Note: Full spoilers for Community: Season 6 follow.

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6 seasons. 110 episodes. No matter what the future holds for Community , the entirety of this series has to be looked at as a big success for the show itself, the fans, the cast and crew and, of course, for creator Dan Harmon... even if he wasn’t involved in 13 of those episodes. Most TV shows fail and in the grand scheme of things, a relatively small amount make it to and beyond 100 episodes. So for this ever-endangered series, filled with a surprising amount of backstage drama, to make it this far is a win, plain and simple. And if this was truly The End, Community went out with its head held high.Yes, Season 6 was different, which is saying something, given Season 4 and 5 were also different, reflecting changes in front of and behind the camera, including cast departures and additions and Dan Harmon’s firing and re-hiring. But Season 6 not only saw more cast upheaval, it saw the show rise from the ashes of cancellation by NBC into a new realm on Yahoo – which suddenly took many restrictions away, including those involving content and running time.Harmon, Chris McKenna and their writers used this new platform very well. As promising as it can be, there is also an inherent danger in taking a network sitcom and removing any restriction on its running time and form, as we found out with Arrested Development: Season 4, where many episodes felt meandering and overlong. But, by and large, Harmon used his ability to let episodes run longer in smart ways. There were bits that were allowed to be more subtle or play out longer that often led to some wonderfully inspired tangents, without the whole episode feeling like it was going on too long. Yes, there was also a couple of episodes were the pacing felt off, but for the most part, Community used its expanded running time in just the right way – even the 31-minute “Queer Studies and Advanced Waxing” felt like the appropriate length for that particular episode, and its two big storylines.The beloved Community end tags particularly benefited from the expanded running time. Without concern that they wrap up quickly, they morphed into something different this year – oddball little short movies of sort, often taking a peripheral character from the episode (or simply an idea from the episode) and turning it into its own story, almost suggesting 13 different offbeat ideas for spinoffs we’ll never see.As for the cast changes, this was (once again!) handled very well. It’s unfortunate that we didn’t get to see an onscreen exit for Shirley -- especially given Yvette Nicole Brown made two cameos this season! -- but with Shirley joining Pierce and Troy as former members of the study group, and even Hickey and Duncan suddenly gone thanks to Jonathan Banks and John Oliver’s other commitments, Keith David and Paget Brewster were brought in as Elroy and Frankie, and both fit in great.Brewster was incredibly game and easily able to deliver when Frankie was given funny material like her attempts to console the Dean continually turning into insults over his intelligence – though the character was, by her design, a more stern, less overtly comedic one. David in the meantime was given something special with the behind-the-times Elroy and wow, did he nail it. One of the MVPs of the season, he was continually hysterical – from bonding with Britta over their love of Season 6 running joke Natalie is Freezing to his amazing delivery of “paint…ball?” to his moments of outrage at the others. Elroy quickly became a go-to source of hilarity on the show and David was a joy to watch.Amongst the returning characters, this was Ken Jeong’s year to shine. Chang had always been a tricky inclusion on the show – often his shtick was that he didn’t really fit in and the writers ran with that and purposely reinvented him year after year. While he already had begun to be more firmly integrated into the group, it was Season 6 that gave him his best material yet. From giving a power point presentation way out of his skill set to laughing hysterically at obvious, racist jokes from a shock comedian to starring in a stage production of The Karate Kid, Chang was funnier than ever and Jeong really got to show off his abilities throughout the season. They also successfully managed to show the character’s more sympathetic side, amazingly enough (given his history), from that aforementioned Karate Kid episode, which found him bonding with Annie, to a funny, yet meaningful wedding speech he gave.The whole cast continued to deliver, and even six years in, I never felt anyone was phoning it in, with Gillian Jacobs (who got a lot of big episodes this season), Danny Pudi, Alison Brie, Joel McHale and Jim Rash all still delivering, as we saw the original characters in new situations, and dealing with the new additions to the group.The show took the risk of pseudo-sequel episodes a few times, mostly pulling it off. The exception was “Advanced Safety Features”, which once more tried to pull off a winking, “We’re in on the joke” mega-product placement episode, but didn’t do it quite as deftly as before. However, episodes once again utilizing Abed making a documentary and the beloved paintball scenario were terrific – particularly the latter, “Modern Espionage”, which was one of Community’s best episodes ever.

Community: Will There Be a Season 7?

There were some other misses through the season – episodes focused on a class on grifting, Annie’s anger over finding out a dog may have graduated from Greendale and the group’s trip in an RV were below the show’s strong standards, never quite finding that perfect, Community vibe. But it rarely felt like Harmon, McKenna and the writers were playing it safe or on auto-pilot – they were always working hard and coming up with strange new scenarios, as Community delved into weirder and sometimes more dramatic places than before.It all wrapped up with a terrific season – or series? – finale in “Emotional Consequences of Broadcast Television.” I rated the episode a 9 when I reviewed it and now find myself thinking even more highly of it. With it feeling like this really could be the end, Harmon and McKenna offered a reflective and appropriately meta look back and forward, while also giving some nice closure to a growing subplot this season – Jeff’s sadness and hurt feelings over the group leaving, one by one, while he remained at Greendale. Seeing Jeff come to terms with this and wrapping up on a poignant yet uplifting note was a perfect way to end Community, should this be the end, even as we actually closed out the show with a wonderfully inspired, Dan Harmon-narrated fake commercial for a Community board game that was just perfectly... Community.