Why I'm ho-hum about Community

It pains me when a good friend gives a strong endorsement to a book, movie, band, or TV show that turns out to be total shite. It lessons my opinion of that person to some extent. I can recall watching Anger Management with my then girlfriend at the time, and it was two hours of my life, and relationship, that I can never get back (thanks a lot, jerk!)

I bring all this up because I was reminded of that movie when I first tuned into NBC's Community, a show with a cult-following similar to Arrested Development, which has been praised to the heavens by close friends I like and bloggers I trust.

Set in a community college, the show follows the crazy hijinks of seven freshman, all of different ages, races and genders, and the study group that connects them.  

The premise of the show was promising, and looked like a possible successor to the criminally-cancelled Undeclared, but after five episodes in, I wasn’t laughing. The jokes were corny and too self-aware. The characters weren’t interesting and kind of irritating, particularly the main character Jeff (Joel McHale), who reminded me too much of Bradley Cooper *shudder*. His early attempts to snag the blonde know-it-all Britta (Gillian Jacobs) looked like it would fall into clichéd, will-they-or-won’t-they territory.

I gave up on the show for a couple of months to catch up on some other series I’d neglected (like the excellent In Treatment), but I was recently cajoled into giving the series another try. I was told that I give up too easily on series and should give Community the chance to improve. Shamed like a deadbeat dad skipping out on child-support, I relented. 

Now I’m half-way through season one on Netflix, and my feelings towards Community are… still mixed, although more positive than before. I’m starting to appreciate the series with each episode I watch. I think the cast has a nice rhythm and good chemistry. Joel McHale is less annoying, Chevy Chase is perfectly fine, and Ken Jeong is hilarious of course. But over the course of these 11 episodes or so, I’ve found other things about the show that irritate me. Alison Brie is, as the AV Club pointed out, basically playing the same character as Lea Michele on Glee, right down to the wardrobe. Abed is essentially the same as Sheldon on The Big Bang Theory, both exhibiting signs of Aspergerg’s Syndrome (I read a blog a while back saying this was the newest character archetype). And Troy has his moments, particularly this rap he does here, but some of his lines can grate on the nerves. I’m not sure if it’s the actor or the writing, but I think the writers are worried if they write him too “street” they’ll be accused of stereotyping.  

This leads me to one thing that Community gets right: it’s racially diverse, and you could argue, progressive. Surprisingly for a network sitcom, almost half of the cast is a person of colour, and aren’t relegated to terrible stereotypes. Abed is an Arab-American film student (a Palestinian even! Never thought I’d see the day); Ken Jeong plays a Spanish teacher, basically adapting his crazy doctor character from Knocked Up for a network audience. But at no point do they act like racist caricatures (something that can’t be said for 2 Broke Girls sadly). 

It’s refreshing to see that, and unless the series deteriorates from this point on, I’d say Community rather lives up to its title. Now it just needs to be funnier.