Jmunney's Blog

“For the first time in my long history of being locked in things, I knew someone would find me.”

When the Inspector Spacetime convention episode of Community was announced, fans who thought the whole Inspector Spacetime business was overdone in Season 3 were accordingly wary.  It turns out, though, that “Conventions of Space and Time” isn’t  any more steeped in IS minutiae than it could have been.  InSpecTiCon more or less just happened to be the setting where the Greendale Seven hashed out their current character dynamics.  Actually, interestingly enough, the most Inspector Spacetime-specific moments were those involving Shirley and Pierce.  When the two of them are chosen for a focus group for the upcoming American adaptation of IS, Shirley pointing out that the fans like the original because “it’s smart, complicated, and doesn’t talk down to its audience” is obviously meant to echo how we Community fans feel about our show.  But the real-life echos that I most appreciated in those scenes were the continuing examples of Chevy Chase basically just playing himself, with his protests about being confused by the time travel calling to mind his voicemails to Dan Harmon in which he called Community “a f***ing mediocre sitcom.”

As for the actual IS fans, I was never worried that Abed would be taken away from Troy by Toby, especially after it was revealed at the beginning of the episode that he was perfectly capable of adjusting to the fact that Troy and Britta were now sleeping together.  After a year in which Abed nearly had multiple breakdowns due to his fear of change, he is now coming to terms with the fact that change is inevitable, as demonstrated by his simple acceptance of Troy and Britta being together and even the huge step of allowing Britta to be a fan of Minerva, the worst inspector in the history of the series.  Though,  for the sake demonstrate how hard it really is for Abed to accept certain changes, I did appreciate the moment when he warned Britta that she was really pushing it with her endorsement of Minerva.  Even though the stakes never felt too high, the emotion was real, with a particularly strong beat coming when Abed realizes that Troy will eventually find him after Toby locks him in the phone box.

Annie’s adventure of letting the hotel staff believe she is Mrs. Winger called to mind “Mixology Certification,” when she first demonstrated how convincing her play-acting is.  The details she was sure to include – her career as a world-famous police detective, placing a strand of Jeff’s hair on the bathroom sink – made her odd commitment rather endearing.  Meanwhile, Jeff’s moments with guest-star Tricia Helfer were good enough, but they could have amounted to more.  Honestly, the role of “attractive female Inspector Spacetime fan” didn’t need to be played by someone as well-known as Helfer.  In general, but overall, I wasn’t overly thrilled by the guest stars of this episode.  Matt Lucas did put a solid spin on his psychotic superfan role, but it wasn’t revelatory.  But I changed my tune about guest stars at the end, when 90210 alums (and, along with Chevy, Old Navy hawks) Luke Perry and Jennie Garth appeared as the actors in the American Inspector Spacetime.  Ever since I’ve been following Community closely, I have known who most of the guest stars were going to be ahead of time.  So it was nice that the appearance of these two was actually kept under wraps. A-

If you watch an episode of Community like “Paranormal Parentage” and end up disappointed, then it is because you have high – perhaps impossibly high – standards when it comes to Community.  That is understandable, considering how many all-time classic episodes Community has produced.  And seeing as this is the Halloween (#Valloween) episode, it is doubly understandable, considering the show’s track record with Halloween episodes.  But if you’re overly worried about this episode not measuring up to “Epidemiology” or even “Horror Fiction in Seven Spooky Steps,” you’re liable to have missed what “Paranormal Parentage” had to offer.  After Pierce locks himself in the panic room of his mansion (or so he says), the rest of the Greendale Seven are commissioned to spring him out – and possibly confront the ghost of his father.  What follows is an homage of haunted house movies.  The title suggests that Paranormal Activity may be the main inspiration, but this is actually the Scooby-Doo episode: a bunch of happenings that seem paranormal thanks to clever editing and misleading perspectives ultimately turn out to have a perfectly logical, though fiendishly complicated, explanation.  That fitting conclusion allows for a couple of well-earned emotional beats: Pierce’s brother Gilbert (a very welcome Giancarlo Esposito) returns, and the two embrace after deciding to be roommates, and Pierce’s daddy issues lead into those of Jeff, who it is revealed has tracked down his father (and been wearing his boxing gloves).  Joel McHale plays these dramatic beats better than perhaps any of his others in the series.  The strengths and weaknesses of this episode are flipped compared to those of last week’s premiere: the emotional beats land cleanly, while the humor isn’t as raucous.  That isn’t to say there weren’t any moments that made me laugh.  There were in fact enough to make this episode satisfying, particularly Annie nervously calling out to a missing Abed that if he is doing that thing “like that part in that movie” to stop it because she doesn’t watch scary movies and “therefore can’t appreciate the reference.”  Britta’s overeager therapizing is also a delight, especially the “Ziggy Freud” malapropism and Jeff’s command that she “stop answering phones.”  Also, like Abed, I too remember dates by movie releases. B+