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Context Recap / CommunityS3E05HorrorFictionInSevenSpookySteps

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1[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/horror_fiction_in_seven_spooky_steps_7.jpg]]
2[[caption-width-right:350:Magnum and his girls.]]
3
4Britta is throwing a Halloween pre-party party before the study group goes to the actual party. Abed and Troy show up as [[JustForFun/InspectorSpacetime the Inspector and the Constable]] and Jeff shows up as one of those [[Film/TheFastAndTheFurious Fast and Furious guys]]. When he goes to leave, however, Britta stops him and reveals the truth.
5
6Remember those [[Recap/CommunityS3E03CompetitiveEcology psychological evaluations]] Britta made everyone do? Well, she ran the numbers, and it turns out ''someone'' in the study group has homicidal tendencies. She claims that it's her directive as a psychology student to figure out this person and get them the treatment they need. The problem is that the tests were anonymous, so Britta devises a way to figure out the sociopath: tell scary stories, and see how everyone reacts.
7
8One hour later, Britta has redone all the tests...and six of the seven reveal that the test taker is mentally disturbed. The group decides not to know which one is the sane one so they can all think it is them and leave for the party. Afterwards, it's revealed the sane test belonged to Abed.
9----
10!!The ''Series/{{Community}}'' episode "Horror Fiction In Seven Spooky Steps" provides examples of:
11
12* AcceptableBreaksFromReality: Abed tells a horror story that is consumed with being realistic and avoid clichés or implausible actions, and removes any trope which might result in this ... which results in his story being a boring description of two people standing in the middle of a room on full alert conspicuously not being murdered by a serial killer.
13* AcePilot: Troy and Abed are mentioned to be these at the beginning of Troy's story.
14* AlwaysABiggerFish[=/=]FoodChainOfEvil: Annie's story ends with Vampire Jeff being eaten alive by Werewolf Annie.
15* AndIMustScream: In Annie's story, vampire!Jeff gets eaten and is alive to experience all of it. The entire group is ''horrified''.
16* AnthropicPrinciple: Demonstrated with Abed's story: sure, it is nice to see GenreSavvy characters taking proper steps to defend themselves from an escaped SerialKiller [[DefiedTrope instead of being]] TooDumbToLive, but if obstacles such as, say, [[WhatHappenedToTheMouse the aforementioned serial killer just don't show up]], then all the author gets is a teeth-grindingly annoyed audience.
17* {{Anvilicious}}: In-universe examples. Shirley's story where the bad people are all hurt. Jeff's story has the lesson that killers are just misunderstood people who need a hug.
18* ArsonMurderAndJaywalking: Being buried to the neck in scorpions is followed by a lava enema, which is followed by Pilates. Subverted when TheDevil explains that Pilates is the name of the demon who will eat your genitals.
19* ArtShift: Annie's story is shot in Victorian style.
20* AudibleSharpness: The knife in Troy's story when being pulled out of the block.
21* AuthorTract: Shirley's story is an in-universe example.
22-->'''Devil-Dean:''' ''(swings around a chainsaw and cackles evilly)'' GAY MARRIAGE!!
23* BackToBackBadasses: Britta and Abed in Abed's story. Deconstructed because Abed finishes the story ''right there'' and Annie gets angry because it implies nothing of any kind happens to the characters afterwards (she phrases it as them getting killed, but it's obvious she wanted to see the slasher do ''something'').
24* BeastAndBeauty: This is what Annie's story appears to be going for until the twist.
25* BigNo: In Troy's story.
26* BlowYouAway: In Shirley's story, she appears as an angel and blows away TheDevil (the Dean).
27* BodyHorror: In Troy's dream, he and Abed got sewn together by Pierce. In retaliation, Troy and Abed sewed Pierce's butt to his chest, his hands to his legs, and his feet to his arms.
28* BowChickaWowWow: Parodied in Pierce's story. It opens with a SuspiciouslySimilarSong to 70s porn flicks while all three female leads are in a LingerieScene.
29* BrainySpecs: Britta wears some while reading [[PunnyName Warren Piece]].
30* BrickJoke: Combined with FunnyBackgroundEvent and ShoutOut. As Annie complains that there's nothing on Britta's playlist but Spooky Party, the ''Film/{{Beetlejuice}}'' soundtrack, and Creator/{{NPR}} podcasts, a student dressed as Beetlejuice walks by the window. This is the third time someone has said "Beetlejuice" in the course of the entire ''series'' (previously Michelle Slater said it in "[[Recap/CommunityS1E16CommunicationStudies Communication Studies]]" and Britta in "[[Recap/CommunityS2E08CooperativeCalligraphy Cooperative Calligraphy]]").
31* BridalCarry: Occurs in both Annie's and Troy's stories.
32* BrownBagMask: The sack-masked killer in Britta's and Jeff's stories.
33* BuffySpeak: Britta's story is filled with it, including the killer having a "hook thingy."
34* CallBack:
35** Abed and (maybe) Jeff are likely the only two sane people in the group, as noted in "[[Recap/CommunityS1E20TheScienceOfIllusion The Science of Illusion.]]"
36** "[[Recap/CommunityS3E03CompetitiveEcology Competitive Ecology]]" ends with the group filling in psych profile tests for Britta. This episode focusses on the aftermath of Britta getting the results for those tests back.
37* CardboardPrison: Justified in Abed's story. Given the recent economic downturn, the nearby asylum cut corners and a patient escaped.
38* TheCasanova: Pierce in his story.
39* CaughtUpInTheRapture: Shirley's story.
40* CellPhonesAreUseless: {{Defied|Trope}} in Abed's story. He made sure his cell phone was fully charged before heading up to the mountain cabin and calls the police the very second he thinks the slasher is nearby, which is answered immediately.
41* ChainsawGood: The Dean in Shirley's story.
42* CoincidentalBroadcast: Played straight in Britta's story, {{lampshade|Hanging}}d in Abed's story -- much to the annoyance of everyone except Troy (who bops along with the Muzak Abed has playing until the broadcast proper).
43* ComicallyMissingThePoint:
44** When Britta, very concerned, discusses how borderline-sociopathic Annie's story came across, Troy takes it as Britta "pinning ribbons on her" and comes up with a story of his own in an attempt to top Annie's.
45** Pierce doesn't even try to tell a scary story and instead uses his story to [[HerCodenameWasMarySue glorify himself]] and lash out at Troy and Abed over his treatment in Troy's story. He also assumes the cool hedonist leader in Shirley's story (a stand-in for Jeff) to be his own stand-in character, and wonders why Jeff wasn't in the story.
46** Britta misunderstands the meaning of "[[PersonAsVerb Britta-ing]]" (it's something along the lines of "fucking up") as "making a tiny and ''understandable'' mistake."
47* CompetencePorn: Abed's story is an inversion: sure, the heroic characters are (by slasher victim standards) hyper-competent, but the (InUniverse) audience (other than Troy) ''hates'' this.
48* ContinuityNod: Troy mentions that the Dean got [[Recap/CommunityS2E06Epidemiology taco meat from the army for the Halloween party.]]
49* CoolAndUnusualPunishment: The fate that befalls MadScientist!Pierce in Troy's story.
50* CreatorBreakdown: InUniverse, each narrator's story is more than a little informed by their personal issues and relationships to the rest of the group:
51** Britta's has her and Jeff's FriendsWithBenefits relationship from the previous season as a subtext, as well as her StrawFeminist tendencies, with her being "smart" and staying in the car and Jeff getting out and dying (after Britta badgered him), all while she screams that she was right.
52** Abed's demonstrates his difficulty connecting with people in general and the other members of the group specifically, as represented by Britta; he's more interested in the practical details of the story and shuts down any attempt her character makes to try and bond with him, [[IgnoreTheFanservice romantically]] or otherwise. His story also fails to engage the other members of the group [[HeterosexualLifePartners other than Troy.]]
53** Annie's reveals both [[ShipTease her desire to change Jeff for the better]] coupled with a bit of insecurity over how reliable a potential partner he may be and [[GreenEyedMonster a hint of jealousy over Britta and Jeff's hookups]] masked as disdain for Britta's character.
54** Troy's is about his and Abed's ability to overcome Pierce's attempts to drive a wedge between them out of jealousy in the previous episode, along with the suggestion that Troy might be more than a little codependent in his friendship with Abed.
55** Pierce is not-so-subtly lashing out at Troy and Abed over the previous story, complete with '70s-style [[JiveTurkey racial stereotypes.]] This is coupled with his [[DirtyOldMan leching over the female members of the group]].
56** Shirley is basically a polemic of her religious beliefs coupled with a bit of insecurity/vengeance over what she sees as the ways the other members of the group exclude her.
57** Jeff basically wants to resolve the conflicts that have arisen between the other members of the group without actually putting the work required in to resolve them.
58* DeconstructedTrope: The GenreSavvy RationalFic, as the characters point out how Abed's attempt to be logical and defy typical horror tropes in his story just ends up being boring and lacking suspense.
59* DecoyDamsel: Annie in her story.
60* DefiedTrope: Abed's story is a step-by-step list of defiances of slasher cliches:
61** The characters were already [[SexSignalsDeath hesitant to have sex]] even before they hear about the escaped SerialKiller,
62** The characters [[IgnoredVitalNewsReports immediately pay attention to the news]] about the escaped serial killer and [[ItsProbablyNothing immediately assume the weird noises outside their cabin to be said serial killer]],
63** The characters [[CellPhonesAreUseless immediately call the police through their charged cell phones]], the call immediately gets through and [[PoliceAreUseless the cops (who don't dismiss the characters) tell them they will be there in a few minutes]],
64** The characters [[LetsSplitUpGang stick together and immediately go to a defensible part of the cabin]], arm themselves, and [[BackToBackBadasses stand back to back]] keeping an eye on all entry points while they wait for the cops.
65** In a minor (and more comedic) example, Abed doesn't adds the news broadcast the very second the characters turn on the radio and plays music for a little while because he wishes to avoid such ContrivedCoincidence.
66* DepartmentOfRedundancyDepartment: In Britta's narration:
67-->'''Radio announcer:''' ... an escaped convict from the asylum has escaped...
68* DiggingYourselfDeeper: In attempting to persuade everyone that there could be a psychopathic individual in the study group, Britta's graphic description of what could happen if they were allowed to go unidentified and untreated only serves to freak everyone out and convince them -- and herself -- that ''she's'' the psychopath in question.
69* DontGoInTheWoods: Mentioned in Annie's story where [[HorsingAround she is thrown off her horse]] and Jeff had to save her from the vile creatures of the woods.
70%%* DramaticThunder: All over the place.
71* DramaticUnmask: [[TheKillerInMe Britta]] removing her BrownBagMask.
72* DumbassHasAPoint: When Britta is revealing her motives for the Halloween stories, Pierce points out that if one of them was a murderous psychopath, in over two years of friendship and hanging out they'd have probably picked up on something before now.
73* DyingAlone: A complicated example in Britta's story. The killer in it murdered Britta alone while the other main characters were killed in pairs (Troy and Abed, Annie and Shirley, Jeff and Pierce), but turns out Britta (or at least her EvilTwin) is also the killer.
74* EarnYourHappyEnding: Deconstructed with Abed's story. From what he says afterwards, he seems to think that "earning" it would be the characters following a number of logical steps not to get killed by the book. Annie fires back disgust at not seeing the characters actually having any ''obstacles'' to fight off to go along with the logical decisions.
75%%* EinsteinHair: Pierce in Troy's story.
76* EpicFail:
77** The group refers to this as [[PersonAsVerb "Britta."]] It doesn't help that she graded the tests upside down, failed to notice even after double checking, and set the whole episode's plot in motion because of the misunderstanding.
78** Troy invokes this after Shirley's AuthorTract story.
79--->"You ruined a Britta party. That's like letting poop spoil."
80* EvenBetterSequel: In-universe. Troy expresses this opinion for ''VideoGame/SuperMonkeyBall 2'' right before being attacked in Britta's story.
81* EvilGloating: Lampshaded in Jeff's story when Jeff asks Evil Chang to explain himself.
82-->'''Jeff''': Wait. Before you do anything, tell us why you kill people.
83* EvilSoundsDeep: Annie when she turns into a werewolf. She also gets SupernaturalGoldEyes.
84* EvilTwin: Britta is the killer in her own story. TheReveal didn't happen until after she killed a version of Britta who wore glasses.
85* FateWorseThanDeath: In Shirley's story, the cool hedonists are chainsawed into pieces by Devil-Dean, only for him to put them back together and chainsaw them into pieces again, ''forever''.
86* FlamingDevil: The Dean in Shirley's story.
87* {{Foreshadowing}}:
88** Troy and Abed reveal that they were already in their Inspector Spacetime and Constable Reggie costumes when Britta called to invite them to her Halloween Party. [[spoiler:Chances are, they were dressed this way because they were playing in the Dreamatorium, which will be revealed in two episodes and which they spend a lot of time over the season [[InsistentTerminology rendering imaginated dreamscapes]].]]
89** Annie's story involves her trying to change Jeff for the better (with the [[ShipTease subtext]] of him becoming a more suitable romantic partner for her), only for it all to go south when he reverts to his old ways. [[spoiler:In "[[Recap/CommunityS3E16VirtualSystemsAnalysis Virtual Systems Analysis]]" later in the season, she ends up admitting to herself and Abed that she keeps trying to push Jeff into fitting various roles he's possibly not suited for because she's "in love with the idea of being loved" and afraid of being lonely.]]
90** The murderer in Jeff's story is played by Chang. [[spoiler:"[[Recap/CommunityS3E21TheFirstChangDynasty The First Chang Dynasty]]" has Chang trying to murder the study group.]]
91** [[spoiler: All of the stories are varying degrees of horrific and violent... except for Abed's, who never puts either of his characters in any danger. This foreshadows that he's the one person in the group ''without'' psychopathic tendencies.]]
92* FramingDevice: The results for the tests Britta had the group fill out a couple episodes ago have come back, and someone is potentially homicidally insane. Britta feels the best way to detect who it could be is to tell scary stories and observe the results.
93* FreezeFrameBonus: If you look at the tests at the end you'll see that Pierce's test has all but two answers that indicate he's a psychopath. This is in keeping with him being the most villainous member of the group.
94* FryingPanOfDoom: In Troy's story, he and Abed use one to whack Pierce via telekinesis.
95* FunnyBackgroundEvent: This episode takes it to a whole [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=19FMU3M7Jtk&feature=player_embedded different level.]] After two previous episodes had characters saying ''{{Film/Beetlejuice}}'' Annie said it a third time here. Sure enough, Beetlejuice himself walks by in the background right after.
96* FurAgainstFang: Annie's story -- after her AuthorAvatar fails to reform Jeff's vampire character, she reveals she's a werewolf and eats him alive.
97* GagPenis: Pierce has one in his story. There are two hits when he unzips his pants, one is when it hits the floor, the other is when he uses it to knock Troy's character to the ground.
98* GangstaStyle: Abed and Troy hold their guns this way in Pierce's story.
99* GenreSavvy: Parodied and deconstructed; Abed objects to the GenreBlindness displayed by the characters in Britta's story, explaining that character's making decisions the audience never would makes us lose sympathy for them. His innate Genre Savviness leads him to construct a perfectly logical horror story where the protagonists [[AvertedTrope avoid every single cliché, mistake and convention]] present in the genre ... even the [[AcceptableBreaksFromReality ones necessary for telling a story]] (up to and including not even bothering to show the killer). This almost completely robs his story of suspense, tension and horror and just serves to bore and irritate his audience.
100-->'''Annie:''' Ugh! Do these people ever die or what?!\
101'''Abed:''' ''["Spooky" voice]'' Eventually ... once it had been ... '''''earrrrrrrrned!!'''''
102* GenreRoulette: The study group's stories all parody slightly different subgenres of horror fiction. Abed's story is a SlasherMovie (with a streak of meta-commentary in the vein of ''Film/{{Scream}}''), Annie's story is a ParanormalRomance story in the vein of Creator/AnneRice or Creator/StephenieMeyer, Troy's story is a [[Creator/DavidCronenberg Cronenbergian]] sci-fi horror story, and Shirley's story is a ReligiousHorror story with the same premise as ''Literature/LeftBehind''.
103* {{Glurge}}: Invoked in-universe; Shirley's tale is a perfect, [[ComicBook/ChickTracts Jack Chick-like]] mix of treacly moralizing and horrendous damnation, and most find it annoying rather than scary or uplifting.
104* {{Gorn}}: Annie doesn't spare any details about Vampire!Jeff's rather gruesome fate.
105* GrievousBottleyHarm: Shirley's ImprovisedWeapon.
106* GroupHug: Jeff's story ends with one, even including hook-handed killer Chang.
107* HalloweenEpisode: With all of the standards, including disguises, special titles, and being a FormulaBreakingEpisode.
108* TheHedonist: In Shirley's story, she depicts the other six members of the group as such.
109* HeldGaze: The vampire and the schoolteacher is Annie's horror story when he enters carrying her and they're both staring at each other, referencing the "googly eyes" phenomenon between Jeff and Annie in real life.
110* HerCodenameWasMarySue: All of the stories play with this to some degree:
111** Pierce makes himself an irresistible sex-stud with a full head of hair capable of beating up gangbangers with his GagPenis.
112** Shirley makes herself a [[MessianicArchetype angelic messiah-figure who nobly forgives her friends their sins]] [[CaughtUpInTheRapture before being raptured into Heaven]]) really go to town with it. Her story contains a particularly lame attempt to pretend this isn't the case:
113-->'''Britta:''' Thank you for saving us, Shirley! I mean, your name's not Shirley, this is a story about strangers!
114** Britta isn't as aggressive about this, but her AuthorAvatar is much more sensible than Jeff and takes the opportunity to gloat about her survival.
115** Abed makes himself very rational and competent, to the point that it ruins his story. Though he also does this to Britta's stand-in.
116** Annie makes herself a sweetheart who teaches Vampire Jeff to read and reforms him but [[SilkHidingSteel can also brutally murder him when he betrays her.]]
117** Troy's stand-in outsmarts a MadScientist, gains superpowers, and plays out an involved revenge fantasy against Pierce that he shares with his best friend Abed.
118** Jeff's stand-in stops a murderous Chang and saves all his friends with a powerful speech.
119* HoistByHisOwnPetard: Pierce in Troy's story. His MadScientist self sews Troy and Abed together, but ends up being experimented on himself. But it's subverted in that he actually [[TooKinkyToTorture enjoys what they've done to him]]...
120* HollywoodPsych: While sociopathy is certainly not a condition to take lightly, it doesn't automatically mean that one is predisposed to homicidal behavior, as there are multiple factors that affect one's propensity for violence. Then again, it ''is'' [[KnowNothingKnowItAll Britta]] interpreting the results, which, as it turns out, she didn't process correctly in the first place.
121* [[HookHand Hook Thing Where His Hand Should Be]]: The killer in Britta and Jeff's stories features one.
122* HourglassPlot: Troy's story has Pierce swap power positions with Troy/Abed.
123* HypocriticalHumor:
124** During the stand-off at the end, Annie can be heard yelling, "Stay back, psychos, or I'll slit your throats and bathe in your blood!"
125** Jeff doesn't know which of ''Film/TheFastAndTheFurious'' guys he's dressed as because "I don't watch that shallow crap. [[ImmediateSelfContradiction I just pick a costume girls'll like.]]"
126** As Jeff explains that he isn't a sociopath, he actually displays several traits of sociopathy such as remorselessness, egocentricity and amorality. See the [[Fridge/{{Community}} Fridge Brilliance]] page for more details.
127** Shirley's self-description of herself (via her perfecter-than-perfect AuthorAvatar) as a human embodiment of forgiveness, compassion and mercy is undercut when she blissfully abandons her friends to get horribly tortured for all eternity, thus hinting at the vindictive streak lurking underneath her self-righteousness.
128** Although Abed calls Britta out for the lack of realism and logic in her story, his own ended up being even worse in that regard.
129** After Pierce tells his story, Annie worries that the stories were getting personal. However, she used her story to vent her frustrations regarding her relationship with Jeff and even includes a jab at Britta.
130* IAmAMonster: Jeff in Annie's story.
131* IdiotBall: Abed's story is devoted to defying this completely.
132* ImprovisedWeapon: Despite being in a college library, most of the study group can come up with a weapon at a moments notice. Shirley wields a [[GrievousBottleyHarm broken bottle]], Pierce a fire extinguisher, Annie a [[ShearMenace pair of scissors]], Troy uses pencils for WolverineClaws and Abed becomes the ChairmanOfTheBrawl. Averted by Britta, who wields a SinisterSwitchblade.
133* InUniverseFactoidFailure:
134** Shirley seems to think that you can snort marijuana and that NPR is a music station on which partying kids would be listening to Death Metal.
135** Also, Britta seems to think that ''Literature/WarAndPeace'' is actually called ''Warren Piece''.
136* InadvertentEntranceCue: in Shirley's story.
137-->'''Hedonist leader (Jeff)''': Oh man! End of days! Could anything suck harder than this!
138-->'''Devil!Dean appears'''
139* InstantSedation: Spoofed in Troy's story when Troy and Abed go out in no time.
140* IToldYouSo: In Britta's story, "Britta" feels the need to point this out to "Jeff". While he's being ''stabbed to death by a serial killer''.
141* JawDrop: Britta's response to Pierce's story is slack-jawed, horrified astonishment.
142-->'''Jeff:''' [[PunctuatedForEmphasis What ... in the hell ... was that.]]
143* JiveTurkey: Troy and Abed in Pierce's story.
144* KavorkaMan: Pierce hooks up with all three female leads in his story.
145* TheKillerInMe: The ending to Britta's story. Even the ''real'' Britta didn't see it coming.
146* KubrickStare: Jeff in Annie's story after declaring IAmAMonster.
147* LingerieScene: The female characters in [[DirtyOldMan Pierce]]'s story (see page image).
148* LittleNo: Abed in his own story, when Britta asks him if he would like to kiss her again.
149* MadScientist: Pierce in Troy's story.
150* MessianicArchetype: Parodied by Shirley's story, in which Shirley -- "I mean, your name's not Shirley, this is a story about strangers." -- shows up in a heavenly cloud to defeat Satan!Dean Pelton with a single breath before nobly forgiving her friends for "making fun of her Christianity." And then she gets raptured ... conveniently leaving her friends there to get tortured by Satan.
151* MindOverMatter: In Troy's story, getting sewn together gives you this power.
152* MoodWhiplash: In-universe, Annie instantly switches from dramatically describing the death of a vampire in [[{{Gorn}} horrifically precise gory detail]] to innocently chirping "See? There was a twist!"
153* MoreDeadlyThanTheMale: Both of Britta's stories, as well as Annie's and Shirley's have fatalities. Troy's and Pierce's stories have mutilations and beatings, respectively, but nobody gets flat-out killed. Abed's and Jeff's stories lack any violence. This ends up carrying to the real-life confrontation in the study room; the men (sans Jeff) have impractical, improvised weapons while the women are armed with deadlier ones.
154* MsFanservice: The female characters all provided FanService this episode. In Pierce's story they're all in a LingerieScene, while in Annie's own story both she and Britta are wearing [[OfCorsetsSexy corsets]] with Annie also sporting an ImpossiblyLowNeckline.
155* MuggingTheMonster: Vampire!Jeff in Annie's story.
156* MundaneUtility: Troy and Abed use their kinetic powers to fix themselves a sandwich.
157* MurderIsTheBestSolution: Subtly done in the final confrontation, when everyone is paranoid that everyone else could be a serial killing sociopath and arms themselves. It also subverts WomenAreWiser; the boys chose weapons which are clearly either just the first things at hand, defensive in nature (a chair for Abed) or less-than-lethal (a fire-extinguisher for Pierce and a bunch of sharp pencils held like Wolverine's adamantium claws for Troy) suggesting that they're not aiming to kill, while Jeff himself doesn't go for a weapon and tries to talk the situation down. The ''girls'', however, appear to have either brought with them and look frighteningly adept at using a variety of lethally-sharp stabbing implements; Shirley smashes a bottle, Annie threateningly brandishes a pair of sharp-looking scissors, while Britta is armed with what appears to be a ''Bowie knife'', implying that they're ready to go straight to lethal force if necessary. This also counts as MoreDeadlyThanTheMale.
158* NightmareFetishist: Annie is ''quite'' happy in describing her gory ending, to the entire group's shock. Annie having the most psychopathic tendencies of anyone actually tracks with the rest of the series, if you consider that she's likely the Ass-Crack Bandit.
159* NoodleIncident: Judging from Jeff's reaction when Britta comes to him with her problem, apparently Britta dropped her psych tests in a puddle at one point, and presumably called on Jeff to help her fix them up.
160* NothingIsScarier: Abed tries to invoke this in his story, which ends with himself and Britta standing back-to-back in the middle of a room with knives, waiting for either a serial killer or the cops. Instead, everyone is disappointed, with Annie asking of the serial killer ever actually appears.
161* OfCorsetsSexy: Annie and Britta in the former's story.
162* OnlySaneMan:
163** When Britta runs the test sheets again, apparently only ''one'' member of the group ''isn't'' violently insane, and it's Abed.
164** Jeff might be sane, as he randomly filled out the test. But then again, considering the rest of the season as a whole is largely devoted to how screwed up he is, it's unlikely.
165* OurWerewolvesAreDifferent: Annie is a vampire eating one in her story.
166* PaperThinDisguise: Of a sort; Britta is trying to psychoanalyze her friends secretly to determine which one of them may be a psychopath, but almost everything she says on the subject sounds like she's quoting it verbatim from a psychology textbook chapter on how to analyse your friends secretly. Probably the only reason they don't suspect what's up is that she tends to overanalyse them anyway.
167* PersonAsVerb: Becomes a RunningGag that's taken up to eleven at the end.
168** "You Britta'd."
169--->'''Jeff:''' You probably just Britta'd it.\
170'''Britta:''' Are people using my name to mean "make a small mistake"?\
171''[[{{Beat}} Long pause]]''\
172'''Jeff:''' [[SureLetsGoWithThat Yes.]]
173** "Pulling an Abed" (to be meta)
174--->'''Jeff:''' Wow, you Britta'd Britta'd.\
175'''Abed:''' Yeah, way to pull an Abed.
176** "To Pierce" (for cases of ComicallyMissingThePoint)
177--->'''Shirley:''' I don't get it.\
178'''Jeff:''' Shirley, don't Pierce.\
179'''Pierce:''' I don't get it!
180** "To Shirley" (to protest/to lecture at): After the gang leaves the study room, Jeff and Shirley start arguing. Most of it is hard to hear, but Jeff distinctly says "Well, now you're Shirleying" at the end.
181* PoliceAreUseless: Defied in Abed's story. The moment Story!Abed calls with his cell phone, the call is picked up and officers are sent immediately. He ends his story with the "victims" waiting for the cops while armed and standing back-to-back in a defensible part of the cabin, just in case.
182* PsychicPowers: Abed and Troy obtain MindOverMatter powers from being stitched together on Troy's story.
183* PsychoPsychologist: Discussed; when beginning to worry that Britta might be the potential serial killer, Abed notes that manipulating a group of people to tell horror stories in order to secretly analyse them is the kind of thing that a PsychoPsychologist ''would'' do.
184* PunnyName: Warren Piece.
185* PurpleProse: Annie's story is ''dripping'' with it.
186-->''"Stifle your slackened maw, you drained and tainted bitch dog!"''
187* RedAndBlackAndEvilAllOver: Dean Pelton is portrayed as the devil incarnate in Shirley's story. He's wearing a LittleBlackDress with red accents.
188* RescueEquipmentAttack: After it's revealed that there's a closeted sociopath in the study group, the lights flicker off, allowing all of them to quickly improvise a weapon to defend themselves. Pierce ends up with a fire extinguisher, and when the lights come back on, he points the nozzle at the others menacingly and bellows "You don't want to be Barium Sulfated!".
189* RevengeViaStorytelling: Many of the stories had jabs directed towards other members of the group. Britta's story portrays Jeff as a bastard boyfriend. Annie's story outright calls Britta (her romantic rival) a {{slut|Shaming}}. Pierce believes Troy's story about a MadScientist who kidnaps two fighter pilots is about him. In response, he tells a story where heavily stereotyped versions of Troy and Abed try to rob him and get handily defeated. Shirley's story has the rest of the gang getting left behind during the end of days in retaliation for them making fun of her Christian beliefs.
190* RottenRockAndRoll: In Shirley's story, the group dances to rock music. One more nail in their coffins.
191* RuleOfCool: In Troy's story, he and Abed gain multiple PsychicPowers after being sewn together. Why? Probably because of this.
192* RunningGag: Yet another appearance of the show's own AffectionateParody of [[Series/DoctorWho a certain wildly popular British sci-fi franchise]] occurs in this episode when Abed and Troy show up to the pre-party dressed as JustForFun/InspectorSpacetime and Constable Wigglesworth.
193-->'''Britta:''' I told you guys, you didn't have to dress up.\
194'''Troy:''' We know. We were wearing this anyway.\
195'''Abed:''' Yeah, when we're dressed up, you'll know.
196* ScreamingWoman: Annie in Jeff's story when Evil Chang appears.
197* SexSignalsDeath: {{Defied|Trope}} in Abed's story. He shuts down Britta's attempt to kindle romance to avoid dropping their guard.
198* ShipTease: Britta/Jeff in Britta's story, Abed/Britta in Abed's story, Annie/Jeff in Annie's story.
199* ShoutOut:
200** Annie and Shirley's stories appear to have been a little influenced by ''Literature/TheTwilightSaga'' and ''Literature/LeftBehind'' respectively. Britta's story is a version of the popular [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hook "hookman" urban legend]]. Troy's story is reminiscent of ''Film/TheHumanCentipede''.
201** The final story about how the sack-masked anonymous killer would slay the study group references ''Film/{{Triangle}}'', especially with TheReveal.
202** When the group turns on each other after the lights go out, Troy has ComicBook/{{Wolverine}} claws made out of pencils.
203** In Shirley's story, Annie is dressed like Velma from ''WesternAnimation/ScoobyDoo''.
204* SpecialEditionTitle: The Halloween version used [[Recap/CommunityS2E06Epidemiology last season]] is back, now accompanying Creator/JimRash (Dean Pelton)'s credit with a drawing of a man in an electric chair.
205* StylisticSuck: Each story is deliberately and humorously subpar in a different way depending on who's telling it:
206** Britta's first story jumbles details and is told in a rushed, awkward fashion as would be told by someone who isn't really that good at telling stories half-remembering something -- additionally, the scant characterization is influenced by her StrawFeminist-esque views on intergender relationships (the man is [[AllMenArePerverts horny]] and [[TooDumbToLive idiotic]], while the woman is sensible [[CassandraTruth and proven ultimately correct]]);
207** Abed's story is overly logical and lacks emotional resonance, more concerned with filling plot-holes and avoiding clichés, tropes, unrealistic actions, GenreBlindness and {{Contrived Coincidence}}s than actually trying to engage the audience;
208** Annie's story is melodramatic and filled with overblown dialogue and PurpleProse;
209** Troy's story over-relies on RuleOfCool at the expense of making sense and all the characters -- no matter who they are -- talk like he (and Abed) would;
210** Pierce's story is sexist, racist, filled with TotallyRadical attempts to remain relevant and [[HerCodeNameWasMarySue portrays himself as an overpowered sex-god]], while also completely missing the point of what a scary Halloween story is supposed to be in the first place;
211** Shirley's story is a poorly researched [[TheMoralSubstitute bad Christian P.S.A. version]] of a horror story which turns Shirley herself into a self-righteous [[HerCodeNameWasMarySue but still perfect and angelic]] {{Messia|nicArchetype}}h figure who saves the day with a DeusExMachina before delivering a poorly-disguised sermon to her friends.
212** {{Subverted}} with Britta's final attempt at a story, which -- from what we see -- is actually good ... a little ''too'' good, since the fact that Britta is capable of effectively creating a violent, murderous narrative on the spot utterly freaks out her friends and makes them suspect that ''she'' might be the potential serial killer.
213** Downplayed with Jeff's story since it's rather short, but he still doesn't bother to construct a proper narrative and just skips to the end where everything easily resolves itself.
214* SuperSexOrgans: In Pierce's story, his penis is capable of giving people uppercuts.
215* SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome: Abed's story is full of this about a couple ending up facing a potential serial killer on vacation:
216** A radio wouldn't have a CoincidentalBroadcast. In fact, music would likely be playing first. Pierce stops Abed from singing the whole song and asks him to cut ahead.
217** The serial killer was able to escape from an asylum due to budget cuts hitting the security detail.
218** The police do respond to a potential emergency but need time to arrive at a remote cabin. Abed advises Britta to grab a knife, and they stand in the middle of the room, waiting.
219* TerrorAtMakeOutPoint:
220** The setting of Britta's story.
221** Averted in Abed's story. He explains that it's no longer TheFifties, so it makes sense to rent a cabin rather than park at a make-out point.
222* TooDumbToLive: Jeff in Britta's story. Abed calls Britta out on it while telling his own story.
223* TotallyRadical: The characters in Shirley's story have a bit of this going on:
224-->'''"Annie"''': Yo, Jango! Check it out!
225* TwistEnding: Annie is particularly proud that her story has one.
226* UncertainDoom: Lampshaded in Abed's story where the couple is left waiting for either the serial killer or the police to find them first. No one is impressed in the real world.
227* VampiresAreSexGods: How Jeff is portrayed in Annie's story.
228* VignetteEpisode: Consisting of six short stories.
229* VillainousGoldTooth: The story Pierce tells involves a racist reimagining of Troy and Abed as gangbanging home invaders. This version of Troy has a gold tooth.
230* VoluntaryVampireVictim: In Annie's story Britta is Vampire Jeff's casual blood donor. He keeps her in a closet for when his HorrorHunger comes. She looks all pale and covered in bite wounds. But she claims she is fine with that treatment.
231* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: After making heavy importance of the fact there is an escaped serial killer in his story (to the point that the characters immediately go to high alert, call the police, arm themselves, and maintain said readiness until the cops arrive), Abed finishes his story without having his protagonists encountering him. Immediately pointed out by Annie ("do these people ever ''die'' or what?").
232* WildTeenParty: In Shirley's story.
233* WolverineClaws: Troy's ImprovisedWeapon, wooden pencils held between his fingers.
234* WomenAreWiser:
235** Parodied; in her story, Britta's AuthorAvatar feels the need to point out that she was right about the situation to Jeff while he's ''being stabbed to death by a psycho with a hook for a hand''.
236** Subverted in the final confrontation; as noted in MurderIsTheBestSolution, the boys all pick weapons which are defensive, less-than-lethal and clearly the first things at hand (while Jeff himself tries to talk the situation down), whereas the girls are all either already heavily armed to begin with or pick weapons that are clearly lethal in intent, suggesting they're ready to go straight to lethal force.
237* WriteWhoYouKnow: In-universe, perpetrated by ''everyone'' for increasingly petty reasons.
238* YouDoNOTWantToKnow:
239** When it's revealed that all but one member of the study group is, according to their psych profiles, completely insane, they collectively decide it's better that they can keep ahold of the comforting delusion that ''any one of them may be sane'' rather than knowing who is or isn't. Turns out it's Abed.
240** To be fair, it's ''technically'' possible that Jeff is also sane -- he states that he filled in his evaluation randomly, so the results of it are presumably inaccurate. Most of the rest of the series, however, would seem to suggest that even with this considered, he's still probably not as sane as he would like to think...

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