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Community Moving to Yahoo! For Sixth Season

Community lives! Internet giant Yahoo, which made it clear last spring that it wanted to jump into the same original programming waters as Netflix, Amazon and Hulu, has struck a deal with producer Sony Pictures Television to stream a 13-episode, sixth and almost certainly final season of the Dan Harmon comedy. And yes, Harmon will be back as showrunner. "I am very pleased that Community will be returning for its predestined sixth season on Yahoo,” Harmon said in a release announcing the dea. “I look forward to bringing our beloved NBC sitcom to a larger audience by moving it online. I vow to dominate our new competition. Rest easy, Big Bang Theory. Look out, Bang Bus!" Community was canceled by NBC in May, but lead production studio Sony Pictures Television has been working relentlessly to find a new home for the show ever since. The studio engaged in serious conversations with Hulu about a deal, with the internet streamer seriously interested in acquiring exclusive rights to season six (it already syndicates past seasons). The two sides couldn’t make the economics work, however, people familiar with the discussions said. By contrast, Yahoo!, eager to land a show with a built-in audience and flush with cash, didn’t have a problem figuring out the financial details. Indeed, Vulture hears the production budget for Community’s sixth season will not be dramatically different than the most recent NBC season of the show.

In addition to Harmon returning as showrunner, Community vet Chris McKenna is also in talks to return as exec producer and Harmon's top lieutenant. And while the six seasons part of #SixSeasonsAndAMovie has come true, there’s nothing official — yet— about the feature film part. Industry insiders, however, say there have been discussions about how that might still happen, too. NBCUniversal-owned Universal Televison, meanwhile, blessed Sony's talks with Yahoo and will remain as a co-producer on the show (though Sony, as it always has, will remain lead studio in day-to-day production of the show).

The Yahoo deal represents an amazing reprieve for Community, which many Hollywood types considered to be well and truly dead after NBC's axing and after various cable nets passed on the show. But Sony execs, as they have in the past with many shows on their roster, continued to explore all options to keep the show alive. (The studio has developed something of a rep for not accepting network cancellations as final verdicts, having previously resurrected Damages, Rules of Engagement and Unforgettable. Sony is now hoping to secure a second season of NBC's The Night Shift, which had been assumed to be a summer burn-off but has so far performed well for the Peacock). Timing also worked to Sony's benefit, since Community's free agency happened around the same time as Yahoo chief Marissa Mayer's plan to jump into first-run programming. The Internet giant wants to find new ways to attract advertisers beyond print content and short-form web series. And while outlets such as the Wall Street Journal and Variety have reported Yahoo has been talking to agents about finding new material their clients might produce for Yahoo, picking up Community will let Yahoo quickly get into the first-run, full-length series game.

Dan wrote:There's going to be a 6th season!

stupidregister wrote:

Dan wrote:There's going to be a 6th season!

Yeah...but why?

Tommy Bunz wrote:Last season was hit or miss but still pretty happy about this.
Glover really needs to stop acting like a fag and come back.

Greendale College has lost another student.

Yvette Nicole Brown's Shirley won't be retuning to "Community" when it makes its move to Yahoo! next year, following five seasons on NBC.

The actress told TV Guide that she's leaving the show in order to care of her ailing father.

"Yvette was an integral part of Community and is irreplaceable. We are sad to see her go and wish her the very best," the show's creators Dan Harmon and Chris McKenna said in a statement.

It's unclear as of now how the show will explain Shirley's absence, but it will reportedly be introducing two major characters, one male and one female.

Fans will still be able to see Brown on TV in 2015 however. She recently took on a supporting CBS' upcoming revival of "The Odd Couple," co-starring Matthew Perry and Thomas Lennon. The show is a multi-camera comedy which will have a much more flexible schedule than "Community."

"A multi-camera sitcom is a better fit for the life I have now," Brown explained. "I can't say enough how much I respect Sony and Dan for how they handled this profound change in my life."

"Community" stars Joel McHale, Gillian Jacobs, Alison Brie, Danny Pudi, Ken Jeong and Jim Rash will all return. Co-stars Donald Glover and Jonathan Banks exited the series last season.

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bbatson1 wrote:just watched the 1st episode. Terrible. Probably one of the worst of the series. I'm about to check ep 2. I hope it gets better.