Community Premiere, and Other Thursday Night Good Stuff

Well Community premiered this past Thursday and I can’t say I was completely bowled over.   I can’t say I was particularly bowled over by the commercials for the show so I can’t say my hopes were very high, but for right now I can only say it’s off to a passable start.   Now I’m not saying the show’s not funny at all, it definitely has its moments of hilarity here and there, but there just seemed to be a lack of energy with everybody in it.   It just seemed they went for the really easy jokes, which can be funny, instead of going for more edgy humor that I’ve come to expect from Joel McHale on The Soup.   The premise is very simple as well, not that I was expecting something overly complicated, but it doesn’t seem like a premise that could sustain a whole season.

Basically McHale needs to pass all of his law classes to be able to practice as a lawyer again and in doing so he becomes intertwined with the various misfits that populate the campus, and I guess that’s about it so far.   Now I know I’m one to attack a shows first episode if I don’t like it but then get pleasantly surprised by the following episodes and then fall in love with the show, and I actually do want that to happen here. I like Joel McHale, I like the community college setting, hell I even like Chevy Chase in it well enough, but there’s just a few things they need to change if they want to make the show not as annoying at points.   First off they need to get rid of the Indian kid who might be one of the most irritating characters I’ve seen on TV recently.   Also with a lot of the characters they need to keep them from staying two dimensional characters and add a bit more life to them.   It should really be considered more of an ensemble show then just a show where McHale and Chevy get all the best lines and hog up most of the screen time.   If they can do all that then they might be golden Pony boy.

In other Thursday night goodies we also got the premiere of both The Office and Parks and Recreation, two shows that take the subtlety of comedy to its greatest heights.   Both premiere episodes were fairly good but I think the greater stand out would surprisingly be Parks and Recreation. I found their episode to be a bit funnier with Leslie Knope accidentally marrying two gay penguins and then accidentally becoming the new crusader for all gay marriage.   Amy Poehler of course milks this for all the comedic gold she can and it was also great to see where some of the characters have gone since the end of last season.   Where Andy is living now is both sad and hilarious and completely misguided all at the same time.

As for The Office, it remains pretty low key funny as usual as it’s the last day of the summer interns and gossip and rumors seem to be the order of business around Dunder Mifflin.   Michael ultimately gets backed into a corner where he must come up with rumors about everyone in the office and one of them hits a little too close to Jim and Pam who, if you’ve seen last season’s finale, are most definitely knocked up.   There is also a great bit from Andy as a rumor is spread that he is gay and he’s not exactly sure if he can dispel it.   So all in all things are shaping up NBC’s Thursday night comedy and I eagerly await the return of 30 Rock, cause that’s just truly funny stuff.