Community: "Applied Anthropology and Culinary Arts”

Season 2, Episode 22

Another bottle-ish episode plays to the show’s strengths.

Okay, let’s get this straight. Community was originally picked up for a 22-episode second season, and then back in January NBC added two more episode to the order, which I guessing fucked-up the break-down/narrative order for the season. (The same thing happened last season, which is why the production codes and the airdates don’t line up in the back half of the season.) Then, in March, NBC announced finale dates for all of its shows, including an hour-long finale for Community on May 12^th, yet there is still an episode airing next week, which I guess means that the show got three extra episodes, but I somehow didn’t hear about it. Which leaves me with one question: What the hell is going on? According to the promos, next week is paintball oriented, and so is the one the week after that, if we can believe Wikipedia. But is the episode in two weeks still an hour-long? I’m so confused.

But those are thoughts for another time, as the above rant was really started only to make one point: Tonight’s episode was originally intended as the season finale, and it shows. Shirley, through some slight plot contrivance (did that non-Chang baby look premature to you?) ends up giving birth, right in the middle of the Anthropology final. It was perhaps an obvious move on the show’s part – so many season finales of so many shows have been based around the birth of a child – yet I can’t fault the show too much, for it was a fairly entertaining half-hour filled with characters that I love, and it reminded me of why I love them.

“Applied Anthropology and Culinary Arts” is quite similar in many ways to last season’s “English as a Second Language.” Both involve overly easy final exams, and both show Annie easily frustrated by the fact that the class is too easy (though here that didn’t come to much). But even more, this episode, combined with “Paradigms of Human Memory” and the next two/three episodes will (mostly likely) make up something resembling a multi-part finale, with each episode marking at different approach to ending the season, much like “Modern Warfare”/“English as a Second Language”/“Pascal’s Triangle Revisited” did last season. (And no, I’m not pulling this out of my ass. This idea, at least concerning the season one episodes, comes from the DVD commentary. I’m just extrapolating outwards.)

And as a finale (or part of one), this episode works. There are plenty of callbacks – Abed references delivering that baby last fall, we see that Fat Neil has grown in his social skills, and he and Starburns share another “remember when” moment that we’ve never (and in this case, still haven’t) seen – to the past season. And if “Paradigms” was a reminder of how terrible these people have been to each other, this episode is as about how kind this group can be to one another. Taken together, they represent the dichotomy of this group, which is alternatively pulled together and repulsed by their flaws.

What is most interesting about this episode as a singular episode of television is the way that the show is able to incorporate non-stop jokes and pathos. Usually Community will pull away from comedy for a few beats in order to pull off such emotional beats, and to great effect. But here, the show surrounded Shirley’s birth with a blanket of subplots/runners – Britta attempting to “be there” for her, Chang’s varied, hilarious family facts, Troy and Abed “selling out” their handshake, the Dean’s interview – rolling from one joke to another seamlessly. The end results was that the show got to have its cake and eat it too, as the show was able to show us the birth scene, yet avoided some the treacly sentiment that most shows hit when they focus almost exclusively on such events.

But what really makes this episode work is that much like “Cooperative Calligraphy” and “Paradigms,” the episode consisted solely of the characters kept in one place, leaving them to bounce off one another. While the extra cast members means that this wasn’t technically a bottle episode, the group was kept in one place (due to a race riot brought by an ill-conceived foreign foods fair, of all things), and it echoes some of the show’s finest moments, with the entire cast around the study room table, just riffing off of one another.

Despite the generally great quality of this episode, there is one sticking point that I can’t quite get over. For longer than anybody else, Chang has remained a cartoon, a harsh caricature who can’t mesh with Community’s emotional core, and some critics have called for his oust. Now, part of the reason the Chang seems to lag behind the rest of the characters is due to the fact that it wasn’t until this season that he entered a place where he could become fleshed out. I thought that this baby would be that change, but the show hasn’t taken that away from us. Now, the show did show Change tonight being uncharacteristically caring and unselfish, and I guess he could continue in this vein, having learned the value of self sacrifice, or some other trite bullshit like it. But with the motivation that a baby can provide – even if he now has a namesake – I’m not sure if the show will feel the need to stick with it, and that worries me a bit.

Quotes, Etc.:

“Throw paper balls at her until she sits down.”

“You’re not drinking. Someone is cruising for an A-”

“You have a booger.” “I know. It’s a part of me.”

“That is what Jews do at weddings. Anthropology!”

“You know like that film, Children of the Corn.”

“Indecent Proposal.” “Indecent Proposal.” “Woody.” “Demi.” “Nice.”

“An epidural is a Christian woman’s only chance to get wrecked.”

“First of all, together my cats can do anything.”

“Can somebody get every mop on campus?”

“CHANG BABY!”

“Remember when they all took that fishing trip on St. Patrick’s day?” “God that was a good week.”

“Hey, show me some respect, I might be that kid’s estranged father.”

“Do it. Make your money, whore.” “What’s a Benny Grable?”

“It’s like buying candy from a baby.”

“I delivered a baby last semester.” “Where was all of that?” “I dunno, off in the background.”

“Let’s use ‘kerfuffle,’ okay Mr. Winger?”

“Also if you can imagine a rabbit riding a dragon, that will increase the chance of winning lotteries.”

“I take it the head has reached the cervix.”

“Just get in there and force that baby out of Shirley.”

“Well, don’t tell any doctors this, but at this point the bus pretty much drives itself.”

“And it’s also a black person! Not that that matters…”

“I thought he said ‘Chang’.” “No, he didn’t.”