Recap (Complete with listings of flashbacks!):
Two months after their expulsion from Greendale, the group is still happily together and having a potluck dinner. Abed, dressed as Inspector Spacetime, shows up escorted by Officer Cackowski. Apparently, Abed was caught going through Dean Pelton’s garbage, believing him to not be the real Dean. “Dean” agrees to not press charges if Abed sees a specific psychiatrist, and he’s even willing to pay the bill.
At the office of the psychiatrist (John Hodgeman), all seven of the group join him—Britta tries to use her psych major privileges to help diagnose him, and the rest admit they came because Abed never goes to doctors alone. When they note that Abed is normally adorable weird but not creepy weird like now, the doctor asks if this was all because of the expulsion. The group, however, remembers other times that he was a little creepy weird:
- Abed freaking out about losing an hour when the clocks turn forward.
- Shirley saying Brett Ratner is the “new Spielberg,” resulting in Abed freaking out and calling her a “bad person.”
- Abed narrating Pierce (driving Pierce to no longer want to be in his novel.)
- Abed video-recording Annie sleeping, waking up, and telling him to get out of her room.
When the doctor determines Abed is clearly sick, the group defends Abed by saying they’re all a little “crazytown banana pants,” remembering:
- Britta showing up hilariously disheveled, asking “how long does Peyote last? Just…asking for a friend.”
- Annie having “Troy and Abed and Annie in the Morning” with stuffed animals; Troy and Abed walk in, angrily asking what all the “cameras” are doing there.
- Jeff giving Annie his coat at a costume party, but then giving her rules: “Just don’t eat anything, or drink anything…and no sweating, or hanging at the elbows, and no chairs with backrests, and if you take that off wooden hangers only.”
- Troy driving a 4-wheeler into the library because it’s “all-terrain.”
- After her children eat all the cookies she baked, Shirley brings the group her boy’s possessions as punishment. Troy gets a karate trophy, thinks he can do karate, and hurts his hand.
The doctor believes that having the group as a “support system” is only worsening Abed’s condition, and Abed should be committed to an institution. Moreover, the doctor thinks the obsession with Greendale is the problem. However, the group notes that they’re survivors of Greendale, remembering:
- Baby Talk class.
- Dean having human chess to agree on parking for a job fair.
- Advanced Breath Holding class.
- Shirley finding a book sectioned-out in the shape of a gun.
- Pierce getting a celebration for 10,000th flush.
- Can I Fry That? class (and the student that asks “fries?” gets kicked out.)
- A hobo with an angry guard dog sleeping in the study room.
- Ladders class, where the teacher climbs up a ladder, followed by the class applauding.
The doctor says they can only be mentally healthy if they stop dwelling on Greendale, prompting the group to instead remember moments when they liked Greendale:
- Dean Pelton, dressed as a firefighter, warning the study group of a fire before anyone else.
- Annie and another girl, Darcy, wearing the same outfit; Dean tells Darcy she’s “sick” and madly chases her out of the school for Annie.
- Dean secretly pulling the last six pieces of pizza for the study group on pizza day.
- Dean singing the Greendale 7 a song on the intercom instead of singing for other students’ birthdays.
- An unseen gangster-themed paintball episode clip, where Dean is shot by Pierce. Dean says he wanted Abed to win, but Abed understands now that paintball feels forced. When Dean dies, Abed yells “LAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAME!”
Annie realizes that all of their good memories have Dean Pelton in them. Abed has been saying for two months that the real Dean would have never expelled them, because he loved them. They realize that Greendale didn’t drive them crazy, and there’s something up and they need to be there. The psychiatrist, however, reveals something shocking—Greendale doesn’t exist! Greendale Community College is, in fact, Greendale Asylum. The last three years have been their shared psychosis, and they are all relapsing together. They were committed because of trauma—pill addiction, failed legal career, broken marriage, lost scholarship, being old, etc.—and fabricated a mental alternative compatible to their grim reality. They then remember their moments through the lens of a mental institution:
- Jeff and Troy on the trampoline in “Aerodynamics of Gender”.
- The climax of “For a Few Paintballs More”.
- Singing “Baby Boomer Santa” from “Regional Holiday Music”.
- Talking about memories in their last clip show, “Paradigms of Human Memory” (and Troy’s long yell), plus Pierce referencing sex with Eartha Kitt from “Remedial Chaos Theory” and “Geography of Global Conflict”.
- Drs. Garrett and Dean Pelton wanting to see what will happen if they confiscate one of their pens, referencing “Cooperative Calligraphy”.
The doctor notes that they don’t know any Spanish despite being a Spanish study group, and community colleges only last two years, so Greendale couldn’t be real. The group is convinced for a moment, but as soon as they leave, they realize it made absolutely no sense (Shirley has kids, Abed has pictures, Annie is even literally wearing a Greendale backpack.) They return to the office to see the doctor sneaking out the window, on the phone with someone saying “I think they bought it.” They grab him, and he tries to convince them that “Greendale is purgatory, and I am the devil.” Finally, he concedes and says that Dean was kidnapped by Chang and replaced by a double; the doctor was hired to get them off the scent. They remember all times Chang was insane:
- Chang snorting corn chips like coke.
- Chang having Garret in a pool, trying to use him as a pre-cog to predict crimes (a la Minority Report.)
- Chang repeatedly tasering himself in the balls while Abed watches.
However, while they remember Chang is crazy, the fake doctor sneaks away. They realize they must find the Dean and get back to the school to help him. Chang, however, has realized the study group has gotten wise to Operation Doppel-Deaner. He then tells the kids to move on to “Phase 2″…which they must come up with.
Review:
One major thing Community has done right throughout its entire run is being able to not run a popular concept or gag dry. Season 2’s paintball sequel made the battle epic to the point that it couldn’t be topped, so we don’t have one for season 3. Any bottle show follow-ups to “Cooperative Calligraphy” were stealthy and less self-referential. ”Documentary Filmmaking Redux” brought the documentary set-up to a larger and more comical scale than its predecessor. Here, we get a sequel to one of season 2’s best episodes, “Paradigms of Human Memory”, still using common clip show tropes but throwing in some very awesome twists on other tropes we didn’t see coming. Even better, we still get plot momentum and some character development.
The clip show portions of it were just as creative as season 2’s, but in a drastically different way. While season 2 took a more meta stance in its clips, with parodies of its concept episodes, flaws and fanbase, “Curriculum Unavailable” instead explored its own universe. We got a larger peak at the unseen ridiculousness of Greendale, and many smaller character moments and jokes. And as much as I adore “Paradigms of Human Memory”, one of the only flaws then was that sometimes the clips went on a little too long, while the much faster display of clips this time around was a vast improvement.
“Curriculum Unavailable” uses the flashbacks to form a clear trajectory for the overarching plot, giving their order a definitive reason as they bring the Greendale 7 closer and closer to the truth: that Dean loved them and Chang is really really crazy. However, that last part was also one of the episode’s only problems: the Chang realization just felt a little shoehorned in. After such a big break from the clip show and into the “asylum” tropes, going back to flashbacks for only three short, mildly funny clips so the group can realize Chang is crazy (didn’t they already know that?) lost the episode some momentum right at the end. Admittedly, though, the fake doctor escaping during their flashback was a funny joke, and overall it didn’t hurt the episode that much.
Using the psychiatrist’s office as a clip show frame isn’t a super prominent trope, but shows like Malcolm in the Middle have done it to varying degrees. Community manages to give it a two-fold purpose—yeah, they do the whole “flashbacks to clips we never saw” shtick, but suddenly it becomes a play on “you’re all actually crazy!” twists. I’ll come right out and say that I’m unfairly partial to any kind of “mindscrew” episode of a show; episodes like “Normal Again” from Buffy the Vampire Slayer or “Labyrinth” from Smallville are among my favorite episodes of TV just based on the concept. So having even a portion of this episode parody “it was all a delusion,” especially when done so well, really shot it up into awesome territory. Keeping it a quick twist and untwist was smart, as devoting an entire episode to convincing the group they were in an asylum might have been too boring. Sort of like the episode “Dave” in Lost, it also disproved what could be a fan theory (though I doubt it’s a popular one) and what could have even made for an (anger-inducing) series finale, if the writers were more unoriginal. The callbacks to past episodes through the lens of a mental asylum were absolutely brilliant, with the entire cast selling the parts hilariously.
Actually, the psychiatrist serves a three-fold purpose, since we also get the group to realize Dean Pelton did legitimately love them. It’s a small character beat for the overall group, but it’s important; some of the things they said about him in “Course Listing Unavailable” were quite mean, so having the realization that he’s both an ally and a friend ought to change their dynamic from here on out. But then that leads into its four-fold purpose—getting them involved with Chang’s sinister plot so they can rescue the real Dean and save Greendale. As ridiculous as the Chang dictatorship plot is—like, seriously, how did someone actually come up with that?—its strength is how it’s serving the characters, bringing the group together to save Greendale.
This is a surprisingly clear and oddly epic goal for a sitcom to have, and the amount of build-up and momentum makes this entire arc feel like the back half of Buffy the Vampire Slayer season 5. Every plot point has a reason, and it’s all coming together in full-force in what’s essentially Act II of a gigantic story. And the fact that I’m talking about an “epic story” and made multiple references to Buffy and Lost in a review of a sitcom about a community college pretty much proves how unique and utterly crazy this show is, and why it’s more than deserving of its recently announced fourth season. Bring on the 90-minute season—not series—finale!
Some stray tidbits:
- Tag: Troy and Abed in the Morning: Nights!
- Let’s just give some props to director Adam Davidson (“Conspiracy Theories and Interior Design”) and writer Adam Countee (“Studies in Modern Movement”) for such a stellar episode.
- Jeff noting specificially that “the average community college student goes to school 5-7 years” finally clearly establishes in continuity that they could stay in school until season 7 and it’s still justified in the Community universe.
- Look, I know the whole point of that paintball flashback was to reference that they should never do another paintball episode…but…I’d still love to see how they’d handle a gangster-themed episode.
- Anyone come up with the recipe for Troy’s Bagel Bites/deconstructed Hot Pocket/Doritos glaze casserole yet?
- Jeff is really obsessed with Greendale having lockers.
- John Hodgeman fit in really well with the show’s very fast line delivery. Gags like “You probably got released because your insurance ran out,” the “swingdancing in the 90s” line, or the crazy/help gag were very funny-yet-subtle in a way not all actors can handle.
- Erik Charles Nielsen was hilarious as both pre-cog Garrett and deep-voiced Dr. Garrett (is his real voice that deep?)
- Love Yvette Nichole Brown’s little cross touch after hearing “rape’s up 8%.”
- Everything with Troy’s injured-hand gag was awesome. Actually, Donald Glover in general had some really great stuff (as always when he has to cry and scream a lot.) Notable moments were “Crazy people jail!” and redoing his meta-yell from “Paradigms of Human Memory” in the asylum—itself a brilliant gag, by the way.
- Though it’s a little frustrating that Chevy Chase has been given almost nothing substantial this season outside of basically having Alzheimer’s, his “sundowning” is still always funny in a slightly sad way.
- Britta’s psych major stuff is coming really close to running dry, but considering how funny Gillian Jacobs was this week, it’s still got steam for now.
- “Think a guy becomes a cop because his prom night was a dream?” It’s always nice to see Craig Cackowski back as Officer Cackowski.
- “Reggie, to the timebooth! We don’t have much…space.”
- “Britta’s right…wait what?”
1 Comment
Erik Charles Nielsen stated in a comment on AV Club that his real voice is not that deep, and that he wasn’t sure if they edited his voice post-filming or had someone do voice-over.
Anyway, brilliant episode, and thanks for writing these incredibly thorough recaps.