Eulogy to Community - Thank You
Like thousand other "Human Beings" out there I love Community. I would go so far as to say it is my favourite show of all time. When Community was on its 'A' Game it was untouchable by every other show. Gut-bustlingly funny, with characters that I care about more than most people I know, in situations that I cannot do justice by simply explaining them in words. So, as you can imagine hearing about its cancellation deeply upset me in ways that I didn't even know I could feel upset (on my birthday of all days NBC, for shame!). This post is just a way for me to work through my emotions. I think the main reason is that I have such a love of Community is how much I see my own life reflected in it.
Like everyone who ends up at Greendale I messed up a big portion of my life. College wasn't the greatest time for me and as such I messed up my grades and ended up at a University that at best has no prestige attached to it. I had always considered myself to be fairly smart and figured that at least academically my life would work out. Clearly this didn't (or at least hasn't) happened. Like the Greendale 7 though, I had the great fortune to come across a bunch of loveable misfits that taught me that despite everything that I consider to have gone wrong in my life and despite how much I consider myself a failure, it was all alright. It was better than alright, it was good. This links in with how much Community means to me and one of the biggest themes of it: there's nothing wrong with being happy.
Extract from Todd VanDerWerff's review of Community's "Regional Holiday Music"
"There’s nothing wrong with enjoying something so much that it strips away all that irony and cynicism. And there’s nothing wrong with loving anything so much that it feels like it could pull your heart out of your chest and toss it on the floor."
And that's what my love of Community has allowed me to feel. It's what allowed me to apologise to my parents, it what has allowed me to ask the girl I had a crush on out and then tell my girlfriend that I loved her, it's what allowed me to open up my heart and give me some of the greatest friends a guy like me could have.
So thank you Community for teaching me to be happy again.
Thank you Todd VanDerWerff and Alan Sepinwall for giving me somewhere to go week after week to talk about the show I love.
Thank you: Joel Mchale, Gillian Jacobs, Danny Pudi, Yvette Nicole Brown, Alison Brie, Donald Glover, Jim Rash, Ken Jeong, Chevy Chase, John Oliver and Jonathan Banks for populating the weird and wonderful world of Community with some of the most real, human characters I have ever had the absolute pleasure of caring about.
Thank you Chris McKenna for writing some of my favourite episodes of all time and making me fall in creepy stalker love with the show.
And thank you Dan Harmon, what the show has done for me and what you've done in created in means I love you more than words can say.
Thank You Community.
One by one it all just fades away.
