Ladies and Gentlemen, Television Has a New Object of Your Lustful Desires
By Dustin Rowles | Posted Under TV Reviews | Comments (31)
Community: Anyone who thought the kiss between Jeff and Annie to end season one of “Community” was a left-field twist simply hasn’t been watching the show enough. They’ve been setting that up since the episode that had Jeff whispering dirty things about Annie in Troy’s ear. And ever since the debate episode, it was apparent that there had been some weird sexual tension between Jeff and Annie, which showrunner Dan Harmon has called back occasionally. Also, they’ve done a great job in the latter half of the season in sexualizing Annie — she came in as the naive, too-innocent, prim, fastidious schoolgirl, and she ends season one as the schoolgirl fantasy. The press she’s been doing lately, specificially for Nerve.com, certainly hasn’t hurt, either. If there’s such a thing as a sex symbol on “Community,” it’s Alison Brie. (And it’s OK, folks. She’s 27; she only plays a 19-year old on television).The transformation is complete.
Of course, the first thing that next season does will probably be to back off the kiss: A late 30s lawyer can’t have a relationship with a 19-year-old. It was a vulnerable moment for both.
But let’s back up a minute and see how we got there: It’s the last day of school, and nothing can go wrong for Jeff and the gang. That is, until the after-semester transfer prom is announced, and Britta is nominated as prom queen/tranny queen. Meanwhile, enter Jeff’s ex-girlfriend, Professor Michelle Slater, who has decided that she wants Jeff back. But not so fast: Jeff has slept with Britta now and realized his feelings for her. Slater is now jealous of Britta, and vice versa, all of which culminates in a moment during the dance in which Britta grabs the mic and confesses her love for Jeff, at which point, Slater does the same thing, putting Jeff in the uncomfortable position of having to choose between the two women in front of the entire school. Instead, he bolts, where he runs into Annie, who decided earlier in the episode to transfer to Delaware to be with the annoying shirtless hippie, but who changed her mind on the way, realizing that Greendale is where she’s supposed to be. Jeff unloads on Annie with a nice little speech about how when he’s with Slater, he wants to be a better man, but when he’s with Britta, he’s comfortable being himself. Big kiss. Fade to black.
Thank God this show was picked up for a second season.
Elsewhere, the Troy/Abed plotline had Troy trying to become Abed’s roommate next year, with Abed rebuffing him, noting that you don’t live with your best friend if you want to remain best friends; you live with someone you like but whose friendship you aren’t too worried about destroying. So, Troy decided to move in with Pierce, who promptly told Troy to come by the next day to get his uniform fitted. (Oh, Pierce: You hilariously racist asshole).
Parks and Recreation
Showrunners: Just a note — that 30-second extra bit of episode you put after the final commercial break? Yeah. That’s for funny little bits. Or bloopers. Or hilarious exchanges between Troy and Abed. You’re not supposed to put anything important during that time. That’s when DVRs are most likely to cut off or, in some cases, where you over fast-forward through the commercial break and up to the delete screen, where you have to decide whether to delete the episode or start all over and fast-forward through the entire episode just to get the last 30 seconds. Needless to say, Ron Swanson making out with Tom’s ex-wife is not a good moment to include during that time.
Elsewhere, who thought that Andy would become the central love interest of this show? Goofy, bumbling Andy? Meanwhile, Leslie’s romantic life has been non-existent for the last few episodes. Indeed, like in “Community,” the “Parks and Rec” final ended with a love triangle: Here, Ann kissed Andy, after he wrecked his motorcycle and found himself in a hospital bed. This right after Andy finally expressed his feelings for April, in the only way that Andy knows how, and after April rebuffed him out of fear that Andy would ditch her in favor of Ann. Also, April kissed Andy right after Ann kissed Andy and then Andy, being the adorable dumbass that he is, told April that Ann had just kissed him, prompting April to flee.There’s a lot of A names in this show, isn’t there?
Also, Leslie — whose job was, at least temporarily, ironically saved by budget-slashing Ron Swanson — held a park concert in the lot behind Ann’s house during the government shutdown and Ben made a nice gesture by securing Freddy Spaghetti for the concert. Meanwhile, Mark — who quit the parks department to go into the private sector — had a sweet moment in the end, where he revealed to Leslie that he’d designed the eventual park that would built in the vacant lot. See ya, Paul Schneider.
A nice, sweet episode that goes a long way toward setting up next season.
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Comments
Posted by: TylerDFC at May 21, 2010 9:22 AM
As soon as Jeff ran into Annie outside I said "Oh no." and KNEW that kiss was coming. It had been building for a while for sure but it was still pretty awesome when it came. As characters, between Britta and Slater it is Britta all the way. But between Annie and Britta, yeah, that one is not so cut and dried. If Annie was older it would be no contest at all. Now between the actresses? No contest Alison Brie all the way.
If NBC fucks up the Parks & Rec ratings by shelving it so they can launch that horrible looking Outsourced I'm gonna stab someone. Fucking morons. Best line in Parks & Rec: "I got a great interest rate. 12%. The highest they got!"
The Office was ok, but had no ending. The "everyone was a whistle blower" twist was pretty funny and went with the characters. But there was no resolution to it. I have a hard time thinking a hard ass like Jo is just going to have a bonding moment with Michael and then stop searching for the culprit. It would have worked better as an hour long with more "search for the suspect" and everyone getting more and more paranoid. They could have turned it into a Survivor parody with alliances and the whole thing. Just really weak kind of like most of the fizzled plot lines this season.
30 Rock was pretty good. I'm glad the love triangle is over but have a hard time thinking Elizabeth Banks is sticking around. Or Matt Damon for that matter so as amusing as they are, story wise it's obviously going to be resolved somehow and they won't be around. So really, the storyline didn't move forward in the long run.