GLEE MEANS, LITERALLY, GLEE: If you're going to go out on a forced extended vacation, you might as well do it the way that Community did, with a brilliant, dense, layered, pissed off episode. One could probably sit down and write a term paper on everything that went right, from the spot-on parody (the bad rapping and production numbers, the nonsensical characterization, the continuity failures) up one level to overt rips ("if you don't like Glee Club, it doesn't make you a bully, and saying it does is reverse bullying"), to the reproach to Community's own fetishists (Annie's sexy/infantile come-on) to the meta jabs at Community's tone and self-destructive behavior. Community may have spent too much time this season trying confusedly to please disparate masters (including NBC, and not excluding its superfans), but this episode was nothing but the show doing what it wanted to do, well and proudly, and boy, did it hit the spot for me.
In other news, I'm trying to think of a sadder clown on recent TV than Ellie Kemper's Erin.
