Community: Remedial Chaos Theory

Life is full of choices and decisions. But sometimes when you have to make a tough choice, you turn to chance. You flip a coin or roll a die. You act based on what chance decides. But what if you made the other choice? Is there an alternate timeline where you made the other choice and something totally different happened. Last Thursday's Community was all about alternate timelines and alternate choices, showing us all the things that could happen, based on a seemingly inconsequential choice: who leaves the group for a minute to get the pizza. And it was also probably one of the best episodes of Community ever (and the first episode I talk about to get a rare perfect rating. But that's getting ahead of myself.).

Remedial Chaos Theory was the first "experimental" episode Community has done this season, but it was also a simple bottle episode and a character study, as we learned new information about most of the characters and saw them relate with each other. It's also an episode that demands multiple viewings in order to catch all the foreshadowing before events happen and all the jokes, background and foreground. Plus you'll probably want to see it again anyways. It's that good.

The episode starts off simple enough, as we find ourselves at Troy and Abed's new apartment (which should always be said to the tune of Troy and Abed in the morning.) for their housewarming party. Right away, we notice little details that are going to get expanded upon later. Shirley is busy baking, which doesn't seem to be welcome. Annie has taken the brick that keeps the outside door open, and jumps when the buzzer rings. Britta is overly into Abed's scale model of the rolling boulder scene from Raiders. Pierce casually mentions that Troy used to live in a mansion with him. Jeff cracks a joke at Troy's expense and Troy calls him a "fellow adult". The gang is ready to play some Yahtzee (Or Peuortan Rican chess), when the pizza guy comes, meaning someone has to go down and get the pizza. No one wants to go. Then Jeff picks up a die and things get interesting.

"Ok, starting on my left with one, you're number comes up: you go." "Just so you know Jeff, you are now creating six different timelines." "Of course I am, Abed".

So he rolls the die. 2 comes up. Annie goes. Britta puts on Police classic "Roxanne" and her attempts to sing along are thwarted by Jeff. Pierce mentions he slept with Eartha Kitt in an airplane bathroom. Troy sees a gun in Annie's purse. His concern distracts him from Pierce's housewarming gift. No one seems interested in Shirley's pies. Britta goes into the bathroom, and when she comes out seems strange (plus the bathroom smells weird.) This alone could be an interesting episode, but when Abed wonders how things are going in the other timelines and Jeff insists there are no other timelines, we hear the sound of the door buzzer and well...

"Ok, starting on my left with one, you're number comes up: you go." "Just so you know Jeff, you are now creating six different timelines." "Of course I am, Abed".

And so we move through all seven possibilities. Sometimes they end fine, like when Britta and Troy share a moment when Troy expresses frustration about Jeff always treating him like a kid, when he's 21. Sometimes they end bad, like when Shirley learns that the gang doesn't want her to have an identity based around baking, has a bit of a breakdown and storms out or most of the gang ends up mad at each other. Sometimes they end weird, like when Britta comes back from getting the pizza to announce she's fallen in love with the creepy pizza delivery boy and plans to marry him.


Along the way, we learn more and more details. Pierce is resentful that Troy moved out and his gift to Troy is a norwegian Troll doll, that Troy is terrified of. Britta is high and gets more high whenever she goes into the bathroom. Shirley thinks baking is all she's good for in the group. Annie's apartment is really dangerous and part of her attraction to Jeff may be because he reminds her of her father. Jeff sees Troy as a threat, because as a man, Troy could challenge him for leadership of the group. There are also constants. Pierce always mentions he slept with Eartha Kitt and Jeff always hits his head on the ceiling fan. Britta always tries to sing along to Roxanne (except when she goes for the pizza) and is always immediately shut down by Jeff. And of course, there are plenty of Chekov's Guns if you will (That's a minor plot point/detail which turns out to be important later on for those not in the know.). The rare liquor, the cigarettes, the boulder from the model, the norwegian troll doll. And of course, Annie's actual gun. This all comes together when Jeff rolls a 1, Troy leaves and chaos ensues. Sweet glorious chaos.

But ultimately, after seeing all the timelines, we go back to the true timeline where Abed catches the die, and gives a beautiful speech about how they should be weathering the chaos together, instead of creating more of it. He then points out that Jeff's system ensures that he never has to go get the pizza, so Jeff has to leave. He still hits his head on the fan, but Annie shows him no sympathy this time. Troy organically sets up Pierce for his Eartha Kitt boast, but Pierce decides not to and ultimately throws out his bitter housewarming gift (out the window actually, if you pay close attention), while everyone sings and dances to Roxanne. Jeff sees this after getting the people, and amused, watches on after saying "See what happens when I leave you guys alone?" This points out the ultimate constant in the alternate, mostly worse timelines: Jeff. When Troy leaves, we get the worse timeline. When Jeff leaves, we get the best timeline. The implications of this are staggering and hopefully, we see more of this down the road.

Now if the episode had ended there, it'd be almost perfect, but the tag pushes it over the edge. We go back to the darkest timeline, where Pierce has died from his gunshot wound, Annie has gone insane from guilt, Shirley is a drunk, Jeff has lost his arm in the fire, Troy's lost his larynx from trying to destroy the burning troll doll by eating it, and Britta has put a blue streak in her hair. The funniest, most chaotic sitcommy scenario has turned into the darkest, funniest, most realistic (?) thing ever. Abed regrets not catching the die and has a plan for the study group to go evil (complete with fake goatees until they can grow their own), and try to get back to the prime timeline and replace their past selves. No one is amused with this or wants to go with it. No one except Troy. "Evil Troy and Evil Abed". Wow (if the show ever finds a plausible way for these guys to return, I'll be psyched).

I could say more about this episode, but I won't. Because in the end, all you really need to see is this:

Grade: HOLY (BLANK)! (Perfect)

Memorable Moments

-I wanted to list lots, but this took a long time to write, so I'll only put a few down.
-Troy and Abed read a book on how to throw the perfect party. Advice given includes "Avoid difficult topics, like the Negro issue." The book was written in the 40's.
-Pierce: "Man, pizza boys are getting worse and worse. I guess all the good ones went into porn".
-Before Britta meets the pizza guy, everyone else points out how creepy he is.
-I'll be more timely with the next episode, which has been delayed a week to coincide with Halloween.