Community: Season 2, Episode 15 "Early 21st Century Romanticism" Review

 "Books!"

-Abed Nadir

"Early 21st Century Romanticism" picks up with Troy (Donald Glover) and Abed (Danny Pudi) both crushing on a librarian, Mariah (Maite Shwartz).  They get her attention by periodically yelling "Books!" before pretending like they are asleep.  Since they both like her, they ask her to attend the Valentine's Dance with both of them to get to know them and decide who she would like to see again.  Mariah agrees.

When the study group meets, several of them express concern about the amount of painkillers Pierce (Chevy Chase) is taking.  Britta (Gillian Jacobs) arrives and the group sees her say goodbye to her new friend, Page (Brit Marling).  Britta tells the group that Page is a lesbian, so Pierce, assuming Britta is dating Paige, reads off a prepared statement, which is offensive, but surprisingly supportive.  Pierce then pops another painkiller and moonwalks out of the room.  When the rest of the group suggests an intervention, Jeff (Joel McHale) shuts it down.  When he makes an uncalled for dig at The Barenaked Ladies, it turns into a fight between Jeff and the others and he storms off.

Professor Duncan (John Oliver) convinces Jeff to skip the Valentine's Dance so Duncan can watch soccer at Jeff's place, but Chang (Ken Jeong) overhears their conversation.  He arrives at Jeff's in the middle of the game with Jeff's driver's license.  Jeff reluctantly lets him in only for Chang to immediately break a lamp with his nun-chucks.  Chang offers to order a pizza to make up for it, but instead of calling a pizza place, Chang calls in a pizza owed to him from Star-Burns (Dino Stamatopoulos) and tells him to invite people to a party at Jeff's.

The next thing Jeff knows, dozens of people arrive at his place to party, including Leonard (Richard Erdman) and Magnitude (Luke Youngblood).  Jeff reluctantly let's the party happen and even starts to enjoy himself until he realizes Chang is using the opportunity to try and stay at Jeff's for an extended period of time after being kicked out of his home by his wife.  Jeff kicks Chang and the partiers out.

As Jeff and Duncan clean up, Jeff mentions how exhausting is to care about his study group and how needy they can be.  Duncan believes that Jeff actually likes being needed and suggests he stop resisting it.  Jeff is also surprised to discover none of the study group have contacted him all night.  He ends up allowing Chang to stay with him temporarily.

Britta and Page end up deciding to go the Valentine's Dance together.  Annie (Alison Brie) meets Page's friend, Claire (Cyrina Fiallo).  They discover that both Britta and Page are actually straight, but think the other is gay and want to be seen as progressive and cool by having a friend that is a lesbian.  They end up not telling Britta or Page.

At the Valentine's Dance, Pierce spends most of it dancing with the Tiny Man (Andy Dick) who tells him to take more painkillers, but doesn't want to share Pierce with the study group.  Britta and Page arrive at the dance and immediately get self-conscious, but dance with each other.   The Tiny Man makes fun of them to Pierce, who yells, "lesbians!" at them.  To prove a point about intolerance, they start awkwardly making out on the dance floor, but when they reveal that this is both of their first times kissing another woman, they realize both of them are straight and their friendship comes to an angry end.  Annie ends up comforting Britta afterwards.

Mariah ends up picking Troy, and Abed respectfully leaves them to their date.  While dancing, Troy asks Mariah why she didn't pick Aded, she says she thinks Abed is weird.  Troy storms off to find Abed and they give each other a hug as Mariah leaves the dance.

Jeff ends up sending the group a text apologizing for the fight and telling them he loves them.  He tells Pierce to try opening his heart to the others, but Pierce doesn't see the message as he is passed out on a park bench from a painkiller overdose.  

The episode ends with a blindfolded Abed eating Valentine's Heart candy with messages on them.  He impresses Troy by knowing what the hearts say while eating them, but eventually admits to cheating.

What Works:

Donald Glover and Danny Pudi are always fantastic on this show, but this episode gives them a really fun angle that I don't think we see in previous or future episodes.  They're in competition with each other for the affections of Mariah, but it may be the friendliest competition of all time.  I love the way these two interact with each other in their conversations with Mariah.  It's incredibly wholesome and very funny.  I especially love the briefcase full of tacos.

Everything involving Britta and Page is hysterical.  It's one of my favorite single-episode storylines of the entire show and it's the most Britta thing to ever happen.  The friendship between Britta and Page just keeps on escalating and escalating to the hilariously, awkward make-out session.  And it's even better when you realize Britta and Page are basically the same person and could probably be good friends if they could stop getting in their own way.

Annie and Claire also help make the stroyline ever better, just from the reactions of Alison Brie and Cyrina Fiallo.  They're very much the audiences surrogates watching something bizarre and surreal play out in front of them.  Plus all of the dialogue from Annie gets recontextualized after she nearly kisses Britta at the end of the episode.  It's not the first time Annie's bi-curiosity is hinted at and it makes this an even better episode on the rewatch.

Pierce having a prepared statement for Britta seemingly coming out of the closet is pretty on brand for Pierce and I'm glad we didn't watch most of it, but I love that apparently parts of it were pretty supportive.  It's wholesome in Pierce's odd way.

Finally, I love that Chang orchestrated an entire house party just so he could try to crash at Jeff's for an extended period of time.  He ramps up the insanity as the episode goes on as only Ken Jeong can and it's a fun use of the character who doesn't always get a ton to do.

What Sucks:

As I mentioned the last time he appeared, I don't love that Andy Dick is in this episode.  Yes, it's pretty perfect casting as Andy Dick and the Tiny Man are terrible influences on the people around him, but I don't think that makes it worth casting him.  Lots of people could have played that role, plenty of whom aren't garbage human beings.  I'm just glad this is the last we see of him.

Finally, I would have liked to see more of Jeff interacting with people and having a good time at the house party.  He tells us he started having a good time, but the moment we see of that is very brief.  Even like a game of beer pong with Leonard and Magnitude would have been awesome.  I think there was another scene of story to get out of this plot and we don't get it.

Funniest Moment:

For me, the funniest moment of the episode is the Britta and Page dance turned make-out session.  It's one of the funniest Britta moments of all time.

Heavenly Human Being:

The Heavenly Human Being Award goes to the MVP of the episode.  For "Early 21st Century Romanticism," this Award goes to Ben Chang for successfully getting Jeff to let him stay with him for at least a little while.  This is Chang's 3rd time winning this Award, which ties him for 5th place with Pierce and Britta.

Verdict:

This is a very funny episode of Community thanks to an incredible Britta storyline.  Everything involving her, Annie, Page, and Claire is hysterical and amazing to watch play out.  I also really like the performances of Donald Glover and Danny Pudi, as well as Chang's party scheme.  I wish we got to see some more from the party and I wish Andy Dick wasn't buzzing around, but this episode has still got it going on.

 8/10: Really Good