Is Community suffering from post-Shirley blues? Has its entrance into Yahoo Originals, in surprising cancellation-slash-new-channel-slash-movie news, marred the excitement and originality so much so that it is hard for the series to come back to its former glory? Has Community lost too many of its star players, shuffling along without true navigation? These are interesting questions to pose, and have been brought up by regular Community reviewer Graham in his recent coverage of the brand-new episodes, so it may seem futile to bring them up yet again
But they still gnaw at the back of your noggin: Am I really enjoying this, or do I stick around because we’re now all part of a collective community?
Episode six of the dwindling series proves that the ideas and innovative stories are running a little thin, especially as it couldn’t balance two separate storylines. The whole episode was dominated by Jeff versus the Computer Con, and should’ve been left as so. Instead, they sandwich in this awkward Britta versus Annie element as they rage on in battle over a party, with Abed’s social ineptness and filmmaking pissing both of them off. It seems like a waste of writing because, if given the attention it needed, the second storyline could've been just as hilarious, but meekly serves as a filler against the other moments.
Perhaps it’s the actors who are phoning it in after realising they’ll have to stretch their characters over another 13 episodes, or maybe it’s the writing. It just seems that this season of Community is struggling with ideas and jokes. Don’t get me wrong, last week’s episode was genius and felt fresh, like a beacon of hope for the once triumphant television series. But it falls back down with a thud this week, and that is the biggest shame. The ringing sensation in the atmosphere is this...
Maybe Community should’ve been left cancelled.