article_snippet: The premiere briefly touches on this in this own way, with Shirley's absence sounding a lot like the setup for a spinoff (as the character Abed points out, along with several other inconsistencies throughout the episode).
article_snippet: The "new Shirley," as Dean joked, is Paget Brewster's Frankie, who exists to play the disapproving authority figure to antagonize the former study group.
article_snippet: Soon, the former study group was running a Prohibition-esque bar before the former study group could learn to live with Frankie.
article_snippet: And how about the end of the first episode, which gave us a look at the spinoff, "The Butcher and the Baker," with Shirley and Steven Weber as a Southern lawyer?
article_snippet: Episode two got even more out there, with Dean Pelton's adventures in 1990s-style virtual reality and a less-successful plotline involving Britta's parents.
article_snippet: Most interesting was the introduction of Keith David as '90s tech genius Elroy.
highlights_snippet: The series is just as weirdly hilarious as ever, with surprises in store .
  