Community #3.13 “Digital Exploration of Interior Design” Recap & Review

In the beginning of this season’s epic two-parter, friendships are tested, pillows are thrown, Garrett may or may not be saved, and everyone will Eat Fresh.  And it’s very, very good.

Recap:

Subway opens in Greendale’s cafeteria.  Pierce and Shirley, still wanting to open their sandwich business from “Urban Matrimony and the Sandwich Arts”, figure out that any business must be 51% owned by a Greendale student.  However, it turns out Subway used Corpo-Huminazation, which allows a person to represent the humanity of a business; meaning there’s a Greendale student known as Subway, swearing away the rest of his identity.  Shirley and Pierce ask Britta to go undercover to seduce and investigate Subway (the man) and find a way to get him fired, therefore forcing Subway out of Greendale.  However, when Britta talks to him, she starts to really fall in love with him, realizing he’s actually a very good person.  They bond over 1984, despite Subway not being allowed to pursue non-platonic relationships (at risk of his corporate image).  Pierce and Shirley suspect that Britta’s falling for him, and plant a bug on her.  The next time she meets with Subway, they make love in the pillow fort—and Shirley and Pierce take the recorded footage to the Subway head.  The extent that Subway and Britta’s sex escalated disgusts him to the point that Subway is fired.  Britta later finds another person calling himself Subway, who appears to have all of old Subway’s memories—except he denies their sexual escapades.

Jeff discovers that Greendale students have lockers, and in fact he’s had one since day one that he never knew about.  He finds his with two-year’s worth of fliers and notes slipped through the cracks.  One of them is a hate letter from someone named Kim, who tells Jeff he is “inconsiderate.”  However, Jeff has no idea who Kim is; Annie suspects it’s a girl Jeff made out with and ditched.  Jeff investigates the locker of whom he suspects to be Kim, and meets a man who tells Jeff that Kim died.  Jeff is torn up over never being able to understand what he did wrong and apologize.  Annie tells him to apologize to Kim’s locker anyway, as a way to confront his guilt.  He does, and admits to being a self-centered jerk, when the man from before returns—revealing himself to having been Kim all along.  It turns out that Kim and Jeff have hung out multiple times, but Jeff would never remember him.  So, Kim made up the story of the dead Kim to hurt him.  Annie, however, is outraged that this wasn’t about a Jeff’s issues with dominating women and is instead about another man.  She eventually comes to her senses and apologizes, only to realize that Jeff has forgotten who Kim is again.

Troy, Abed and Annie’s apartment is being fumigated for termites, which inspires Troy and Abed to build another fort at Greendale—this time a pillow fort instead of a blanket fort.  Dean Pelton informs them that they might actually be capable of breaking the Guinness World Record for largest blanket or pillow fort.  Troy considers doing a blanket fort, because it would be easier to win, but Abed wants to stick with the pillow fort.  Vice Dean Laybourne shows up (with a beard and ponytail) and tries to get Troy to join the A/C Repair Annex once more.  He then compares Abed and Troy to Inspector Spacetime and Constable Reggie—saying Abed is the Inspector, who always bosses around Reggie, the naive obedient lap-dog, aka Troy.  Troy is profoundly affected by this, and confronts Abed about it, who tells him he can make a blanket fort…as long as it’s not part of his pillow fort.  Dean gets a Guinness representative prepared to come, but Troy’s separate blanket fort is 2,000 square feet shy of the record—with Abed’s pillow fort in the way.  Dean tells Abed to self-destruct his fort to allow Troy’s to beat the record.  Before Abed can, Vice Dean Laybourne appears and tells him not to abandon his dream, supporting craftsmanship in the eyes of mediocrity, especially considering the world is run by “unremarkable people” when Abed himself is remarkable.  Abed then refuses to tear it down. When Dean Pelton commands Abed’s fort be torn down, an angry Starburns throws a pillow at Troy’s fort, knocking part of it down and inciting a war between the two sides.   “To be continued,” utters Abed.

In the tag, Vice Dean Laybourne reveals his plan to split up Troy and Abed so Troy will have no choice but to join the Greendale A/C Repair Annex, and then leaves for band practice.

Review:

The producers promised us a great episode this time around, and wow, did it deliver.  There really isn’t anything particularly negative to talk about.  In fact, it’s clear everyone really pumped their all into this episode, to the point that I would have expected this two-parter to be the finale of sorts.  Also, it’s interesting how heavily serialized this season has become; whether that’s ultimately good or bad remains to be seen once we can see the sum of its parts.  But as it stands, seeing the various story threads slowly bloom over multiple episodes is an interesting and engaging experience, especially when we get big steps like this episode.

One of the strongest aspects about this episode is how it utilized the entirely of the major cast.  Chang was missing, but the big Greendale Seven and Dean Pelton had an equal amount to do, something only the strongest episodes have really mastered.  Allowing this to be a two-parter really helped it; we got plenty of substance from Troy and Abed’s story thread, but it didn’t require as much screentime since it was setting up next week’s story.  So while we got an epic-scaled story’s beginnings, we still got plenty of time to explore the other characters’ subplots, and some nice moments from every character.

You really have to hand it to Subway for giving the show such creative freedom with their product, considering its corporate level didn’t exactly seem as angelic as, say, Chuck made it out to be when plugging the sandwich chain.  At the same time, the show was wonderfully on-the-nose with it.  I mean, we actually got a character melodramatically yelling “I LOVE YOU SUBWAY!”  There simply isn’t any higher on the scale of product placement you can go than that.  And really, could any show other than Community have pulled that off?  Also, while the music isn’t something often brought up about the show, I have to commend the dramatic score for many of Britta’s scenes, especially when she meets Subway in the pillow fort.  The reason this subplot worked so well was because of how seriously the characters’ took it (not to mention Gillian Jacobs’ acting), and the cheesy romantic score accentuated that.  Whether or not the forbidden Subway love story continues next week in any capacity remains to be seen, but if this is the last we’ve seen of it, it was a fine ending.

The Jeff and Annie stuff was simple and probably the weakest of the stories—but weakest as in “A” instead of “A+”, so it was still effective, funny and insightful.  We’ve proved that Jeff’s a dick over and over again, so it’s not new territory in the least, but it was cool to see him actually confront that about himself.  Of course, he forgot about it in true sitcom-fashion afterwards, but it’s always nice to see Jeff when he has a heart, even if momentarily.  The only downside is that the Kim reveal was a tad predictable—I called it as soon as Jeff enunciated all the “shes” and “hers” when he spoke to the real Kim—but it was still a clever little twist.  Annie’s outburst was also very funny, as they always are.  It’s popped up numerous times in the last couple of years that she still has issues with how Jeff treated her between seasons 1 and 2 after their kiss, and it’s really evident here how deeply it affected her.  It’s surprisingly dark, actually.  Also, it’s worth noting that the original blanket fort episode, season 2’s “Conspiracy Theories and Interior Design”, also had Jeff and Annie similarly solving a mystery, though with very different results.  Nice parallel, there.

And of course, the meat of the story: the continuing fracturing of Troy and Abed’s relationship.  Breaking down what might be the most widely-renowned part of the show at this point is a daring move, but it invokes a surprising amount of emotion for situations that are otherwise completely ridiculous.  Like Abed walking away from the handshake last week, Troy and Abed’s last glances at one another before the final separation seriously tugged at the heartstrings.  But that in turn becomes a funny moment when you realize just how sad you are about a pillow and blanket fort war.  What’s happening on screen is completely ridiculous, but we’re immensely attached to the characters the crazy plot is happening to, and therefore feel attachment in any circumstance.  That’s good writing—and good acting from Donald Glover and Danny Pudi—and it’s proof as to why characters are the most important part of making a good story.  No matter what the plot is, we have to care about them.  We’ve seen these two people build an amazing friendship for two and a half years, and to see it disintegrating feels like a punch in the gut.  And that’s just awesome.

Next week will likely be more high-concept given the circumstances of an all-out Greendale war, but considering Troy and Abed’s friendship is really what’s at stake, it’s sure to be an engaging hour.  Community is back in full-form now, packing in equal amounts heart, laughs, smart writing, and something for everyone.  Let’s hope we can keep up the momentum for part 2.

Some (many) stray tidbits:

• At first I wondered if Dean Laybourne’s goatee and ponytail meant he was from the Darkest Timeline.  According to the tag, it’s because he was in a band.  I’m not sure if I believe that explanation yet.  Oh, and did I mention that John Goodman is always awesome?
• Pierce progressively losing it for no good reason throughout this episode was hilarious.
• The second best Subway plug (after Britta’s proclamation of love) was the “Eat Fresh” fist bump.
• The chiseled Subway guy eerily reminded me of both Ryan McPartlin (Captain Awesome from Chuck) and Eric Malstaff (Booster Gold from Smallville).
• Knowing this show, “Greendale students in the military reserves” will become a major plot point next season.
• Britta took “Pre-Menopausal Post-Feminist Experimental Marketing Class” (Pre-Men Post-Fem Ex-Mark for short.)  Just fantastic.
• The “Save Garrett” running gag was all kinds of brilliant.
• Pierce downing the ink actually made me gag.  Very few things on TV can induce that.
• It took me way too long to get the “Britta Unfiltered” joke.
• I can’t say I completely understood that “get my jacket” joke from the corporate Subway guy, but the whole exchange had me laughing hysterically.
• Am I the only one weirded out by seeing Jeff in a flannel shirt?  I mean, I love flannel, but…
• Of course Abed would say “To be continued.”
• Subway code for firing their Corpo-Humanoid: “The bread is stale”.
• “Everyone wins! Well, except Abed, but you know, not everyone can win!”
• “Microphones hidden in lipstick and lipstick hidden in microphones, and the most dangerous of all, the penis flytrap.”
• “Dogs with wheels instead of hind legs, Deaf hamsters…”

Here are some images NBC has released from the episode:

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COMMUNITY -- "Digital Exploration of Interior Design" Episode 313 -- Pictured: Donald Glover as Troy -- Photo by: Michael Desmond/NBC