HEY, DID I MISS ANYTHING?
Kids:
A few hours ago, I landed in Los Angeles, turned on my phone, and confirmed what you already know. Sony Pictures Television is replacing me as showrunner on Community, with two seasoned fellows that Im sure are quite nice - actually, I have it on good authority theyre quite nice, because they once created a show and cast my good friend Jeff Davis on it, so how bad can they be.
Whyd Sony want me gone? I cant answer that because Ive been in as much contact with them as you have. They literally havent called me since the season four pickup, so their reasons for replacing me are clearly none of my business. Community is their property, I only own ten percent of it, and I kind of dont want to hear what their complaints are because Im sure it would hurt my feelings even more now that Id be listening for free.
I do want to correct a couple points of spin, now that Im free to do so:
The important one is this quote from Bob Greenblatt in which he says hes sure Im going to be involved somehow, something like that. Thats a misquote. I think he meant to say hes sure cookies are yummy, because hes never called me once in the entire duration of his employment at NBC. He didnt call me to say he was starting to work there, he didnt call me to say I was no longer working there and he definitely didnt call to ask if I was going to be involved. Im not saying its wrong for him to have bigger fish to fry, Im just saying, NBC is not a credible source of All News Dan Harmon.
You may have read that I am technically signed on, by default, to be an executive consulting something or other - which is a relatively standard protective clause for a creator in my position. Guys like me cant actually just be shot and left in a ditch by Skynet, were still allowed to have a title on the things we create and help out, like, I guess sharpening pencils and stuff.
However, if I actually chose to go to the office, I wouldnt have any power there. Nobody would have to do anything I said, ever. I would be offering thoughts on other peoples scripts, not allowed to rewrite them, not allowed to ask anyone else to rewrite them, not allowed to say whether a single joke was funny or go near the edit bay, etc. Its
.not really the way the previous episodes got done. I was what you might call a
.hands on producer. Are my
.periods giving this enough
.pointedness? Im not saying you cant make a good version of Community without me, but I am definitely saying that you cant make my version of it unless I have the option of saying it has to be like this or I quit roughly 8 times a day.
The same contract also gives me the same salary and title if I spend all day masturbating and playing Prototype 2. And before you ask yourself what you would do in my situation: buy Prototype 2. Its f**king great.
Because Prototype 2 is great, and because nobody called me, and then started hiring people to run the show, I had my assistant start packing up my office days ago. Im sorry. Im not saying seasons 1, 2 and 3 were my definition of perfect television, Im just saying that whatever theyre going to do for season 4, theyre aiming to do without my help. So do not believe anyone that tells you on Monday that I quit or diminished my role so I could spend more time with my loved ones, or that I negotiated and we couldnt come to an agreement, etc. It couldnt be less true because, just to make this clear, literally nobody called me. Also dont believe anyone that says I have sex with animals. And if theres a photo of me doing it with an animal - Im not saying one exists, Im just saying, if one surfaces - its a fake. Look at the shadow. Why would it be in front of the giraffe if the sun is behind the jeep?
Where was I? Oh yeah. Im not running Community for season 4. They replaced me. Thems the facts.
When I was a kid, sometimes Id run home to Mommy with a bloody nose and say, Mom, my friends beat me up, and my Mom would say well then theyre not worth having as friends, are they? At the time, I figured she was just trying to put a postive spin on having birthed an unpopular pussy. But this is, after all, the same lady that bought me my first typewriter. Then later, a Commodore 64. And later, a 300 baud modem for it. Through which I met new friends that did like me much, much more.
Im 39, now. The friends my Mom warned me about are bigger now, and older, bloodying my nose with old world numbers, and old world tactics, like, oh, I dont know, sending out press releases to TV Guide at 7pm on a Friday.
But my Commodore 64 is mobile now, like yours, and the modems are invisible, and the internet is the air all around us. And the good friends, the real friends, are finding each other, and connecting with each other, and my Mom is turning out to be more right than ever.
Ah, shit, I still havent called my f**king Mom.
Mom, Happy Mothers Day. I got fired.
Yes, Mom. AGAIN.
