I didn’t appeal to me at all. It seemed like reuse of the gimmick to manufacture clips from past shows as they did last season. It was another weak episode in a weak season, IMHO. But I’m glad you enjoyed it. I actually hope it will be back next season, but better. And I sincerely hope that Chang will be gone. I can’t believe Starfish is gone, and Chang is still there, and driving the plot.
I loved the fake memories they had of being in an asylum. Other than that, I thought the episode was OK. I’d give it 7 out of 10.
I’m glad that it got 13 more episodes, and am at peace with that being the end of it. I’d rather see Community cancelled than watch three more seasons of something vaguely Community-ish and it’s clearly gone down the Arrested Development rabbit hole of self-reference, which is great fun (for a little while) for those of us that enjoy that, and completely unsustainable from both a ratings and a pure entertainment standpoint.
I love Arrested Development and Community but you are dead right. You cannot enjoy these shows without watching every episode at least twice and it’s hard to keep up with (besides writing for). Easier a lot of the time to be moderately entertained by Chuck Lorre.
Evidently, Subway has a lot of influence on NBC.
None of these shows are popular. They’re good, and they have critical cachet, and, to the extent they have any audience at all, it’s a demographically desierable one. But the ratings are meagre.
Anyway, as I assume Exapno’s link presents, Community has now also been renewed for 13 eps, but not necessarily a final 13. Those might be it, but the show could be picked up for the “back 9” later in the year, or something else might happen. It depends on how those 13 episodes perform, and how that compares to the new comedies NBC has also picked up for next season.
No word on Parks yet, AFAIK.
–Cliffy
Community is great, epic great. 30 Rock I want to like but it’s just too wacky and quirky for me. It tries too hard.
13 episodes leaves Community just shy of enough to earn the coveted syndication money for the network, so you’d really think they’d try harder to get it over the hump.
Love that it’s coming back; hope it gets a fuller order.
If NBC renewed Community, they’ll very very likely also renew Parks & Rec.
Community has lower ratings than P&R and is owned by someone else. Parks & Rec does stronger ratings and is fully owned by NBC Universal. I’ll be shocked if P&R doesn’t get at least a 13-episode order.
Parks & Rec cannot go away. I need to see Andy Dwyer go through the Pawnee Police Academy.
Meagre is an understatement. The ratings for these three shows are so shockingly invisible that it’s amazing that NBC has ever carried them. Any reality show would be better.
How low? The numbers of viewers for Parks & Rec, Community and 30 Rock COMBINED are significantly lower than a moderate hit sitcom like Modern Family or Mike and Molly. If you add in The Office, which does better, the four of them COMBINED barely attract more viewers than The Big Bang Theory, their direct competition.
I doubt anything like this has been seen on network television since the days of the DuMont network.
It’s astounding and wonderful that NBC will give them half season send-offs, and a tribute to us, their fanatic and vocal fanbase.
I do feel that the Ron Swanson character is past his glory days, and that’s the only reason I’m not wailing and gnashing teeth at this news.
I love Annie. She’s insane. When Abed said “cigarettes” in his madmen voice Annie started to do that hair thing she does when she has a crush on someone.
Despite the different tones woodstockbirdybird and Quimby took in their OPs, these “Say goodbye to Community…” and “Community gets a Season 4!” threads are about the same topic, so I’m merging the threads.
The syndication requirement is not a hard-and-fast number, and I heard that Community’s syndication has already been bought and paid for.
Do you have a cite for that? It’s not what I’ve read from Alan Sepinwall and Todd VanderWerff, who’ve written on the subject somewhat extensively.
I love 30 Rock (which I admit is getting long in the tooth) and especially P&R. I don’t understand why their ratings are so low, especially compared to The Office which is way past its glory days. At least they’re not getting a sudden axe and there will be opportunity for closure if next (half) season is the end.
It was either from VanDerWuff or an AV Club news article. I’ll have to find it later.
Seconded. Has there been any updated word on Parks & Rec?
I think in Parks & Rec’s case, the very early episodes were so bad that it soured a lot of people on the series permanently. Even now I hear people say “That show was terrible.” and I have to try and convince them to give it another shot. It failed at grabbing a strong audience early on and has suffered ever since.