May 17, 2013
Dennis’s Grand Baseball Theory of Fall TV Scheduling, or, why NBC is below the Mendoza Line

image(Mike O’Malley, NBC’s new DH.)

How bad do things have to get for a network to take a damn chance?

Of course I’m talking about NBC here, the net’ whose former sinecure as one of the Big Three was recently and humiliatingly usurped as it fell to fifth place behind Spanish-language Univision in the 2013 February sweeps period. (Count me among those who, um, may have been unaware that such an outcome was even remotely possible.) Of course, the fortunes of any TV network are cyclical, and while it seems inconceivable that anyone will ever topple CBS’ current domination with its easily-digestible lineup of broad comedies, reality shows, and the CSI/NCIS juggernaut, its day will come. You know, as its elder-skewing viewership, shall we say, gradually…stops watching.

But since it’s currently NBC’s turn as TV punchline, I have a few questions.

NBC is losing or has lost some of its flagship series (The Office, 30 Rock), and its recently announced lineup of new shows looks singularly unadventurous, with remakes (Ironsides), movie adaptations (About A Boy), spinoffs (Chicago PD), yet another doctor show (who cares), and Mike O’Malley. At the same time, the Peacock has passed on a number of pilots, among them an autobiographical sitcom from SNL writer and standup John Mulaney. I haven’t had the opportunity to see Mulaney’s show, but by all accounts it was a hip, funny autobiographical showcase for a talented, up-and-coming comic. (I mean, it’s not like that Louie show is a commercial and critical success or anything, right?) And while the decision to not to pick up one show isn’t itself proof of anything, NBC’s current predicament and programming decisions indicate that the prevailing philosophy remains steadfastly conservative, even in the face of undeniable, and ongoing, futility.

Which leads me to repeat-What, exactly, would be lost if a floundering network took a flier on the unexpected for one TV season?
Now, I’m not talking about some irrational Tunnel Vision/The Groove Tube/Videodrome experiment in broadcasting anarchy here. Network television isn’t being disassembled and recast in the image of a million tweeting fanboys. Or TV critics, for that matter. It’s simply a matter of taking a chance and playing some Moneyball.

First, instead of swinging for the fences with high-priced approximations of what’s worked before, or, you know, what’s currently working really well for its competitors, NBC signs innovative but unproven creators to much cheaper deals. (Like, oh I don’t know…John Mulaney!? C’monnn…) More shows are always going to fail than succeed, and often with shocking abruptness, leaving behind nothing but wasted money and a very annoyed David Alan Grier. So why not minimize the financial risk by fielding a lineup of more inexpensive shows/creators? The initial investment will be less, those involved will be hungry (and talented), and there’s at least an equal chance of ratings success. (Or at least the same sort of ratings failure but at less cost.) I suppose it could get worse for NBC theoretically. What’s in sixth place anyway? ABC Family? ESPN Deportes?

In addition, the inevitable critical buzz (in the event that the gamble pays off creatively) and internet/fan buzz (even if the shows don’t work, there’s good press to be had for trying) will be an improvement over the press involved in getting beaten by a network many viewers remain happily ignorant of while they watch CBS.

Second is a plan that NBC is, accidentally, sort of enacting right now. With Hannibal and Bryan Fuller, the network greenlit a show by an idiosyncratic showrunner with a small but incredibly devoted fan base. See where I’m going here? And while Hannibal (even with the seemingly sure-fire Lecter factor) hasn’t pulled great ratings, critical praise and a small but incredibly devoted fan base have won the show a second season (THIS SEEMED CERTAIN WHEN WRITING THIS- STAY TUNED) with which, one hopes, to build a larger audience. In the meantime, fans of Fuller’s Wonderfalls, Pushing Daisies, and Dead Like Me are out there tweeting, creating fansites, building momentum and putting fresh eyes on the show. The primacy of Nielsen ratings is being increasingly challenged by the myriad ways of measuring viewer enthusiasm for a TV series, and luring in creators whose fans are going to follow him or her to the gates of cancellation hell and beyond is just smart baseball. Some suggestions of currently homeless television auteurs who’d deliver a such a built-in audience: Barbara Hall (Joan of Arcadia), Amy Sherman-Palladino (The Gilmore Girls, possibly Bunheads depending on the breaks), Rob Thomas (Party Down, Veronica Mars, once the movie and its inevitable crowdfunded sequels wrap up), Dana Fox (Ben and Kate), Mike White (Enlightened), or Ted Griffin (Terriers). Add your own neglected geniuses in the comments.

(Also, at this point, I would like to put out there that a third option “bring back the cancelled shows from these creators” was rejected outright, proving once and for all that this is not some raving, woefully impractical fanboy dream about reuniting the cast from Firefly, but a well-reasoned programming theory.)

Will NBC turn into the Yankees with this philosophy in place? Well, no, probably not. Big ratings generally do come from big, proven stars. But big television stars are made and not born, and if, say, a major network were to make itself a haven for inventive new (or established but neglected) talent, then that sounds like a good place for such stars to be discovered and nurtured. However, and with apologies to readers in Chicago, NBC is the broadcasting equivalent of the Cubs at this point, placing all its frustrated hopes on former stars (Sean Hayes? Him?) in the service of inflated contracts and hoping, in the manner of the deluded ever, that repeated application of the same formula will produce, somehow, a more positive result.

The secret of moneyball is deploying your assets according to unique criteria your opponents have undervalued. Sure, you have to hope that you catch a few breaks along the way, but you’re gonna win more than you lose, and pick up (or regain) some respect (and paying customers) in the process.

At least you’ll beat Univision.

Image courtesy of Collider.com

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Filed under: Hannibal John Mulaney NBCwhy? NBC 5th place network programming Bryan Fuller 
April 21, 2013
The Magic of Jackie Robinson

Justin: We both have a deep and abiding love for Key & Peele because they have this frightening precision in their comedy. What I mean by that is they accomplish a lot in the small window of their show. It’s slapstick, it’s societal commentary, it’s BOTH!
One of the best examples of this in their short history is the “Dueling Magical Negro” sketch, which rises the popular trope of the wise, life-changing black man to the level of legitimate sorcery.

I’ve been thinking about that sketch a lot recently whenever I see the commercials or trailers for 42, the Jackie Robinson biopic. Why? Because I have this creeping fear that the movie will reduce one of the greatest, and most important, baseball players in history into a Wizard who ran the base paths and enchanted the world. I’m worried Jackie Robinson will become just another magical black man in movies.

Am I crazy? Am I overreacting?

Dennis: Sadly, you maintain your streak of never overreacting about anything ever. (Vegetarian faux bacon nothwithstanding.)
I have been all over the trailers for this one since they started appearing, dissecting them like a starving man after a lasagna (I admit that the lack of baseball season may have contributed.) I scoured the limited images they gave us, looking for some indication that Jackie Robinson’s story wasn’t going to be smoothed out, dumbed down, and otherwise diluted with bland, cinematic milkiness. I like the look of this young guy with the completely unmemorable name they got to play Jackie (seriously- I’ll give anyone three dollars if they can remember it without hitting IMDb.com), but was alarmed at the noble looks and sound bites he got to deliver. The there was Harrison Ford’s Branch Rickey, growling his lines and chewing the scenery like Mister Magoo.
I was very, very concerned.
And now that the first reviews are in, it seems those concerns have been, well, confirmed. The phrases “well-meaning,” “earnest,” and “inspirational” come up a lot.
Ouch.
Look, I never saw Jackie Robinson play. (I’m old, but not that old.) I came to his story through second hand histories and newsreel footage. And, as the suburban white boy half of Brannigan’s Law, I feel silly laying any special claim to #42’s legacy.
But I know how much I love baseball. I know how readily I respond to it as a parallel history of the United States. And I know I simply cannot watch the Jackie Robinson episode (episode 6, “The National Pastime”) without, every time, sobbing like a little kid. Simply put- I had a lot invested on this film getting this story right.
And it looks like they didn’t.
Instead, it appears this will go down as another forgettable exercise in hagiography and, as all such stories must and do, it looks like it will reduce Robinson to a cliched cipher. A saintly black man, sent by the (white) screenwriting gods to reveal our (white, American) sins, and then absolve us of them. It’s thoroughly disheartening (and frankly inconceivable) that this is the tack the filmmakers seem to have taken.
There’s a story to be told here. A great, uniquely American story encompassing race, and baseball, filled with fascinating, often contradictory characters and complex roots.
I hope someone makes that film one day.

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April 5, 2013
Roger Ebert, R.I.P.

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Dennis: When I first became aware of, and hopelessly besotted with movies as a lonely, isolated little kid I watched everything. Everything I could get a hand on in the land before cable, VCR movies, and films I was too young and timid to sneak into, I watched and tried to process. I was at sea, though-good movies, bad movies, movies I could not possibly hope to understand with my limited experience-I watched them all in a deep, overwhelmed state of confusion as to the nature of this new world I had discovered and become bewilderedly enraptured with.
Then I discovered Sneak Previews on PBS, and saw these two nerdy guys arguing, laughing, and doing this thing I gradually learned was called analyzing these things. Like the books at school, but, you know with a pair of teachers who, for all their balding pates and paunches and turtlenecks, seemed to love movies as much as I did. I started keeping a notebook carefully marking down the thumbs up/thumbs down verdict from each on each show’s movies, movies I for the most part had never heard of and wouldn’t have a chance to see for years. I suppose I liked them equally at that point but when I discovered that the fat one (sorry Roger) started writing books with his reviews in them?!
I simply devoured them. I bought a highlighter at the same bookstore I bought my first Ebert movie guide in and gradually marked off the films I was able to see. (Thankfully home video, cable and the rest of it appeared at my house- I may not be young.) And I realized that, as entertainingly chatty as this man was on TV, he was a damned good writer. Of course I was too young to know about things like that, but I was struck by how what he said, free of having to fit his opinions into a three minute catfight with that bald guy (sorry Gene) made so much sense.
Roger Ebert’s books taught me how to appreciate movies which I had heretofore just devoured, albeit lovingly. I remember his review of the entertainingly pedestrian 2010, and how he used ee cummings to explain the difference between a movie that got into your head and one you just enjoyed. I remember his review of Brazil and getting mad at how he deconstructed Terry Gilliam’s narrative weaknesses (I was a Python freak, too- shocker), even as I petulantly realized he had a point.
 And I remember how this guy, who’d seen more movies than the me I was could have ever dreamed of never seemed to get tired of talking about them. How he never tossed off a review with contempt. How he spent as much energy and creativity explaining why a movie sucked as he did when the film in question had truly engaged his heart.
Because Roger Ebert always, always had heart where movies were concerned. You could feel it in every sentence, in every damned word. He loved movies, and he loved his job, and he loved inviting you to share his enthusiasm.
And that’s what I responded to.
Of course I disagreed with him, and often. And I came to regard him as something of a cornball, prone to a certain provincial rube-iness, even as I, the snotty suburban white boy was succumbing to my own blind spots and sentimentality. I turned on Roger, pledging my allegiance to Pauline Kael (and Cult Movies maven Danny Peary, whose out of print books I heartily recommend).
But I always knew where I came from, and I always bought every successive Ebert guide, and I always brought my highlighter.
Roger Ebert taught me how to watch movies. And how to love them. Critically, sure. But always with love.
Because watching movies is one of the great joys in living.
Thank you Roger. I will never be able to repay what you gave me, but I’ll always remember that.

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March 14, 2013
Weekend Update: Justin Timberlake goes for 5 on SNL

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Justin: First, this week’s episode with Justin Timberlake was a predictable, and delightful, winner. And I’ll get back to that in a second. But before that…Maine Justice?

What was going on there? The joke, as someone put it best on Twitter, is that they’re Cajun in Maine? As former Maine resident, I had prepared myself for the worst (looking for evidence of bad Maine accents on SNL, go no further than “gay lobstermen in love”), but instead was just in a state of bewilderment. I think it has something to do with the word “Maine,” because otherwise the sketch was the kind of post-Weekend Update goofiness I fully endorse on SNL. You want to let Jason Sudeikis and Kate McKinnon go nuts on some funny accents? I am on board. Throw in shenanigans with an alligator and I’ll be giggling by the time we reach commercial. Instead I was just staring at my TV like a dog that had just been shown a card trick.

Overall, I’m in favor of MORE of those “back 9” kind of sketches that get thrown in the last 30-40 minutes of the show. “Sober Caligula,” even though it didn’t fully land, was a good attempt, funny and crude, plus the benefit of using almost all of the cast. And then there was “Moet & Chandon,” or the “why does Justin Timberlake have on a filthy mustache and why am I laughing so hard” bit. I’m sure that’s just the kind of free publicity the people at Moet are looking for, SNL-ers playing former porn stars who survived tragic magic tricks and waking up covered in blood. Also, “It’s like nice champagne, but some of it’s Sprite.”

But all of this was secondary, really, to a jam-packed, crying-because I’m laughing so hard, first half of the show. Aside from the Elton John cold open, it was largely predictable. If not for the fact that Timberlake is doing Jimmy Fallon all this week, I’d bet we would have seen another Barry Gibbs talk show bit.

If you have not just Timberlake, but Baldwin, Hanks, Martin, Chevy, and Andy Samberg in the wings, even the most overly telegraphed play can still be a riot. “It’s a Date,” was like the “Star Trek Generations” of SNL douchebags, and it was so wonderful. I screamed (in a manly way, of course) at the sight of Steve Martin and Dan Aykroyd as the Festrunk Brothers. Guest-star power aside, the sketch really worked so well because of current cast like Vanessa Bayer, Bill Hader, and Bobby Moynihan.

So a very solid episode, helped largely by what I think is a new rule of comedy: Timberlake + costume + dancing = comedy gold. I’m not entirely sure why, but “Give it on up to Veganville” is just funny. 

Dennis: I am the world’s biggest fan of the 10-to-1 sketch concept. I know Lorne’s an expert at this point of paying the bills, giving the people what they want, etc, but I like to imagine that somewhere deep inside, he’s still the same 30 year old Canadian weirdo who green-lighted things like the Coneheads (before they became an institution), David Keochner and Madeline Kahn passive-aggressively trying to lay blame on each other as they’re being carried off in the claws of a giant bird, and Steve Martin and Bill Murray just spending five minutes asking, “What the hell is that?” on national TV. (I maintain that all of Portlandia represents Fred Armisen’s adoption of Lorne’s former freak flag.)

Maine Justice? Carrying on the 10-t0-1 tradition of puzzling oddity into the new generation. While the first iteration of the sketch explained at the end that Maine had become the resettlement home of choice for Southern caricatures after hurricane Katrina, I liked it better when Sudekis and then-host Jamie Foxx were just Maine rednecks without any explanation whatsoever: That’s the 10-to-1 spirit! This time, having established the premise previously, they just went ahead and let Maine Justice be the inexplicably weird last sketch of the night it was meant to be, and I heartily approve. Plus, Sudekis doing his thing and a random alligator puppet eating gumbo? Yes, please.

And while I agree that the whole Caligula thing didn’t land (hello-pacing…), the Moet & Chandon thing was as money as it was, again, in the Jamie Foxx episode. Is the joke that there are two numbly-dumb sex workers pitching off-brand champale while inadvertently letting slip the horrifying details of their boozy, sex-addled lives? (“One time I did a weird photo shoot in Mexico. Two of the girls disappeared but I’m alive. Thanks, champagne.”) Yes. Is it basically one long dumb-chick(s) joke? (I got banged into a sinkhole. But then a mole person banged me back up. I’ll drink to that.”) Ok, sure. But it’s also the sort of random, loony concept the 10-to-1 spot was made for and Cecily Strong, Vanessa Bayer, and host JT (with aforementioned porn ‘stache and a healthy dose of hilarious cluelessness) turn this one into a nonstop, awe-inspiring giggle machine. I will never, ever not think it’s the funniest thing ever when JT keeps gliding into frame asking, “Did somebody say celebrate?” It’s just not going to happen. The sort of completely un-commercial comic nonsense that the best last sketches  sketches are built upon. Freed from the need to create recurring characters and catchphrases, it’s this forgotten spot that seems to be the place that SNL writers let their comic imaginations out to play.

As for the rest of the show, I wouldn’t want to see this sort of thing every week, but seeing the show just go for it with cameos out the wazoo was a little present to the me that started watching this show when I was far, far too young and didn’t get 3/4 of the jokes. (I also may not be young.) And, apart from seeing how truly terribly Danny Aykroyd has aged, how Chevy is still way too pleased with himself and has no sense of live comic timing, and how I don’t need to see Martin Short do schtick again, ever - it was a pretty good night.

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Filed under: Saturday Night Live SNL Justin Timberlake Give it on to Veganville 
February 28, 2013
The AV Club says we're being too hard on Community. We say, "You've never had your heart broken!"

Very good think piece from the AV Club’s Joel Keller examining showrunner worship and the (over?)reaction of certain people to Season 4’s perceived lack of…something.  Of course, Dennis is humming loudly with his fingers in his ears, but should he ever read this, there’s some wisdom to be had…

Image courtesy of http://geek-news.mtv.com

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Filed under: Community Again with Community? AV Club 
February 18, 2013
Advanced Fear Economics: Community’s Second Episode and the Death of All You Love

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Dennis: Who’s dead inside - Community, season 4 or me?

This is a real question. I’m actually asking you, Justin.

I need some help here.

I’ve been through the wringer on this one. We both have. Back in the day, when things were simple and pure (you know, when all we had to do was worry incessantly that one of the best sitcoms in TV history would be cancelled at any moment- remember how great that was?), we could just love Community, look forward to each episode, and wait out the yearly hiatus. Good times. We worried about the suits pulling the plug and wrote our little articles and goaded our inter-pals into watching the show- but we always knew that the thing we loved, we loved. We’d love it no matter what happened. If the show went on, we knew that Dan Harmon would guide the ship to somewhere weird, and wonderful. If the plug got kicked out by the forces of evil and commerce and evil commerce, we’d have our precious DVDs and our righteous/self-righteous wrath at those philistine execs who deprived the world of something that made us happy as hell. Good times.

But the reality of this Community seems actually worse than if the axe had fallen. Instead, the governor called, the headsman was sent home for the year, and Community was given back to us. Like this.

Read More

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Filed under: community Again with Community? oh god here they go again on Community NBC sitcoms Dan Harmon Buffy Joss Whedon 
February 18, 2013
If You Don’t Watch Enlightnened, You’re Destroying The Planet

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Dennis: Now in its second season on HBO, this half hour sort-of comedy series isn’t getting the same press as the uber-buzzworthy (and excellent) ‘Girls’. Maybe it’s the general lack of naked young flesh that’s keeping this show in semi-obscurity, or, you know, the fact that it is almost impossible to describe in a way that will make anyone want to watch it, ever. I mean, I resisted Enlightened for a good long while before finally succumbing, and now it’s appointment viewing for me, so I’ll give it a shot. A vehicle for actress Laura Dern, the show follows her character who, as the show begins, is Amy, a hard-driving, even harder-partying junior executive at a typical corporate multi-whatever who, after a particularly public breakdown at work finds herself attending a holistic rehab facility. While there, Amy wholeheartedly adopts the spiritual awakening philosophy and returns to work, only to find that she’s being phased out of her old job and that, shockingly, her newfound social/environmental/all other ways consciousness doesn’t jibe with the corporate philosophy. Shunted down to the literal and figurative basement of the company, she finds herself little more than a data entry drone, surrounded with the rest of the company’s misfits; the company can’t really fire an employee who’s undergone the recommended treatment, but they sure can bury her in drudgery and humiliation and hope she’ll quit on her own.

The thing is- this new Amy is filed with the righteousness that only the truly self-righteous can know and she takes it upon herself to bring her newfound, well, enlightenment to the corporate world- and then probably the world, especially when she accidentally discovers that the company may be up to more than the typical corporate malfeasances that go hand in hand with good ol’ capitalism.

There- now you can see that I’ve spent a lot of words trying to convince you to watch this show and that I have failed completely. It sounds like a drag, frankly: maybe it’ll be a bummer of a self-satisfied liberal polemic, or a nasty-headed cringe comedy mocking new agey types. I thought it was going to be one of those, but what I didn’t count on was Mike White, the sneaky genius whose written things like Chuck & Buck, School of Rock, Year of the Dog, and more, and under whose guidance (he writes every episode), ‘Enlightened’ has revealed itself as one of the most multi-layered, surprising, character-based series in a long time. The key to the show (as it was with White’s underrated Year of the Dog) is that it’s entirely possible to be absolutely right in your convictions and yet be absolutely insufferable in your actions. Dern’s Amy, like Molly Shannon’s awakened vegan animal rights activist in Dog, undergoes what to her is a meaningful spiritual awakening that completely takes over her life, and then loses all perspective on the fact that, just because you’ve had an epiphany, you can’t just assume that the rest of the world is going to do everything you say.

Now, that may sound a lot like the aforementioned “new age bashing” but Enlightened really isn’t that; sure Amy’s newfound obsessions are played for queasy, uncomfortable laughs more often than not, but you get the sense that White thinks her positions are essentially correct. It’s more a show about a fundamentally unhappy woman who exchanges one unhealthy obsession (her career) for another (fixing the entire world) without the leavening wisdom of perspective to prevent her from becoming, well, a monster. Because, in Dern’s hands, a monster is what Amy becomes, her toothy, wide eyed earnestness whooshing past the needs of others and sweeping the unwary along with her on her monomaniacal yet unformed crusade to save the word, largely by destroying the company she’d once lived for. It’s a stunning performance which (like Shannon’s in Dog), plays empathy ping-pong with the viewer as Amy is at once the humiliated underdog out for vindication and a single-minded zealot out to wreak revenge on those who she thinks have wronged her, no matter who her vendetta destroys. (And, as ever, the shocking openness of Dern’s face is absolutely captivating to watch- and terrifying.)

The balancing act White and Dern pull off here is fascinating, but that’s just the half of it. The show has a habit of pulling back from Amy’s story unexpectedly to throw an entire episode at one of the minor characters (that’s how she sees them, anyway) in Amy’s life, giving them an entire episode to show what a life in Amy’s fanatical orbit is like. Luke Wilson, who hasn’t been this good since The Royal Tenenbaums, gets one as Amy’s still-addicted ex-husband, and Diane Ladd (Dern’s real mom) gets one as Amy’s put-upon mother who takes Amy back into her quiet retirement (and formerly peaceful house). And Mike White himself, who heartbreakingly portrays Tyler, the ghostlike office mole and computer expert who finds himself unable to resist getting sucked into Amy’s quest. (Seriously, his season 2 episode had me in awe-struck tears throughout, when I wasn’t laughing.)

So there you go- ‘Enlightened’ is a weird, ambitious, unsettling, funny, heartbreaking, nigh-uncatagorizable series anchored by great writing and a daringly bananas lead performance. I’d watch it, if I were you…

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Filed under: Enlightened Shows in Danger Mike White HBO Shows you should be watching Why aren't you watching this show? Laura Dern TV TV shows 
February 14, 2013
Karaoke Night at Greendale, or, what it’s like to watch the new season of Community

                                         

Justin: It’s been a week since Community returned to the TV box. Some are calling it Zombie Community. Others are talking about the uncanny valley of Dan Harmon. At this point I don’t even know if Dennis has recovered.

I think even the most generous fan of Community would have to admit the season premiere had a strong karaoke quality to it that made it enjoyable but a little empty. And I say this as someone who likes Community and karaoke.

Let me be clear: The new Community is not bad. In fact I laughed a lot. As a fan, it’s hard not to get excited to see this group of actors get back into their old costumes and put on a show, even if it feels as forced as an extra special Jim Rash costume change. And oh, where there many. And jokes about them.

The karaoke metaphor feels right because the storyline in the premiere had all the markings of a Harmon-esque script, sprinkled with doses of emotional reflection tempered with zaniness. It looked and sounded like the real thing. There was plenty of meta-ness. It’s not just that our characters are aware that their time as students, and as a study group is coming to an end, it’s that the show, itself, is telling us the same thing in the form of an Abed illusion, a “sitcom” version of life at Greendale starring the study group (with a great Fred Willard cameo starring as Pierce Hawthorn).

The thing is, it hits all the familiar notes, a kind of melancholy glee that outsiders of any kind can identify with. Dealing with change can be really fucking hard, as fans, or as the raw nerd heart of a group of community college misfits. Abed is having a hard time dealing with change, but he may be the only one who knows it, even if he’s reaching a layer of self-Inception that even Tom Hardy would have trouble pulling him out of. 

But ultimately, the whole affair felt off by just a few degrees. The sitcom in a sitcom bit was good for laughs, but it felt so very on the nose. We’re commenting on the controversy surrounding our show, see?

But, it’s only the first episode down. And I can be a man of everlasting patience when it comes to TV shows. (Unless the TV show is The Killing. Sorry.) So I’ll give it a shot. And I’m hopeful that the idea of the gang transitioning could be used to greater effect throughout the season, a way of shifting our expectations for this final zombie/uncanny/karaoke season of Community.

But what about you? Have you come out of your bunker yet, Dennis?

Dennis: Bu…but, everything is still standing? I went into the bunker because the bombs were coming…weren’t they? WEREN’T THEY!??  Damn you!! Damn you all to hellllll!!!!!!

Thank you.

If one may unpack that metaphor, yes, I have emerged from my Harmon-less Community bunker and stand blinking unsteadily into the wavering light emanating from season four. On the one hand, definitely relieved that there wasn’t the soul-scarring spectacle of a giant, smelly season four premiere bomb to cope with, yet still feeling a little unsteady in the face of the uncertain future suggested for Greendale (and me) from a first episode that was…fine.

Fine.

In some ways, that word, rather than, say, “embarrassing,” “dreadful,” or “dear God in Heaven- save us Dan Harmon!!! We were so wrong!!!” is what I was afraid of most. I went into this new season with an open, if terrified, mind and came out thinking, well, several things:

1. The premiere was too ambitious. It seems silly to fault the new regime for shooting too high right out of the gate, but there was simply too much going on here. I get it- in fact, it was a very Hamon-esque attempt to fold in all the internal and external aspects of Community one episode in. It was very much like the “we’re gonna be more normal and accessible” musical number that started off season three, except that, when this was Harmon’s campus, all of those elements blended together (the meta and the text, the larfs and the heart, the character stuff and whatever potshots they were taking at Chevy) almost seamlessly. Here, I saw the seams; the Hunger Deans/Jeff wackiness stitched to the “Jeff is leaving the group early” plot, the Abed breakdown scotch-taped to the “Abed TV” gags, the Troy/Britta and Annie/Shirley stuff floating around all unattached to anything. There was a lot packed into this 23 minutes, and I applaud the effort, but it lacked the strong emotional throughline that Cap’n Harmon nearly always provided.

Am I being too hard on this first show? Am I just being a Harmon-ite in the face of reality? Or, more alarmingly, has the show and its particular blend of comedy simply gone stale and I’m simply heaping on the new showrunners/writers the bile that I would have ignored if Big Dan were still at the wheel?

It’s a thought, but I don’t think so. There was something just…off.

2. The show looks different, and I don’t approve. You noticed that, didn’t you? Too clean, too many close-ups, and (especially in the Britta/Troy montage at the wishing well) too much cutting. One way to ensure continuity would be to retain the show’s visual style. This was subtly jarring- and alienating.

3. I hated the Shirley/Annie popcorn gag. Actually, I liked the gag, up to the point where their makeshift mirrors actually started popping the popcorn in the car(?!) That was a Scrubs-style surreal gag right there, and as much as I liked Scrubs, Community is not Scrubs. This was ay, way too broad, and if it’s indicative of a creeping undercurrent of surrealist wackiness, not in some Abed-ian dream context but in the main reality of the show itself…well I hate it.

I’ll leave off here, except to say that, while I wasn’t completely destroyed by this episode, I have doubts about the direction the show is heading. But I’m hanging in ‘til the end- it is Community after all…

I love Community. It’d have to be a lot worse than this for me not to watch it.

6:59pm  |   URL: http://tmblr.co/ZAG4Iye9Td03
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(Notes: 5)
  
Filed under: Community Dan Harmon TV Sitcoms NBC Greendale Karaoke 
February 13, 2013
Happy Galentine’s Day from Brannigan’s Law. Especially to you, Dennis Perkins, who, like Ann Perkins, is a beautiful tropical fish.

Happy Galentine’s Day from Brannigan’s Law.

Especially to you, Dennis Perkins, who, like Ann Perkins, is a beautiful tropical fish.

8:18pm  |   URL: http://tmblr.co/ZAG4Iye5WmFu
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(Notes: 3)
  
Filed under: Parks and Recreation Amy Poehler Leslie Knope Galentine's Day Ann Perkins gifs gifs gifs 
February 11, 2013
Be warned: You may never see the ISIS office the same way again. Ever.  [via Vulture: “See The Real Models for Archer Characters”]

Be warned: You may never see the ISIS office the same way again. Ever. 

[via Vulture: “See The Real Models for Archer Characters”]

11:54pm  |   URL: http://tmblr.co/ZAG4IydzHf4u
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(Notes: 7)
  
Filed under: Archer FX Danger Zone ISIS 
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