Okay, now that I’ve devoted the last couple of posts to demonstrating how it sometimes irks me when a TV series crawls up its own ass, I’m now going to praise a show for pretty much the same behavior.

Cartoon Network’s Batman: The Brave and the Bold saw its end coming and spent its final year indulging every lunatic whim of its creators. Here’s a sampling of what went down:

• Homages to classic DC Comics stories featuring the Rainbow Batman, the Jungle Batman, the Mummy Batman, the Batman of the Future and the Batmen of All Nations.
• Adaptations of the ’50s Mad parody “Bat Boy and Rubin” and of the infamous ’60s Japanese manga story featuring the villainous Lord Death Man.
• Team-ups with the Haunted Tank, the G.I. Robot, the Creature Commandos, Bat-Ape, ‘Mazing Man, Space Ghost, Scooby-Doo, “Weird Al” Yankovic and Abraham Lincoln.
• A sitcom called  ”The Currys of Atlantis,” starring a singing Aquaman.
• Oh, and Batman was turned into a baby. And a vampire. Not at the same time.

It’s what happened when a team of creative, nostalgic people collectively decided to say “fuck it, we’re not going to get this chance again.”

And I loved it.

The Brave and the Bold wrapped up its run last Friday in its own go-for-broke style. ”Mitefall!” obliterated the fourth wall as Bat-Mite–a 5th Dimensional magical imp/uber Bat-fan–got bored with the series and did his best to have it cancelled in favor of a darker, grittier Bat-show. His tricks–including giving Batman both a cutesy daughter and a Neon Talking Super Street Bat-Luge, then recasting Aquaman with reputed show-killing actor Ted McGinley–succeeded in making the series suck. However, as he realized too late, its cancellation meant his own end.

It was “meta” to the Nth degree and, honestly, a bit much. Scriptwriter Paul Dini knocked down a whole row of straw men in the forms of grousing fanboys and indifferent network executives. I can’t speak to how Cartoon Network insiders felt about the show, but it was my understanding that the initial fan backlash to The Brave and the Bold‘s lighthearted approach largely evaporated once people realized how much Silver Age fun was to be had.

In any case, it didn’t seem as if the series was cancelled so much as it had reached its natural end. Sixty-five episodes is a standard number for an animated series, as that’s enough to “strip” repeats five days a week for 13 weeks. (The previous Batman cartoon also wrapped up after 65 installments.) And, as “Mitefall!” itself pointed out, shows like this are toy-driven. Judging by the diminishing assortment of new Brave and the Bold product on store shelves over the past year, it was clear that Mattel wanted to move on to another Bat-iteration.

False premises aside, “Mitefall!” was an enjoyable end to a fabulous series. And if any of you didn’t tear up during Batman’s final speech to the children, I don’t want to know you.

“And until we meet again, boys and girls, know that wherever evil lurks, in all its myriad forms, I’ll be there with the hammers of justice to fight for decency and defend the innocent. Good night.”

Good-bye.

Dave TV The Brave and the Bold

I mean, really. Here’s Community inserting a ”watch this show obsessively or you’ll miss it” Easter egg reference to the movie Beetlejuice. The gag is that, as in the movie, Beetlejuice appears (watch the background) after his name is said three times. The “oh, I’m so surprised that this show is on hiatus” bit is that the three times are spread out across three seasons.

It’s impressive, but still…

Dave TV Beetlejuice, Community, Easter eggs

November 14, 2011: The Day the Internet Lost Its Collective Shit; aka The Day It Learned that Community Wasn’t on NBC’s Midseason Schedule.

Community, currently in its third season, stars Joel McHale as a smug lawyer whose lack of a legitimate degree sends him to community college, where he becomes the de facto leader of a misfit study group. It’s a good show. Sometimes it’s even a great show. But it’s also a prime example of television that’s too clever for it’s own sake.

Its first breakout character was Abed, a pop culture-immersed twentysomething with what appears to be 21st Century TV’s favored disorder, Undeclared Asperger’s Syndrome. Reportedly, Community creator Dan Harmon has a fair amount in common with his fictional mouthpiece, and that may be why the show has had such difficulty connecting with a mass audience.

Because Community is a show that dares you to enjoy it. It says, “You tune in at 8:00 pm Eastern/7:00 pm Central looking for easy laughs? Fie! We will give you multi-layered meta commentary punctuated by uncomfortable moments and populated by emotionally-damaged and occasionally unlikable characters!”

I’ll give you a couple of examples, both from the show’s sophomore year. In “Mixology Certification,” the group convened at a bar to celebrate the 21st birthday of their friend Troy, only to fall into alcohol-laced melancholy. While it worked as an encapsulation of what it was like for me in my early twenties–feeling alone in a room full of friends–it was difficult to watch. Later that season came another birthday episode, “Critical Film Studies,” a demonstration of the series’ self-indulgence. What began as a Pulp Fiction tribute morphed into an extended riff on My Dinner with Andre, a 1981 indie film that even Community‘s hipster audience probably never has seen.

That Community has lasted this long is testament to the floundering of NBC, whose inability to spawn hits has had the not-unwelcome side-effect of encouraging them to stick with low-rated critical darlings such as 30 Rock and (my current favorite) Parks and Recreation.

To be clear, I never miss an episode of Community. I love the ensemble cast. (Even Chevy Chase.) Alison Brie is my girlfriend. (Yeah, right.) And I can appreciate a zombie-themed episode as much as the next AV Club reader.

But my main beef with it is that it’s too in love with its high-concept installments. Lots of TV series have produced format-breaking episodes–think M*A*S*H‘s war documentary or Buffy‘s musical theater–but what made those notable was their deviance from a well-established baseline. Community doesn’t have that. When you tune in, you don’t know what you’re going to get. They’re stop-motion animated! They’re simultaneously existing in seven parallel realities! They’re aboard a Kentucky Fried Chicken-sponsored space shuttle! (All actual episodes.)

Really, it should be no surprise to anyone that Community is taking a little lie down. But don’t despair, it will most likely go on for at least another season. The same economics that kept it around this long should sustain it until it reaches the magic number of episodes required for syndication. (Sony has already been taking out sales ads in broadcasting trade publications.)

Dave TV Alison Brie, Community

I’m pretty happy with these “stuck in a meeting” sketches I drew yesterday.

I’m especially fond of the werewolf and the long-haired Japanese ghost girl.

Dave General sketches