10 More TV Sitcom Characters With Shockingly Dark Backstories

Community's Jeffrey Winger is a cool, witty, and confident man. However, underneath that bravado is an insecure person terrified of being abandoned. What led to that? Well, it was his relationship, or lack thereof, with his father. 

There were many times throughout the show when Jeff discussed his tepid relationship with his dad. But, this absent-father story became far deeper (and darker) in the fifth episode of the maligned fourth season, "Cooperative Escapism in Familial Relations." 

In this episode, Jeff confronted his dad and laid out some of his shockingly dark trauma. He revealed that his father's absence left him so starved for affection as a child that he faked having appendicitis at school. He even went so far as to use his mother's scissors to give himself a self-inflicted surgery scar. Shockingly, he claimed that while it hurt like hell, it was worth it because his peers actually worried about him. 

This comedy's unexpected tale of self-harm and insecurity was a profound way of exploring how you can never know how a person is by only observing the surface.