This special narrative arc of Three Jokers in the Pandemic 2: Get Vaccinated was written and directed by Aaron Seltzer and Jason Friedberg.
It was sure to be another wacky day filled with hijinks, adventure, and important life lessons at Greendale Community College in the great state of Colorado. In anticipation of this, the Greendale Study Group were sitting at their usual table in their usual room. Yep, it was looking by all means to be yet another day at Greendale. But for some in the study group, there was an eerie feeling that they couldn't quite shake.
"Hey, Jeff…" Annie Edison whispered as she looked over the rest of the study group sitting at their seats and doing their things. "...does something about this… seem off?"
"Uh-huh. Sounds nice, Annie." Jeff Winger was very intently locked on his phone. Occasionally, he would hum what would be a sound of agreement if he wasn't just pretending to listen.
"Jeff! This is serious! Something is seriously super duper wrong!" Annie hissed, still trying to get Jeff's attention. "Just look!"
In a fit of desperation, Annie knocked Jeff's phone out of his hands and grabbed his eyelids with one hand and forcibly cranked his head around with her other arm. Jeff saw the study group laid out before him lost in their own little islands in the minutes before a sea of studying was to wash over them: Britta Perry, Pierce Hawthorne, Shirley Bennett, and who could forget the all-star iconic duo of Troy and Abed not just in the morning but 24/7 open?
Britta Perry was the only one of the group not at the table, she was huddled in the corner wearing a N95 over a surgical over a cloth mask for some reason. Her eyes were red, she shook like she had the shakes.
"Britta, is something wrong? Do you need a hug or some kind words about our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ?" Shirley started to step over, but Britta merely hissed. Shirley backed away, back into her seat.
"I won't let any of you gimme the plague! Keep away!" Britta mumbled before she ripped her sleeve back to reveal an arm full of track marks. Everyone recoiled in horror, except for Jeff who was just kind of annoyed Annie was still clamping his head and prying his eyelids open. This was a bit sexier in his dreams. "I'm like super-duper quadruple vaxxed and uber-boosted. Better safe than sorry! BETTER SAFE THAN SORRY! YOU'LL BE SORRY AND I'LL BE SAFE!"
None of this came out legibly on account of her triple-layering masks.
"Uh did Britta say something about a plague, Abed?" Troy asked.
"A plague, huh? I wonder what kind of plague. The kind that turns you into zombies? The kind that just super kills everyone, like in Stephen King's The Stand? Maybe the lucky survivors get super-powers. I think it'd be neat if I got sick but then I turned into Batman if I got better."
"Batman doesn't have any powers." Troy pointed out.
"Yes he does. His power is Batman. In any case, I'm prepared to ride any plague out at home. I didn't spend six months worth of rent money on specialty label blu-rays for nothing. I think I'll watch my Kickpuncher X: Kickpuncher X-treme 4K ultra-hd tonight. In honor of Britta's Plague."
"ABED!" Troy and Annie shouted at him in unison. "Again?!"
"What? You think making the rent on time is more important than owning unopened brand new copies of Kickpuncher VIII: Deathkick and Kickpuncher IX: Kickpuncher vs Punchkicker? Combined, these out of print babies were only $300 on Ebay." Abed asked his roommates in confusion. "I'm only three
"Enough! Troy, you deal with this shit!" Annie released Jeff. "Can't you see, Jeff? Something is wrong!"
"Annie, nothing seems wrong to me." Jeff said in a pretty annoyed voice. "I swear we've been stuck in this community college since the Obama Administration, so trust me Annie when I say that everything seems perfectly normal."
At that moment, Dean Pelton wheeled on by the study room's open door on a unicycle - completely naked except for a dalmatian print thong that left nothing to the imagination. Ritualistic Celtic markings had been painted on him and he wore a customized gramophone helmet which Dean Pelton used to broadcast announcements to campus as he unicycled all over campus despite the campus having a loudspeaker system built in his office just for that.
"And I'm sorry to announce that due to the sudden and tragic chimp attack that has taken the life of Professor Bellend - Intro to Stand-Up Comedy is cancelled until further notice! Oh heeeeeey, Jeffrey! Lookin' good!"
Jeff sighed. "Well as normal as Greendale can ever get.."
"Damn. I was looking forward to heckling that class." Pierce complained.
"I got it, Jeff! What's wrong!" Annie snapped her fingers then very rudely, very violently pointed at Pierce. "Don't you remember what happened? PIERCE SHOULD BE DEAD!"
"That's news to me." Pierce said. He then pulled his pants out forward and looked down at Pierce Junior. "Kiddo, I seem pretty alive. Let me just imagine Eartha Kitt naked to be sure. Yeeeeeppers, I'm alive."
"You shouldn't be! You died jacking off! C'mon, guys! Back me up here! You all remember! There was like a wake and everything! And a hologram too!" Annie insisted. Everyone stared blankly at her, except for Jeff who had gotten back to checking his phone. And Britta, who remained in the corner, muttering to herself in nonsensical obscenities about Coronaviruses and deliberate inept government responses to kill and control under her breath. "How is Pierce alive? People just don't come back from the dead!"
Annie then stared deep and hard at Troy Barnes and Shirley, and not just because they were blacks in immediate vicinity of a dainty attractive hetero white girl like herself. She pointed at Shirley. "Shirley, you… you should be gone too! Doing that thing… you were doing… with that guy! In that place, that's not here!"
"You mean spreadin' the good light and word of our Lord and savior Jesus Christ? Honey, I don't need to leave Greendale for that!" Shirley rolled her eyes. "Annie, sweetie, have you gotten the Devil in you or something?"
"And Troy!" Annie was now jumping up and down and violently pointing at Troy. "You shouldn't be here too! You should be… WHEREVER YOU ARE!"
"Whuh whuh whuh does this mean Pierce is a ghost? And Shirley is a ghost? Does that mean… I AM A GHOST TOO? Nooooo!" Troy started screaming and began punching himself to make sure he was still tangible.
"I really don't want to be the straight man to whatever the hell all this is." Jeff sighed.
"Don't worry, in a few days you'll all be too busy getting your asses kicked by some super Covid variant. But I won't because I'm smert! I social distance and maskinate!" Britta shouted loud enough to be heard through her muffling masks.
"Covid? What the heck is that? Some kinky lesbo kind of shit? And where can I get my hands on the tapes?" Pierce asked. Britta hissed.
"We shouldn't even be like this… still in a study group! We're supposed to like a committee now! Where's Elroy? Where's Frankie?" Her voice then dropped to a whisper. "...where's Chang?"
"Why would we ever let freaking Chang hang out with us? And… who the hell are Elroy and Frankie? You take some pills, make some imaginary friends?" Jeff asked while Pierce snickered at the thought of Annie doing drugs and seeing imaginary friends for some reason.
"They're not imaginary! They're like part of the Save Greendale Committee with us!" Annie insisted.
"Save Greendale? That does not compute, Annie." Jeff rolled his eyes hard as he tried to suppress his laughter. "Why would I ever want to dedicate ANY of my limited and fleeting free time to saving this dumpster fi"
"Shut up, Jeff! You will listen to me! Because you're a… A SAD MIDDLE-AGED MEDIOCRE LOSER WHITE MAN! And I am a… YOUNG ATTRACTIVE HETEROSEXUAL WHITE WOMAN!" Annie yelled. Her accusation of his character needed some work, but that second statement was a pretty convincing argument she was making, Jeff thought.
"Hey, so am I! But none of you are listening to me about COVID!" Britta butted in from her corner.
"Britta, I have had it with you trying to muscle in on my pretty white girl turf! You're not young and attractive like I am! You're an old… person! I get WHITE WOMAN PRIORITY over you!" Annie stared daggers at her blonde counterpart, stormed over to Britta, and ripped the masks off her. Britta gasped as Annie began to scream in her face, spreading countless untold germs. G-ross! "The only virus here is you Britta! You're bitchy, I'm lovable! No one loves you! Not even yourself! Did you get a monkey named after your boobs? NOOOOO! Now everyone SHUT UP THE HUCK UP and tell me I'M RIIIIIIIGHT!"
"Your right, my left!" Britta slapped Annie on her right to shut her up. Shocked, Annie quickly recovered and slapped Britta in response. Rinse, cycle, and repeat.
"Girls, girls. Please take a chill pill." Jeff sarcastically said as Pierce began to record the events on their phone. "Don't fight on my account."
Author's Note: SLAP by Britta, SLAP by Annie
"Shut up, Je[SLAP] Ow! When I'm through with her I'm gonna [SLAP] slap some sense into you too! I'll set everything righ[SLAP] Ugh! Starting with you, Pierce I'm gonna kill you the way I know you died [SLAP] and make sure you stay dead this ti[SLAP]!" Annie threatened as she and Britta kept trading slaps. "Stop cutti[SLAP] me off, Britta you [SLAP] bitch!"
"Oh nooooooooooo." Was all the guys could say. They did not seem too threatened.
"Boooooo! Get to the exciting stuff already! Like the clothes-ripping!" Pierce begged.
"You crazy honkeys all need to get some Jesus." Shirley sighed.
"CAN SOMEONE JUST TELL ME WHETHER OR NOT I'M A GHOST?" Troy cried. He was now running into the walls over and over again, to see if he could phase through. Finally, before he could hit the wall one last time and explode his bleeding head, Abed pulled a replica Ghostbusters proton back out of his backpack and stepped in front of Troy.
Abed pushed buttons and made ghostbuster noises as the proton pack lit up. "No, Troy, you are not a ghost. Otherwise I'd have busted you. Right now."
Relieved, Troy calmed down and returned to his seat. "Thanks, Abed. What would I do without you, bro?"
"It's all cool, man. Cool, cool, cool, cool. Cool cool cool. Cool." This went on for a while. Abed kept saying cool until Abed realized how many times he was saying cool, even for how many times he usually said cool cool cool. He then looked at the rest of the study group. Shirley was praying for the swift finality of Jesus' divine intervention while Britta and Annie were still fighting over who was gonna be the one to kick the shit out of Jeff. Pierce occasionally would commentate with a very non-PC joke.
Suddenly, a light bulb turned on in Abed-land.
"A-ha! That's it! I know what's going on!" Abed snapped his fingers so loudly everyone shut up. The silence awkwardly hung in the air, the lunacy which had seemed to absorb most of them wear off. Everyone, even the sullen Britta, sat down in their seats.
"I still say there's a pandemic and we… not no me, just the rest of you are all being very stupid about it." Britta grumbled as she reached into her pocket and pulled out a spare mask to put on. Everyone ignored her complaining.
"Y'know, the state of Iowa and I thought you weenies would never shut up." Leonard walked by, eating a slice of pizza.
"Shut up, Leonard!" Jeff snarled.
"I may shut up, but in the end, I'm Leonard Likes Pizza with 250 million subscribers on Youtube while you're the Alpha Loser of a pack of neurotic losers with not one scrap of emotional contentment shared between the alla-y'all." Leonard said as he walked off eating his pizza to his heart's content.
Jeff flipped Leonard the birds, then turned his attention to Abed. "Ok, Abed, this better be good. What TV show cliche are we living out this time?"
Abed wagged his finger. "Oh no, Jeff. This is something far far worse than what even the lousiest episode of dumped-on-Netflix content has to offer."
Jeff groaned and buried his head in his arms. Jeff really wished Abed… everyone would just get whatever wacky study group hijinks today was gonna have over with, so he could go home.
"You see everyone…" Abed paused for dramatic effect, making sure he took the time to directly look the rest of his study group one by one in the eye for at least a minute of silent intensity to really pump up that drama. "...we're in a fanfiction!"
"I CAN'T COUNT THE REASONS I SHOULD STAY ONE BY ONE THEY ALL JUST FADE AWAY."
Some pop song was playing on their radio as the Three Jokers arrived at Greendale Community College in the Tumbler, which in the time in-between chapters of this fanfic they had essentially Jokerized with paint and graffiti slogans.
"Is it just me or was that song really well-timed to coincide with our arrival here?" Leto Joker asked as they searched for an open parking space. "Hmm… you think this… Greendale's got their own version of Gotham City's Radio Needle Drop?"
"Don't care. This song sucks." Ledger Joker shot the radio with his gun to shut it up and began ranting. "Animal I Have Become by Three Days Grace, now that was a song. I made so many goddamn Sasuke and Itachi AMVs with that song back in the day. Man, those were the days!"
"Uh, we're just looking for parking. Not escaping the po-po." Phoenix Joker pointed out as the Tumbler bumped into something knocking it over and what followed was a long sick crunching noise. "You should drive more carefully, Heath. I think you just ran over that guy with the star burns."
"Tough nuts." Ledger Joker scoffed.
"Hate to agree with Heath, but someone with a fashion sense like that is just asking to get hit by a car." Leto Joker said, without a scrap of self-awareness. Look who's talking, Mr. Damaged!
"Fuck it." Ledger Joker, in the driver's seat, decided that enough was enough as they kept passing filled up spaces. Using the massive Batpower of the Tumbler, he drove over three unlucky students' cars and drove off as the crushed wreckage exploded. The student with the star burns had been trying to claw his crushed body away like a pitiful bloody snake, only to be enveloped by the flames. Unaware of this, Ledger Joker backed over him and then the smoldering ruins to park.
"You sure this is the place?" Ledger Joker asked Phoenix Joker as he put the Tumbler in parking.
"Yeah, I double-checked the app Lex Luthor made for me before he, um, died a couple chapters ago." Phoenix Joker explained. "There's a lotta potential folks potentially becoming The Jokers just concentrated here."
"Here? Some random ass college in Colorado?" Leto Joker butted into the conversation. "What the hell ever happens in Colorado?"
"Hey, Jared, shut your mouth and show some respect! This is the state with the college that gave us the guys who gave us… South Park! And Cannibal the Musical! And Team America! And… Baseketball! …scratch that last one." But then Ledger Joker thought about it some more and realized he had some doubts. "But still… you really think this is the place where we're gonna grow our Joker Army? South Park came outta a real college, not a fuckin' community."
"Hey, that app is Lexcorp Tech. When it comes to anything besides killing Superman, 'ol Lex was real dependable. The data ain't lyin' if it says there's lotta Jokers waiting to be born here. We just gotta find out how." Phoenix Joker rubbed his chin as they got out of the car and looked around. A few Greendale students stared and whispered, but most of the campus just seemed to carry on like nothing had happened.
"Huh. You'd think Three Jokers showing up would bring more attention. The way they're ignorin' us, you'd think we're bums or something." Phoenix Joker pointed out.
"Well, it's a college you know. Breeders of liberal tendencies. And what is more liberal than ignoring the homeless cause they're inconvenient while hitching yourself to the latest social justice bullshit trend?" Ledger Joker insisted.
"Hey are you guys the teachers for the Advanced Professional Cosplay course?" Some fat nerd in glasses dressed up as the fat guy in glasses from Jurassic Park asked as he walked up for them. "I'm Garrett and I worked really hard on this chick magnet outfit! What do you think?"
"Fist magnet, more like it!" Ledger Joker punched Garrett.
"New teachers? We ain't fucking teachers!" Leto Joker grabbed Garrett by the neck while he was stunned. Leto Joker looked around. Nobody seemed too plussed that there were Three Jokers, abusing the hell out of one of their fellow students. Nobody intervened, called for someone to call for help - everyone just moved along. "Kid, what kind of fucked up school is this if Jokers showing up is nothing outta the ordinary?"
"Blame the Study Group!" Garrett panted as Leto Joker released him. "Ever since they formed, weird shit kept happening at this school until weird shit just became normal!"
"Study group, huh? And they're what this school revolves around, eh?" Phoenix Joker rubbed his chin and then snapped his fingers as he got a bright idea. The Three Jokers produced their pistols and pointed them at Garrett, who started sweating an ocean. "Fatso, take us to your leader!"
"Abed… how the hell are we in a fanfiction? We are all…" Jeff glanced at who he was talking to again and corrected himself. "Most of us are living in reality."
"Please do not demean me." Abed chided Jeff. "Just because I am hyper media-literate and sometimes choose to cope with the harsh unsentimental reality of everyday life via the comforting lens of my favorite pop culture does not mean I am not acutely aware that we are living in reality. Cool? Cool cool cool."
"Abed, how does one make fanfiction of reality? Doesn't it have to be fiction… by a fan… of fiction?" Jeff pointed out.
"Uh, Jeff, you can totally make fanfiction about reality." Annie nervously interrupted, then glanced around the room in a bit of a sweat. "Not that I would know, heh heh."
"Yeah, just look at anything Britta tweets about 'ol Hillary." Pierce chuckled, then ducked as Britta threw an eraser at him.
"YOU'RE STILL FOLLOWING ME? I THOUGHT I BLOCKED YOU!" Britta roared.
"So you did. So you did." Pierce winked as Britta got on her phone and then her Twitter to start blocking Pierce's twitter alts. Pierce summarily opened up his phone and began making new alts on which to follow his fellow study group members on Twitter.
Abed disapprovingly shook his head at the side ruckus these two were causing and turned his attention back to Jeff.
"Everything happening today can be explained away by us being trapped in a bad fanfiction. Have you noticed how some of us seem so out of character?" Abed glanced at Britta and Annie, then at Shirley. "Or some of us have that one singular character trait that gets honed in on and exaggerated so much we might as well be out of character? That's what bad fanfic writers tend to do - just so completely botch the voices of the characters they proclaim to love. Have you noticed how you're even more of an abrasive dick than usual, Jeff?"
"I am not an abrasive dick. I just tell things like they are." Jeff sighed.
"Said every abrasive dick ever." Abed replied like that was a gotcha.
Abed then snapped his fingers and on cue Troy wheeled over a big whiteboard with a bunch of important-looking information written on it, like they do in the movies when the film needs to dump a bunch of exposition on you and the set designer gets the job. Jeff sighed. He had a dreadful feeling he was not getting out of here anytime soon.
"Pierce is Dead? Troy is Missing? Not so fast, breaking news: our eyes don't deceive us…" Abed poked Troy to make sure he was there. Troy poked himself too, not exactly confident he was all there. "...yet Annie claimed otherwise. She claims not only that have we welcomed Chang into our fold but we also have made acquaintances at the least with some people we've never even heard of. Though Frankie… why does that name fill me with a sudden sense of dread?"
"Is your tone suggesting that I'm crazy? I'm not crazy! I'm very normal!" Annie insisted. Abed shushed her and resumed lecturing the others.
"And we also have Britta, insisting we're living in some super plague pandemic. Did you watch the movie Contagion recently, Ms. Perry? Did it make you paranoid? Silly Britta, I'm supposed to be the one that can't distinguish fiction from reality. You know, you should have consulted me first. I'd have warned you against wasting your time on that bore. Try 28 Days Later instead. It's a fun movie. And watch 28 Weeks Later too, don't believe the haters. Any movie that kills Jeremy Renner so horribly deserves accolades. I'm sorry, was that a spoiler? It is, I suppose. But if Jeremy Renner dies in your movie I think you should proudly be plastering it all over your advertising campaign. Fuck The Hurt Locker. Fuck American Hustle. Fu - actually, The Town and the Mission Impossibles were pretty neat. Wind River was alright if you need something to put Dad to sleep with on Saturday afternoon, I guess. But Renner - he can never be forgiven for Hawkeye. Fuck Hawkeye, really. How the hell do other Avengers keep getting killed to prolong his lifespan. Age of Ultron, that was some Age of Bullsh-"
"Abed, get to the point! You're trailing off into movie bullshit again!" Jeff piped up in frustration, cutting off Britta who was about to also voice her protests. Britta glared and mumbled something under her breath about how the rest of the study group were gonna be sorry for treating Covid like a hoax once they stopped breathing in a few days.
"I stopped watching movies. They're nothing but psy-ops to maintain the patriarchal white supremacist status quo." Britta finally proclaimed but everyone had already moved on.
Troy raised his hand.
"What is it, Troy?" Abed asked.
"Maybe we're experiencing a gas leak. Gas can do very funny, very bad things. I learned that from my adventures in maintenance." Troy explained.
"Excellent theory, my companero, but there's only so many times we can write things off as mass hysteria caused by a gas leak. No… all the evidence is pointing towards this entire community being trapped in a fanfic." Abed's face suddenly shifted into a more furtive expression. "Maybe everything Annie says is actually true. Some of us have died, some of us have moved on with our lives, while the rest of us remain trapped here as writers strain to contrive reasons as to why we're spending another year in a friggin' community college."
Annie's face brightened at the prospect that she might be right, and everyone else wrong.
"And maybe Britta is also right. That the world actually is going through one of those unprecedented events, that when it passes, will change things forever so thoroughly that there'll be no going back. And that us behaving as if everything is normal with the world is just pure bullshit that denies what's actually going on."
"Very insightful of you, Abed." Britta remarked.
"Eh, not so much. I think I'm mostly paraphrasing from advertising materials for The Dark Knight."
"COOOOOOOOOOOP." Britta pointed her finger at Abed like Donald Sutherland at the end of Invasion of the Body Snatchers (70s version) or Meg Tilly mid-way through Body Snatchers (the 90s version if you wanna get real hipster cinema about it) and began shrieking. "HOW COME BATMAN JUST SPENDS ALL HIS TIME BEATING UP THE POOR AND MENTALLY ILL INSTEAD OF SPENDING HIS MONEY ON SOCIAL INFRASTRUCTURE."
"Well you see…" Abed began.
"Seriously? My friggin' time is not bottomless!" Jeff bitched. But it was too late. Britta had successfully, how intentionally she actually meant it, baited Abed into derailing the conversation into a tangent again. Who knows how long it would take to get back on track. "Goddamn you Batman!"
"It's actually the Goddamn Batman, actually." Abed paused his current lecture to correct Jeff. "Not Goddamn you, Batman. Cool, Jeff? Cool cool cool. Now, back to what I was saying about comic book reality…"
"This is why I burnt my kids' comics. Smashed their Marvel DVDs. Nothing good comes from caped buffoonery. No, all they need is wholesome Bible-affiliated entertainment like Superbook and Veggie Tales." Shirley proclaimed as she shook her head in disapproval and Jeff plugged his hands over his ears in a vain attempt to drown out the noise.
"So, um, who are you guys again?" Dean Pelton was at his desk in his office. He'd been looking at a dusty VR set-up like the way of a lifelong boozer trying to get off the wagon looks at that bottle of Jack Daniels after a day or so. Without his pants on. Standing in front of him were The Three Jokers. When they came into his office he'd pulled them back up and buckled up in a hurry.
Not so successfully. Leto Joker couldn't help himself but stare down. And cringe. The feeling was mutual, whenever Dean Pelton laid eyes on him.
"And what's up with the masks?" The Dean eyed them curiously.
"Sir… have you forgotten there's like a very deadly plague going around?" Phoenix Joker pointed ou.t
"Plague, huh? The only plague around here is City College. You ain't from there, are you?" The Dean raised a suspicious eyebrow.
"Uh. No. The Coronavirus, bro. It's like killed millions." Ledger Joker corrected him.
"First I ever heard of it. And believe me, I would know. Knowing things and announcing them is like my job." Dean Pelton shrugged.
"Dude, the virus is everywhere. It's super-contagious." Leto Joker warned him.
"Well, prove it. Cough on me." The Dean got up in the Three Jokers' faces. "If I start feeling sick and die I'll believe you."
"Uh… like… let's not." Phoenix Joker pushed the Dean away from them.
"Those millions dead from your imaginary virus… hope they were all City College students and alumni. Soooo really., who the flip are you?" The Dean asked again as he straightened himself out.
"We're The Jokers. The Three Jokers. We're famous. Surely you've heard of us." Phoenix Joker introduced himself and held out his hand for a shake.
"Yeah, we're the Terrors of Gotham City. Like real terrorizing. We make Batman shit his pants." Ledger Joker swatted Phoenix Joker's hand aside to substitute his own right as the Dean was about to shake it. Bzzzzzzt the Dean went as the joy buzzer Ledger Joker had hidden on his palm took the Dean for an electric boogaloo.
"Heh. We gonna rock down to Electric Avenue." Ledger Joker quipped as the two other Jokers hooted and hollered.
"Ouch! That wasn't very nice!" The Dean wrung his hand as Ledger Joker let go. "Gotham City you say? Well sorry to inform you, but Gotham City is all the way over there and this here is Greendale, Colorado. Do you Gothamites keep track of what's going on in Kansas City? No? I didn't think so (and if you ask me, it's real fucked that Kansas City is in Missouri and not Kansas)."
"Seriously? You don't care who we are? We're like criminal masterminds." Leto Joker said. "We like fight Batman all the time. He's famous."
The Dean shrugged. "Batman? He's okay. But I always preferred Superman. Like, just look at that tight red underwear. And those muscles. And that chest hair just peekin' out from beneath that collar. Yuuuuuu-uhhhhh-mmmmmmy! Also, you're all ugly. Sorry, but I'd rather chase hairy than ugly."
The Three Jokers took a moment to briefly stare among themselves and wonder if what they were about to do was a good idea. Who was this bald-headed eccentric academic administrator? Who the hell in the year 202X besides losers and virgins prefer Superman to the goddamn Batman?
"Now if you're really criminals… well, I try to run Greendale with a strict anti-crime policy so this is normally where I'd get security to throw you out…" The Dean sighed. "Buuuuuuuut, our last security guy went kinda nutso and tried to take over the school. So I learned a valuable lesson and decided: no more security - just really really trust in the honor of students and staff to do the right thing. But that also means… I guess I'm at your mercy."
Phoenix Joker snapped his fingers. "Great! This means we can get whatever we want from you?"
The Dean shrugged and nodded.
"Okay, give us all your money." Ledger Joker demanded.
"Sorry bout this bro, but rent's tight." Leto Joker faux-apologized.
The Dean sighed. Took out his wallet and plopped out everything on the desk in front of the Three Jokers. It was not an impressive amount. Not even a Lincoln to be found in that lot, much less the Hamiltons and Jacksons. The Dean then reached in his pockets and produced one single penny turning green. He dropped it down on the desk where it rolled on its side haphazardly until clattering still.
"That's it?" Ledger Joker raised his eyebrows. "$3.01?"
"Hey, I'm a dean of a community college. What did you expect?"
Ledger Joker still scooped up all the money and pocketed it. "Oh well. Every buckaroo counts."
"Anything else I can do for you gentlemen?" The Dean scoffed.
"Yes, can we have a job?" Phoenix Joker asked. It was time to set the plan into motion. If all went according to plan… the New Joker Gang would arise in this here Community.
Six hours later
"And now that we have concluded that the argument Batman should be using his money to fund social programs and whatnot instead of beating up the mentally ill and poor is plain bullshit because it never bothers to acknowledge that Batman is operating under fantasy comic book logic rules - e.g. cops can be good. And also because that would really be a boring fucking movie. We can get back to our original topic of debate: proving that we are trapped in a fanfiction."
Britta opened her mouth. No legible words came out, just a wretched croak. She'd lost her voice screaming at Abed about how Batman is a copraganda fascist.
Abed took a deep breath and looked around the room. The women all looked bored out of their minds, except Britta looked like she was willing to let this go for another two days at the least. Abed gave her a look that let her know maybe it was time to go on, and also get a glass of water while you're at it because Jesus Girl your throat cannot be good right now. Jeff was on his phone again looking real pissed. Abed deduced that Jeff was either pissed at him, or on Twitter. Troy was asleep, good for him. Pierce had a doped-up expression on his face and was drooling, his hands were reaching downwards under the table and occasionally his arms would twitch violently. He was probably dreaming of Eartha Kitt again.
"For the last time, Abed, we are not in a fanfiction! We are real, we are not fiction. And I just lost my entire day to this lunacy!" Jeff complained as his stomach growled real loudly, jolting Troy and Pierce awake.
"Blast and tarnation! Right when it was getting good!" Pierce shook his head and shot Jeff a murderous look.
"Jeff, deny all you like, but the evidence all says otherwise."
"What evidence, Abed? All you got is the ravings of two very confused women." Upon saying that, Jeff seized up and silently cursed his big mouth. Now Annie and Britta had joined Pierce in looking like they were gonna kick his ass and take a leg too.
"True, all we have is Annie and Britta's words to go on about alternate realities that are supposedly the true realities we're actually the alternate reality of. But that's just what fanfiction can do - ignore the true status quo of both the content and the reality in which that content exists, in order to settle something that mayhaps is more comforting and thus preferable to the fanfic author."
"Abed, you're making me cross-eyed." Troy was starting to reel.
"Hang in there Troy. I'm almost done."
"Oh thank god." Jeff sarcastically crossed his arms like some petulant toddler in the toy store.
"And come on guys - do we really want to have our adventures reflect the less adventurous reality of whatever year it really is?" Abed turned to the reader, while everyone else gaped in confusion and wondered what Abed was looking at as they saw him stare and talk into empty space. "Do you really wanna know which of us would've voted for You-Know-Who and then stormed the Capitol and then tazed themselves in the plumbing? Which one of us would be some anti-vaxx conspiracy theorist, who'd probably be the first to get Covid and then give it to everyone else?"
"Uh… why are you all staring at me?" Pierce asked, extremely uncomfortable all of a sudden. They couldn't explain it, but the entire study group felt a sudden compelling urge to look at Pierce suspiciously. Even Jeff, despite his best attempts at apathy, couldn't resist the pull of the stare. Jeff Winger, for some reason, started feeling chills in his bones.
"And on and on and on of the things the people probably don't need answered about us. There's only certain kinds of media, especially the frivolous kind, that can responsibly deal with real pressing issues and do you honestly think we're the type for that? Would audiences - the type who aren't terminally online and use CNN as their primary news source - really prefer six seasons and a movie of lectures over laughter?"
Abed suddenly looked like he was having second thoughts. "Huh, maybe scratch that movie part. Six seasons is well enough. Movies are on life support anyways, and TV probably isn't too far behind either."
"Six seasons, I like the sound of that." Pierce said, raising up his fingers. But for some reason, he could count to four. Every time he tried to go higher, all his fingers went down and counted back up to four and down again. Over and over. "A little help here, guys?"
"Forget it, Pierce. We're not pulling any of your fingers!" Britta spoke for the ladies, with Annie and Shirley nodding in agreement.
"Guys… I'm having trouble too!" Troy yelped, suddenly panicked as he too found that he couldn't count to six. Only five and then he was back at the bottom of the slide.
"Hmmm… I can't attest to that. But I can only get my little pinky up halfway." Shirley noted. She couldn't extend her pinky to full length as she counted to six.
"Seeeeeee? It's cause you're not supposed to be here!" Annie cried.
Jeff shook his head. The day had finally come, hadn't it? Abed had snapped again and his madness was spreading fast to the rest of the study group. If Abed suddenly put on some fake cardboard paper goatee again, Jeff was freaking outta here for good. Jeff rose out of his seat and stormed over to Abed. He started shaking Abed back and forth.
"Get a grip Abed!" Jeff shouted. Suddenly, the door was kicked open. Everyone turned to see it was Todd. His clothes were all disheveled, burnt at the shoulders as massive clouds of smoke drifted upwards from him, and he was bleeding from his forehead. For some reason he was occasionally sparking off electricity. Gripped in his shaky hands with a bloodied wrench. Cupped above his other arm was a box of kittens.
"Uh… I can see this isn't a good time. Uh… nice seeing you guys!" Todd awkwardly waved good-bye and walked away awkwardly.
"Ah… and another piece of the puzzle shows itself." Abed pointed out. "Just like when Leonard walked by earlier. We have a writer who clearly thinks that clunky references to previous events and walk-on cameos by beloved tertiary characters can cover up their own hack tendencies. Hell, just look at what I'm saying. Pointing out you're a hack writer in text does not excuse you from being a hack writer! Can't you see it, Jeff? Can't you?"
"No, Abed. I can't." Jeff fumed and went back into his seat, and got back on his phone. "Just let me know when I can go home."
"It's a pity…" Abed looked around. "You'd think that if we were trapped in a fanfic… the puppetmaster would at least have the decency to go wild with wacky adventures. The budget is but endless words of imagination in fanfic. But we've spent the entire day deliberating in this room… like it's just another bottle episode. Only without any monkeys or Chang for amusement. Judging by my gut feeling, I think we're at the end of this chapter, and it was honestly a real lousily plotted one. Nothing but set-up for nothing and tangents about nothing. And I don't think there's going to be any last minute development to sha"
Before Abed could finish his sentence, Dean Pelton burst into the room. He was dressed like the Penguin and Catwoman from the 60s Batman TV show in one outfit… and for some reason, with a dash of Two-Face from Batman Forever only instead of scar tissue his scarred half was dalmatian spots.
"Huh." Abed thought.
"Heeeeeeeeellooooo study group!" Dean Pelton said. "I've come here to personally announce our exciting new course to replace Intro to Stand-up Comedy: Intro to Jokerfication! And here to meet you himself is Professor Fleck!"
Dean Pelton stepped aside and in walked Phoenix Joker, who had taken off his make-up and undyed his hair to resume usage of his pre-gamer and pre-Joker identity of Arthur Fleck. Upon seeing him, an alarm went off inside Abed's head as red flags began waving in front of his very eyes. Arthur Fleck... why did that name fill him was dread? Just what was Jokerfication? Did it have something to do with The Joker, arch-nemesis of his hero Batman?
"Hiya kiddos! And hiya to the not-so kiddos!" Phoenix Joker waved to the Greendale Study Group.
"Who the heck are you supposed to be?" Pierce asked derisively. "The Dean pick ya outta Bums R Us (aka the city of San Francisco) to teach Advanced Hobology?"
"Ha ha ha... not! Weren't ya payin' attention? The course is Intro to Jokerfication!" Phoenix Joker chided Pierce extremely condescendingly. "You clearly ain't no Joker yet... but that's what Jokerfication is for!"
"Uh… Jokerfication? What's that?" Troy scratched his head in confusion.
"Jokerfication… is when you become The Joker… like this!" With a whirlwind of action, Phoenix Joker rapidly applied make-up and hair-dye to turn himself back into The Joker. "I'm Professor Joker and I'm looking super forward to working at your school and teaching all ya how to become… Jokers! Just like me and my TA here - TA Joker!"
In walked Ledger Joker.
"I'll put some education in that head." Ledger Joker cackled as he rubbed his palms together.
"EEEEEEEEEEEEE." Abed froze up as he fully processed and began blaring his internal alarms out loud just what the hell was going on here.
"Intro to what now?" Jeff looked up from his phone briefly before looking back at his phone. "Oh well, as long as it's easy credit."
On the next Three Jokers at Community (not?) in the Pandemic(?):
Leto Joker, working in a different job in Greendale Administration than his fellow Jokers, gets shit all over.
Phoenix Joker's plot is threatened by the arrival of another crossover… from a show about nothing!
Star-Burns is okay and expected to fully recover.
And last but not least…
Chang.