Community is a show I don’t watch regularly, but I really should… especially after seeing the two awesome images above!
Those are screenshots from a video game the Greendale College study group will be zapped into for the first part of the third season finale, “Digital Estate Planning.” Pierce (Chevy Chase) may lose his inheritance unless he does battle with his father’s former assistant (Breaking Bad’s Giancarlo Esposito). But the battlefield turns out to be a 16-bit video game. Kinda sounds a bit like Ready Player One doesn’t it?
The screenshot on the left is clearly an homage to the Super Mario Bros. franchise. That waterfall (and the jumping fish above it) are ripped right out of Super Mario Bros. 2 and the hilly platforms are very Mario-esque.
And the image on the right looks exactly like a screenshot from Earthbound. All of the Community characters even bear more than a passing resemblance to Ness and company.
Head on over to The AV Club to get a full-sized look at the images.