Community – Paintball, part 1

The goal of this episode was obviously to outdo last year’s epic paintball episode. In terms of pure badassery, Community has succeeded. In terms of Jeff/Britta study room sex, they have failed. In all seriousness though, this two-parter was meant to be a single episode and it shows. The episode was great, but seems unfinished; like it was arbitrarily cut off at the half-way mark, which it totally was.

I understand NBC’s decision to stretch this out, but with an Office repeat airing directly after it, there was clearly no reason to do so. Especially because anyone who happened to watch this who isn’t already a die-hard Community fan was probably left a little perplexed.

The episode was a surreal mixture of Grindhouse and Western, and seemed to start in the middle of an episode. There’s no exposition other than a reference to last year’s paintball match. Instead, we’re offered a group of people in Western-style clothing with very little information. We eventually find out that some weird ice cream company is sponsoring this event and offering a $100,000 prize, but we never find out what happened to Annie’s skirt.

Community is hands-down the most absurd show on television, easily usurping former title-holder 30 Rock this season. Between Dungeons and Dragons, magical trampolines and fake clip shows, Community manages to re-invent itself as a different genre every single week.

As great as this episode was, I have to go back to the fact that it was cut in half. I was left wanting more, but not in a good way. When the episode ended, I was left feeling that I need to just leave it on my DVR and watch it right before next week’s episode, so I can get the full effect.

With that complaint aside, there were so many things to love about this brief affair: Jeff’s insecurity when confronted with Josh Holloway was hilarious. Combine that with two forehead jokes in nearly as many weeks, and Jeff is quickly becoming a candidate for a breakdown.

While Jeff, who is usually the leader became weak in the face of Holloway’s magnificent chin, Annie stepped forward. Abed noticed how awesome she’s become and whether it’s because of the game, the $100,000, or just the lack of pants, Annie’s a total badass. She carried the episode with a snarl and without a cardigan.

Even though we already got our “clip show,” this episode was great in that it threw references in about many of the season’s episodes. Neal mentioned playing Dungeons and Dragons, we saw his maybe-girlfriend from last week’s episode, and Pierce’s villainy was addressed, as was Shirley’s baby. I’m sure that next week we’ll get even more.

The episode did manage to end on a bit of a cliffhanger, with the inside men from the ice cream company coming in. I actually am pretty curious to see how this all ends — after all, none of the guys from the study group can actually win the $100,000, right? If they did, there’s certainly no reason to come back to Greendale, and we can’t have that.

But even more importantly, is Nathan Fillion going to make an appearance next week?

Clacked by Kona Gallagher
on May 05, 2011 @ 22:11 EST5EDT