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soundonsight:

Thursday Comedies: Community 3.16 & Parks and Rec 4.19

Community, Season 3, Episode 16: “Virtual Systems Analysis”
Written by Matt Murray
Directed by Tristram Shapeero
Airs Thursdays at 8pm ET on NBC

Community seems to flourish when it brings Abed’s autistic tendencies to the forefront. They played a crucial factor in the recent “Pillows and Blankets” two-parter, but it’s episodes like “Abed’s Uncontrollable Christmas,” “Critical Film Studies” and “Intermediate Chaos Theory” that “Virtual Systems Analysis” calls to mind, wherein Abed’s antisocial tics inform not just the plot but the actual structure of the episodes. Whether the resulting episode is deeply introspective (as in “Film Studies” and “Systems Analysis”), appropriately cutesy (“Christmas”) or merely wildly entertaining (“Chaos Theory”), it’s hard to argue that these aren’t singular episodes, Not just for Community, but for any recent TV show.

The cleverness with which Dan Harmon and company go about making the audience painfully aware of the conceptual tricks they are using while simultaneously pulling them off without a hitch is akin to Babe Ruth’s called shot; but though Community doesn’t always hit it out of the park, they’re certainly on a roll at the moment. This is the fourth consecutive week in which Community has delivered an episode that manages to entertain while striving for, and attaining, something deeper.

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Mikko Kuorinki, Wall Piece with 200 Letters, 2010-11.

(via a-tablespoon-of-hemlock)

silencedsilver:

I need to remember this more.  Especially since I’ve already found that person and he tells me this all the time! <3