There was a time when most US TV comedies were a variation on this theme: Tony Danza standing in a beige living room, burping and farting to a canned laugh track and making lame jokes about modern life. But no more. Now they’re all quirky and self-referential, like Modern Family and Arrested Development. They have indie soundtracks and drop knowing pop culture references hither and thither, like 30 Rock and Scrubs.
Community, the latest US export of this type, gets its UK airing tonight at 9pm on the Viva channel, and you should really watch it*. Here’s why.
It’s set in an adult education (or, wait till you see what they did there, ‘community’) college, where Jeff Winger, a smart-alec lawyer and scarecrow (Joel McHale from fast-talking entertainment round-up The Scoop) is banished when his law degree is discovered to be fraudulent. There he meets blonde liberal Spaniel/woman Britta (Gillian Jacobs), and organises a study group purely in order to get into her pants.
And who hasn’t been there?
Various other misfits join the study group, complicating the matter for Jeff, but through tribulations and some razor-sharp scripting they all bond and oh who cares, because it’s just a ploy to throw a bunch of brilliant actors, writers and producers together and see what happens. Which, when the writer is Dan Harmon from The Sarah Silverman Program, bodes well.
So here are five reasons you should watch Community tonight:
1. The first episode isn’t very funny
We realise that this in itself isn’t a ringing endorsement. But most comedy series start off clunky and awkward until they find their feet. Remember all that self-conscious Central Perk posturing in the first episode of Friends? And this is how Scrubs started:
Did you see the funny thing Zach Braff did with the shaving cream? Yeesh. But we let Scrubs run until every character became a tired and bloated shrieking parody of themselves. So get off your high horse, Captain Judgie, and hang in there till the end, because…
2. The end titles are very funny
No, they are. Look:
And, look, here are some more:
3. It all starts to gel in episode three
By this time everyone involved seems to be more comfortable and have a good idea of what works and what doesn’t, and it all starts to get awesome. We can’t really tell you much about that without spoilers, so here’s a video of a cat going “om nom nom” instead:
4. Chevy Chase is in it!
He plays a retired businessman who comes out with lines like “I can’t think of anything more frightening than a half-Polish half-Arab virgin in his thirties. One way or the other, that story ends with an explosion.” We couldn’t find any decent clips of his Community role on YouTube, but we did find this promotional video for the community of a Maryland town called Chevy Chase, which is almost better:
5. Ken Jeong is in it!
Ken Jeong! The crazy Chinese mafia car-boot guy from The Hangover! You know, the one who wasn’t the tall one or the little fat one or the forgettable one or the one from the American version of The Office. Or Mike Tyson. Or Mike Tyson’s tiger. And he’s EQUALLY MEMORABLE here:
And there you have it. Five perfectly good and not at all lazy reasons why you should watch Community tonight, and then keep watching it for a good three episodes before you decide it’s rubbish. Hecklerspray, bravely watching good television so you don’t have to, and then telling you that you have to watch it.
Don’t mention it! Oh, you didn’t.
*Unless of course you don’t have satellite television, in which case we’re sorry to have wasted your time. But how about that cat, huh?
Claire says
It’s The Soup, not The Scoop! I thought you’d know better, Hecklerspray…