Community, S03E20
Just when I thought this show couldn't amaze and blow me away, they had an episode where the gang was turned into video bit versions of themselves and had to complete a mission in a classic RPG fashion. I absolutely love classic bit designed games (sometimes I feel like the excessive realness of games is distracting) and RPGs, so this was an absolute pleasure to watch. Pierce's father had designed the game so that the person who defeated him would get his inheritance, but they had no idea that Gilbert, the late Hawthorne's secretary, would fight against them as an incredibly skilled opponent. They were angry at Gilbert for using such underhanded techniques to keep Pierce from his inheiritence until they learned that he was Hawthorne's secret child whose father had wanted to keep under the rug even after his death. Pierce and the rest decided to just let Gilbert win, and Pierce embraced having a brother.
Who knew that a story revolving around Pierce (my least favorite character) would be so good? As soon as they all morphed into their game characters of themselves (with a cool bit version of the theme), I was overjoyed. I basically liked the episode throughout, even with Gilbert kicking their butts, but I'll try to focus on my three favorite aspects. It's hard to pick when even Pierce was hilarious in his old man-esq lack of skill where he was stuck in corners and unintentionally digging himself underground. You put these character who already funny in human form into game form, and you pretty much double their hilarity.
One of the best things was the racial and intolerant tones of the games, which was reflected in almost all areas of the game. It was no more apparent than the names of most of the towns in the game world. These included "Village of Laziness," "Gay Island," and "Black Cave." These were all meant to portray stereotypes about Latinos, homosexuals, and blacks. We didn't get to see what was in the first two towns, but in the last there were afro-headed "jive turkeys" attacking the gang. It was so ridiculous, you had to laugh. The late Hawthorne really did just hate just about everyone, despite that he had an affair with a non-white woman. It's funny how people can spend so much energy on prejudice (and screwing over their own children) to the point that it just comes off as too comical to be taken seriously. Each time he took a stab at hippies or the disabled ("Free Ride Ferry"--really?), it just made me wonder with amusement how else he could make himself look like a foolish old man with his intolerance.
Another of the great moments was when Annie and Shirley went to the weapons shops. I know none of them (except Abed who is that kind of genius) had no real idea how to play the game (it seemed like it had a lot more player capabilities than your usual RPGs), but I never expected that Annie would set the blacksmith on fire, beat him to death, and try to hide his body! It was so funny! Usually in the games you can't grab torches and throw them at townspeople. I loved it! Then to add to that great scene, Shirley burned the blacksmith's wife and beat her to death too, claiming they would have no witnesses to their crimes. Never would have guessed those two would be acting like murderers. Plus, thy burned down the house just to be sure! Wow! If only you could do that in some games. That would be so awesome! It was so great the sort of things they could get away with in the game. One of my main annoyances about role-playing is that you are limited to certain things, but not in their game. It was simply wonderful.
The absolute best thing about the Hawthorne game was Abed's romance with Hilda and the ease in which he began to change the game to suit his own purposes. I loved how taken he was with Hilda once he found out she had all kinds of information he could learn about. Some of my favorite topics were:
- cinnamon island
- raccoon clothes
- unstable bath
- unkillable bears
- island of annoying voices
- collect all blue coins
- boring regular old fire
- fun murder quests
How I love the bond between Troy and Abed. Only with those two would that conversation not raise an eyebrow, but just make you laugh. He was jealous of basically a computer program. But with Abed's peculiarity, something electronic or digital is more likely to steal Abed's attention away from Troy than any flesh woman is.[Abed] She can make me babies.[Troy] Oh, and I can't? ...I can't.
But I felt a little uneasy that even within the fantasy of a game that Abed was using his children as slaves, mostly in those mines (it was funnier when the babies were used as ammo). He made so much progress (in a conquering way) that I wouldn't have been surprised with more time left to himself that he would have been able to replace the old man as the end boss (and changed all the racist lands into Abed-themed towns). It's interesting that Abed has these dictator qualities that he sometimes gives off. I'm really glad that he does have Troy by his side. As seen in a later episode Abed stands on edge when it comes to dancing on the dark side. But luckily he has friends who give him a better purpose, like using his new establishment in the game to provide the gang with weapons to weaken Hawthorne. Good thing Abed is part of the gang and not working for Gilbert.
Can't praise this episode enough. If I could make one complaint it would be that it didn't encompass the whole 3 blocks of Community time we had this Thursday. Not to say the others were crap, but this one was so good, it should have been much longer. But I guess that the non-geeks of this show would get too bored with that. Well, whether long or short, this still ranks as one of my favorite episodes of not just this show, but also one of the best of all TV I seen.
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