'Community' recap: Dungeons & Dragons and Pierce, oh my!

Once upon a time, there was an NBC show called “Community.” Its writers loved to weave pop culture into the fabric of one eccentric community college called Greendale. Nothing was too high or too low for this crew. Zombies, space movies and even Dungeons & Dragons.So gather close that you might hearken the story of Fat Neil (Charley Koontz), who was “born stout of heart but large of bone,” and the best game of D&D ever. 

But first, a major confession -- this recapper knows zilch about Dungeons & Dragons, so whether what follows is true to form or off base is way beyond my ken. Either way, feel free to comment below. Now back to the story of Fat Neil. From an early age, Neil was picked on because of his weight. Only outlets of fantasy afforded him some escape from this darkness. Once the nightmare otherwise known as high school was over, he thought Greendale would be a new beginning. Faced with the same ol’, same ol’, only college style, he’s contemplating “an escape of which we dare not speak.” Jeff the Liar, son of William the Barely Known (Joel McHale), and Annie, the Day Planner, herself a “recovering head case” (Alison Brie), recognize the signs and try to do something about it.

A confab is called where it is decided to invite Neil to a game of D&D designed by Abed. Pierce the Insensitive (Chevy Chase) will not be invited. But since Chang (Ken Jeong) is conveniently in the room at the time, he’s included in the Most Important Game of D&D Ever, where they might “save a life and change the balance between good and Pierce.”

Cue the fantasy-themed opening credits, complete with a medieval-y spin on the “Community” theme. Huzzah!

And we’re back, where for some reason, Chang now has black skin, white hair and pointy ears. Oh, wait -– he’s a dark elf, or a drow. Whatever. It’s pretty startling, though not Chang’s best transformation (that would still be Peggy Fleming). Abed the Dungeon master informs our D&D’ers that they will be playing the game “The Caverns of Draconis.” So, let’s meet our players: Shirley, a dwarf named Zippity-Do (Yvette Nicole Brown); Jeff, Marrrrr (could he be from the Castle of Aaargh?); Troy, Bing Bong the Archer (Donald Glover); Annie, Hector the Well-Endowed; Britta, Lavernica (Gillian Jacobs); and Chang, a magician; and Neil is Duquesne, a character he’s been playing for years.

The game has barely started when Pierce bursts in, demanding to know if he’s being cast out of the group (Please, please, please!).  This is a mean and nasty Pierce, hurling insults at Neil and busting his way into the game (no wonder he’s got multiple ex-wives). “What the hell is wrong with you?” one of his cohorts asks. I might ask the same thing. He won’t go away, so they let him into the game, where he plays a 67-year-old naked man with no weapons, lying in the grass shivering. That soon changes, of course, he’s temporarily kicked out and the new goal becomes to kill Pierce. To do that, our fearless warriors must find a Pegasus. They stop off at an elf tavern, where Lavernica must converse with the gnome-speaking waiter Abed. An intimate encounter with an elf maiden ensues, complete with “Titanic”-like music.

Meanwhile, back in the supply closet, the devil-like Pierce has gotten his cloven hooves on a copy of the game and is looking for ways to cheat and win. He’s becoming more and more unlikable by the second, that man. Armed with an amulet, he’s now in control of Draconis, killing the elf waiter Kyle and freezing everybody else (Troy: “This is why I wanted to play Chutes and Ladders.” You and me both, Troy). A jealous, nasty Pierce spills why Jeff “led the charge on the Fat Neil feel-good committee” -- you see, it was the glib, disbarred lawyer Jeff who coined the nickname. Oops! Jeff talks his way out of it, sorta, Neil throws a 19 and Pierce is vanquished. End of game. “And so it was that Pierce saved the life of Fat Neil while learning very, very little.” Excelsior!

Extra credit: The great debate du jour, courtesy of Troy and Abed: Which would be better: giant ears or a tail?  To Abed’s thinking, if you had giant ears, you could hear stuff miles away and wear backpacks as earrings, which would free up your hands. Hands down, the best part of the episode.

Post-script: Still not a fan of Chevy Chase, and two Chase-centric episodes in a row has really tried the patience of this TV viewer. Here’s hoping the focus shifts to another cast member next week.

-- Alison Dingeldein

Photo: Chevy Chase on "Community." Credit: Lewis Jacobs / NBC.

Comments

[Elias]

This was an absolutely awesome episode of Community, and seeing it in DISH's HD (I'm a customer/employee)was even better. I agree with you about Pierce in this episode, he just seemed incredibly cruel (more so than usual) though I usually get a kick of his curmudgeonly character, last night he was just mean. Again, fantastic episode though, one of my favorites of the year so far.

[Alyssa]

Seriously? No mention of the LOTR references?

[Alison Dingeldein]

Alyssa, care to share with the class?

[Floyd]

Pierce has become the blackened heart of the series. He's so much better now he's become a villain instead of an inept Grampa-Simpson-like windbag. The more mean he is, the better!

[Drew]

An outstanding episode, and it looked great on my 1929 Western scanning disk television-radio set (if dude can plug blah blah company, I'm plugging the way old-school shizz).

These artsy concept episodes of Community have been hit-or-miss, and this one was all hit. Guessing it's Emmy material, especially considering the current tragic state of scripted comedy. Even 30 Rock is hitting a slide, so it looks like Community is going to be the anchor of Thursday nights in a year or two. If they keep bringing out the big guns like this one, anyway.

[Adam]

That, I have to admit, was one of the best Community episodes, ever! (Ranked next to the paint-ball episode...)

To begin with, I loved the medieval spin on the opening credits: awesome!

And throughout the episode, it was full of funny comments and jokes (like usual) and it was quite suspenseful just to see what would happen in the end- sad, I know, but it actually made you want to play the game and see what happened next.

And I loved that line by Troy: "This is why I wanted to play Chutes and Ladders"- it was getting all dramatic, with Pierce on the dragon or whatever than he freezes everyone and then Troy says that... And then the twist learning Jeff was the one to start the name "Fat Neil" Hilarious!

One of the best parts: at the closing, the woman who was talking through out the episode in a kind of medieval manner ends up being some cleaning woman telling the story! Ah.... good times... funny episode, I think I'm going to watch it again!!!

[Grace]

Alison, the entire intro was LOTR-based. The map, the voiceover, the slow-mo cascade of fantasy books. The gathering of a council, etc. Very clear reference.

[Alison Dingeldein]

Love the comments, folks! Keep them coming.

Guess I'm in the minority on not liking this episode ... mean Pierce really spoiled it for me. I know he can be curmudgeonly, but this uber-nastiness ... it seemed to come out of nowhere. Ah well, there's always next week.

And speaking of, here's hoping there will be many "next weeks" to come for "Community" despite the poor ratings. Looks like NBC's ordered an additional two eps for this season, bringing it up to 24 ... Does this mean renewal will be next? Fingers crossed.

Grace, thanks for illuminating this LOTR illiterate.

[Rochelle]

LOVED THIS EPISODE! Best one yet! Can't believe you didn't like it. Yes, Pierce was evil. The comedy came out of how unbelievably evil, small and petty he was being just because he was left out...I like his role as the self centered jerk. He's the character you love to "hate".

ps--"Shouldn't there be a board? or dice? or something to JENGA?" HA!

[Alan M.]

Great recap and comments =)

I'm a HUUUGE Community fanatic (even went to San Diego just to see the cast speak at Comic Con!), and I've got to say, this is my favorite Community episode to date!!

In my humble opinion, this episode had nearly all of the fantastic elements that make us love Community: pop culture references (e.g., Pierce saying "....NOW" like the Star Wars Emperor), quick-fire jokes, feature film story packed in one episode (it felt like a 23-minute movie), feature film production value (the LOTR score!), random/quirky one-liners ("you're the AT&T of people"), ice-breaking one-liners when things get serious ("this is why I wanted to play Chutes & Ladders" near the climax), character balance, inspired storytelling (the Jeff twist, the pity attack on Pierce), and best of all, HEART (despite and beneath all the quirkiness, wink-wink humor, caricatures etc., Community is heartfelt at its core).

I LOVED the LOTR/fantasy feel, e.g. the horn-filled minor key rendition of the opening credits, the airy European/elvish narration, and Chang's exit music.

My only reservation is Pierce's character development. He's really becoming a purely unlikeable character with virtually no redeeming traits. It makes me wonder if they're writing Pierce out of the show and making room for permanent addition of Chang. Chevy Chase is know to be incredibly difficult to work with, and to be honest, just about everyone at Comic-Con could tell that the cast (and even Dan Harom) was uneasy around Chevy, especially after he made some pretty angry, off-color comments when he thought his microphone was off.

Sorry for the long comment =/ but cheers to fellow Community fans!

[Corrie]

I loved this episode as well! I, too, enjoyed when Troy said he wanted to play chutes and ladders, but I LOVED when Annie and Abed were describing the sexual encounter and Troy gets out a piece of paper to take notes!! ROTFL! And then when she's summing the story up says that she would spoon and Troy says "and how long would that be?", Classic! Now, with Pierce, I will agree he was unusually nasty in this episode, but I don't see that out of the scope of his character. He's really always been like that and he was really doing this because he felt left out. So for the person that said he doesn't have any redeeming qualities, I disagree. Although he was nasty, he was jealous; and even though that's not really a good quality to have, it came from the love he has for the study group, which has been evident in many episodes!