd just accept that it's a weirder, sillier show than he'd prefer and stop making the same complaints every time it does a high concept or one-off episode (which is about 2/3 of them). 

 

Theme episodes are a big part of what Community is.  That's not going to change until cancellation, whether that's sooner or later.

You know, watching these episodes again leads me to give credence to a theory posted in the AVClub's forums: much like how Pierce slowly became season two's villain, Abed might slowly become THIS season's villain. I'm sure he won't mean to be; it'll come from a place of wanting to bring the study group closer together (like how he put Mr. Rad's evil plan in motion) or, in a darker sense, wanting to brew conflict in order to make things interesting. It probably won't go that way, but I can just imagine Abed looking into a mirror...and seeing evil Abed staring right back at him from the other dimension! 

That would certainly be more clever than having Jeff be the villain.

I hope there's not another paintball episode simply because I don't think we need one every year.  At the same time, if there is another paintball episode I know that Harmon will nail it.  Again.

I hope if they have another paintball episode, it doesn't actually show the paintball, it starts with the janitor angrily cleaning up the campus (again) and goes from there.

That's great. Have the first episode back be immediately following the paintball tournament.

I'll just leave this here, courtesy of my facebook feed:

 

 

very good

but it looks too much like "Spicetime"...the "I" should in the word "time"
 

 

I'd love to see a Memento episode where they fill in the details from the time gap.

Bring back the relationship stuff. Yeah I know some won't like it, but it along with a lighter tone might help the show appeal to a broader audience and get another season. Yeah Harmon needs to swallow some pride and play the game. I rather have a few sappy episodes to guarantee renewal chances.

I wouldn' hate it, but wouldn't like it, if the show returned to Jeff being the main character if it makes the show easier for more audiences to watch. Oh and time for him to start taking back the arc of season 1, where he was actually learning his place at Greendale, and not being as selfish. In fact maybe aside Pierce, everyone needs to lighten up.

Oh and can we bring back Chang wanting revenge on the crew, but actually put him in a position to actually threaten the crew. Like maybe him taking/blackmailing for the position of the dean. Have him possibly manipulate Jeff with an honorary degree. Cliff hang the finale with Chang knowing where to get in contact with Jeff's father. Maybe even sending him to Jeff's apartment right before the credits.

 

While I love that show evolved to be a truly ensemble piece, I'm forced to agree that I think it might find a wider audience if Winger slipped back into the main focus again. 

 

I remain uncertain about the "relationship stuff." It may not be to the tastes of the mainstream audience, but I really dig how he's done a lot with Jeff, Annie, Troy, and Britta obliquely.

 

Well I was just spit balling ideas, not all of them mutually exclusive. Thing is, I understand a lot of the "brilliance" of this show. I get why people like it. Thing is, I get also why it's alienating. So Harmon need's to swallow some pride and grab the audience back.

Bringing the focus back to Jeff just focuses the storyline persay, but Friends was an ensemble and it lasted quite a while. Thing is, Friends' characters were all relatable and likeable to a point. I love the absurdity, but it becomes numbing to a point.

Maybe also Jeff had the biggest potential arc of redemption that made him very interesting in season 1. Troy and Abed were the extreme comic relief, while Annie was trying to grow up. Pierce per say was constant, as was Shirley. Chevy has good delivery, so he can make his character funny. Just during season 2 when he got more assholish than deemed necessary, it was alienating and expecting an apology from the crew was extremely self centered. Shirley is just there to get a better job for her family and go on Jesus rants. Sadly one of the most potentially relatable characters is also one of the most underwritten.

Which brings me Britta. Season 1 has her learning her place in a modern world and getting slightly in touch with her female side. It's an arc, but she wasn't as funny. So all they do is just make her a charaicture especially by season 3.

Quote:

 Huh? "Grab the audience back"? The true audience for this show has never, and most likely will never, go away. This thing has one of the most dedicated, rabid fanbases on the net.

Okay okay, expand his audience. A great fanbase is nice, but if it doesn't allow you to continue a storyline?

You have the strangest ideas of what a showrunner requires for "continuing a storyline". How would an expanded audience affect Harmon's ability to tell whatever stories he wants? If anything, the broader the audience, the more limited he'd be in storyline choices.His current audience gets what he's doing, in a big, big way.

 

It's like Schwartz said above, this show just simply doesn't meet whatever it is you want out of it.

I think he just meant that even a passionate fanbase doesn't mean much if the show gets canceled (which would prevent him from continuing the story).

Well, I'd still prefer a dedicated, passionate showrunner as opposed to someone who starts throwing in dick and bodily fluid jokes to attract the Two and a Half Men audience.

 

And anyways, the show's numbers aren't the problem, it's the network's timidity in promoting it and slotting it appropriately. They should've put all that atrociously wasted Whitney money behind Community, moved it to 8:30, and given it a decent lead-in. I bet they'd have reaped some better rewards then.

I don't know what Community needs to do or how it needs to do it to become viable, but all things considered, the last thing I want it to do would be more like Friends. I'd rather it got cancelled early than drop what makes it special. But then, I've never agreed with Sairus's beef with this show at all. Season One is the season with the most surface level character development. Britta, my favorite character, was flat out terrible for more than half of the year. It had more realism, I suppose, but that's kind of bullshit anyway, because it was never at all realistic, it just had a realism more recognizably in line with other network sitcoms. And if that's what you're looking for, How I Met You Mother appears to be in no danger of cancellation anytime soon.

There are 2 things about Sarius's prescription that don't make sense to me, even aside from opinions on the quality of the show itself.

 

1)  That stronger ongoing story arcs will bring in a wider audience.  Not "stronger" as in "better", because obviously better is better, but as in more continuously serialized.  The big network hits, the Two and a Halfs and BBTs, are not known for having strong seasonal arcs.  I'd say The Office is probably the most serialized a sitcom has been while being a real breakout hit, and it's the exception that proves the rule.

 

2)  Even given that the parody episodes are alienating some of a wider audience, they're also what attracted the loyal fanbase the show does have.  Ditching those to go in a more CBS-y direction may or may not succeed in bringing in a wider audience, but it will certainly come at a cost to the rabid core and critical acclaim that the show can rely on now.  Going safer and broader is something many shows do, but when they aren't working.  Community is working, albeit not as well as anyone would really like.  Sacrificing what the show does have going for it in the mere hope that its not too late to rebrand it as something less challenging strikes me as a bad bet.  It's guaranteed downside in exchange for a nebulous upside that may not materialize at all, even leaving aside how transparent and craven it would be artistically.

I don't know if Community needs to do this, but why hasn't Drew Carey made an appearence again, dammit!

 

Because they realized he's creepy as a skinny guy?

 

To me, the solution to what ails them is simple:  more John Oliver.  Much, much more.

I predict the return of Rob Corddry as one of John Goodman's lawyers in his hostile take-over of the school, forcing Jeff to lawyer up against his old friend/foe. Showdown! 

 

 

Kind of scary how well this works...

 

Well, maybe not Pierce as Worf.

Yep.
Dear god no Two and a Half Men jokes. The humor in the 1st season was streets ahead of this. That said, I prefer humor that arises out of the situation.

I simply say the show needs not to abandon it's craziness. It just needs to know when to use it. Season 1 seemed to have a flow that built up the insanity of the paintball episode. Season 2 felt more everything and the kitchen sink. Season 3 feels overtly subdued and mellow.

The show doesn't need an Arrested Development style of continuity and flashback references, but I really no longer care for the characters. There is no threat, no romance, no positivity. It makes you hard to relate in any sense to a character and cheer for anyone. I know and find a lot of things funny in a stand alone episode, but I don't know why I come back? Maybe to post about it.

I guess I just disagree with the premise that Community's 3rd season is in any way a step back. Show's just as funny as it's always been.

If Annie could read my mind, she would slap the taste out of my mouth.

I object to that picture on the grounds that Troy would never presume to put on Geordi's visor.  It takes a special kind of megalomaniac to invite that comparison.

Sairus loves shit like Smallville and Outsourced. Completely invalidates any fucking opinion he has on Community.

WOO hoo...?!

 

 

 

 

Found this on my travels, thought I'd just leave it here...

 

Thank you, Rain Dog! I can think of another thread where that post would be appropriate, as well.....

Unfortunately that thread is locked to me while I'm at work, having the word "Boobs" in the title, so I put it in the next best place.

 

Stalker!

PS: I hate Smallville now. Egad, opinions change. Still hate the early episodes of Outsourced, but being Indian myself, I might have bias to the show.

Season 2 was funnier. Season 1 was subtle. Season 3 is just like an overtly negative mess.

I disagree that season 3 has been overtly negative. I was watching the foos ball episode today, and I thought the shot of young Jeff and Shirley, aka Big Cheddar and Tinkle Town, really sweet. Same goes for the last scene of the Christmas/glee parody.

But Sairus, you had absolutely nothing nice to say about Community last season either. You don't enjoy this show.

That GIF. Rain Dog, every breast-lovin' Chewer owes you a beer or two.

Abed must be crushed.  First Community (and I'm pretty sure Abed knows he's in a TV show, thus why Abed the character would be crushed), now Cougar Town:

 

http://www.deadline.com/2012/01/abcs-dont-trust-the-b-scandal-get-time-slots-but-not-cougar-town-tca/

 

I think you're overstating it a bit. Besides, the season's only half over and has been arguably just as funny as it's ever been.

I love season 1 (solid 8/10). Season 2 is a throw everything at the wall (7/10). It doesn't feel refined, but it when it does hit, it hit's really high.

Is the show better than a lot of stuff on TV. Hell yes... BUT... ...when you look at the entire scope of TV, there's still A LOT out there.

PS: I love Arrested Development, best TV comedy in the last 10 years... ...other than Kim Jong Il's fake criers.

Hey, I love me some Community. Its probably second to Breaking Bad on my favorites list of shows on tv now. But Arrested Development is not a show that anyone s ever going to match on consistency. No ones ever been close to them with that, certainly not a comedy.

 

Truth.  Look at how funny the "Beetlejuice" throwaway gag is for Community.  That's the kind of thing AD was essentially doing weekly knowing that people might catch it the 4th time they watched the episode and not caring.  AD was consistent, and dense in a way that comedy just isn't dense any more.

 

But Community is still the best comedy we have right now and I love it for that.

Comedy-wise, what's out there right now to compete with Community? Two Broke Girls?

 

PARKS & REC is consistently funnier than COMMUNITY.

 

For me, no one can beat Community for consistent laughs-per-minute.  Parks and It's Always Sunny can match it in their very best episodes (your "Ron and Tammy part X" or "Eagleton" or "Chardee MacDennis"), and 30 Rock can when its "on", which is more frequently than those two, imo. 

 

But there's also heart to consider, which is what makes Parks special even though its jokes are less rapid-fire than those others.  It can deliver a genuinely heartfelt moment between any combination of 10 characters, and does so with effortless consistency.  Community can do the same with a slightly smaller cross-section, but it has to work a bit harder to get through the layers of snark.  30 Rock has exactly one genuine human relationship in Jack and Liz, while Sunny has a (big, proud) goose egg.  The further down the spectrum you move, the more dependent any episode gets on its premise and specific jokes, and some of them are always going to be misses (sexy baby on 30 Rock, Frank's brother on Sunny, etc).

Guess I have very high standards with Arrested Development. My favorites on TV right now are: Breaking Bad, Mad Men (it's about to be back), How I Met Your Mother, Daily Show, Colbert Report, Sons of Anarchy.

I do have a loyalty to Conan if push came to shove, but I'll maybe once a week catch an episode.

I want to have more time for Parks and Rec, 30 Rock, & the Office on a more consistent basis.

Need to checkout Boardwalk Empire, but that requires HBO.

Sarius, The Office is incredibly fatigued at this point, but for what its worth, I think you'd love Parks and Rec.  Its much more grounded than Community and features stronger ongoing plots.  The first couple episodes are rocky, but it takes a giant leap about 6 episodes in and just gets better and better.

 

30 Rock is very much goofy for the sake of goofy, which doesn't seem to be exactly your thing, but it plays so fast and loose I can't imagine anyone not finding plenty to laugh at every week.  It's very much a live action cartoon, but never pretends/aspires to be anything else.

Shit guys really we're going to try and argue which comedies are funnier? Comedies? Really?? The most subjective form of entertainment in human history? Really?