Community: "A Fistful of Paintballs"

Season 2, Episode 23

ARE YOU READY FOR SOME PAINTBALL????

Let’s get this out of the way: I was extremely worried about the show doing another paintball episode. Even though the show has a great track record with these genre episodes, returning to the subject of their most famous one feels at best like ill-intentioned fan service and at worst like the show is merely chasing the cultural zeitgeist, as if it’s trying to tap into the thing that all the kids think is cool. (Which would mean that the show has one more thing in common with Glee. Weird.)

Yet the show, smart as it is, managed to churn out one hell of an episode. (Or one hell of a first half. Forget what I said last week. Next week’s conclusion is only a half-hour, which brings the season to 24 half hour episodes. I was wrong/confused, though I think part of the blame should rest at NBC’s feet for going back on their original plan to air these two parts back-to-back as an hour-long episode.) Certainly there was some fan service here – an appearance by Josh Holloway, Allison Brie running in slow motion (I smell a new GIF!) – but it was exactly the kind of fan service the show has always done. And as far as the zeitgeist-chasing, well the show mostly managed to dodge that accusation as well. Yes, it was still about paintball, but whereas “Modern Warfare” was an action movie homage, “A Fistful of Paintballs” is obviously indebted to westerns. But not the Clint Eastwood westerns (which actually creates a slight disconnect between the title and the episode); no, this episode was obviously inspired by the Robert Rodriguez-style Spaghetti Westerns, complete with over the top action, crazy title cards, and flashbacks.

(I’m also pretty sure, giving the ending of this episode – guys in white snow suits, and overly complex conspiracy – and Dan Harmon’s affinity for Die Hard – per the commentary track for “Modern Warfare” – that this will also turn into an homage for Die Hard 2. But we’ll see.)

And that meant that for the majority of the running time, the show decided to eschew references and jokes, and instead just let us enjoy the awesomeness of watching Greendale once again fall into anarchy, this time Old West Style. I don’t mean to imply that this episode wasn’t funny – it certainly was at bits – but it’s not as funny as many other episodes, including the genre episodes, have been, and I think this was intentional on the show’s part. Instead of trying to capture the success of past reference episodes, they decided to give us something different, something that was equally engaging, but in a way that were not used to seeing from this show. I can’t say for sure whether the paintball story itself will hold up – we won’t know that till next week, but honestly it seemed to get a bit too ridiculous at the end there – but boy was this first half a hell of a lot of fun.

“So once again I’m the bad guy?”

-Pierce

But of course it wouldn’t be a true episode of Community without some good character based moments, and we got those in spades tonight, starting with what may perhaps be a fix to this season’s most problematic storyline: Evil Pierce. If this season had ended last week like it was originally supposed to, then it would have ended with Pierce back in the group, the ending of “Intermediate Documentary Filmmaking” serving as the sole explanation of Pierce’s reintegration into the group, and that ending was too easy for me to accept.

Now, given the chance, the show has revisited the plotline, and will hopefully give it the ending it deserves. Sure, given that these episodes were most likely ordered after the finale was written kind of sells short what the show is trying to do here – they certainly can’t claim that they were” planning this all along” – but it’s certainly better than the alternative, and it shows that Dan Harmon and his writers are willing to cop to their mistakes.

Of course, we can’t know until next week how this is ultimately going to work out, but I can’t say that I’m entirely happy with how it developed so far. Though I liked the idea of Pierce apologizing to the group and using the $100,000 prize to make up for the way he acted, I wasn’t so wild about the fact that he turned back into the bad guy halfway through the episode, selling out Jeff and turning against the group when they confronted him. Such actions are in character to be sure, but it’s not a character that I think I can stand watching anymore. Now of course this can still turn around  - and I think it will, more on that in a bit – but for now it’s still the same old Pierce that I can’t stand, and given that the episode seemed primed to turn Pierce around at the beginning, it’s a bit disappointing that maybe the show won’t follow through on that promise.

“She’s pretty awesome today.”

-Abed

So clearly we believe that Annie was the one to vote with the red card, right? Given the way that she was so gung-ho about making sure that the rest of the group acted nice to be Pierce, it has to be guilt, right? Right. (UPDATE: As Myles McNutt pointed out, of course we were supposed to know that Annie voted against Pierce, since that explains why she was ostracized from the rest of the group at the top of the episode. My bad for not catching this.) Now this is mostly likely going to connect up with Pierce’s reintegration with the group, and that’s fine and all, but right now it’s just an obvious twist that I will have to wait a week for the show to get to, and it’s a bit disappointing for the show to do something so obvious. (Though I suppose it’s quite possible that they made this thinking it would air as a hour-long whole, in which case I forgive them.)

But other than that? Annie was just the portrait of Awesomeness tonight, and it was a testament to Allison Brie’s talent that she was able to slip into Badass Action Babe mode without a hiccup. The show has often played with the idea that maybe Annie isn’t the good little girl that she acts like all the time, that there is actually somebody more impulsive and strong-willed inside her, ready to break out of that shell. Maybe this will be a turn towards a stronger Annie next season, but if not, well at least we got this episode.

Oh, and don’t tell nobody, but I’m also expecting a Jeff/Annie hookup to close out the season. For serious this time. See ya’ll next week for the conclusion.

Quotes, Etc.:

Apparently The Wrap made an oral history of Magnitude. Do with that what you will.

What that all there was to Anthony Michael Hall’s appearance? Cause I felt like they could have down more with that.

“Jeff wants to see you.” “Yeah, and I want pants.”

“Math club, are you guys Asian?”

“I hear he has more paint than a French kindergarten.”

“He’s really good looking. Like network TV good looking.”

If you can produce a living, homosexual Jeff Winger, that’s worth 20 paintballs, easy.

“My forehead’s not that big, is it?” “It’s not small.”

“It began with a dream Annie. A dream of hiding in the bathroom.”

“Since a dance major Jeff. And she loved Twinkies.”

“For you betrayal of the Cheerleaders’ Alliance, we sentence you to pretend death.”

“Stop trying to fluster me with your handsomeness. You’re creepy.”

“And what kind of ice cream company does this?”

“Okay Black Rider, now let’s see who’s attractive.” “Dude, you have a problem”

“Look, if you’re half the cool cowboy you pretend to be…”

“You’re just an average looking guy with a big chin.”

“I’m out of here. I got Coldplay tickets.”