'Community' 'Repilot' Recap: Dan Harmon Brings Greendale Back From the Dead

If you watched Community's fifth-season premiere, you witnessed a miracle. It wasn't the kind of miracle where the blind regain their vision or lame can walk again. This was a TV miracle, which I'm pretty sure are WAY down the to-do list of miracles. It was a miracle nonetheless.

Community came back from the dead.

The show's fourth season saw creator Dan Harmon fired, new showrunners brought in, plots that showed that the new guys didn't fully understand what made Community click, and the departure of Chevy Chase. By all accounts, Community should have been finished.

This is where the miracle begins. Sony brought back Harmon, and on Thursday night, the world got to see the appropriately titled "Repilot." In less than half an hour, Harmon and his team not only cleaned up the mess from last season, but also quickly got Community's heart beating again. Sure, this episode touched on many notes from the series' first few seasons, even replaying bits of dialogue, but unlike during Season 4 when these actions felt like someone just attempting their best Community impression, "Repilot" was genuine.

Harmon didn't trash the previous season and the decisions that were made his absence. We certainly know how he felt about Season 4, but in a move that a past version of Dan Harmon probably wouldn't have made, the new Harmon and the resurrected Community set their sights on moving forward.

NEXT EPISODE: 'Introduction to Teaching'

Recap
After graduating from Greendale, Jeff Winger (Joel McHale) tried to be an upstanding lawyer, hoping to actually help people instead of fighting for crooks and big businesses. Turns out there's no money in that idea, leaving Jeff broke. His old law partner, Alan (Rob Corddry), offered Jeff the chance to get back into the game: In order to represent an architect under fire for a bridge collapse, return to Greenville — er, Greendale (sorry, I've been spending too much time on NBC's website) — get the architect's records and help him sue Greendale for giving him a degree.

Jeff went back to Greendale under the premise of helping to save the college by protecting it from that very bridge suit, only to discover that Dean Pelton (Jim Rash) had already shredded the architect's records. The rest of the study group was already back at Greendale under the belief they were helping Jeff's cause. When Jeff realized his former study group was now worse off than they were when they entered Greendale, he got a new idea — sue Greendale. Using his classic Jeff Winger skills, Jeff gets Troy (Donald Glover), Abed (Danny Pudi), Annie (Alison Brie), Shirley (Yvette Nicole Brown) and Britta (Gillian Jacobs) on board to sue the college.

On his way to the Dean's office, Jeff stumbles across a hologram statue of Pierce (Chase), whose prerecorded speech convinces Jeff to fight for Greendale instead of screwing it over. With his heart changed, Jeff marches into the Dean's office and berates him for letting his friends down. The Dean asked Jeff to help actually save Greendale by becoming a teacher there. While Greendale didn't have "school-saver" in its budget, it could afford to add Jeff to its faculty.

Jeff accepted the position and told his friends the news. The study group decides to reenroll at Greendale, realizing they had all compromised on the dreams they once had before going through four years at Greendale. Jeff tore up the lawsuit. Britta's attempt to light the shreds on fire wound up burning down the study room table. Don't worry — the group built a new table, even if they got an F on the project.

Highlights
We can apply Abed's reprise of the line "I see your value now" to Sony and Harmon, right? We always knew that it was Harmon's brain fueling Community, and now that we can see Season 4 compared to "Repilot," there's no way to argue that fact.

After graduating from Greendale, Annie is working as a pharm rep for a community that invented fibromyalgia ... and invented the cure, Britta is a bartender, Abed is no longer working in film, instead trying to invent the next big social media app, Troy is planning on suing Abed over that idea to make millions, and Shirley's focus on her business led to her husband leaving her and taking the kids, dog and their dvr with him.

Troy has been maintaining a Clive Owen Tumblr.

Very classy of Chase to come back for that hologram cameo. Despite all the bad blood between Chase, Harmon and Sony, they still found a way to do what was best for Community.

Quotes
Abed: "Season 9, Zach Braff was only in the first six episodes."
Troy: "That son of a bitch! After everything Scrubs did for him?"

Britta: "That’s like me blaming owls for how bad I suck at analogies."

Troy: "Do you guys feel weird about doing this without …" [Gestures to Pierce’s seat] "... Magnitude."

Jeff before beating up Alan with Alan's own tie: "You're not worth the monologue. No monologue for you! Give me your tie!"

Troy realizing Jeff's commercial wasn't real: "YOU STAGED A ROBOT FIGHT?"