Review: Community - ‘Cooperative Polygraphy’

This week’s episode of Community, ‘Cooperative Polygraphy’ is definitely the best episode of season 5 so far and likely ranks up there with some of the better episodes of all four seasons.  For while there are no crazy gimmicks and wacky storylines, what this episode does have is a return to what originally made the show so enjoyable - the characters.

With Pierce dead (spoilers from last episode), the group must come together to attend his funeral and, after that, to deal with his lawyer.  For, you see, Pierce had it placed within his will that if he should ever die, each member of the group must submit to a polygraph test in order to prove that they didn’t murder him.  Of course, they can opt out, but that means they don’t get whatever he happened to leave them in his will.

So, with Pierce being a millionaire and all, they all decide to sit around and indulge his last wish.  What results is an attack from the grave, Pierce doing everything that Pierce is known for, albeit without his physical body.  The group is incited to anger, forced to make embarrassing and unwelcome revelations about themselves and confronted with their own (sometimes creepy) flaws.  Eventually, however, their old friend (?) gives them each an honest compliment, showing that he was, deep down, partially human.

The greatness of this episode relies purely on the banter between the group.  This is one of the only times that the actors have had the chance to really just play their characters without interacting within some sort of more complex plotline and you can tell they really have fun with it.  And better yet, they don’t just rehash all the things we already know about the group.  The writers have taken the essence of the characters and come up with clever ways to play on their personalities.

Honestly, I was never a fan of Pierce, despite the fact that Chevy Chase was playing him and I generally like Chevy Chase.  He was always the character that spat out generic lines and barely ever changed or grew as the series went on.  With this final farewell, however, I think I might have to reconsider where the writers were trying to take Pierce’s character, even if they usually messed it up with obvious racist jokes and slapstick ignorance.  No insult to Chevy, but the character played out better when he wasn’t on the screen.  Am I a bad person for saying that?

It looks like Community is picking up a bit, which is good considering the so-so quality of the first three episodes.  Next week, ‘Geothermal Escapism’ looks to be bringing us back to the more gimmicky storylines, which should prove an apt test of the show’s vitality.  And again, there’s no trailer out there (why?!) to watch.  If you want to check out some stills from the next episode, however, you can head over to this site.

Photo Credits -

Cooperative Polygraphy courtesy of blog.zap2it.com