I’m watching Community for the first time and S2.9 could be straight out of Rick and Morty. The genealogical relationship is very clear in a few episodes like this. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conspiracy_Theories_and_Interior_Design

Goddamn https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.cbr.com/rick-and-morty-community-cross-over-dan-harmon/amp/

This is mildly unsettling. Reminds me of the connections through Nathan Fillion shows. Several actors from Firefly show up in Castle, and Castle in Rookie.

Also tells me I’m shallow. I like the science fiction setting better though it’s now clear most plot premises would probably work in either show. It’s obviously the same storyteller. Apparently the private toilet R&M episode was originally conceived for Community.

Something about this is fun but also sad. Transpositions. Matt Groening also has a bit of narrative resonance between Simpsons and Futurama but not as much.

It’s really fun watching Community having watched Rick and Morty first. The quiet little subversions are much easier to spot. One of the most effectively done is how they managed to take Brita from stereotypical blonde lead to genuinely annoying and least likeable character.

She’s sort of the Jerry of the the ensemble.

Chang is an odd character. In the context of characters he’s played since, it’s really Ken Jeong’s stock character. It either fits or doesn’t. Has he ever played anything else? This is the same character as the Hangover movies.

Abed reminds me of Bird Person.

Jeff, Troy, Annie are more standard sitcom characters afaict. Not developed subversively.

Shirley would be awkward today. Cuts a bit close to the emerging black+antisemite thing.

Pierce seems written for Chevy Chase to be himself.

The pre-Weirding vibe is very disturbing though. It’s like we know, but the show doesn’t, that there’s a nuclear bomb under the set and everything they do either accelerates or slows the countdown.

This is a good test for any show from 2000-15.

Ah they figured out the clips-from-non-existing-episodes episode idea on Community first.

Chang living in the air vents with a monkey is very much a cartoon kinda premise. Interesting how the gimmicky episodes (paintball, stop motion), while annoying, work better than they do in regular shows, since this is basically a live-action cartoon.

Chang is basically a loud in-your-face version of Gollum in LOTR.

Losing the Spanish teacher job = losing the ring. Now he has to stalk the fellowship.

Ok S3.4 Remedial Chaos Theory is as brilliant as I was told. It’s actually better than the corresponding Rick and Morty episode (A Rickle in Time, S2.1). How am I just discovering this show? The intricacy of the plotting is just a pleasure. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remedial_Chaos_Theory

I think Dan Harmon is sort of edging up the barrier of post-narrative. Many people try to screw in meta-ways with narrative structure but usually it results in tedious self-indulgence. His meta stuff is actually fun. Eg Community S3.5 Halloween episode and the R&M train episode.

He clearly actually like storytelling. Many storytellers come across like they don’t actually like stories and are just trying to prove they’re capable of mastering the form.

Hmm what is the point of the dean character? I guess any school-based show needs an authority figure, but why this character?

Best line in the show so far:

Jeff to Brita after she does a dumb thing: I thought you were smarter than me when I met you

“We went in one end as real people and out the other end as mixed-up cartoons” — Jeff Winger in S5E1.

Rick and Morty started in Dec 2013,

S5 of Community started in January 2014, with Dan Harmon returning to helm after a year being out

Starting to see the weakness in this structure-driven storytelling approach. It turns characters into non-rechargeable batteries. When they run out of juice, the stories get tedious. Characters as derps. It’s entirely character driven. Community S5, it’s there.

The plots have no function except as canvases for characters to express themselves. The nihilism R&M has been accused of is also evident in Community S5. Neither show has much to say about the world that’s not latent in a character. Character determines plot.

This makes me sad. Futurama, South Park, and early Simpsons had much more interest in the world, and more to say about it. They were interested in the world. Rick’s big “the universe is an animal” monologue sums up both shows’ worldviews

Szplug. I may have disenchanted myself a bit from Harmon’s stuff.

The other extreme style of storytelling is extremely interested in the world, and only mildly interested in characters. The hill of exploring the world shapes the characters. They are shallower but live longer.

Character drives plot = shorter stories about deeper characters

Plot drives character = longer stories about shallower characters

Simpsons went zombie because it was character driven but the characters ran out out of juice. Futurama, Seinfeld timed the ending just right.

Plot-driven stories tend to have a certain eager innocence to them, since they approach and learn about the world. Tintin is an example. Every comic book is also an excuse to learn random shit. And it doesn’t feel didactic because it’s pure curiosity, not trying to teach.

A more adult example is the mysteries/thrillers of Dick Francis. They’re all set in the horse-racing world, and all explore some random nerdy things about that world and some other world it might intersect with, like the Diamond trade or something.

Hmm. Douglas Adams I think almost fell into this trap, but was interested enough in the world to forget the character-driven structure repeatedly and chase down random insights into the world. The device of excerpts from the Guide allowed him to insert them.

Rick and Morty is basically Hitchhikers Guide without a guide checking the nihilism (represented by everyone except Arthur Dent, but especially Zaphod+Marvin). Instead of zillions of encyclopedia entries being teased via excerpts we get Rick’s Derp. Or World According to Abed.

HHG world-building, while often satirizing SF tropes, invariably had a real insight too. The galaxy according to the guide was a museum of sardonic philosophy lessons. R&M galaxy is a bunch of set pieces for Rick to show off.

Still, I like both.

The cost is that none of Douglas Adams’ characters comes anywhere near as alive as most Harmon characters do. Dirk Gently comes closest. The narcissism of nihilism? The Total Perspective Vortex couldn’t exist in Harmonverse, because Harmonverse is pre-emptively set inside it.

Several people have been replying with links to Harmon’s story circle stuff. This tweet is just to note that yes, I read all about it last week, thank you. Good stuff.

Ah shit, this might be hedgehog stories vs fox stories. Szplug.

Hmm. Strong vs weak halo effect stories. High vs low charismatic energy. Confidently wrong vs superforecaster storytelling.

Harmon is fun but likely on the wrong side of this particular divide.

This is probably too esoterica reach but Harmon is Heideggerian while Adams was Sartrean. I think.