This Sitcom Gave Us One of the Most Hard-Hitting, Traumatic Thanksgiving Episodes

Community’s holiday episodes normally highlight what a sanctuary friends can be as opposed to family during the holidays. The Christmas episodes often actually take place in early December, rather than Christmas, since that’s when the characters are still with their college friends. But, the sitcom went in a different direction for its sole Thanksgiving episode, Season 4’s “Cooperative Escapism in Familial Relationships.” This episode serves up brutal reminders of how hard family Thanksgivings can be. In one storyline, Annie Edison (Alison Brie), Abed Nadir (Danny Pudi), Troy Barnes (Donald Glover), and Pierce Hawthorne (Chevy Chase) are stuck having Thanksgiving dinner with Shirley Bennett (Yvette Nicole Brown) and her extended family. The episode captures the feeling of being trapped at a bad Thanksgiving dinner with a Shawshank Redemption parody.

While the Shawshank Redemption plotline captures tedious, awkward Thanksgivings, the story focused on Jeff Winger (Joel McHale) depicts the other side of bad Thanksgivings — the truly emotionally scarring ones. After a push from therapist-in-training Britta Perry (Gillian Jacobs), Jeff spends the holiday with his estranged father, William Winger, and his half-brother Willy Jr., played by guest stars James Brolin and Adam Devine, respectively. The episode realistically captures how family members try to push their feelings down, get along, and make small talk. But, eventually, Jeff’s issues come out and he confronts his absentee father. Between the two plotlines, the episode hammers home how brutal Thanksgiving dinners can be.

The Shawshank Redemption parody is just about perfect. Abed provides the V.O., explaining that he has the gravitas of Morgan Freeman. When the study group members are surrounded by Shirley’s family members who have chronic flatulence, no appreciation for Pierce’s humor, and opinions about Batman that Troy isn’t ready to hear, they all escape to the garage and agree that they feel like they’re in prison. Abed takes a very literal approach in his idea of how to escape the prison that is Shirley’s family home. When Annie says they need a plan that won’t damage her property, he replies, “Definitely don’t look behind that poster then.” This is the most direct reference to the famous escape in The Shawshank Redemption.

The group endures Thanksgiving burdens like Shirley’s cousin doing a Borat impression for a full hour. As the characters try to find some way out, there are clever turns like Annie attempting to leave by saying she has painful cramps, only to be referred to Shirley’s relative who’s a gynecologist. The punchline of this scene is Abed narrating, “I’d like to tell you Annie avoided Shirley’s doctor sister-in-law, but this ain’t no fairy tale…” another direct reference to The Shawshank Redemption. The study group members never do successfully break out, because they come to realize that Shirley needs their support and decide to help her get through the holidays with her in-laws. Because they never successfully pull off a prison break, in the end, Abed narrates that they didn’t get to do The Shawshank Redemption. He then starts thinking about how he hopes that for Christmas they’ll do Die Hard.

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As great as the Shawshank Redemption homage is, Jeff’s story is what truly makes this episode so painful and memorable. Joel McHale and James Brolin are a great match; their equally sardonic performances give Jeff and William a natural rapport. Adam Devine’s broader performance adds a different energy to the family dynamic, as he plays Willy Jr. with a heart-on-his-sleeve earnestness that makes Jeff and William visibly uncomfortable.

At first, Jeff and William are able to get along and their Thanksgiving seems preferable to the awkward dinner with Shirley’s extended family. But, William upsets Jeff by suggesting that maybe abandoning him was for the best, because it clearly made him strong and independent. He compares Jeff favorably to Willy Jr., who’s still living at home as an adult and gets insecure easily. Jeff lets this slide at first, but in the end he confronts William with a brutal monologue about how broken and desperate for affection he actually is inside. He doesn’t hold back in this monologue, going as far as telling a story where he cut himself so he could fake having an appendectomy scar just to get attention. This beat when Jeff finally gets emotional feels well-earned. Jeff’s issues with his father are a big presence in Community. This cathartic monologue four seasons in is a major turning point, with Jeff no longer bottling up his feelings.

In the final scene of the episode, the group enters the study room and discovers that Jeff has prepared a Thanksgiving dinner for all of them. He tells them they should take a moment to be grateful for their real family, the one they chose. Many sitcoms about friend groups capture the joy of Friendsgiving. But, those celebrations with friends are even more meaningful when you remember what they’re an escape from. Community Season 4 brilliantly chose to depict family Thanksgivings in horrifying detail, before the cathartic scene when the characters reconvene for their own celebration.