I’ve been meaning to start up my Tumblr after a couple of posts last year but I never get round to it, I mean nobody is reading this anyway, right? … Today I have found the motivation, sadly though it’s not for any happy reason.
My week has been kinda shitty, I’ll be honest with you. I’m feeling pretty stressed, work is difficult, my car overheated on me and I’ve got no money to get it repaired - at least NBC renewed Community last week, that’s one bright little star shining into my life, right? … WRONG.
If you love Community (and honestly, the ONLY reason you are reading this right now will be because someone tweeted a link to it with a Community related hashtag) then you already know what I’m talking about. News arrived on the glorious, all-knowing internet that Dan Harmon, the man responsible for the phenomenal and crazy idea’s behind the best TV show to have been broadcast in recent years, is no longer to be show runner for Community. THIS F**CKING SUCKS. There’s no getting round it. This is, effectively, the end of Community as we know it.
Dan Harmon has posted an amazing piece here which explains his point of view with regards to what happened. I’m sure it’s been reblogged and linked to endlessly by now but if you haven’t read it, go there, go now and then go out and buy Prototype2. I’ve read a whole heap of articles about what has happened, several of them are very insightful. Many of the articles point out that working with Dan Harmon isn’t an easy experience. Is working with an artist that has a unique vision EVER easy? People with a creative personality are rarely straight-forward, “off the shelf” human beings, they are a beautiful confusing mess of idea’s and emotions and the complex inner beauty of their minds can only be revealed to us mere mortals after a lot of hard work, support and nurturing. Did you miss that Mr Goldblatt? Do you not understand that Mr Nameless (and Soulless) Sony Pictures Televison Executive? Or perhaps you’d have told the notoriously difficult Stanley Kubrick to f**k off when he was making The Shining? Perhaps you could have replaced Christian Bale with Tim Allen as Batman, I mean I hear Mr Bale has got a bit of a temper after all. I find this side of the argument utterly implausible after reading Dan’s comments about Bob Goldblatt, I’m almost certain that it’s hard to judge someone (certainly with any authority) as difficult to work with when you can’t even be bothered to speak to them.
I’m sure we’d all love to earn the big bucks TV execs earn by making the easy choices, by sitting up on high and commissioning soulless unimaginative bland TV show after soulless embarrassing bland reality show. Oh what’s that now? A TV show where contestants torture us with stories of how difficult they’re lives are and how it’s been a lifelong (read “since I first heard of this show”) ambition of theirs to sing because it’s what they truly love (oh it’s not about the money, it’s about love) but the twist is they have to have adopted a sweet homeless animal that we can show cute footage of them playing with before they perform? F**k YES! Let’s order a full season of that shit and then sit on our asses counting money whilst the TV watching population of America grows dumber by the minute being spoonfed this inane crap. What about if we all spend our time trying to find the next “insert generic sitcom title here” ? Wouldn’t it be great if we could emulate the success of that (intermittently funny, broadly appealing, populist) show at the cost of risk taking originality and ingenuity? Yes lets do it … lets launch “3 Broke Guys” and “Last Gal Sitting” next year, I’m sure they’ll work because they’ll adhere to the same shitty formula as every other sitcom.
My point is, I guess, (and admittedly I am not making it well) WHY NOW? Why bother to insult the fans of this show with a fourth season renewal and then cut out the heart and soul of the show? Things would have been harder this year after Neil Goldman left but now to dismiss Harmon without so much of a thought? Stupidity beyond belief. Is it sheer arrogance that they think everyone will continue to follow the show (don’t get me wrong, I LOVE the amazing cast and I don’t want to let them down) without Harmon? Do they think that Community fans are like fans of less passionately loved shows, that perhaps we don’t care about who’s in charge just as long as we’re getting a fix? Community fans are NOT (and I mean this in the greatest way), normal. We are (and I hope I’m speaking for everyone here, certainly the Twitter fans and my personal friends who are fans of the show) obsessive to the point of insanity. We know who Dan is, we know the producers, we know the writers, we follow them on social media and hang on their every word. The talent in Community isn’t just up on the screen and we are VERY aware of that. Last year my fiancee and I based our whole vacation around a visit to San Diego Comic Con with the sole purpose of seeing the Community panel and hoping to meet the cast - even more impressive when you consider we live in the UK - and it was absolutely amazing. That one hour in the Hilton Bayfront ballroom (after standing in line for two hours and sitting through 3 other panels for shows we hadn’t even seen or heard of) watching Dan, the prooducers and the cast talk, seeing them in person, hearing how passionately they loved the show - the same show we watched - that they were creating. It was unbelievable and it was an experience I will never forget and Dan Harmon was a HUGE part of that.
I don’t understand what NBC/Sony are hoping to achieve here - at best Community would retain it’s existing viewers, at worst the faithful will leave and they will leave in DROVES. Perhaps they are trying to turn Community into something less quirky and more accessible (much as I LOVED episode 3.20, you’d be hard pushed to argue that it wasn’t totally inaccessible to anyone who didn’t watch the show every week) which will gain a bigger audience but I don’t see any chance of that happening - who really starts watching a show in it’s FOURTH season? I mean, really?
I think both NBC and Sony are looking for a hit (well NBC are DESPERATE for one) and I think the only reason they are trying to turn Community around in the ratings is because they don’t want to lose the cast who are oustanding. How Danny Pudi has not been nominated for an award is utterly beyond me. If they had big enough balls they would have bitten the bullet and tried to thrash some sort of amicable deal out with Harmon. If they had ANY balls they would have just admitted that the show was no longer viable to them and let it end properly. What they appear to have in their testicular region is nothing more than a vacuous space.
I apologise if none of this made sense, if it seemed disjointed or unorganised. I’m upset and I’m tired. I’m not a TV critic, I’m certainly not a writer, I’m nobody of any significant importance. I’m just a fan, a viewer, I’m just the guy that these shows are supposedly made for … so why would anyone care what I think?
I love you Dan Harmon, I can never thank-you enough for Community, for the utter brilliance of what I think is the best entertainment I have received ever by any medium. I’m sad to see you go and I wish you’d hang around to write season4 but if you don’t then I totally get it and I wish you well. I just hope you can arrange for Troy to sabotage the air conditioning in Goldblatt’s office before you leave. #sixseasonsandamovie without you is unthinkable #fourseasonsandaproperending would at least be something #threeseasonsandaboycott seems most likely.
If you need me I’ll be in the Dreamatorium, I’m already watching the Harmon/Goldman produced movie …
