10 Things You Learn Rewatching Community

Throughout most of the show, we're led to believe that Pierce is nothing more than an outdated, ignorant, casually racist fool, mostly because for the most part, the show does little to disprove this. To the point of casting Chevy Chase to play him to be as thorough as possible.

But then the season 2 episode Intermediate Documentary Filmmaking comes along and completely flips the script.

Seemingly just for the fun of messing with his supposed friends, Pierce fakes being at death's door and uses the sympathy such situations would garner from his friends to put them in scenarios that turn their very natures against themselves. From Troy meeting LeVar Burton in person and freezing up, to Britta being forced to choose between using a blank check from Pierce as a gift to charity or to help her own living situation, to forcing Jeff to confront his own unresolved feelings about his deadbeat father.

That last one is what causes the whole scheme to unravel, but at that point, the only way to control that situation would be to ACTUALLY produce Jeff's father. When you can utterly take control of everyone around you until it reaches a point of absolute chaos, then you've got a brain on you worth envying. Or at least you would if that brain wasn't also SUPER racist.