Yahoo sets 'Community' date

From the Television Critics Association's winter meetings:

The sixth season of "Community" will premiere online March 17, with two back-to-back episodes, followed by the release of one episode a week after that, Yahoo announced Tuesday.

As one reporter noted, that's "kind of an old-school way"  to roll out a series in the age of binge-watching, when Netflix and Amazon are releasing entire seasons in a single day.

"Community" creator Dan Harmon, who proclaims his ignorance of the business TV early and often, said the way the show is marketed and distributed is Yahoo's privilege, but "I feel in my old-school bones...that that's the way to do it."

"Maybe old school is the best school," he said, likening it to rap.

Naive or not, Harmon, whose show has so far had two-thirds the lives of a cat, said he's "not writing this [season] as if it's the end."

Keith David and Paget Brewster are joining the show, which is losing Yvette Nicole Brown, who played Shirley, and Jonathan Banks, who was Professor Hickey.

On Monday, Brown, who had asked to be released from "Community" because she's caring for her father, who suffers from dementia, said she wanted to make it clear that her having since joined  the cast of CBS' "The Odd Couple" is more about hours than anything else. "Community," a single-camera comedy, involved much longer work weeks than the "Odd Couple" remake, which is filmed before a live audience.

Banks, meanwhile, was reportedly already committed to AMC's "Breaking Bad" spinoff, "Better Call Saul."

Harmon, who said he's looking forward not to having to wake up to Nielsen ratings, isn't sure yet exactly how being online instead of on the air will differ.

"I know that it's not subscriber-based," and that it will be available free through an app. There will be ads, and thus act breaks, he said.

Could episodes be longer?

"I don't know. Maybe the things that go on Yahoo can be a little chubby, like me," joked Harmon.

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