Before you judge Dan Harmon, know this: The man has done terrible things in the name of comedy.

In his five-minute Web shorts for the ahead-of-its-time site Channel 101, Harmon has played sidekick to an underwear-clad Jack Black, farted lasers as the world's least likely superhero, and pretended to be Hannah Montana, complete with a blonde wig and a bright yellow mumu. (You probably don't want to watch that last link at work, or while eating, or, you know, ever.) But no matter how absurd the situations he's put himself and others in, Harmon's consistently demonstrated a rock-solid understanding of the fundamentals of good writing.

I'm glad to see that moving up to the network big leagues hasn't changed that. Community, Harmon's new series for NBC, may be less outrageous than his Channel 101 skits, but it's no less funny or well-scripted. The pilot never actually made me laugh out loud, but its clever characters, fun performances, and witty dialogue had me grinning throughout.

Sit Down Shut Up, the doomed-from-the-get-go animated sitcom from Arrested Development creator Mitchell Hurwitz, lasted all of four episodes last spring before Fox yanked it from the schedule. (Its replacement, King of the Hill reruns, was admittedly not as much of an insult as, say, American Dad reruns.)