Review: Community - ‘Repilot’ and ‘Introduction to Teaching’

This last Thursday was, so far, the best day of the New Year for me, for Community has returned to the airwaves.  Better yet, they were kicking off the new season with two episodes instead of just one.  With Dan Harmon back as showrunner, I was eager to see if he could bring back some of the life that had drained from the show during his absence.  And while Harmon has yet to bring his trademark “WTF just happened?” style back in full force, the first two episodes proved to be quite satisfying.

Episode 1, ‘Repilot’ brings the gang back together some time after they have all graduated.  Beginning with a broke Jeff, victim of his own idealism, we see that life at Greendale did nothing to help anyone get ahead.  All of them have failed in one way or another.  Jeff decides that the only course of action is to sue the school because of its ineptitude.  Eventually, however, he sees the error of his ways and instead becomes a teacher while everyone else re-enrolls.

Episode 2, ‘Introduction to Teaching’ follows Jeff as he learns the ins-and-outs of his new job.  Of course, he never really had a proper law degree, so he knows nothing about what he’s teaching.  In the meanwhile, Annie attempts to challenge him in order to make him actually become responsible  And Abed loses his mind while taking a course entitled ‘Nicolas Cage: Good or Bad’ (of course, who wouldn’t?).

Again, Harmon has not brought out the gimmicks that have made him so famous (yet!), but what he does do is bring more life to the characters.  It’s always been my biggest issue with Community that after the first season the character development went into the toilet for most of the cast.  It appears that Harmon realized this and there’s even a joke thrown in about how Britta has turned from an anarchist into an airhead during her time at Greendale.

The second piece of awesome is the presence of Jonathan Banks (aka Mike from Breaking Bad).  He’s pretty much the same character as Mike, which fits incredibly well into the show.  While Community has never really steered in the direction of darker humor, I can see Harmon taking full advantage of Banks’ time on the show to bring us some more twisted tales.  And, I’m not ashamed to say it, when I saw Banks sit down at the table in Pierce’s old chair, I was seriously giddy.  I already hope he sticks around for more seasons.

All-in-all, Harmon put together two solid episodes, a perfect combination for getting people back into the Community spirit.  He’s set the stage with the characters and the overall plot and now it’s just about waiting to see what sort of chaos the show descends into.  From the season 5 trailer, it looks like we have a ton of memorable moments to look forward to and I will be watching (and reviewing) every one.

Photo Credits -

Community courtesy of screencrush.com