What Happened, Yo!:
-It's the grand opening of the new Subway at Greendale and Shirley, Pierce and Britta are unhappy about it, since Shirley and Pierce had been hoping to open a Sandwich shop of their own. Pierce finds a bylaw that says that 51% of any business on Greendale must be owned by a student, but Subway has brought in a student named Subway, who has sacrificed his birth identity in order to become the human embodiment of a corporation and all their values, becoming a corpo-humanoid. Pierce and Shirley try to get Britta to seduce Subway (Corpo-humanoids aren't allowed to have any romantic relationships), and though she doesn't want to do it at first, Subway takes an interest in her and she begins going along with it. She soon realizes that she's falling for Subway though and decides not to spy on him any longer, destroying a spy pen Pierce wanted her to give him. But Pierce has planted another bug in Britta's backpack and records the two of them having sex. The tape is shown to the representative from Subway, but he accepts it and decides the two of them can be involved as long as it's healthy. Seconds later though, the tape reveals that the relationship has become incredibly unhealthy and Subway is taken away, much to Britta's sadness. Later, she runs into a new Subway in the hall, who pretends that he's the same guy.
-Meanwhile, Jeff is surprised to discover that he has had a locker for the past two and a half years. When he checks it out, he finds a lot of flyers for dances, but also a hate note from someone named Kim, who calls him a self-centered jerk. Alarmed that someone he can't remember thinks he's a dick, Jeff and Annie track down the locker of the only Kim Jeff ever had a class with, only to be informed by some guy that Kim had died two weeks ago. Jeff is shocked that Kim has died before he got the chance to change her mind about him, but Annie tells him an apology doesn't work like that and gets him to apologize to her locker. Jeff offers a heartfelt apology, but is surprised to learn afterwards that the guy who told him that Kim was dead was actually Kim, and had been mad at Jeff because Jeff kept forgetting about him because of his unusual name. Jeff apologizes to him, but Annie is upset, because she thought she was doing this for a woman. She later apologizes to Jeff, but Jeff has already forgotten about Kim.
-Finally, Troy and Abed are planning to build a pillow fort (harder to make than a blanket fort) to stay in while their apartment is being exhumed, when the Dean informs them that they might have a shot at the world record for longest blanket/pillow fort. Troy wonders if they should build a blanket fort instead, since that'd be easier to reach the record with, but Abed shoots his idea down. Troy later runs into Vice Dean Laybourne, who asks if Troy has reconsidered his offer to join the air conditioning repair school. When Troy refuses again, the Vice Dean tells Troy how much Troy and Abed remind him of Inspector Spacetime and Reggie, and also how the Inspector never lets Reggie do anything for his own, implying the Inspector (or Abed) is a self-centered nerd and that Reggie (or Troy) is just a lapdog. This causes Troy to decide to break away from Abed's fort and build his own blanket fort so he can set a world record. Soon however, Troy runs out of space with 2000 square feet left to go, which is in use by Abed's pillow fort. Abed won't merge the forts, so Troy and the Dean ask Abed to tear it down. Abed decides to tear it down, but he has his own encounter with the Vice Dean, who laments how the Inspector Spacetimes of the world are always having to compromise to the Reggie's, and suggests that Abed stop trying to fit into a world run by the unremarkable. Abed refuses to tear down the fort, starting a big disagreement in the study room between the denizen's of both forts. Troy and Abed have a big fight. The Dean tries to take Abed's fort down by force, but Starburns tosses a pillow at him, which hits the blanket fort, collapsing part of it. This causes a massive pillow fight to break out between the two camps, with Troy and Abed caught in the middle. As they look at each other, both sides retreat and Abed declares the situation "To Be Continued."
-With war between Troy and Abed imminent, Vice Dean Laybourne tells an underling that Troy will soon embrace his destiny and join the air conditioning repair school.
I Like This: During my months of waiting for the return of Community, I held onto every bit of information I could find about future episodes to keep me excited, and nothing excited me more than the prospect of the Blanket Fort Civil War two-parter I had heard was happening. Now it's here, and while last night's Community only offered a prelude to the main attraction, it was a great prelude. Actually, the Pillow/Blanket fort dispute was in the background for much of the episode, with more focus on the other two stories (which I'll talk about in a minute, but I enjoyed them both.). This was effective, because we got to see this start off as a small C-plot, then watched as the forts creeped into both of the other stories in some shape or form, before it suddenly took precedence for the last couple minutes as Troy and Abed finally had their falling-out. I liked the use of Vice Dean Laybourne here, as he slowly pulled the strings to make this happen, getting Troy and Abed to realize things that were both true in a way. John Goodman has been great as the villain this season, and I hope to see more of him soon.
As for the main story though, Britta falling in love with Subway was an excellent story, really giving Gillian Jacobs a great showcase and making great use of guest star, Travis Schuldt (Keith from Scrubs!). Pierce and Shirley also had good moments throughout the story, as they went further and further to try to make their sandwich shop happen. But it'll take more than a torrid affair to take down Subway, which is good because Community was ingenious with their use of product placement, making fun of Subway, while praising it simultaneously. The idea of Corpo-humanoids is a fantastic one and I can't wait for more of this in the future. Jeff and Annie also had a good story this week, and even though it was pretty obvious that Kim would turn out to be a guy, it was still quite funny, especially when Jeff wound up forgetting him minutes after he apologized.
But...: Jeff dealing with his self-centeredness was thematically repetitive to him dealing with his narcissism last week. I'll just chalk that up to the scheduling change though.
The Bottom Line: A great episode, with lots of laughs, clever use of product placement, and some great set-up for even more awesomeness right on the horizon.
Grade: 84% (Great)
Memorable Moments
-The Dean's giant scissors breaking as he calls the new Subway Greendale's first step into the realm of the legitimate was a great gag.
-Troy: "All difficult things are better, like carrying in a disease or holding in a fart right now."
-Pierce: "Dean, I assume you are familiar with Greendale's bylaws." Dean: "I am not." Pierce: "Shirley, you do the honors. My brain starts getting weird this time of night." Jeff: "It's 10 AM." Pierce: "You're welcome." Jeff: "Uh oh."
-Jeff looks at all the flyers in his locker: "Halloween Dance, Post-Halloween Dance, Dance Contest, Contest Dance? Oh come on. What's this? Save Garrett? What's wrong with Garrett?" Annie: "Nothing now. We saved him. (Cut to Garrett having trouble with the water fountain) Jeff: "Wait, that's saved Garrett?" Garrett got plenty of screentime this week, which I also enjoyed.
-Britta: "I am not a whore! And, not that I've done the math, but if I were, I'd be the super classy kind that gets flown to Dubai to stay in an underwater hotel."
-Kim: "Sorry to drop this on you and run, but, there's a rally for Garrett." Annie: "But, we saved him." Kim: "Did we?"
-Subway: "You should try Subway's Veggie Delite." Britta: "You should try reading George Orwell's 1984." Subway: "I have. It's a great book. It really awakened me in high school. I think kids should be forced to read it." Britta: "Me too."
-Pierce: "Top notch whoresmanship, Britta." Shirley: "Pierce!" Pierce: "Sorry, whoreswomanship. Forgot it was the nineties." Shirley: "Uh oh."
-Jeff: "Leonard, what are you doing?" Leonard: "Abed's fort needs pillows." Jeff: "But I was gonna lie there." Leonard: "And I was going to invest in IBM in 1952. But life is full of disappointments."
-Britta: "Who do you think I am? I lived in New York!" Pierce: "You never lived anywhere. You're a weapon designed for sex. You only think you lived in New York, because I implanted your memories!"
-Pierce drinking pen ink may be the sight gag of the night.
-Britta: "Subway, I love you!"
-Garrett: "There is a situation developing in the study room! I would elaborate but I am out of breath because I walked her very briskly!"
-On an unrelated note, this blog now has an official Facebook Fanpage, so I encourage you to check it out at www.facebook.com/kennysagetalkstvyo
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