I love that Community has found it's niche as that quirky show that tackles a totally different genre with each and every episode, and as a male child of the 80's I couldn't have been happier to see the choice for this week's episode: GI Joe/ animation. Titled GI Jeff, the episode was a hilarious blend of a combination of 80's style animation, 80's action figure commercials, and live action.
The plot for the episode was darkly funny, which is typical Community: Depressed about his advancing years on his 40th Birthday, Jeff Winger drinks a 5th of scotch, downs a handful of Asian "happy magic youth" pills hoping to reclaim his lost youth, and winds up in a coma, suffering a minor psychotic break, where he and the rest of the cast are trapped in an eternal GI Joe Cartoon, separated from actual reality by a subconscious layer of 1980's GI Joe commercials, which are partially drawn from the stock footage that I remember from my youth.
In his fantasy world Jeff becomes Wingman, a Joe with a jetpack, who doesn't play by the rules. The other community cast also make appearances as part of Jeff's team: Shirley becomes Three Kids, Annie becomes Tight Ship, Britta becomes Buzz Kill, and Ahbed becomes 4th Wall, Each with a hilarious costume and spin on their community personas.
I was hooked right from the opening credits where an animated Community cast fights alongside the traditional Joe's to fend of a Cobra attack lead by Destro. Wingman actually kills Destro in the final moments of the opening sequence, which gets him and the team thrown in the brig for breaking the GI Joe code of conduct. The rest of the episode is spent, trying to escape, and return to reality. Hilarity ensues.
Now I can also appreciate that not everyone would enjoy this particular episode as much as I did, for example, all of the young women I have discussed this episode with, just didn't get it. GI Joe just wasn't a significant part of their upbringing, which I can certainly understand.
But, that aside, this was 22 minutes of fantastic television.
