Community: Wedding Videography
May 26, 2015 8:12 PM - Season 6, Episode 12 - Subscribe

Garrett proposes to his girlfriend. Abed films everything from proposal to wedding. The gang shows up drunk and late and get chastised by Garrett's mom into being the best wedding guests ever. And then Jeff stumbles across something....

As usual, Jeff's law class is total slackerdom--he writes the word "LAW" on the board and helps himself to his own personal ice drawer in his desk. But Garrett has an extra credit class project, which Abed is going to videotape. He sets up the projector to give a surprise proposal to Stacy, who's also in the class. He proposes, she looks like she's freaked the shit out and then she says yes! Jeff's eyes bug out of his head.

We find out that the two have been dating for 16 months, plus some days or whatever. She makes his anxiety less. "Well, it's official, I'm getting laid!" Garrett finishes.

Cut to the AAB Apartment, where Annie is being recorded by Abed doing "missing lover footage" like they do in all the movies. I'm reminded of "Thanks For The Memory" on Red Dwarf with Lise Yates, myself. Britta wanders in to announce that "the health department called, they don't want anything back." Talking to the camera, she says that they don't really know Garrett despite going to school with him for the last six years. You know, he's that funny looking guy. After Annie yells at her, Britta is all, "She doesn't understand filmmaking. I lived in New York." Anyway, everyone's doing "wedding staging" at their apartment.

Annie wants to paint their nails and Britta just wants black. Annie is all "we'll all have black nails when our bodies decompose!" She says this VERY cheerfully. Britta fires back with "my accountant has black nails!" but we all know she doesn't have that. It's a part of speech called making things up. Someone knocks at the door and Abed won't answer it, he wants someone else to. They just yell to walk in. Frankie does. She's been invited over to be girls together! She seems unthrilled. "I didn't say no. Who says no to something like that?" She also flashbacks to the time when she went to a sleepover and everyone stoned her with rocks. That's not going to happen again!

The girls drink cosmos. Frankie already sounds tanked, but not Sadie Doyle tanked, alas. She mentions her dead sister and her mentally retarded sister again.

PANTY RAID! DRINK NOW! DRINK NOW! The other guys in the group arrive. Annie brags that they lied to the guys about what time the wedding was at--they showed up 40 minutes before they thought the wedding was going to happen. Now they have three hours to...well, imitate Garrett as various celebrities. It's a new game, Celebrity Garrett Marriage! Jeff talks to Abed's camera from a papasan chair, in a nice suit, while Frankie shoves her head in the side to yell that he's talking about codependency. Eventually Annie realizes the time is off, and they're all late, so everyone runs for it. Chang was left behind and is all "I got left home alone" (except for Abed), Jeff goes back for them both.

Todd is performing the wedding ceremony and seriously wondering if he is God. Garrett wrote his own vows, which were very sweet, even if he at one point says, "You are my favorite video game." I can only imagine what their sex life is gonna be like if that's the case. "What combo do I push for orgasm?" huh huh huh. Stacy loves making sandwiches with him, doing the laundry with him, and feeding him his medication. Garrett points out that's just a list of stuff, not his lovable qualities, but the wedding goes on somehow anyway, despite the loud shhing going on when the gang shows up in the back during this. And Chang falls over a few times. Anyway, they actually get married! Time to party! Or as Jeff puts it enthusiastically, "Okay, let's endure this!" Elroy is all, "Who would have thought that Barrett's wedding would be one of the best days of our lives?"

Garrett's mom approaches them and cheerfully, passive-aggressively, wants them to not wreck the wedding. "I'm not Dr. Phil, but I don't want my son to kill himself, so do what you gotta do!" They all feel bad and agree to be great wedding guests from now on. And they DO, which is flabbergasting. Britta goes to dance and tell Abed she loves him.

We find out that from 2002-2006, Elroy developed an addiction to encouraging white people, so he knows how to be a good wedding guest. It used to be simple survival in the tech world. You tap the gas because why tap the brake? He learned the cheat code: white people like encouragement, because they are very discouraged, and discouraging to each other. He never felt like a sellout and never said anything untrue. This is bizarrely adorable, especially when he's shown singing to a guy that he should keep wearing his pants. He feels like a superhero when he encourages Garrett and Stacy to spoon up their respective foods at the dinner table, it even stops them critiquing each other!

Annie and Frankie are learning the wedding guests, such as Great Aunt Polly and Meemaw. Frankie tells Annie they have the same dragon of helping others, and "Annie, the world will still need you after you finish your cake." They debate training the dragon vs. getting rid of it, and Frankie is all, if we get rid of it, we'll become Jeff. Let's come up with a list of dragon names!

Frankie says by herself to Abed's camera that she wants to get Annie away from Jeff, then asks if anyone will see this. No. Then why are you filming it? "It's relaxing. It's like knitting with less discipline."

I sadly cannot type fast enough to get down all of Annie's dragon names, so I hope someone else can. I got down "Christian Scale," "Carson Scaley," and "Arianna Puffington." I am so naming a dragon Christian Scale now.

Since Garrett's older brother (probably played by the same actor under a big wig) Bones has relapsed and will be unable to give a toast, Jeff volunteers his services to Jeff's mom. And he's NOT going to Winger speech it! It'll be rocket fueled selflessness! "God, I love my job. Wait, this isn't my job. God, I love myself."

Jeff and Frankie critique the maid of honor's speech, which for some reason includes the phrase "Don't let Garrett keep you from painting." In Jeff's own speech, he disses the MoH, which makes her cry. The Dean defends this as "reading the room" because everyone hated that chick's speech. Jeff brags that he has learned about both clans. He starts fixing people up on each side with corresponding interests. How sweet! "These are the kinds of things you learn being the biggest jerk at a wedding." Jeff has also learned that Great Aunt Polly on one side and Meemaw on the other side are both 90 and born in the same town. Let's get them both out on the dance floor! Wait, why is there only one old lady? (And is she dead? I guess not in this episode, but I was expecting it.) Oops.... SHE'S RELATED TO BOTH SIDES AND NOBODY REALIZED IT! Elroy encourages: "This is a man who knows how to marry his cousin!" Garrett's mom faints.

The group gangs up in a corner and grumbles about whose fault it is. Britta drops a Godwin by saying, "None of us would have met if Hitler hadn't been born." The Dean is all, "Britta, we're all the worst right now, take a day off." Most of them concur that they're all the worst with each other, except for Chang who says he's at his best with them. Ouch! That clinches it, time for all of us to split up now!

Garrett cuts the wedding short, announcing that while it's legal to marry cousins in Colorado, they feel like an annulment is warranted. Chang gets up and hops to their defense, fixing them back up. YOU GO CHANG! Who knew he had a non-ass moment in him? I'm so proud! Garrett re-proposes with, "Stacy, will you be my legally incestuous wife?" "Yes." Stay and eat cake! Chang hugs everyone. The group slow dances in a giant pack together.

And here commences possibly the best stinger this season: the credited author of the week's episode, Briggs Hatton (also the writer's assistant!) tells us that he has been researching incest on the Internet, and according to the NYT, first cousins can totally have kids without risk of disease! The laws are totally outdated and depend on your state. We see a brief shot of the writer's room with some kind of pie plate alien spaceship hanging from the ceiling and Dan Harmon looked passed out or concussed or whatever. He says everyone agreed to let him write the episode if he would do this PSA at the end. So just remember: he's Briggs Haddon, and he wrote the Community season six incest episode!
posted by jenfullmoon (26 comments total) 4 users marked this as a favorite
 


Stand-out moments:
Chang's speech
Garrett's mic drop
Jeff loving himself
Hatton speech
Foreshadowing the cousin revelation with Annie and Frankie talking about Meemaw/Aunt Polly

Was this episode a way of saying that everyone else is moving on with their lives except this little band? The tiny little 8x11 Yahoo sign was pretty funny. You'd expect something bigger.
posted by Ik ben afgesneden at 9:08 PM on May 26, 2015 [3 favorites]


Frankie at the pre-party was awesome.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 9:12 PM on May 26, 2015 [1 favorite]


I loved this episode so much, and half-hoped that it really was one of the writers taking the fall as in the stinger credit, but it was an actor. Beautifully played with his earnest "And that was in the New York Times!" lines.
posted by dorothyisunderwood at 9:12 PM on May 26, 2015


That was wonderfully weird, especially Annie's murder/abduction video and absolutely everything Frankie said or did.
posted by mochapickle at 10:28 PM on May 26, 2015 [3 favorites]


Frankie's great, huh? Really good addition.

I'm really enjoying this season, although sometimes I think they should just go ahead and rename the show to "Three Walls and the Dean".
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 11:50 PM on May 26, 2015 [1 favorite]


Also, from the A.V. Club's comments:
People Like Us
"Between this episode and the stand-up bit a little while back, I have a bit more respect for Erik Charles Nielsen, who plays Garrett. Dude obviously has a somewhat limited range, but his delivery is just golden sometimes."
Bobo Chimpan
"You know he posts here sometimes, right?"
Erik Charles Nielsen
"It's fine. I think my range is a little wider than the projects I've had the chance to do have shown. But let's face it, there's a fairly obvious bullseye in the middle of it."
I think that Nielson is really good.

Some good bits:
Annie and Britta told me to come over and get ready with them for Garrett's wedding. I didn't say "no". Who says "no" to something like that? A cold off-putting, incompatible person. The kind of person turns a sleepover into a, uh ... stoning.

I had rocks. Thrown at me. Biblical, igneous, jagged, hateful, pointy, ninja ... rocks. And that's not going to happen again.
Drayguns:
Princess Firebreath. Sir Pent. Dr. Rachel Spinetail. Holly Hotbreath ... no. Jimmy Talon. Christian Scale. (I got into a bit of a celebrity pun-barrel here.) Carson Scaly. Jude Claw. Arianna Puffington.
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 12:24 AM on May 27, 2015 [5 favorites]


I just can't get over how perfectly they nailed the Very Special Episode vibe during the stinger about cousin marriage laws from state to state. So good.

Also, was Danny Pudi not available for this episode or something, or was the choice to have Abed behind the camera completely an artistic choice?
posted by DoctorFedora at 12:58 AM on May 27, 2015 [3 favorites]


Also, was Danny Pudi not available for this episode or something, or was the choice to have Abed behind the camera completely an artistic choice?

I was wondering about that myself. Seems like we saw him a lot less than on previous "Abed behind the camera" episodes, which were all as much about Abed as observer vs. Abed as participant.

Garrett's older brother (probably played by the same actor under a big wig)

This also seemed like a weird choice. Clearly, they had the budget for a crowd scene, and paying someone to say, what, one line? wouldn't have broken the bank.

while it's legal to marry cousins in Colorado

I think they were intentionally vague as to the exact family trees, but if "Memaw" means grandmother in this case, then her also being a great-aunt would most likely mean Garrett and Stacy were second cousins, which is legal pretty much everywhere in the world (only the Eastern Orthodox church appears to currently prohibit it).

Yes, I wikipedia'd it immediately. That is how I roll.
posted by Etrigan at 4:23 AM on May 27, 2015 [3 favorites]


Really liked the bits with Elroy, and the ersatz Dan Harmon sitting at the table at the end.
posted by drezdn at 4:53 AM on May 27, 2015 [1 favorite]


The actress who played Stacy was none other than Erin McGathy. Coincidentally, Erin and Dan Harmon have only been married about six months perhaps? I'd love to know if anything from the episode was inspired by their wedding.

This was another solid episode, as it feels that Harmon and the writers are finally hitting their stride with the last few shows.

Every episode is wrapping up with some kind of group hug. I can't help but think it's going to lead to something. Hrm.

Loved Frankie's analysis of Annie and Jeff's relationship.
posted by Atreides at 6:11 AM on May 27, 2015


I'd love to know if anything from the episode was inspired by their wedding.

She wore the same dress!
posted by mochapickle at 6:35 AM on May 27, 2015 [5 favorites]


awesome.
posted by Atreides at 7:29 AM on May 27, 2015


There... are no words...
posted by Etrigan at 7:35 AM on May 27, 2015


You can listen to Erin and Dan's wedding ceremony on her podcast, with some commentary by the bride and groom.

It was a while ago that I listened to it, but I think Stacy and Erin's vows may have been similar.
posted by He Is Only The Imposter at 8:05 AM on May 27, 2015 [2 favorites]


According to the AV Club comments, Danny Pudi was off filming a pilot during this episode.

I loved the actor who played Garrett's response to that. He handles himself well.

OMG, Dan and Erin's wedding.

Interview with Dan that mentions the casting of his wife: (warning: auto-play video)

"This season, we didn’t really have any time to make choices. The casting director was being handed scripts the day before they’re shot. So in the example of my wife playing [one of the character’s] fiancée, I think it was just a matter of me running into her office and saying, “We only have a day’s notice, but we need to find a really remarkable woman that could make it seem believable that she loves [the character], that she’s not being taken advantage of, that the love’s genuine, even though [the character’s] kind of a jerk. But we don’t want it to seem like a joke; it has to be really convincingly true love.” The casting director said, “How about your wife?” And I think her point was, she pretty convincingly married a piece of crap."
posted by jenfullmoon at 8:27 AM on May 27, 2015 [15 favorites]


Following off of jenfullmoon's link, here is the Post Mortem for Episode 12 with Dan Harmon. Good stuff about the wedding, Frankie's evolution, and codependency vs. Synergy.

Also, Harmon does not know who played him in the end scene.
posted by He Is Only The Imposter at 8:56 AM on May 27, 2015 [3 favorites]


Yay! I was looking for a link along those lines but I guess they hadn't posted it by the time I was looking.

Very touching, and explains Frankie's background.
posted by jenfullmoon at 5:50 PM on May 27, 2015 [1 favorite]


I like Frankie even more now that I know they were determined not to make her someone who's fallen from grace.
posted by mochapickle at 7:27 PM on May 27, 2015


Is the whole "jimming" the camera thing really a reference to The Office? That was what came up in a Google search, at least.

I mostly just loved Frankie in this episode. Everything revolved around Frankie for me. And her awkward throat clearing when she was talking about her sisters was the best part. I think I like her because she's partly me (only with more stoning).
posted by tracicle at 11:24 AM on May 28, 2015 [1 favorite]


Is the whole "jimming" the camera thing really a reference to The Office?

Yes, absolutely.
posted by Gary at 11:52 AM on May 28, 2015 [1 favorite]


Oooooh right. I never really watched The Office. All is clear.
posted by tracicle at 1:07 PM on May 28, 2015


In an interview, Dan Harmon referenced his own sister as an inspiration for Frankie's.
posted by Atreides at 1:19 PM on May 28, 2015


I meant to post this last week- the music playing during Garrett's powerpoint was Evrgrn by Sybarite.
posted by Dr-Baa at 12:02 PM on June 5, 2015


Ugh, so much Jimming.
posted by codacorolla at 9:54 AM on June 7, 2015


This was one of their best. Watched it at night, nearly woke my entire family up.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:57 AM on February 11, 2016 [1 favorite]


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