Few TV shows have a fanbase as dedicated as Community’s, so Dan Harmon is understandably feeling some pressure about its upcoming movie.
Harmon opened up about that in a recent interview with THR, saying that the Community fanbase has “been the most supportive of me, all told, and has endured the most for supporting me.”
“Because I wasn’t thinking about them when I was feuding with Chevy [Chase],” Harmon said. “Only later did I realize that I’d hurt these people who didn’t want to think about me as some kind of odd, self-styled Kubrick. They cared about Greendale, this world that I created, and suddenly, they were getting this unadulterated side order of me, which was not fair to them.”
Community’s loyal community, of course, it what got it to its long-coveted “six seasons and a movie,” which became the fans’ rallying cry all through its sixth and final season on Yahoo! in 2015. After years of waiting, Peacock finally ordered the movie in 2022, and Harmon says he hates to say how “terrified I am to do it wrong, because there’s a part of me that knows that that fear cannot possibly result in a good thing.”
“You’re not going to get anywhere doing an impression of what you think you should do or what you think they want, but I really don’t want to do it wrong, and it is truly terrifying,” he added. “But then I’m holding on to the hope that being honest with myself about how scared I am is at least a way to break the cycle.”
The other thing giving him anxiety, he said, is getting everyone together to shoot once the SAG-AFTRA strike is resolved (the actors guild is resuming negotiations with studios today). The appeal of the Community movie, he admitted, is in seeing most of the whole gang in the same place again – and while that doesn’t include Chase, who isn’t returning, it does include Donald Glover.
There were plenty of questions over whether or not Glover would return for the movie, as his schedule has been well-booked since he broke out in Community, and he’s currently working on Disney’s Lando Star Wars movie. But Harmon revealed they had planned to shoot in Atlanta so he could be a part of it, and Glover was “stoked” – although he acknowledged that it might be tough to get everyone’s schedules in order once again.
“By the time we can recoordinate, what are the odds that everyone’s schedule is going to once again align?” he said.
The Community movie was close to shooting before the writers’ strike began, Joel McHale said back in June. Harmon, per a larger THR profile that ran last week, still needs to finish the script with one of his former Community writing partners Andrew Guest, so it’s likely he’s focused on that in the meantime.
Alex Stedman is a Senior News Editor with IGN, overseeing entertainment reporting. When she's not writing or editing, you can find her reading fantasy novels or playing Dungeons & Dragons.
