Netflix Pulls ‘Community’ Episode ‘Advanced Dungeons & Dragons’ Due to Blackface Scenes (Exclusive)
Netflix has pulled the “Community” Season 2 episode “Advanced Dungeons & Dragons,” which features Ken Jeong’s character, Ben Chang, wearing blackface during a game of “Dungeons & Dragons,” TheWrap has learned exclusively.
In this episode of the Dan Harmon-created series, the study group gets together to play a game of “D&D” with fellow Greendale student “Fat Neil” (played by Charley Koontz). Chang shows up to the game wearing a white wig, with black makeup covering all of his exposed skin. When Shirley (Yvette Nicole Brown) says, “So, we’re just going to ignore that hate crime, huh?” Chang responds, “I’m a dark elf or a drow.” Chang proceeds to play the game dressed that way, acting as the character “Brutalitops the Magician,” until he is killed and eliminated.
“Advanced Dungeons & Dragons,” the 14th episode of Season 2 of “Community,” first aired Feb. 3, 2011 on NBC.
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Sony Pictures Television, the studio behind “Community,” declined to comment on Netflix’s decision to pull the episode. When asked if Sony plans to request “Advanced Dungeons & Dragons” be removed from Hulu’s library of “Community” episodes and platforms where the show is available for digital download, the studio also declined to comment.
Representatives for Hulu and Harmon did not immediately respond to TheWrap’s request for comment.
Netflix’s decision to remove this episode of “Community” from its service comes on the same morning TheWrap exclusively reported “The Office” creator Greg Daniels and NBCUniversal’s decision to re-edit a Season 9 Christmas episode of the comedy that includes a character in blackface.
Earlier this week, two other sitcoms, “Scrubs” and “30 Rock,” pulled multiple episodes each that featured characters in blackface. Both were done at the request of the show’s creators.
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