- Joel McHale stars (MCT Campus).
NBC’s newest sitcom “Community” offers comedy-seekers a hyperbolized chance to scope into the life of a community college student.
The show stars Joel McHale as humorous Jeff Winger, a lawyer forced to attend Greendale Community College as a result of his “non-legitimate” college degree. He is willing to go to any extreme to gain a college degree again as easily and quickly as possible.
As Jeff’s time at Greendale lengthens, the more experience he gains through his courses andpeers. His main effort in the pilot episode is to win the heart of an attractive female, Britta, who’s in need of tutoring in Spanish. The study pair rapidly evolves into a massive band of misfits seeking assistance.
The group consists of individuals of all races, ages and intelligence levels. They steadily grow closer following the discovery that Jeff actually has no knowledge of the Spanish language. Jeff titles the diverse bunch “a community.”
The cast includes Chevy Chase as an older character named Pierce, Yvette Nicole Brown as sassy Shirley and John Oliver, the overjoyed dean. Chase is well-known from “Saturday Night Live” and many movies through the 1980s and 1990s. Brown has been on numerous sitcoms and made an appearance on the recent “500 Days of Summer.” Their acting makes the storyline flow smoothly.
Many community college students will argue the show clearly does not depict their actual daily lives, yet it does not cross boundaries that would be considered offensive to viewers who attend community college. The scenario of a lawyer returning to school is not practical, yet the perfect schema for a sitcom. This show addresses negative connotations associated with community college, such as lack of intelligence, a high enrollment of older adults and less strenuous classes than a regular university.
The writers have exaggerated community college stereotypes to create a humorous effect on their viewers.
October 14, 2009 at 3:04 pm
Yes! I was glad to see that you guys did a review of the new NBC show “Community.” I have yet to watch it but it does look promising. I read the review and I heard “many community college students will argue the show clearly does not depict their actual daily lives,” so it might open up another idea for an interesting article. How is the show and Longview different? Talk to a few professors and see what they think. Talk to students and see what they think. I don’t know if anyone has done this yet. Just throwing out my two cents.