From "Modern Warfare", the now-infamous first-season paintball/war episode that put the show on the map; to "Epidemiology," the ABBA-fueled Halloween episode brimming with zombie and horror movie references; to "Abed's Uncontrollable Christmas," a pitch-perfect send-up of stop-motion holiday specials, Community's loving satire of genre entertainment is without peer. Hell, that list doesn't even include a Dungeons and Dragons episode, a multi-layered conspiracy theory show or a Pulp Fiction parody that rapidly evolves into another exercise entirely.
That being said, "Pillows and Blankets" isn't going to join the Community satire Hall of Fame. It's a more-than-competent take on Ken Burns' documentary The Civil War - a bold choice in itself given that, at 23, I'm part of this show's target demographic and only know Burns' work from my seventh-grade history class - but it's simply not as funny or well-executed as its brothers listed above.
The episode started strong; knowing that Troy and Abed's pillows vs. blankets argument would continue from last week, I hoped to see clever packaging for it, and from the faux-Morgan Freeman intro voiceover I knew Harmon had that taken care of. The show even recognized why this week's action would be filmed, a common bugaboo of documentary sitcoms, and used the format well in displaying a hilarious diagram of the first pillow fired and presenting conversations held on paper or electronics. Cutting between photos and video doesn't quite make sense, but its dramatic impact was enough for me to excuse the inconsistency.
Unfortunately the episode's plot left far more to be desired.
Let's start with the good: the core of "Pillows and Blankets," Troy and Abed's decaying friendship, was executed deftly. While it stretches credulity to think these two man-boys can achieve the kind of insight into each other on display without gaining a hint of self-awareness, their competing, unrelentingly accurate analyses reminded us why they ended up best friends. (The best friends magazine they designed together didn't hurt either.) Also, I laughed out loud at Abed's proclamation that while Troy drew first blood, Abed's Pillowtown would draw First Blood Part 2. Even the telethon tag generated some laughs, as bizarre as it was.
Where the episode began to go wrong was its subplots. Jeff and Annie were admittedly decent, including the fantastic text images gag, but Shirley and Pierce getting involved in the fight felt unnecessary, Britta's "awful war photographer" schtick ran thin fast and the 'Changlorious Bastards' bit felt more like setup for a later storyline than important material for a documentary. Admittedly, none of those plots hung around long enough to be truly irritating, and I enjoyed seeing Fat Neil finally have a radio-DJ purpose besides being the token nerd.
The undoing of "Pillows and Blankets" was its ending, when, after Jeff failed twice to resolve Troy and Abed's differences, he was finally able to paper over the disagreement and call it a day. Nothing was settled; nothing was changed; but somehow Jeff (an admitted proxy for Harmon) was able to make everyone stop fighting through the sheer power of persuasion. (If only the Chase debacle could be swept away so easily.) The conclusion of the story seemed to make the documentary about Jeff, who merely floated along in the conflict and used the entertaining friend-hat gimmick as a crutch for a shallow psychological breakthrough we've heard before, and better. (Valentine's Day comes to mind.)
Ultimately, I'll probably come back to "Pillows and Blankets" for the well-executed genre exercise, a few solid laughs and Keith David's fantastic narration. As a story, however, it fell flat, and I was left hoping Harmon can get Community back on its narrative feet to finish Season 3 strong and secure a well-deserved senior year.
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