Image courtesy of hitfix.com

A little part of me died when Law and Order was canceled a few years back. It wasn’t a cutting edge cop show at that point and hadn’t been for 15 years. Though still going strong quality-wise, it wasn’t even the best police drama anymore; The Wire had overtaken it by then (largely thanks to the performance of Michael K. Williams who featured prominetly as the biology professor in this episode and had his past role referenced). But for me, it was always a great thing to be able to turn on and watch after a long day or a tough wrestling practice, and I’ll always remember watching episodes with my gradfather during the winter holidays.

It holds a special place in my heart, and thus I was the perfect target audience for this week’s episode fo Community, an homage to L&O. Needless to say, I loved it. One reference followed another in short order, and nearly all landed perfectly, from Troy and Abed’s attempt at Lennie Briscoe one-liners to Annie eating Chinese takeout while reviewing files to, of course, the classic L&O opening credits.

The plot concerned the study groups biology project, a yam, being dropped on the floor and stepped on. Several members fo the study group arrive at the scen and quickly assume the classic L&O roles. Troy and Abed are the detectives, Shirley is the police chief and Jeff and Annie the prosecutors. Pierce appeared early running a gambling ring and Britta was a technician, but neither had much of a presence this week. Abed and Troy first suspect Todd, then go through several other suspects before coming back to Todd. At the fake trial, Todd confesses, but Jeff figures out Neal had tampered with the yams beforehand to help Vicki, absolving Neal, to an extent.

This was not a so-called character episode, a departure from recent weeks. That said, there was still room for characters to shine. Annie and Abed led the way. Abed embraced the spirit of Briscoe, straight-faced and wry the entire time as he led the investigation. Annie embodied all of Jack McCoy’s female sidekicks, passionate but overzealous. Characters embraced their roles, and it just worked.

I’d be remiss if I did discuss the most concrete development of the episode. In an off-screen scene, Starburns, the punchline of jokes for much of the show’s run, died when the meth lab in his trunk exploded. This came right at the end of the episode, so there is clearly a lot to come from this that we don’t know yey. Next week’s episode will obviously be centered on this and could go in a number of ways. I would never have called Starburns a vital part of the show, but I would hope that the writers had a good reason to end his run.

Courtesy of imdb.com

This week, Community was simply trying a little too hard.

This episode had big ambitions. A Dreamatorium-focused episode is sometihng I am pretty sure the writers have been sitting on for a while, waiting for the right time to use it. After last week’s solid, but low-key episode, I can see why the . . . → Read More: TV Recap: “Community,” ‘Virtual Systems Analysis”