The fourth season of the television comedy series Community premiered on February 7, 2013 and concluded on May 9, 2013. The season consists of 13 episodes and aired on NBC on Thursdays at 8:00 pm ET as part of the network's "Comedy Night Done Right" programming block.
The season marked the departure of showrunner Dan Harmon and overall received mixed reviews from critics. In the series's fifth season, Harmon returned as showrunner.
Video Community (season 4)
Cast
Starring
- Joel McHale as Jeff Winger (13 episodes)
- Gillian Jacobs as Britta Perry (13 episodes)
- Danny Pudi as Abed Nadir (13 episodes)
- Yvette Nicole Brown as Shirley Bennett (13 episodes)
- Alison Brie as Annie Edison (13 episodes)
- Donald Glover as Troy Barnes (13 episodes)
- Jim Rash as Dean Craig Pelton (12 episodes)
- Ken Jeong as Ben Chang/Kevin (9 episodes)
- Chevy Chase as Pierce Hawthorne (11 episodes)
Maps Community (season 4)
Episodes
Production
The series was renewed for a fourth season of 13 episodes on May 10, 2012. On May 18, 2012, after returning to California from a cross-country flight, series' creator Dan Harmon received a text message alerting him that he had been relieved of his position as Community showrunner by Sony Pictures Television. Reportedly, Harmon's erratic behavior (such as disappearing in San Francisco for a few days during the SF Sketchfest, and his intake of alcohol) and leadership style (which included coming to work late, his tendency to fall asleep during work, and the "tug of war between his perfectionist tendencies and his procrastinator nature") were the reasons that the studio fired him. To replace Harmon, Sony Pictures Television hired writers David Guarascio and Moses Port, the co-creators of the short-lived CW series Aliens in America. Sony Pictures Television claimed that Harmon would serve as a consulting producer, but Harmon affirmed via his Tumblr that he would not return in a position without executive prerogatives. Regardless, Harmon was credited as an "executive consultant" for the season, despite not working on a single episode.
The fourth season saw other behind-the-scenes changes, as well. Executive producers Neil Goldman and Garrett Donovan, writer/producer Chris McKenna and actor/writer Dino Stamatopoulos all departed following the third season. Frequent episode directors and executive producers Anthony and Joe Russo also left in order to direct Captain America: The Winter Soldier. McKenna, Stamatopoulos, and Joe Russo later returned to work on the show's fifth season.
Returning writers for fourth season include co-executive producer Andy Bobrow, producer Megan Ganz, and staff writer Tim Saccardo, who have been with the series since season two; and co-executive producer Maggie Bandur, and writing team and executive story editors Steve Basilone and Annie Mebane, who joined the series in season three. New additions to the writing staff in the fourth season include co-executive producer Ben Wexler, co-producers Hunter Covington and Gene Hong, and staff writers Issac Gonzalez and Jack Kukoda. Cast member Jim Rash (who won an Academy Award for co-writing The Descendants) wrote the eleventh episode of the season. Tristram Shapeero, who directed several episodes during the first three seasons, was promoted to an executive producer and directed the majority of the fourth season's episodes.
Filming for the season began shooting in August 2012, and the series was initially scheduled to premiere on October 19, 2012, airing in a new time slot on Fridays at 8:30 pm. In early October 2012, NBC delayed the premiere. NBC.com released a video of the cast of Community in character addressing the delay of the season premiere; this video humorous claimed that October 19 is merely a "state of mind". On October 30, 2012, NBC announced that the fourth season would premiere on February 7, 2013, returning to its original time slot of Thursdays at 8:00 pm.
Chevy Chase's departure
During the filming of "Advanced Documentary Filmmaking", Chevy Chase became angry at the racist direction his character was heading. While venting his frustrations, he used the slur "nigger"; episode director Jay Chandrasekhar argued that Chase's use of the word was "political", and an attempt to point out how racist his character had become. Regardless, the slur upset cast members, and Chase walked off of the set. He later returned to film some additional scenes, but later announced on November 21, 2012 that he had left the show.
As a result of timing and the agreement made, Chase's character Pierce is absent for two episodes--he did not appear in tenth episode, "Intro to Knots", or the twelfth episode, "Heroic Origins". He also appeared in a voice-only role in the episode "Intro to Felt Surrogacy", which was the final episode produced for the season, and as part of his agreement to leave the show, Chase was required to record all audio for the scenes where his character, alongside the other characters, appeared as a puppet. The season finale, which was filmed out-of-sequence, as it was the eleventh episode produced, marked the final on-screen appearance of Chase as a regular cast member.
Reception
Rating
The season premiere, "History 101", was seen by 3.88 million viewers and scored a 1.8 in the 18-49 demographic. This meant that its ratings were up when compared not only to the third season finale (which was seen by 2.48 million viewers and received a 1.3 in the 18-49 demographic), but also the aforementioned season's premiere (which was seen by 3.93 million and received a 1.7 in the 18-49 demographic). The premiere's ratings were enough to generate cautiously optimistic speculation that the show would be renewed for a fifth season (speculation that was later confirmed). However, as the season wore on, the ratings began to dip, which led some to wonder if this would be the show's last season. The season's final episode, "Advanced Introduction to Finality", was viewed by 3.08 million viewers and scored a 1.3 rating in the 18-49 demographic.
Critical reviews
The fourth season of Community scored 69 out of 100 based on 17 critics on Metacritic based on episode 1 and 3, indicating "generally favorable reviews". On Rotten Tomatoes, it was reported that 76% of critics gave the season a positive review. Verne Gay of Newsday stated, "Still defiantly Community, still good and still uninterested in adding new viewers." On the other hand, Hitfix's Alan Sepinwall stated, "It feels like [Moses] Port, [David] Guarascio and the other writers decided to reverse-engineer the [Dan] Harmon version of Community, but couldn't quite manage without the missing ingredient of Harmon himself." Mike Hale of The New York Times has stated that the series "has been dumbed down, its humor broadened past recognition, and the two episodes provided for review...have fewer laughs between them than a single good scene from the old Community." At the end of season 4, The A.V. Club's Todd VanDerwerff confessed, "I never thought I would say this, but I just don't care anymore."
Harmon's response
In an episode of Harmontown--a weekly live comedy podcast--Harmon initially said that, while the season was an "impression, and an unflattering one", it was merely "not [his] cup of tea". Later in the same interview, however, he likened it to "'flipping through Instagram just watching your girlfriend blow everyone' and seeing a friend 'Like' a photo of your ex-girlfriend with her new boyfriend on Facebook." Later, in a Tumblr blog post, however, Harmon apologized for some of his more cataclysmic statements; specifically, he apologized to the fans of the show (e.g. "I am first and foremost sorry to Community fans that got paid nothing to stick by Community and get us to a fifth season only to hear the incoming showrunner say some stuff that felt very un-Community"), its cast and crew (e.g. "It was dishonest to imply that something you worked on was as hard to watch as my family being assaulted"), and the writers (e.g. "I'm sorry I pooped on your work. You had to do something nobody should have to attempt, and you had the option of doing it the lazy way or the sellout way and you clearly did what you did because you were thinking of the fans"). Sony later expressed an interest in having Harmon record commentary tracks for all the fourth-season episodes, although this did not come to pass.
DVD release
The fourth season was released on DVD in region 1 on August 6, 2013 (2013-08-06), in region 2 on October 28, 2013 (2013-10-28), and in region 4 on July 3, 2014 (2014-07-03).
References
External links
- Episode guide at NBC.com
- List of Community episodes on IMDb
- List of Community season 4 episodes at TV.com
Source of article : Wikipedia
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