"Six seasons and a movie." Given the fact that it's been cancelled and re-commissioned like, sixty-eight times, nobody probably ever thought that Community would ever live long enough to embrace that particularly amusing running joke that set out to prophesied the future of the show. And yet the sixth season arrives this year (courtesy of Yahoo!); it should absolutely be the last. There's only so many jokes you can make about a show like Community, which now feels messy and disjointed as a result of its time spent on TV's own version of death row. Six seasons feels about right. Which is to say: Community still clings to a sense of dignity, in the sense that the quality hasn't gone down quite enough for its fans to have said: "The show is lost it." Granted, season four wasn't overtly brilliant by way of its lack of Dan Harmon, but season five managed to steer things back to more familiar (and therefore funnier) territory. But "six seasons and a movie" should be adhered to as if it were a message from God himself: what better way to end a meta-minded series like Community than as the punchline to a long-running joke? That way, even if it takes three years, or five years, or ten years, there's still the possibility of a movie fulfilling that oh so sacred prophecy.
Sam Hill is an ardent cinephile and has been writing about film professionally since 2008. He harbours a particular fondness for western and sci-fi movies.
