As six seasons and a movie comes closer to becoming a reality, Community alum Joel McHale revealed one outstanding actor from the original cast will return for the film. Donald Glover, whose fame has blown up in the years since his departure from Community in the show’s fifth season, will reprise his role as Troy Barnes in the study group.
Glover starred as Troy, a former jock for his high school’s football team who had a goofy, naïve and loveable personality. He was best friends with Abed, played by Danny Pudi, and the pair’s quirky characters worked well together as they made an imaginary morning talk show ‘Troy and Abed in the Morning!’, made a special friendship handshake and, at one point, went to war over a blanket or pillow fort being better. Troy was also strangely gifted as a repairman, being forced at one point to join Greendale’s Air Conditioning Repair program as their chosen ‘Truest Repairman’.
Glover left the series midway through Community‘s fifth season after the offscreen death of Pierce Hawthorne, who left his vast wealth all to Troy if he sailed around the world in his boat with his idol LeVar Burton of Star Trek: The Next Generation and Reading Rainbow fame. Since leaving Community, Glover has had a successful and incredibly career as a rapper under his Childish Gambino moniker as well as starring in, writing, producing and showrunning the hit FX series Atlanta which has been hailed as one of the best drama comedies in the modern age of TV and been nominated for numerous awards.
When the Community movie was announced, Glover was one of two of the series’ original cast members who was not named in the press release. McHale spoke to Kelly Ripa on her podcast Let’s Talk Off Camera and confirmed Glover would be back, saying “Donald’s coming back and that’s really important. The fact that Donald’s gonna do it, that was the big piece. But I think everyone’s coming back. I mean, so far we’re pretty good. And I think that will happen. If not then, you know, Donald will be there.”
The only other remaining original Community cast member left unknown is Yvette Nicole Brown, who played Shirley in the series. Brown left the show after the fifth season, returning only for a couple of brief cameos in the sixth season. Hopefully with McHale’s confidence at everyone else returning for the movie, Brown will join Glover and the rest of the original cast in the long anticipated movie.
SEE ALSO: The Top Ten Best Community Episodes of All Time
The Community movie was confirmed in October 2022, with Peacock also acquiring the entire series of 110 episodes of the Emmy-winning comedy, which will be available as part of its streaming library.
Ricky Church – Follow me on Twitter for more movie news and nerd talk.
