Parks and Recreation, Season 4 Episode 6 – "End of the World"

At its best, there may not be another show on television – hell, maybe not that many in the history of television – that does warm as well as Parks and Recreation. Not in some syrupy, studio-audience-goes-"aww," fuckin', like, Cosby Show / Full House sort of way, but in a truly genuine way that comes from sincere love for its characters. I don't know that I laughed harder at "End of the World" than I have at any number of other sitcom episodes this year, but in the warmness, it excelled. The ending montage set to "All Will Be Well" gave me tingles that I daresay hinted at the way I routinely felt at the end of Friday Night Lights episodes.

Another part of what made the episode work so well for me is how all its stories grew from the same starting point. I know other people may not mind it – in fact, the wildly enthusiastic reaction to last month's "Ron & Tammys" pretty well proves they don't – but I tend to be less of a fan of sitcom episodes where the assorted stories feel rigidly segmented, like they might as well be taking place in entirely different episodes.

Here, it all started with the Reasonableists and their end of the world cult. I kind of tensed up when that story was introduced, thinking that one of the office's dumber employees (i.e. Andy) would suddenly start to believe, but it turns out it's me who should have had faith... in the show, that is. As they played it, no one actually believed in Zorp or the dawning apocalypse, but the vague idea of what the end of the world would entail did indeed drive the action.

First off, Leslie and Ben and the return of Shauna Malwae-Tweep (not as funny a character as Joan Callamezzo, but always helpful in how she allows Leslie and other characters to bounce comedy off of her). Leslie and Ben have never necessarily been the TV couple I'm most invested in, but Amy Poehler and Adam Scott tore into the dramatic meat of this story with such gusto it's hard to complain. Leslie admitting that if it were the end of the world she'd want to be with Ben captured a perfect balance of the depressing and the heartwarming.

I just hope they stick with Leslie putting her city council run first, because that's flat-out more interesting from a character perspective, and a slightly miserable Ben is just more funny to watch. Chris Pratt can make happiness hilarious with Andy, but Adam Scott's comedic skillset tends a little more toward the put-upon side of life. (Also, by the way, this episode again keeps up the tradition of alternating election and non-election stories, with this of course being an off week.)

Also a bit miserable but trying to spin it Rumpelstiltskin-style into pure joy are Tom Haverford and Jean-Ralphio, finally (and, as I mentioned last week, thankfully) at the end of their Entertainment 720 journey. I was never an enormous fan of this story, but, like bad sex that nonetheless ends in orgasm, it went out with an enormous bang. Their end of the world party wasn't necessarily super-funny, but it was super-fun, every second of it completely and totally enjoyable. Around the time Jean-Ralphio did his drum line dance I'm pretty sure I had a nothing-short-of-moronic grin plastered across my face. The return of Lucy was also a nice surprise, and will hopefully continue into future episodes.

And this week in "Ann's Place In This Ensemble Is Awkward and Loosely Defined,"we have her... not really doing a whole hell of a lot of anything, which I guess fits the name of this paragraph-long mini-segment I've established in these reviews. She talks to Chris a little bit, I guess, and then goes to the party with him, but I have absolutely no investment in them as a couple whatsoever, so I can bring myself to do little more than shrug.

As it turns out, April and Andy (i.e. The Actually Funny Jim and Pam) going through Andy's apocalypse bucket list was the only truly and undilutedly funny story of the night. From Andy's quest to hold a thousand dollars to the return of Burt Macklin and Janet Snakehole, it was one solid laugh after another. But even this story turned quite sweet at the end as they tooled down the road toward the Grand Canyon together, while still sneaking in one last wonderfully unexpected laugh in its final seconds. See the next paragraph for further details.

Funniest Moment: If you're just going by pure laugh volume, it's a close call between Leslie bluntly and tactlessly telling Shauna Malwae-Tweep to keep it in her pants and then backpedalling and the very last moment where Andy asks April, "Where's all the faces? Like the presidents?" Specifically Aubrey Plaza's "What the fuck?" facial expression immediately after, a reaction that would make Arrested Development-era Jason Bateman nod in approval.

Final Grade: A-

Parks and Recreation, Season 4 Episode 5 – "Meet 'N' Greet"

First off, is anyone out there really mourning the end of the Entertainment 720 subplot? Pretty much the sole thing I was excited about going into this story was the promise of more Jean-Ralphio, which was to some extent delivered on, but, as Ben Schwartz has been cast as a regular in another series, my dream of Parks and Recreation and Jean-Ralphio was not to be. It's not that I object to shows changing, but it can try one's patience when said changes obviously aren't going to last, especially when they feel as intrusive and generally grating as Entertainment 720 did in this episode.

But I'm just getting that one bit of negativity out first thing, because, E720 aside, this episode was a lot of fun and had more than its share of laughs (and even that story made me laugh sufficiently hard with the not-anonymous confessional from "Mark Zuckerberg"). April and Andy in particular were on fire from the opening seconds. April was largely just hanging on the side making quips rather than being directly involved in the action, but she was part of the episode's single funniest moment (as usual, detailed below), so it's all good. Ben and Andy's feud was a bit of a Lord of the Rings film trilogy situation (that is to say, the middle was the weakest part), with Andy's initial attack on Ben in Ben's room being hilarious and the "We're brothers" payoff making it all worthwhile, but the all-night headlock did get just a little soggy before it was done.

As for the rest of the Halloween party, this episode really got me thinking about the interesting role Chris Traeger plays in the ensemble. There's no doubt: he's the peppiest, most friendly, positive, optimistic person on the show (not an easy title to claim with Knope in the mix). He literally loves everyone. But he has, at the same time, filled the antagonist role from the second he stepped into Pawnee, first as the cut man there to slash City Hall's budget to ribbons, then as the obstacle standing in the path of Leslie and Ben, and now as Jerry's (unwitting and benevolent) antagonizer via Mr. Gergich's lithe, willing daughter.

Now, Jerry's despair is always hilarious to witness, and I approve of it wholeheartedly. But I also hope there's a confrontation coming, because Jerry has been bottling up the rage for years now, and I see no better story opportunity to finally let some of it loose.

And this week in "Ann's Place In This Ensemble Is Awkward and Loosely Defined," we have her teaming up with Ron Swanson to put the hammer – the hammer of home maintenance, that is – to April, Andy, and Ben's rotting house. It becomes more difficult by the week to deny Ann's status as Mark Brendanawicz 2.0, but this story wasn't without its solid laughs, particularly Ron's reading of "Sonic and Hedgehog" and his stoic confirmation that if you touch the shock wire above Andy's shower, you do, indeed, die.

While I had my problems with Entertainment 720, I did like the parts of Leslie and Tom's story that less directly involved Tom's floundering startup. They may have reached just a little too hard for the heartwarming beat at the end with her crying over Tom's campaign video (although even that moment wasn't without humor), but there was something very believable, sympathetic, and humorously cringe-inducing about her denying credit for the Harvest Festival that was her baby from the word go.

It's also interesting to note that "Meet 'N' Greet" continues this season's pattern of switching off election and non-election plots for Leslie each episode, which is a format that is definitely working and keeps this season moving without making the election stuff ever get stale. Well, I don't want to say ever, but not yet anyway.

Funniest Moment: For pure schadenfreude goodness, the only real choice is the look on Jerry's face as his daughter and Chris dry hump on the dance floor, perfectly punctuated by April correcting his stick-on smile.

Final Grade: B

Best TV Episodes, October 2011

I've decided to kick off a new feature wherein, on the first day of each month, I go through and rank and give some brief (spoiler-free) thoughts on my ten favorite television episodes that aired over the last month, plus pick a few runners-up. I can't watch everything, so I make no claim of this being any kind of definitive guide, but I thought it would be a fun way to organize my thoughts and share them at the same time, and maybe even talk a little about some shows I otherwise don't much.

Keep in mind that there's no "only one episode per show" rule in effect, so it's entirely possible that a few shows may dominate the top ten any given month. I may be a liberal, but the Tea Party should approve of this feature: there is no sharing the wealth here.

Runners-Up:

17. The Vampire Diaries, Season 3 Episode 5 – "The Reckoning" 16. Parks and Recreation, Season 4 Episode 5 – "Meet 'N' Greet" 15. Revenge, Season 1 Episode 5 – "Guilt" 14. Boardwalk Empire, Season 2 Episode 2 – "Ourselves Alone" 13. Homeland, Season 1 Episode 4 – "Semper I" 12. Parenthood, Season 3 Episode 4 – "Clear Skies From Here on Out" 11. Community, Season 3 Episode 5 – "Horror Fiction in Seven Spooky Steps"

Top Ten:

10. Homeland, Season 1 Episode 5 – "Blind Spot"

Last Sunday's Homeland did a great job further cementing the show as, as I labeled it in my pilot review, the thinking man's 24. It excels at depicting espionage, intelligence gathering, interrogation, and other anti-terrorism activities in a way that adheres a million times more closely to reality, and continues to move the plot quickly yet patiently forward. I plan a full review of this episode in a day or two, so I'll leave it at that.

9. Breaking Bad, Season 4 Episode 12 – "End Times"

I mentioned in my Breaking Bad season four review that I found this episode arguably the weakest of the final act of the season, with a closing scene that seemed to take a certain character from smart to psychic. But, just as your favorite food slightly misprepared is still probably preferable to most anything else, problematic Breaking Bad is still Breaking Bad.

8. Parks and Recreation, Season 4 Episode 3 – "Born & Raised"

Joan Callamezzo is one of Parks and Recreation's great secret weapons, always hilarious but never overused and made stale (her talk show also anchored one of the funniest scenes of one of the funniest episodes of the series, "Media Blitz"), and she makes her season four debut to huge laughs and a really well-structured, interconnected plot. An all-around great episode for Leslie's character development and Ben being hilarious, because Adam Scott is always hilarious.

7. Parenthood, Season 3 Episode 5 – "Nora"

Parenthood is one of the most difficult shows on TV to define my enjoyment of, because the show is, at its heart, about decently well-off people having mostly small-scale, quickly resolved first world problems that have no impact whatsoever on the world at large. But showrunner Jason Katims (also behind Friday Night Lights) has a deft, borderline-magic touch for making these people so likable and their issues so compelling regardless that I end pretty much every episode with a goofy grin on my face. "Nora" was simply the goofy grinniest of October.

6. Boss, Season 1 Episode 1 – "Listen"

The second-best pilot of the fall and one of the best of year, Boss, the story of a fictitious Chicago mayor and the machinations surrounding the office, is dense, brainy, literate television, hugely stylish and theatrical but with a thick undercurrent of realpolitik running through it. At showing the corrupting power of politics it excels far beyond the recent George Clooney film The Ides of March, and Kelsey Grammer is so ferocious as the titular boss that he damn near scrubbed the residual nightmares of his recent sitcom Hank from my mind.

5. Boardwalk Empire, Season 2 Episode 5 – "Gimcrack and Bunkum"

Long-simmering tensions between two characters come to a perfect boil, series dark horse Richard Harrow gets an awesome, actor-friendly showcase, and there's not one but two scenes of gruesome, beyond-the-pale violence. Hands down the best episode of the season, and one of the best of the series since the pilot; a sweaty, heart-pounding episode of a show that can occasionally feel cold and detached.

4. Homeland, Season 1 Episode 3 – "Clean Skin"

Effectively the third act and climax of the first act of Homeland's debut season, "Clean Skin" may be in certain ways the least cerebral Homeland yet, but it's also the most tense and thrilling, with one particularly shocking moment that will make almost anyone watching jump. It's the episode of Homeland where it's most evident the show is run by two of the same guys as 24, but without ever giving into that show's baser instincts.

3. Homeland, Season 1 Episode 1 – "Pilot"

Homeland's pilot, for my money, jumps ahead of the (both now deceased, the former more tragically than the latter) The Chicago Code and Lights Out and stands behind only Game of Thrones as having the best pilot of the year. While it does a great job laying the show's groundwork as a terrorism thriller, its true accomplishment is building its two key figures, Claire Danes' Carrie Mathison and Damian Lewis's Nicholas Brody, into startlingly rich, compelling, three-dimensional characters within the space of one hour. Watching Danes in this episode was the first time I was riveted watching an actor in a new series this fall.

2. Breaking Bad, Season 4 Episode 13 – "Face Off"

As perfect a fourth season finale as I think any of us could have hoped for a few months back, "Face Off" is explosively tense, violent, satisfying, and just plain climactic television, bringing tons of plot threads to their conclusions and showing an awesome, wicked delight at sending the show's premise spinning in a wildly new direction. (The episode is also surprisingly funny at points, particularly when Hector is spelling things out with his bell.) It doesn't necessarily contain Bryan Cranston's greatest performance of the season, but it does take the character into fascinating new territory, one where they now might as well go ahead and retitle the show Broke Bad. The stage is well set for a terrific fifth and final season next year.

1. Community, Season 3 Episode 4 – "Remedial Chaos Theory"

The first two seasons of Community each have a pair of episodes that loom tall and monstrously above the rest as little 22-minute comedy masterpieces among the best television has ever seen. Season one had "Modern Warfare" and "Contemporary American Poultry." Season two had "Advanced Dungeons & Dragons" and "Conspiracy Theories and Interior Design." And now season three is halfway to the same place with "Remedial Chaos Theory," a blast of dizzyingly clever comedic brilliance that singlehandedly makes almost all of the tens of thousands of sitcom episodes that have come before look lethargic and unambitious in comparison.

It has a hugely clever and perfectly-executed central gimmick, does terrific character work spanning the entire cast, is loaded with uproarious jokes, and has as heartwarming an ending as anyone could hope for, one that filled me with warm fuzzies that even Parks and Recreation at its best struggles to measure up to. If Community gives us just two or three more episodes on the level of this and the other four I mentioned before series' end, Dan Harmon can look back on a life's work and consider himself one of comedy's great architects.

NBC Sitcom Roundup for 10/13/11

(I felt there was too much positivity in my NBC sitcom roundups as of late, so effective immediately and until I decide I've had enough, I've added Whitney to the lineup. May god have mercy on my soul.)

The Office, Season 8 Episode 4 — "Garden Party"

Well, after three pretty solid outings for The Office's eighth season, we got us a bit of a clunker. Not an apocalyptic clunker – "Garden Party" is no "Christening" – but an incredibly generic, run-of-the-mill Dunder Mifflin party episode, one we've seen a million times before, and one where the few things that differentiated it were primarily for the worse.

The garden party setting, while outwardly harmless, gave rise to one of the dumbest episode framing devices in the history of the show with Jim's garden party advice book. Never mind that most of the resulting Dwight wackiness was less than hilarious; even for a sitcom, the idea that Jim wrote a complete book (from the look of it, a decently thick one) in preparation for this one event, created an anonymous online profile, and somehow got Dwight to buy it in lieu of however many real garden party books there are on Amazon to get a couple silly laughs is unacceptably stupid. Moronic. Almost insulting.

Josh Groban as Andy's brother was the worst, most obnoxious kind of stunt casting, the kind that made last season's finale so grating and that The Office admirably held itself above for six seasons (unless you count supporting players from The Wire as stunt casting, anyway). Now, Groban's performance for his first scene or two was fine, but then they had to bust out the guitars and go for the "funny" singing (i.e. just plain singing), which became an ultimate comedy pet peeve of mine at some point between the hundredth and millionth time they did it with Jenna on 30 Rock. Nothing but hate for that part of the episode.

Of course it all came around to a feel-good ending where the office rallied in support of Andy to make him feel welcome as their new boss, which would be great if they hadn't done the exact same ending two goddamn episodes ago in "The Incentive." Let's start thinking a little outside the box, guys!

Now, granted, there were some funny punchlines here and there as the show's viewpoint swung erratically around the party, including Mose making chaos while parking cars, a bird stealing Erin's hat, and the Citizen Kane debate between Oscar and Darryl. But alas, those bits were but sprinkles covering tuna-flavored ice cream. Worst episode of the season by far.

Funniest Moment: Ryan toasting the troops. All of them. Both sides.

Parks and Recreation, Season 4 Episode 4 — "Pawnee Rangers"

Like The Office, this was a fairly run-of-the-mill Parks outing, but with the important caveat that Parks and Rec's current mean quality level is much, much higher than The Office's. Multiple stories stemming loosely from the same event (most of the office being out camping, the few people left taking advantage of the empty nest), Leslie being triumphant, Ron being stubborn, Ann being awkward, Chris being peppy, Jerry being put upon, Tom and Donna being materialistic, Ben being a nerd, heartwarming ending, etc. All bases covered.

The main Pawnee Rangers vs. Pawnee Goddesses story, while light on Andy and April goodness, was full of funny stuff, especially in the contrast between the two camps and in Leslie's overly precocious kids. After a string of "Ron is awesome and always right" stories last year like the burger cook-off, it was nice to see an episode take him down a peg and show that he can, in fact, be wrong. I also like that, at least as of four episodes in, they seem to be alternating election and non-election stories for Leslie. Good way to do it, I'd say.

Ben, Tom, and Donna's "TREAT YO SELF" B-plot was definitely the highlight of the episode, if only because of Ben eating soup alone on a bench, his fear of acupuncture, and the Game of Thrones and Dark Knight references. Nevertheless, this has been the third consecutive episode to pair up Ben and Tom, so I wouldn't mind Ben getting a new story partner next week. Chris and Jerry's subplot all seemed like buildup for the two-second punchline of Jerry's reaction shot when Chris tells him he fucked his daughter, but that punchline was funny enough to make it all worthwhile.

Funniest Moment: Andy's intensity while reciting the oath of the Pawnee Goddesses.

Community, Season 3 Episode 4 — "Remedial Chaos Theory"

Best sitcom of last Thursday? Yes. Best TV episode of the week? Certainly. One of the best of the year? Absolutely. Best Community since "Advanced Dungeons & Dragons?" Quite possibly! "Remedial Chaos Theory" was the sort of condensed, propulsive brilliance Community specializes in that makes all other sitcoms feel small, dull, and gray in comparison. Granted, it's not the first sitcom episode to explore multiple timelines, but it is the first to explore seven multiple timelines, and weave countless subplots and running jokes through all of them in a manner reminiscent of a man juggling a dozen knives.

What's great is how the episode managed to have its cake and eat it too, being alternately absurdist, dark, poignant, slapsticky, or (in the case of the prime timeline) heartwarming depending on who got the pizza, and, like they've done with action movies, zombies, and Westerns, they made it all fit seamlessly within the framework of the show's reality. In addition to all the stories they were juggling, "Remedial Chaos Theory" showed supreme confidence in its grasp of tone, and how to make it veer in wildly different directions without ever feeling haphazard or uncontrolled.

It doesn't take a master sitcom analyst to look at the episode and notice that the group dynamic immediately improves when Pierce or Jeff is missing. When Pierce is absent, everyone starts getting along. When Jeff the judgmental steps out, they immediately lose their inhibitions and start having fun, which Jeff of course judges them for upon his return ("You guys see what happens when I leave you alone?"). This seems to tie directly into Jeff's nightmare about literally becoming Pierce back in "Biology 101." But beyond Jeff and Pierce, it's also interesting to look at how the absence of the others impacts things.

When Britta is gone, the group loses its heart and gets mean, with Pierce getting a little too harsh with Abed. With Shirley missing, they get selfish, letting her pies burn. When Abed is gone, they just plain stop having fun, with everyone getting really real then hurting each other's feelings. And without Troy, everything goes to fucking hell, seeming to say that without his goodhearted enthusiasm anchoring them there can be no group at all. (The only one for whom this theory seems to break down is Annie, who just last week in "Competitive Ecology" was voted most popular in the group, but whose absence seems to have little ill effect on anyone.)

Even putting aside the breadth and ambition of its storytelling, "Remedial Chaos Theory" was just hilariously funny. From Britta's pizza dance to Troy's candy cigarette to Annie's gun not being a pregnancy test to the Norwegian troll doll to Jeff repeatedly hitting his head on the fan to Britta's repeated botched attempts at singing "Roxanne," the episode refused to lighten up on the onslaught of comedy for a second. Granted, this is more the rule than the exception when it comes to Community, but it's always nice to see and nice to laugh as hard as this show demands.

It's also interesting to note that, save last season's "Competitive Wine Tasting," this is the most brazen episode yet concerning the seemingly inevitable romantic collision of Troy and Britta. I have no extremely strong feelings on this one way or the other, but I am curious to see if Community can pull off coupling up the study group (actual couples, I mean, so not counting Jeff and Britta's secret sex last season) without it starting to feel incestuous the way Friends did around the point that Joey fell in love with Rachel. The show has pulled off 98% of what it's taken a swing at up to this point, so I have no reason to believe they'd botch it.

But the most important question to ponder moving forward is, of course, whether or not we'll ever visit Evil Troy and Evil Abed in the dark timeline again. The show would continue on fine without them, but it would be a shame not to follow up on that astoundingly brilliant tag. If we ever return to that timeline I hope we get a chance to visit in on psycho Annie.

Funniest Moment: For the sheer, manic energy of it I'd have to go with Troy's Darth Vaderian "NOOOOOOO!!!!" upon seeing the Norwegian troll doll amidst the fire, but he also had the funniest line delivery not a minute into the episode. Shirley: "Time flies when I'm baking!" Troy: *grinning widely* "No it doesn't!"

Whitney, Season 1 Episode 4 — "A Decent Proposal"

Watching Whitney's latest pile of shit masquerading as a sitcom episode, it occurred to me that I'd seen this story before: Whitney and Alex's game of romantic chicken was instantly evocative of Jeff and Britta in Community's second season premiere, "Anthropology 101." Now, I'm not saying that Whitney's writers ("writers" in the same sense that one who defaces a urinal with graffiti is an "artist") ripped off Community – nothing about Whitney implies that anyone involved has ever seen a funny episode of television – but it's fascinating to compare the two and see why one works and one doesn't.

Now, you might say, "Tim, you asshole, one is funny because it has good writers, good jokes, Joel McHale, and Gillian Jacobs, and the other is unfunny because it has shit writers, shit jokes, Whitney Cummings, and Chris D'Elia!" And, of course, you'd be right. But beyond that, examining story structure, Community's romantic chicken worked because the two people involved weren't already in a longterm relationship, they were forced to put on a performance for everyone else's benefit, there was another character (Abed) driving the stakes upward, and they had the people around them choosing sides ("Jeff Winger you're a jerk!").

Whitney, however, shows no aptitude whatsoever for the basic notion of comic stakes: The romantic chicken is being played exclusively between two (uninteresting) people, and, whoever wins, no one will care and nothing will result. It will have no impact on Whitney or Alex as people or on their relationship. It's small, boring storytelling. And, yes, as I mentioned above, on a moment-to-moment and joke-to-joke basis, it was cripplingly unfunny. This show sucks the big dick.

Funniest Moment: Geez. That's a little like being tasked with finding the tastiest turd in a toilet bowl full of shit, isn't it? I guess if I had to choose I'd go with the part at the end where Jonathan from 30 Rock proposes to the redheaded one, because it was hilarious that Whitney actually thought I would be emotionally moved by that. You just want to pat the show on the head and say "Aw, good job, champ!", like you would to a kindergartener showing off their artwork.

Weekly Power Rankings: 1. Community 2. Parks and Recreation 3. The Office 4. Whitney

NBC Sitcom Roundup for 10/6/11

The Office, Season 8 Episode 3 — "Lotto"

While by no means an Office all-timer, I'd say "Lotto" is the season's best effort to date, an episode that was fairly funny, balanced good A and B-plots, and did interesting dramatic character work with Darryl all at once. The big confrontation between Darryl and Andy in the lobby was genuinely involving stuff which also retroactively fit some of Darryl's odd missteps in the second half of last season into the show's universe and explained in more than satisfying detail why Andy was promoted instead of Darryl. Great scene all around.

The Darryl spotlight (along with last week's strong Andy focus) also seems to indicate a post-Michael Office where the weekly protagonist shifts around, which is very interesting and opens up lots of story possibilities. I'm curious to see whether some more background characters like Phyllis or Oscar will get similarly centric episodes later on in the season.

And the warehouse B-plot, while almost pure physical comedy, was pure physical comedy that more or less worked. It was a little absurdist without totally chucking reality out the window, and Erin and Kevin make a surprisingly potent comedic duo ("You need to drop it, okay? They hate it. I like it a lot, but they hate it, so drop it!").

Outside of the dog in the car cold open (which, except for the final gag with Kevin passing out, was a near-complete dud in which Oscar seemed wildly out of character), the weakest part of the episode was, surprise surprise, the generic Jim / Pam wannabe cuteness with them debating what to do with their hypothetical lottery winnings (although I did like the line, "In your fantasy we're Stephen King characters."). Yes, yay Jim and Pam. For the millionth time. Moving on.

And while I like Robert California just fine and think he adds an interesting something to the ensemble, I'd be dishonest not to note that his absence didn't even occur to me for a second until I saw someone mention it online after the episode was over. That's actually a good thing, I'd say, that they aren't shoehorning him into episodes he has no organic place in. I just hope it doesn't go so far that direction that he starts to feel like a comedic fifth wheel when he does appear.

Funniest Moment: The biggest laugh of the entire season so far is Stanley's look of shock and outrage upon seeing the warehouse applicant eating his lunch. First time in these three episodes I've done the full roaring from the gut laughter.

Parks and Recreation, Season 4 Episode 3 — "Born & Raised"

This episode was exactly the Parks and Rec goodness I was hoping for when the Leslie Knope city council storyline kicked off two weeks ago. In fact, the exact words in my season premiere review were that the story arc "provides easy access to the unilaterally hilarious talk shows and news shows of Pawnee," and boom, two episodes later, Joan Callamezzo. As with Perd Hapley, I understand why Joan can't be a regular – too much of a good thing, it'd be like eating ice cream every meal – but it's always, always great to see her, and this may have been her biggest spotlight yet.

The general consensus online seems to be that "Ron & Tammys" is still the best episode of the season, but that's wrong. It was hilarious, yes, but I wasn't crazy about the rigidly disconnected storylines. "Born & Raised," on the other hand, does a sublime job having its disparate stories all grow from the same seed and interconnect. Leslie's search for the truth of her birth, Ben and Tom's disturbing lunch with Joan, and Ron and April being forced into spending time with Ann all stemmed from the factual error in Leslie's book, and that's the kind of storytelling I find both more impressive and more rewarding.

As with "Ron & Tammys," the Ann storyline was the weakest part, but more so than when she was matched up with Chris, the general blandness of Ann is here counteracted by the general awesomeness of Ron and April (who, as I've mentioned before, probably have the greatest boss / henchman dynamic on television right now). Whatever Ann-related dullness there may have been was more than justified by Ron revealing his wrong name strategy and April flipping it on him to his pride seconds later.

The episode's subjects of parody were somewhat scattershot and outdated, with the Obama birthers and Oprah's Book Club both getting somewhat belatedly skewered, but it was funny enough that I didn't much care. The gotcha dancers, the return of Bert Macklin, Jerry's tragic quest across Indiana, Ben's theories on Star Trek, and the field trip to Eagleton were all hilarious, and moments like Chris helping Leslie reclaim her Pawnee pride and the final waffle party were pure warmhearted goodness. Parks and Rec is at its best one of the most pleasant and uncynical 22 minutes on television, and "Born & Raised" captured that perfectly.

Funniest Moment: Probably Ben's deadpan "That never happened." response to Joan's Val Kilmer story, because Adam Scott has the best line delivery in the world. Also from Adam Scott, a minute later, "Is she gonna powder her vagina?"

Community, Season 3 Episode 3 — "Competitive Ecology"

In utter contrast to the warmheartedness of Parks and Rec's "Born & Raised," Community's "Competitive Ecology" is quite possibly the most bitter, utterly misanthropic half-hour of the entire series. Now, this could get problematic if it stays this way, but for a one-time thing it pretty much made me laugh my ass off. The evolution of the group's hatred of Todd was a fantastically dark and comedically cruel thing to behold, and the main study room scene definitely had the feel of "Cooperative Calligraphy" on crack. (Not in a good or a bad way, just a plain old on crack, nutso way.)

Loved the return of Magnitude, and of course Vicki for the second week in a row. Hopefully Todd can join them in the stable of recurring characters. The episode also made better use of Michael K. Williams as Professor Kane than the premiere. None of the conversations he has make sense.

Chang's noir private eye B-plot wasn't really treading comedic territory that hasn't been explored years or even decades ago, but it had a lot of funny gags on a moment-to-moment basis. Chang mistaking a common passerby for a noir dame was great ("Legs that went all the way to the bottom of her torso. The kind of arms that had elbows."), as was Mel Rodriguez once again as Chang's supervisor. I also loved Chang's repeated "Was I crazy?", and the fact that the show is at this point pretty brazenly depicting him as mentally ill in a way that could just as easily be dramatic in another show, here played for increasingly dark comedy.

Funniest Moment: Gonna have to go with Britta's failed attempt at a "PEW! PEW! PEW! PEW!" middle finger, which Gillian Jacobs executed perfectly. Awkward Britta is definitely working for me this season.

Weekly Power Rankings: 1. Parks and Recreation 2. Community 3. The Office

NBC Sitcom Roundup for 9/29/11

The Office, Season 8 Episode 2 — "The Incentive"

I said last week that I won't belabor the point of Steve Carell's absence in these sitcom roundups – and I won't – but I will belabor the point of boss Andy being characterized in a way indistinguishable from Michael Scott. Granted, him having to report directly to Robert California, who is frequently in the office, adds a new flavor, but so much dialogue that comes out of boss Andy's mouth (especially the "cocker spaniel" explanation and awkward backpedalling in this episode) feels like they just took unused Michael dialogue from old scripts and did a find and replace with Andy's name. That's a problem.

But despite that, I did like the main incentive and tattoo story a lot. Andy upping the stakes on his point exchange offers, seeing the office come alive with hard work, and Robert's final explanation about the inspirational power of the underdog to the unexceptional all worked completely. And seeing the Nard Dog tattoo was actually a really great moment of office camaraderie that I didn't predict; probably one of the infinitesimally few reveals of a man's bare ass in the 133-year history of film and television that could be described as "heartwarming."

I thought less of the episode's B-plots. Pam and Angela's brief bonding and then feud over their pregnancies was a comedic nonstarter and didn't have enough time dedicated to it to do interesting character work, and Darryl reconnecting with his ex-wife went absolutely nowhere (although Kevin's response to her Dunder Mifflin entrance was pretty funny). I'm willing to assume for now that Darryl's wife is going to be a continuing story in episodes to come, and I hope I'm right, but The Office has bit me in the ass with seemingly unfinished stories that never came up again before.

Funniest Moment: As with last week, there wasn't really any singular moment that made me tilt my head back and roar, but it was a funny week for Kevin all around – both the intro with him talk funny, and his consternation at Dwight putting walnuts in the brownie mix.

Parks and Recreation, Season 4 Episode 2 — "Ron & Tammys"

This is one of the most rigidly segmented sitcom episodes I've seen lately – the three stories had absolutely no connecting tissue and didn't even have any character crossover; they could have easily been from three completely different episodes – but two of the stories were so damn funny I can't really find it in myself to care.

The heart of the episode was Ron taking the opposite approach from when Tammy 2 transformed him into a psychotic sex maniac and becoming creepily pleasant and unmustachioed, which was brilliant and gave Nick Offerman a great new angle to play. Tammy 1 is a perfectly conceived and performed character who simply must appear again, and the drinking contest at the end was awesome. Plus, April and Andy, while lacking any true spotlight, were consistently hilarious, from April's immediate love of Tammy 1 to Andy panicking and giving a false name before sheepishly backpedalling. Great stuff, great characters, greatness.

Also great was the Entertainment 720 subplot, both because Jean-Ralphio is awesome ("Take me there!") and because Adam Scott does the camera confessional cutaways better than anyone else on this show or on The Office. As I'm sure I've said before, it's crazy that Ben wasn't in the first season or most of the second, because he feels like such a crucial part of the show's DNA now that I can't even imagine it without him.

Less crucial feeling, I'm afraid, is Chris Traeger, perhaps partially because of how distant from everyone else he seems up in his office. Ann and Chris's subplot, while having a few laugh out loud bits (Ann shaking her head at the camera after telling Chris they're rolling), was kind of one joke hammered over and over, and definitely a bit of a buzzkill when compared to the other two stories. Still, even it probably made me laugh harder than anything else in any non-Parks, non-Office, non-Community sitcom episode I watched in the last week, which I guess is why these are the only sitcoms I put in the time to actually review.

Funniest Moment: It's a tough call between the party switch at E720, Leslie's reactions to drinking the Swanson moonshine ("POISON." / "What is that?!"), and Andy asking to take a peek at Tammy 2's acid-burned foot (mostly thanks to Chris Pratt's brilliant line delivery). Hilarity all around!

Community, Season 3 Episode 2 — "Geography of Global Conflict"

"Geography of Global Conflict" was another strange, hilarious, and aggressively irreverent episode that I can't imagine being much more hostile to conventional sitcom lovers. From Garrett's "CRISIS ALERT!" to Britta trying and failing to kick over a trash can to Troy taking the lid off Annie's cup to Abed's fixation on Earth 2 to Troy's Georgian accent to all the Lionel Richie music, it was weird and it kept me laughing loudly the entire time. Annie Kim and Professor Cligoris are both characters I'd love to see recur throughout the season. Especially Cligoris, since Martin Starr is high up on my list of the funniest actors alive who will sadly never become huge mainstream stars.

Despite being clearly stuck on B-plot duty, I'd go with Gillian Jacobs as the MVP of the episode, because I'm continually impressed by how much raw comedy she's wrung from what, at the inception of the series, was such a blandly "cool" and uninteresting character. Now Britta Perry is one of the best sitcom characters on television. How things change. Every scene she had across from Chang was hilarious. I also think Mel Rodriguez has been great as Chang's supervisor thus far, which is funny because I didn't really like him at all in Running Wilde. I guess it's all about having a good script to work off of.

The one bit I didn't like so much was Annie's freakout at Annie Kim. I would have been find if they'd left it at the screaming – there's precedent for that, especially in "Cooperative Calligraphy" – but the full-body freakout was a little out of character and just a little too much. But the show made up for it two scenes later with the Spartacus farting confession, so I can forgive and forget.

Funniest Moment: This is tough, but I'd have to go with Abed whispering nonsense to explain his plan, confident that the show will cut away, and Jeff correcting him. That's the kind of joke that feels like it was written just for me, and that assumed pop culture knowledge is a big part of why I love Community so much.

Weekly Power Rankings: 1. Community 2. Parks and Recreation 3. The Office

NBC Sitcom Roundup for 9/22/11

The Office, Season 8 Episode 1 — "The List"

It occurred to me while watching The Office's eighth season premiere, "The List," that the show has gradually evolved into more or less the complete opposite of what it was initially conceived as. Once upon a time, The Office was a bittersweet-to-brazenly-depressing portrait of being trapped in a joyless, dead end job with mostly annoying coworkers that thrived on tension and awkwardness. Moments so uncomfortable that your stomach started to knot and you had to fight the urge to look away from the screen were not an anomaly but the show's bread and butter.

Now, as we enter fall 2011 and the show's eighth season, The Office is a comforting 22 minutes spent among dear friends; a televised glass of warm milk. Moments of awkwardness are far more likely to be diffused with punchlines and cartoonish characters than allowed to let sit and fester, and episodes are routinely punctuated with heartwarming moments to make you coo "aww!" This was especially clear in this episode's ending sequence wherein new manager Andy goes to defend Dunder Mifflin's second tier employees to new CEO Robert California one by one, intercut with beaming faces all around the office and capped off with the millionth "Jim and Pam are cute and have a cute baby" moment of the last year.

But although the bite is almost entirely gone and the days of me counting down the hours until the next episode are long over, I still enjoy the show. The characters are so familiar and so well-defined and the cast so large that plenty of organic comedy can come naturally from even their most mundane interactions, which the show relies on much more at this point than particularly clever or original storytelling. As such, "The List" was an amusing and breezy if fundamentally unremarkable episode of television.

I'm still on the fence when it comes to the new bosses. Andy's somewhat awkward yet well-meaning characterization in this episode was too much like Michael Scott, so let's hope they can differentiate him a bit in weeks to come. I trust Ed Helms has the chops to play something a little more interesting.

New CEO Robert California, while still one-note, seems like a potentially interesting addition, bringing a certain menace (without being a villain) and a very different vibe than Michael. It was pretty clear that he was the best choice of the new characters in last season's finale, anyway, with James Spader being the only one to successfully craft any character at all from what he was given. I was a bit disappointed that the solution to the mystery of his list turned out to simply be winners and losers rather than something more abstract or him just playing mind games, but that's just a one-episode fault. Plenty of room to grow.

Finally, I'll just get this out of the way right now: Yes, there is undeniably a Steve Carell-shaped hole in the show. There's tons of comic talent left on the roster, including several actors who have led or co-led their own wide release comedy feature films, but Michael Scott was the main character and his relationships with the various employees were, barring Jim and Pam's romance, the most important in the show. If The Office had ended gracefully with his departure, that would have been fine, but it didn't and here we are. I miss and will continue to miss Carell's presence, but I won't bother reiterating it after this week, because it'd be redundant and what'd be the point?

Funniest Moment: I guess I'd have to go with Jim's incredulity at Erin, the office receptionist, not having a pen. Not exactly an enormous belly laugh, but there isn't too much to choose from this week.

Parks and Recreation, Season 4 Episode 1 — "I'm Leslie Knope"

One thing I've really enjoyed about Parks and Recreation is the way that it introduces longterm goals for its characters and narrative – filling in the pit in season one and the first part of season two and the Harvest Festival in the first half of season three – and, unlike other sitcoms that do so, such as the mystery of the titular mother in How I Met Your Mother, actually pays off and concludes these stories. It's a sitcom that believes in maintaining a strong narrative skeleton, and Leslie running for office may be its smartest yet. It risks isolating her from the main cast, perhaps, but it also really lights a fire under her character, will make the story move, and provides easy access to the unilaterally hilarious talk shows and news shows of Pawnee.

And "I'm Leslie Knope" did a great job kicking off her campaign and the show's season. It's not on par with the best of the last two seasons, but it never lacked for laughs and it's great to have the show back. Leslie's Perd Hapley interview was typically hilarious, the penis subplot made better use of the perennially underused Ann than the show has made in quite some time (and contained the friendliest possible utterance of "If I could go back in time and cut your eyeballs out, I would."), and Leslie and Ben's forced breakup managed to be touching without dipping into the mawkish. Great stuff all around.

I especially loved Andy being promoted from shoeshinist to Tom's old position as Leslie's assistant, which could result in him being assistant to a city councilwoman if she wins the election. Andy may have the best character development of any current sitcom character and some of the best character development on television, period, with him gradually and believably evolving from a broke, jobless, homeless and friendless man living under a tarp at the bottom of a mud pit into now being a liked, trusted, and happily married worker at city hall as we enter season four. I hope to see that development continue with him actually taking an active role in the government. Leslie and Ben breaking up didn't bother me at all, but I'd be really upset if Andy and April ever broke up.

My only hesitations in regard to "I'm Leslie Knope" are that, one, they seem to be deemphasizing Jerry's sad-sackness, which would be a shame since that's one of my favorite aspects of the show, and two, they blew through April being acting manager of the Parks department for three weeks in about one scene, which is a story I would have loved to see play out at least a little bit longer, even if it meant less Ron Swanson. But still, good solid episode and a promising return for one of the best shows on television.

Funniest Moment: Probably Andy dumping the Pepto-Bismol all over Kyle's shoe. What can I say? I'm a man of simple pleasures. I also liked Andy offering to be Leslie's assistant without pay for no apparent reason before April hurriedly stopped him. Basically, anything Andy does is gold.

Community, Season 3 Episode 1 — "Biology 101"

As of the end of Friday Night Lights earlier this year, Community is now pretty solidly my favorite show on television. I love Game of Thrones. I love Breaking Bad. I love Parks and Recreation. I love Spartacus. But Community is the true shit, a show that is pretty much everything I could ever imagine wanting from a sitcom; a near-flawless marriage of dazzling creativity, boundless ambition, wonderful characters, fantastic performances, hysterical dialogue, and a deep and abiding love of pop culture and the sitcom form itself. It even trumps every other sitcom on the air in non-comedy matters such as score, cinematography, and set design, as if to twist the knife of its effortless superiority. If you prefer another current sitcom, don't feel bad. It doesn't make you a bad person. It just makes you wrong.

And "Biology 101," while perhaps a bit lighter on laughs than last season's "Anthropology 101," was a great kickoff to what looks to be another potentially amazing season. Outside of Arrested Development it may be the most setup-heavy sitcom season premiere I've ever seen, opting to lay pipe for future developments with Dr. Marshall King and Vice Dean Leybourne rather than telling complete stories with them the way "Anthropology 101" did with Betty White (and I'm willing to bet that Abed's newfound love of Inspector Spacetime comes up again too, if the Cougar Town arc of last year is any indication), but that's cool. (Cool cool cool.) I love longform serialized storytelling. I think that's the shit TV is made for, so once again, for the thousandth time, Community and I sync up perfectly.

I do think they may have blown a few episodes of potential story by letting Pierce back into the group so quickly, but I trust that Dan Harmon and co know what they're doing. When it comes to comedy, characters, and storytelling, anyway. Between the abstract opening musical number, Abed's subplot relying on knowledge of Cougar Town, Doctor Who, and British sitcom conventions, multiple open-ended storylines, a protracted 2001: A Space Odyssey parody, Chang throwing a ham for no reason, and a plethora of references to various running jokes and subplots spanning the length of the series, I think it's safe to say they have absolutely no idea what they're doing when it comes to attracting new viewers. I can hardly imagine a sitcom episode more violently repulsive to your average Two and Half Men lover briefly clicking in to see what the deal is with this Community he's heard so much about, but that's totally cool. Harmon is now fully making Community for people who like things that are good, which is so rare and amazing on television.

Funniest Moment: While I absolutely loved the 2001 and end of Cougarton Abbey sequences ("You are the opposite of Batman."), the single exchange that made me laugh the hardest was right at the beginning of the episode, between Shirley and Star-Burns:

Shirley: "Oh, Star-Burns, I see you added a lizard to your special hat and sideburns. Am I missing anything?"

Star-Burns: "Yeah, the human being underneath it all. But no one's really interested in that, are they?!"

Shirley: "Noooo."

Weekly Power Rankings: 1. Community 2. Parks and Recreation 3. The Office