5 Things to Dig from Community ‘Paranormal Parentage’ [Review]

Community hits episode two in its Harmonless fourth season with “Paranormal Parentage”, the Halloween episode on Valentine’s Day that somehow feels absolutely right. I still enjoy the show this season but Scooby-Doo episode two doesn’t feel anymore on track than the season premiere “History 101”. I like being with our characters with their adventures, antics, exploits and hi-jinx but I’m still waiting for the show to find its feet once again – I don’t expect it to be the same as before but it feels like this version of the show, in whatever timeline we’re in, hasn’t quite figured out what its supposed to be and in that, has lost sight of some of the key character dynamics that really make all the weirdness tick.

In “Paranormal Parentage” the moments that I thoroughly enjoyed were about equal to the bits that left me puzzled.

5 Things to Dig:

 Giancarlo Esposito! – That man takes any scene he’s in and turns it up to eleven. Gilbert’s appearance was both an excellent execution of a surprise guest star, and provided the emotional grounding that elevated the obnoxious old Pierce storyline into something with credible emotional resonance.

Hallowine Cougartown Special. I love seeing Annie integrated into the Troy and Abed life. Those three play off each other incredibly whether in a group, or partnered up in a storyline, particularly the Annie/Abed combo. The Hallowine back and forth was a nice reminder of that dynamic and I would love to see that happen in a more substantial way as the season progresses.

Troy and Abed in a Trenchcoat! There is endless humour to be mined from Troy and Abed riffing off each other. I could probably watch hours of their end codas (internet, is there a supercut of this?) A hidden room with a revolving wall entry – of course they would love that! I can completely imagine them spending hours just spinning around that room. It was perfect.

No Sweat, Boba Fett. Shirley as Leia was a great choice; the only thing missing from this picture was actually getting to see Andre dressed as Han Solo! Shirley got to play both sides of her sweet and badass in this episode. Between her judgy-judgy side worrying about Troy’s soul being corrupted by Britta (while knowing more than she’d care to admit about the secret gym) and telling folks to stop messing around because she’s paying teenagers to watch her babies so she can go to a damn party – it was a good episode for Shirley.

The Ring Girl. I love that Annie got the wrong kind of ring girl and went all out perfecting the look, and committing to the character, despite not watching horror movies. I’m sure her roommates had a hand in crafting that excellent Samara costume. It’s hardly surprising that the Dean’s snooping clued him into Jeff’s costume – his ring girl would have made a perfect match for Jeff’s boxer.

Honourable diggables – stop answering the phone! The return of the terrifying trolls this time it’s Grot and an empty spot on the bookshelf where Torg used to reside. I hate reference humour.

Plus, I really loved the continued parallels played between Peirce and Jeff; it’s always been an emotional aspect of the show that has played very well. In this episode focusing on Peirce’s loneliness and Gilbert’s loss it was a great choice to revisit Jeff’s daddy issues on a serious level pulling out that phone number he dug up at the end of last season.

My Big Beef:

I really dislike what’s happening to Troy,  infantilizing him to this point doesn’t make sense with the journey we’ve seen the character go on, and even where he started. This isn’t some continuity nit-pick, it’s a really distracting bit of character inconsistency.

In season one we meet him as a somewhat normal, if not the brightest bulb, jock fallen in with a weird crowd. It was strongly implied that in high school, and in the first season and a half of the series, Troy had been getting with girls quite regularly off screen. Part of his character arc was to see him become more removed from reality (normality) as he becomes closer with Abed in a weirdly co-dependent relationship. A very significant arc in season 3 was dedicated to him realizing that this wasn’t healthy and break away to an extent. In season 4 we see a continuation of that in that he has a relationship with Britta but the maturity that Troy has realized over his series long arc seems to have disappeared and in this episode he’s behaving like he’s in grade school. I buy that he doesn’t know what the indoor swing is about (and that Shirley does!) but the weirdness about sex doesn’t fit.

What did you think of Community’s Valloween episode?