Who Won Thursday?

Posted by Marisa March 5th, 2010 at 10:47am In Community Parks and Recreation The Office Who Won Thursday?

So, the Olympics are over—NBC comedies are back! The question resurfaces: Who won Thursday? Let’s take a look at last night’s episodes:

Community: Physical Education
Abed’s constant pop-culture references are the center of the story instead of a commentary on the action when he tries to impress a girl by trying out some famous personas. I don’t watch Mad Men, so his Don Draper seemed a little shaky to me, but he does do a good impression of Joel McHale.

Parks & Recreation: Woman of the Year
The relationship between Leslie and Ron is quickly becoming one of my favorite things about the show, and I was pretty pleased with the way he spent the first half of the episode needling her, and the second half of the episode supporting her. The “lesson” he was trying to teach her, though—that awards are meaningless—was a little weak. This episode also featured some nice moments with TiFaux Dan’s Crush of the Moment, who is in a band that is no longer called Mouse Rat.

The Office: The Delivery Part 1 + 2
OMG it’s a baby girl SQUEEEEEEE! Even though this episode was obiviously all about Jim and Pam, there were lots of good bits with the other characters, like Michael throwing the keys to Jim’s car away, or Kevin’s “Ultrafeast,” or Dwight’s remodeling of Jim and Pam’s kitchen.

So, who won Thursday?

Community
I bet you thought I was going to say The Office, right, because it was one of those milestone episodes. Wrong! I’m one of those people who thinks The Office doesn’t really work when you stretch it to an hour. The first half was great—Pam and Kevin’s bonding over food, the “distractions” to keep her from going into labor, and even the emotional punch of her trying to avoid giving birth because she was scared. They even did a good job with Michael there, too, since he was more involved than he should have been with the whole birth thing, but not in an extremely uncomfortable way (like his wedding speech). The second half of the episode just petered out, though. That whole thing about the baby not latching wasn’t interesting and came to a quick, easy resolution. I can’t believe I watched a show where there was a subplot that it took someone a day and a half to practice breastfeeding before they got it right. That’s neither comedy nor drama. In the meantime, the “date” between Erin and Kevin obviously wasn’t going to go anywhere so it was a waste of time, and since everyone knew it wasn’t going to work out between them they could’ve made it more of a disaster and didn’t. Weak. Community was able to sneak ahead because of Joel McHale’s commitment to the silly billiards gags, Senior Chang’s declaration that Brita is the “worst” for the way she says the word “bagel,” and the concept of “brown Joey,” which recalls one of my favorite Andy Richter jokes ever. (“You can’t go around calling someone ‘Black Andy.’”)