Community makes references for the generations of people you might just find in this community college study group. It lovingly makes its first episode a tribute to John Hughes, and then just gets better from there. Abed, as Batman, pulls off the greatest surprise ending to a Halloween episode, ever. The paintball fight episode pulls off so many action movie references and 80's memes that it's hard to stop smiling, if you stop laughing at any point.
Do I have a weakness for such 80's pop culture references? Yes. Did they have me at John Hughes? Yes. Are there problems with Community? Yes. It can get a little silly for a bunch of adults to continue acting like they're in high school just because they're in a school setting. And these grown, working people seem to have a whole lot of free time, to a ridiculous degree. But often the humor only works if you accept that Greendale Community College is just stuck in a kind of high school mentality, and that these people do have time to spend their entire days in class. Then again, maybe stuff like sending valentines to your classmates does actually happen in some college out there. Maybe there is a Dean out there that spends way too much time on the intercom making silly announcements.
There's also the cringe-inducing moments with characters like the surly Spanish teacher Senor Chang played by Ken Jeong. Sometimes the stereotype jokes just go so far and wide that they're more confusing and uncomfortable than anything. Luckily, the show tends to reign these moments in and manages to make fun of itself in the process. And even though Chevy Chase has played as the butt of everyone's jokes before, fans may not like how far Community takes things. You want to be laughing with him, but that's just not how his character, Pierce the uncool old guy of the group, is set up here.
It's the kind of show that you can't take seriously and enjoy at the same time. You just keep waiting for it to get more absurd. The punchlines are quick and back to back, often only leaving time for a (quick) face palm before things move on. The characters are silly beyond reason. Everyone's a caricature, but just when you think everyone's one dimensional, you see another side to them. The Scrubs comparison seems to keep coming up, but while they both have equally playful sets of characters and situations, community college just seems to be the better setting for these characters to play. These people are the underdogs, trying to remake themselves, but never quite able to escape their past lives. Plus, they're not expected to save lives.
With commentary tracks and mini-episodes for special features, Community keeps things going when you've gotten through all the episodes. For fans of the series, this is a nice set of real bonus material, and not just a bunch of filler. One interesting thing to mention is that a lot of the outtakes don't even feel like they were mistakes, just alternate versions of scenes from the episodes. It seems there's a whole lot of improvisation that went into every episode. It's a great package for fans of the series, and a great way for newbies to break into the series.
