1,000th Post Edition

I had no idea when I wrote the “Now What?” [6-10-16] post last year that I’d still be doing this.  Imagine my surprise Wednesday night when I suddenly noticed that I’d put up Post #999.  Who’d have thought it?  Start something in 2009 and look what happens.  I hadn’t been posting more to get here; I’ve just had more time to write and been watching and listening to more baseball.    Since the “Now What” post went over my favorite (and least favorite) RPG posts, I thought I’d list some standouts from my sports and other posts.

3-14-09 Junior Post.  Definitely my favorite of my old posts.  Just a pure piece of comedy.  And now, Dale Earnhardt Jr. is retiring.  Where does the time go?

4-14-13 Demolition Weekend.  I’ve never been so happy to be wrong.  The construction of Southwest University Park and the arrival of the El Paso Chihuahuas has been a tremendous boon to the area.  (I still maintain this relationship will eventually end badly.)

5-28-13 First Memorial Day Posting.  This one’s always special, because I still can’t believe how much I watched, listened, and wrote.  It’s simultaneously a testament to extreme laziness and exhausting, back-breaking labor.  

7-17-13 Baseball Fashion Police.  I don’t care if I’m the only person who cares about the look of Major League uniforms, but I just had to get this off my chest.

4-20-14 & 5-13-14 Community Posts.  I enjoyed writing these, since I loved the show.  My Season Six predictions produced my favorite comment (on another person’s blog).  He’d found my synopsis for the season so plausible, he momentarily thought it was real.  I swear Dan Harmon read it, because there was a gag in the actual Season Six that referenced something in it.  (And if so, he definitely didn’t like what I’d written.)

4-22-14 Bullfighting.  This was most real thing I’ve posted here, as it involved actual life and death.  I’m not sure I approve of the spectacle, but I certainly gained a new respect for it after watching it.

1-23-16 First Aggie Women’s Basketball Game.  Given what a big fan of the team I became last season, this post got that relationship off on a really bad foot.  Given my skepticism of the sport and women’s athletics in general, they had to win me over as a fan.  You guys earned it.  

I’m somewhat embarrassed by the post now.  I’d be tempted to take it down or retroactively edit it, but unfortunately, it got a bunch of hits for a bad reason that had nothing to do with the team or the game.  I discovered why about a year after posting it.  It’s really something to see your blog in a screenshot on somebody’s Twitter feed by someone who took offense to it.  I went back and re-read what I wrote, horrified that I might have really upset someone.  I couldn’t see the offense.  I could see that this person had gotten easily offended at some other people.  Now, I’ll be damned if I’ll take it down.                

11-9-16 NMSU Sports Economics.  I sent this to some financial people at work, and they thought it was interesting and well written.  I take some pride in that.

10-29-16 Aggie Volleyball loss and 10-29-16 Aggie Soccer win.  Oh, that volleyball game versus Bakersfield.  That was as angry as I’ve ever been at a live sporting event.  Kudos to the Aggie girls for not taking it as badly as I did.  It took me a couple days to cool down to write the recap.  Thankfully, the soccer team won later that afternoon to make me feel better about life in general.  

4-29-17 The Longest Day.  I’d spent some long afternoons and nights at the university for sporting events, but this one took the cake.  I still can’t believe I was out in the cold and wet all day and didn’t get a cold or worse.

5-13-17 Aggie Softball wins the WAC Tournament.  Once again, these games ran the gambit of emotions.  It was so awesome to see the girls win a championship and in such a dramatic manner.

I know they say that, “The Internet is forever,” but it isn’t.  Ask Apollo Smile.  My 2008 Myspace political blog disappeared after a business strategy change by the company.  All of my reviews, pictures, and even some fan fiction on an Archie Comics fansite went into the ether when their server crashed.  I’ve been locked out of this blog on a couple of occasions, once for a year.  I could say the wrong thing here and offend someone and this place and all 1,000 posts could go away instantly.

So if I have any advice for other bloggers, don’t assume what you post will be here forever or haunt you for the rest of your life.  Write what you believe and feel passionate about.  You’re free to change your mind later, just acknowledge why.  Treat your blog like each new post is your last and you won’t regret anything.  

The Leaked Scripts of Community Season Six Part 2

Previously

History of Current Pop Culture

Abed has “Meta”ed his match.  A member of the new, junior study group can go reference for reference with the master and then some.  In a wacky trivia contest, the kid’s “kung fu” is better.  After putting up with Abed’s pop culture cramming for a week, Rachel, his girlfriend, almost leaves him.  Abed is forced to confront his need for a new shtick.  He picks neurotic boyfriend and asks Rachel to take him back.

Studies in Fan Service

Annie, trying to get Jeff’s attention, becomes a nude model for a Life Drawing class.  However, she soon falls for a blind student, who is able to make stunning paintings of her after feeling her up.  Enraged with jealousy, Jeff attempts to prove that the student is only faking his blindness (which he is).  If the show isn’t on the network, but on premium cable or the Internet, expect to Annie’s actual boobs.  Allison Brie mentally checks out of the rest of the season and contemplates a lawsuit as Dan Harmon has inserted himself into the show as the “blind” student.  “And I thought being on Mad Men was degrading and exploitive,” she’ll say later in a deposition.    

How to Make Enemies and Influence Them to Hate You

Jeff is invited to host the annual city officials roast.  His routine instead focuses on attacking the city council’s enemies in a blatant attempt at kissing their asses for more school funding.  It fails and he bombs.  Joel McHale phones it in for the rest of the season as well in protest at this transparent jab at himself and his White House Correspondents Dinner performance.  

Bottle Episode

Dan Harmon, now fearing the regular actors left on the show, does an episode with the new study group having a fight with themselves in the study room over a tyrannical assignment by Mr. Winger.  Danny Pudi wonders when his character will finally get screwed over, but it never happens.

Dean Ex Machina

Chang activates his final scheme to destroy the school at the behest of the school board.  Hint: it involves a giant pool of urine.  Jeff: “Since Pierce isn’t here, I’m going to have to say it, we’ve got save the school from the “yellow peril.”  The Dean sacrifices himself to save everyone, though his body is never found.  

Basic Mythology

All of the tropes from the previous five seasons, that didn’t directly involve any of the departed cast members, are implausibly used.  Abed ironically comments on his ironic commenting about the situation. 

Advanced Finality-Extra Credit

The Kickstarter for the movie has succeeded.  Harmon begins writing the most epic paintball episode of all time (spoiler: it involves zombies).  Abed and Rachel’s and Jeff and Annie’s surprise double wedding is interrupted by Troy (special guest star) and the Dean, both objecting to the ceremony.  The whole thing ends on a cliffhanger of pop culture references (how appropriate).  Jeff suddenly wakes up with Britta, who tells him it was all a dream (Newhart show ref).  Suddenly, Annie wakes up and finds Pierce coming out of the shower, drying off Annie’s Boobs, who tells her that the last two seasons have all been a dream (Dallas ref).  Meanwhile, Abed is playing with a snowglobe with a tiny, miniature Greendale campus inside it (St. Elsewhere ref).  (Don’t worry.  The movie will tie all this together.)

Okay, I think we can all agree that we dodged a bullet with the show’s cancellation, now knowing what would have happened. 

Given that the network doesn’t like the show or its creator, it’s not coming back to NBC.  I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s probably more personal than business.  Maybe they just let him think that it was coming back, just to screw with him.  The fans say they love the show, but didn’t like the last two seasons and it apparently has no broader appeal, so I question this show’s viability in another venue. 

Without Pierce and Troy, I personally don’t see the point in continuing the show.  (Should have done a better job about bringing in new characters during the previous seasons.)  Dan Harmon himself may not even really like the show, given Season Five’s lackluster attitude.  He actually seems to resent the show being best known for the paintball episodes.  He’s got another show he’s working on anyway.

While no one was too shocked at the news of the cancellation because of the bottom line bad ratings, Season Six was just so assumed, it’s hard not to imagine it still happening.  It’ll happen if for no other reason than to just mess up this post.          

The Leaked Scripts of Community Season Six Part 1

Just to screw up my last Community post, NBC has canceled Community for next season.  (Check out those Alison Brie GIFs in the comments.)  They might have also wanted to get in the last laugh at Dan Harmon for that teaser at the end of the Season Five making fun of them.  (Yeah, but watch them actually produce that “Captain Cook” show anyway.)

For his last column for a computer magazine, John C. Dvorak previewed every future column for the coming year that he wouldn’t be writing.  January: here I will pointlessly attack Apple for no reason; February: here I will do an in depth, technical article about digital photography that will interest exactly three people; March: after an avalanche of hate mail, I kiss and make up with Apple; April: Windows sucks, but the next version should be great, which is what I said last time.  Okay, I don’t entirely remember it and may have made up some of it, because it’s been years and I don’t have the original, but you get the idea.  In that spirit, here are the episodes of Community you’ll be missing next season.    

F.U. NBC

The episode begins with Jeff spanking Annie’s Boobs.  The monkey has been living with Jeff over the summer, and he is damn sick of it.  And so is Jeff.  The apartment just isn’t big enough for the both of them and somebody has to go.  The episode is filled with clever in-jokes and highly metaphorical as Dan Harmon   has his jollies rubbing it in to NBC, who was forced to reinstate the show after their entire Thursday night lineup was canceled.  (Or alternatively, the show was forced into another venue.)  The last casual viewer never watches this show again after this episode.  Ross from Friends makes a guest appearance at the end.  “Hey, I used to live with a monkey too.  What were we thinking?”  

Jump Back to the Terminated Future on Groundhog Day

It’s a pity that statistically nobody is now watching the show.  This is a great episode.  Jeff is sent back in time via the Dream-a-torium 2.0 to his first day at Greendale.  He attempts to undo his decisions and start over, only to have to repeat the day in an endless loop.  Abed follows Jeff and attempts to shoot him with a special paintball gun to end the loop.  

Remedial Cat-Fighting

It’s finally come down to this.  Britta and Annie are taking a MMA fighting class, wherein their pent up anger over Jeff’s inability to choose between them comes out violently.  Yes, there’s a segment where the girls go WWE on each other.  Desperate for ratings, NBC (or whoever) heavily promotes this episode with several salacious clips. 

Seminar: How to be a Success

In this touching episode, the group attends a motivational seminar with a charismatic speaker.  So inspired (and since their characters are increasingly useless on the show), Shirley, Duncan, and Hickey decide leave the school to pursue their dreams.  Britta meant to attend it, but overslept.  Now that she’s completely depressed again, Duncan proposes to her.  “My dreams all include you.  You are my dream,” he says.  The girls go, “Ahhhh,” one last time.  Britta accepts and decides to leave with him.  Jeff, jealous over the motivational speakers’ charm and wanting to keep the group together, finds out that the guy is actually a loser and a fraud.  However, Jeff decides not to expose him in the end and lets the group members leave happy (as do the actors).     

Basic Law for Dummies

The opening credits to the show are finally dispensed with because of the lack of permanent cast members.  Here we’re introduced to a new study group in Jeff’s law class and a bunch of replacement/parody characters who essentially take the place of departed cast members.  Highlight: Jeff saying, “Here’s my cellphone, Mr. Hartly.  Call your mother and tell her you’re not going to be a lawyer.”     

Warmed Over Leftovers

A campus-wide game of “Laser Freeze Tag” puts Jeff on the hotspot as Annie openly declares her love for him.  Since he’s “frozen,” he can’t answer.  To take the joke even further, Annie sings out her affections in a spoof of “Let it Go,” complete in an Elsa costume.  Nobody cares who wins the contest.   

Continued

Review of Community Season 5-Part 3

Previously

"Government Issue Jeff"

First, can this episode be considered canonical GI Joe?  I mean they introduced some new characters and a new vehicle and even had a commercial for them.  Second, it was a spot on parody of the 80’s cartoon and actually had a purpose within the context of the show and the characters.  Unfortunately, it was as flat and aging fanboy-wanking as the D&D episode.  I showed part of this episode to a younger co-worker who loves the show.  He’d never seen the old GI Joe cartoon and probably just thought they were being silly. 

I can totally relate to Jeff having a crisis because he’s turning 40, and I’m familiar with the cartoon.  I was right in the wheelhouse of this episode’s target audience, but all I could see was just another wasted opportunity to do something really special.  This might have worked better as a rapid-fire nostalgia trip with GI Joe just being a short segment (definitely keeping the commercials).  If Annie had somehow been along for that kind of trip, it might have been better.  Jeff’s revelation about his age was quite a shock for her, another twist in their relationship.  For that matter, when do we get to see Alison Brie in that "Tight Ship" outfit in reality?  

I really missed Troy and Pierce here.  If this story felt as flat and functionary as the animation, it was because these two weren’t there.  I kept waiting for Troy to pop up and say something funny, or Pierce to say something racist and make a bad situation worse. 

“Basic Story”

The “Save Greendale” Committee has suddenly succeeded in cleaning up Greendale.  As soon as the college is pronounced to have some monetary value, it is immediately sold to a sponsor, err Subway.  By the end of the episode, a possible solution has been in the form of the hidden treasure of the school’s founder.  This was mostly filler to set up the finale.  The only event that made it worthwhile was Jeff’s impulsive proposal to Britta, and her acceptance.  On some level, the whole series sort of lead up to that moment.  Here, at last, is a happy, meaningful change to the Study Group.    

“Basic Sandwich”

Jeff and Britta’s marriage is hand-waved away with a joke.  Yeah, I saw that coming by the end of last week’s show.  We all did.  I’m not a Jeff/Britta-shipper, but I was kind of hoping they’d actually go through with it.  Musing on the possibilities for Season Six, I thought Jeff going out with Annie might be interesting, but not after this tease.  We do however get the impression by the ending that that may be happening next season. 

The group finds the school’s founder (a funny and almost unrecognizable Chris Elliot) hiding in a secret annex and is able to save the school from Subway.  Here’s where I’d like to give an unqualified “thumbs up” for this episode.  It was funny, fast-paced, and ended on a really upbeat, satisfying note.  It’s impossible not to smile at the end as Jeff brings the gavel down on group’s last meeting for the season.  The funniest bit on the show, in contrast to most every other episode this season, was the ending teaser.  It was a fake NBC promo for mid-season replacement shows next year.  I guess this is some sort explanation as to how this low-rated, creatively running dry show is somehow assured of coming back.  That, and their sponsorship-friendly episodes, that pretty much pay for themselves, and syndication is lucrative.

I’d like to recommend it, but I can’t totally.  The group is functionally whittled down to Jeff, the Dean, Britta, Annie, and Abed in this episode.  Worse, Abed’s bits in this were so meta and so forced, they were painful to watch.  He’s not even part of the group anymore.  He’s like some troll-ish Internet blogger sarcastically commenting on the show.  I HATE people like that! 

Greendale has been saved.  Community is coming back.  I find myself sort of dreading watching next season though, but here’s some predictions.  They’ve foreshadowed a “Freeze Tag” episode.  I think they will establish a “new” study group with new characters, probably as a season-long gag.  (Think Paper Chase.  Jeff is a law teacher after all.  He could be sort of a slacker Professor Kingsfield.)  Abed will get a new permanent partner, because his character doesn’t work right by himself.  Troy will return, briefly.  Jeff, Britta, and Annie’s relationship will be the main storyline.  No surprise there, since this will be the last season.  Given that Veronica Mars got a movie, you can expect a Kickstarter campaign to start during the season.  And finally, I predict, in spite of my misgivings, I will be watching.

Here’s a few suggestions.  In spite of the lack of Troy, there needs to be an Inspector Spacetime episode.  This will only be for the purpose of getting Karen Gillan as a guest star.  The Dean only has two jokes.  He’s not cross-dressing anymore, so that’s one.  While the Dean’s Coyote-Roadrunner-like pursuit of Jeff is amusing, it’s also played out.  Do something a little different with him.  Britta’s character has gotten nothing but dumber and dumber, especially in this last season.  Please give her a little more brains, and give Annie a real job.  How about a Rollerball homage?  (Shrugs.  Another John Houseman reference.)  Just a suggestion.        

I hate to say it, but there needs to be a few more subtractions on the show.  Chang is totally played out.  Please phase him out.  You may as well get rid of Shirley if you’re going to keep under-using her.  Hickey is a good character, but he just doesn’t fit in on this show and is a major depressant.  Abed, as he currently is, has got to go.  I’d like to see him somehow get serious as a filmmaker, but I think that it would require him to have some sort of life-changing experience.  With Abed, that could be anything, such as him meeting the director of Kickpuncher, and getting some advice from him.      

Lastly, a question.  

Britta 

or Annie? 

Hmm. 

I don’t think I could choose between the two, not easily anyway.  Very attractive either way.  

  

Review of Community Season 5-Part 2

Previously

"Geothermal Escapism"

Another campus-wide contest that out the worst in everyone.  In the last episode, Troy received Pierce’s inheritance on the condition that he sail his yacht around the world.  As a send-off, Abed organizes a campus-wide game of “Hot Lava” to send him off.  He puts up a valuable comic to the last person standing.  Chaos ensues. 

Umm.  Yeah.  You’re thinking what I’m thinking.  They went to the well once too often.  The Waterworld-ish homage was kinda amusing though.  What did work here was the ending where Troy says goodbye to everyone.  There was some genuine sadness there.  The sadness would continue for the rest of the season.     

"Analysis of Cork-Based Networking"

Annie’s effort to put up a new bulletin board in the cafeteria runs smack into Greendale’s maintenance bureaucracy.  There was a radio show in the 80’s called Visit New Grimston Anyway.  It might be thought of an Ur-Community prototype: eccentric cast, wacky situations, a few emotional, dramatic moments. This episode somewhat reminds me of the first episode of New Grimston, where the new employee, Neil, joins the city government.  He spends the entire first episode trying to get the window in his office open and running smack into the maintenance bureaucracy.  I wish I could link to something here, but the show may be gone forever and unremembered.         

Briefly, it seemed like the show could still work without Pierce and Troy.  Hickey could work as the cranky old man.  Rachel, as Abed’s girlfriend, could fill in for Troy.  They weren’t bad characters or performances.  They just don’t fit on the show.  Hickey is too damn depressing to be funny.  Rachel is adorable, but Abed having a normal girlfriend, defeats his character’s zeitgeist.  Having Abed sort of “grow up” (for whatever that’s worth), I get, from a narrative standpoint.  From a sitcom standpoint, it’s poison.  Save the well-adjusted Abed for the last episode of the series to put a bow on it.  In the meantime, keep going with the wacky.  This show has its dramatic and poignant moments, but they only work because of comedy.  The characters won’t work in a quasi-drama.     

I totally missed the news ticker message upon my original viewing.  Troy has apparently been captured by pirates.  Cool.  Unfortunately, that’s all we hear about it. 

"Bondage and Beta Male Sexuality"

It seems like this episode and the next should have come after Troy’s departure, with the Bulletin Board one coming after them.  I can guess why they were shown out-of-order, if that’s the case.  In spite of the provocative title, this episode was just terribly depressing.  Given that the show would be off for a couple of weeks for the Olympics, if they’d left off with this unhappy episode, no casual viewer would have returned.  This one shouldn’t have been made, but I get the impression there was a personal message here, but who cares?

I’m not even going to bother with even a two-sentence plot summary, because there wasn’t one.  If you wanted to miss Troy, this was the episode to wallow in it.  Possibly the most heartbreaking moment of the series: Abed, alone in the study room, glancing over at Troy’s empty chair. 

"App Development and Condiments"

Another campus-wide contest brings out the worst in everyone. 

Stop me if you’ve heard that recently.  At least it’s a different premise in that it’s essentially a popularity contest.

Greendale tries out a new social media app that allows people to rate each other.  What could go wrong?  This should have been a great concept episode, but it fell flat as it felt way too rushed in story development.  Our dystopian social media future seems ripe for parody, especially when combined with other cinematic visions.  Britta and Shirley took center stage interacting with Jeff here, but unfortunately their characters have been so diminished this season, they just couldn’t carry it.  Britta and Jeff couldn’t even really work up any sparks together.  However, mad props for putting Leonard in a Sandman outfit. 

"VCR Maintenance and Educational Publishing"

Another episode where we’re missing Troy.  Annie and Abed are having a contest to see whether her brother or his girlfriend moves in with them.  It just didn’t work at all, especially in that depressing little apartment (which is used again as the main set in the next episode).  Worse, the subplot could have made for a great episode by itself.  The rest of the group comes across something valuable and tries to fence it and end up turning on each other.  Unfortunately, this really would have required Pierce to do properly.  Now that this homage has been used, it can only be used again as an obvious retread.  Speaking of which…

"Advanced Advanced Dungeons & Dragons"

Jeff: “Abed, you’re not helping.”

Abed: “I’d be a pretty bad Dungeon Master if I was.”

What game of D&D has there ever been where the DM made all of the die rolls?  Hell, I wouldn’t trust myself in that situation, much less any group of players.  Well, just to be fair, I do sort of get why Abed is doing all of the die rolling.  It’s to move the plot along a bit quicker, rather than having everyone roll and then respond.  Their D&D is a bit like Inspector Spacetime.  It’s not really much of a Doctor Who parody, but that’s not really the point of it.  Unlike that last time, at least they made the game look fun.

Hickey and the group are playing the game so that he can bond with his d*ckish son.  That’s an unpromising premise.  Maybe I’m too hard on this episode because I’m a player.  I didn’t like the first one either (except for the part where Annie describes seducing the elf maid).  This wasn’t a bad episode, just disappointing.

It’s a pity this episode wasn’t coordinated more with the release of 5^th edition.  (Abed is holding the playtest book at the end.)  Let’s say someone, who knew nothing about the game, was inspired to give it a try because of this episode.  What would they get?  4^th edition is the only thing available in the stores and the newest version online.  If you wanted the rulebooks that were used in the two D&D episodes, you’d have to find out that they were older editions and could only get them off of a website.  Would you want an older edition?  “What’s the difference between editions?” a noob might ask.  “Do I really need miniatures?  They didn’t use them on the show.”  And so on.

This is turning into an RPG post, but screw it.  Dungeons & Dragons as a pencil and paper RPG has really got an uphill climb at this point.  It has a bad reputation in the media.  Not demonic influence mind you, there’s a dozen popular, critically acclaimed cable shows that have that.  What I mean is that only socially-maladjusted weirdoes play this game.  Moreover, for the price of one of the new books, you could get a computer game that simulates the experience.  For that matter, you’ll need several books, and you’ll have to do all of the work yourself in order to enjoy the game. 

Continued

Review of Community Season 5-Part 1

I’ll be the first to admit that I was late to this party.  I hadn’t heard of Community until Season Four, when a bunch of fanboys on nerd websites started bitching about it.  I didn’t start watching it until it went into syndication, right before Season Five started.  The first episode I watched was Accounting for Lawyers. I had no idea about the setting or any character knowledge and yet, was completely floored.  I sat there watching with my mouth open the entire time.  I was in the act of laughing, but the jokes were so rapid fire, I was afraid to start doing so that I might miss something.  Then the next episode came on right after, Basic Rocket Science, rifting off of one of my favorite movies, The Right Stuff.  

Suddenly I had a new favorite show, which I talked about incessantly.  I was able to get a co-worker to watch with me one night.  He started laughing immediately, with only slightly more show knowledge than I started with.  While he’s only watched a couple more episodes, he’s still occasionally quoting from what he’s seen. 

I have little qualifications to review this show.  I’m not a long-time fan.  I still haven’t seen every episode (working on it).  I thought Season Four was funny.  I really don’t get the animus against it.  Yeah, the show’s creator, Dan Harmon, wasn’t there, but so what?  It was still good.  Are you a fan of the show, or Harmon?  Well, he’s back for Season Five at everyone’s request.  One would be tempted to map out the show and its characters as has been done with Hideaki Anno and his anime show, Evangelion.  (Anno is Shinji.  Rei is the audience.  Etc.)  Abed is Dan.  The “Save Greendale” storyline is Dan trying to “save” the show after Season Four.     

If the Season Four was the “Gas Leak” year, Season Five is the “Suicide Watch” year.  The show’s return has been mostly joyless and depressing.  Chevy Chase’s departure should, theoretically, have not hurt the show.  And yet, the will-reading episode, where it was like he was there, was probably the best episode of the season.  The inherently depressing Hickey, more of less replaced him. 

Troy’s leaving was going to hurt, but we had no idea badly.  Watching some older episodes, I had the epiphany that Troy was my favorite character.  Donald Glover had a unique ability to take even the dumbest lines and make them hysterical.  Troy and Abed worked so well together, but Troy had enough depth that he could carry stories by himself (unlike Abed).  

Chang was brought back, unfortunately, as an evil mastermind (okay, perhaps an oxymoronically dimwitted one) reduced to a strange annoyance.  The flimsy concept of the study group was replaced with the “Save Greendale” committee.  I could see Jeff somehow ironically (or karmically) ending up back at the college as a teacher.  The rest of the cast, especially Chang, coming back was a real stretch.  What should have been an opportunity to clean house and start over with a new concept, just got recycled and shoehorned into the same old thing, but with missing pieces.       

In my mind, the main problem with this show is that somewhat poor name.  Whatever relevant connotations it has in relation to the show, it’s weak and vague.  Worse, it’s been paired up with the equally badly named, Parks and Rec, forming an hour-long block of inherent disinterest.  At least it has this going for it.  Everyone who sees this show for the first time, immediately says the same thing, “Hey, it’s that guy from The Soup.”  Even I, a guy who doesn’t watch The Soup, recognized Joel Mchale as such.  He is the show, thankfully he’s pretty good in it. 

"Repilot"

At least things started off well.  Jeff and group leave Greendale and find themselves to be total failures outside it.  In the process of blaming the school, Jeff is drafted as a new teacher.  The group re-enrolls and forms the “Save Greendale” committee.  It’s a flimsy premise, but could have worked.  At least it made more sense than the Study Group.    

"Introduction to Teaching"

Here we see Jeff getting off to a shaky start as a slacker teacher, but pulling it together by the end of the show, as he demonstrates that he does have some knowledge worth passing along.  Unfortunately, this is all we get to see as Jeff as a teacher. 

Is anyone else intrigued by this story potential?  You’d think this would be a wide-open opportunity to at least have an episode with a new study group of characters in his class that has a totally different perspective on the “Greendale Seven.”  From a geek angle, it could mirror the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode, “Lower Decks.”  Regardless of missed chances, this episode’s enjoyment squarely rests on an insane Abed doing a flat-out nuts Nicolas Cage impersonation for 30 seconds.    

"Basic Intergluteal Numismatics"

For sheer mood, this one is also a winner.  Jeff and Annie continue their off-and-on flirtation in the context of a police procedural-like search for the “Ass-Crack Bandit.”  It’s clever as heck and a total spoof of any number of serial killer movies.  Unfortunately, in what would set the tone for the rest of the season, news of Pierce’s death suddenly intrudes at the end.  It’s almost like they were afraid to let the audience enjoy an entire episode.          

  

"Cooperative Polygraphy"

This was it.  This was the last great episode of Community.  It was a total “Bottle” episode, highlighted by the group at each other’s throats, as usual.  Somehow, no matter how many times it’s done, this setup works for the show.  It was so poignant because this would be the last time they could really do it correctly.  This was the reading of Pierce’s will to the group as they are all hooked up to a polygraph.  Troy was still in cast, and while Pierce was gone, he was certainly there in spirit.  From here, everything goes downhill. 

Continued