Frankie Dart

Frankie Dart is a final protagonist of the Sony/NBC television series Community, serving as a main character in the sixth season. Sheis a consultant who was hired to whip Greendale into shape. Frankie claims to be a part of a large family full of quirky and eccentric people which includes a relative she moved to Greendale for to look after. She acknowledges and embraces her boring persona and has a take charge attitude which rubs people the wrong way. While this may seem like arrogance to others it's merely the confidence she has in her abilities to achieve results. She has an unseen assistant or partner named Diane who handles some of her paperwork and keeps track of her schedule. Her first appearance was in the Season Six episode "Ladders".
She was portrayed by Paget Brewster.
== Character History ==
During Greendale's 2015 semester, the North Cafeteria roof collapsed under the watch of the school's amateur campus improvement committee. Dean Pelton was forced to get a professional consultant to take charge of things, so he hired Francesca "Frankie" Dart. She was introduced to the Save Greendale Committee, where she made it clear they would all be her subordinates. Frankie quickly implemented a number of changes, including rebuilding the cafeteria roof and adding support columns, cancelling a number of superfluous classes, and prohibiting alcohol on school grounds, which was an insurance liability. Her decisions and blunt personality caused friction with the committee members Britta Perry, Jeff Winger, and Annie Edison.
Her only ally from the committee was Abed Nadir, whom she befriended after they had lunch together. He found her "realism" to be refreshing, but this caused a rift with his friends, who chose to rebel against Frankie. They set up a speakeasy in the school's basement, which Frankie allowed, since it kept them out of her way. It was only after they lured Abed back into their shenanigans that she intervened. This backfired when, in the process, she accidentally insulted Abed. Flustered, she left the school and didn't show up for work over the next several days. She was in an interview for another job when Jeff and Abed barged in. The committee needed her expertise in the wake of a drunken incident at school which injured several students. After she got them to apologize repeatedly, Frankie was happy to go back ("Ladders").
Frankie had to deal with Pelton wasting school funds on an expensive Virtual Reality machine and also got involved in some family drama Britta was having with her parents ("Lawnmower Maintenance and Postnatal Care]"). She and the committee later contended with a negative ad City College was going to air about Greendale ("Basic Crisis Room Decorum"). She advised Pelton about whether he should pretend to be gay to get a promotion, and she helped the committee send a bird back into the wild ("Queer Studies & Advanced Waxing"). With the committee's approval, Frankie partnered with the Colorado Department of Corrections and started a program at Greendale to allow convicts to attend school via teleprescence robots. The initiative was ultimately deemed a failure, and the school lost some potential funds ("Laws of Robotics & Party Rights").
When a young hacker named Ryan broke into Greendale's email accounts, Frankie and the committee were convinced by Britta to not give into the hackers threats. Her resolve was shaken after the committee's emails were made public and she learned that her sexual orientation had been the subject of much debate amongst the committee. She was furious when Chang brought up emails she sent to her sister, revealing that her sibling died; it was a journaling technique she was using to cope with the loss ("Basic Email Security"). Frankie once again had to contend with Dean Pelton's irresponsible spending habits when Pelton got lured into buying several Honda products by Rick, a guerrilla marketer for Honda.
Frankie picked up how to play the Steel Drums after Jeff misled her into thinking this was something their absent friend Troy Barnes had been gifted at. She ended up playing Steel Drums at Natalie Is Freezing's concert at Greendale ("Advanced Safety Features"). Frankie's musical skills were also displayed in Abed's science fiction movie, where she had a brief cameo. She brought the Hollywood friend and film producer Maury and had hoped Greendale could profit from unfinished footage of Chang, who had recently become famous ("Intro to Recycled Cinema"). She participated in a scam Jeff cooked up to get back at the grifting professor Roger DeSalvo who conned his students. She also bonded with Officer Cackowski, because they both have developmentally disabled close relatives ("Grifting 101").
Frankie was key in the Committee taking a trip in Elroy Patashnik's RV in order to deliver Dean Pelton's giant hand to an internet buyer. When the RV got stuck in a Rocky Mountain pass without gasoline, Pelton's buying addiction once again generated friction inside the group. Because of the intense and unusual social situation, Abed Nadir attempted to view the events as a narrative in order to make sense of them, but frequently failed to do so. It was Frankie who provided Abed with the necessary narrative logic, telling him to imagine that the road trip events were a flashback in themselves. This taught Abed to be less strict with narrative, to "keep a loose grip," as he himself put it ("Basic RV Repair and Palmistry").
The new era of Greendale that Frankie had brought about sought to end the damaging and costly paintball battles amongst students that were now happening as a covert tournament, secretly run by Greendale's custodial staff. Frankie entrusted Jeff, the de facto leader of Greendale according to her, to give a speech at her Cleaner Greendale Gala in order to stop paintball once and for all. While Deputy Custodian Lapari's plot about keeping Greendale reliant on its custodians was exposed, the bigger problems behind the paintball menace were the escapist addictions of Lapari, Jeff and Dean Pelton (who had expressed a longing for the old ways because Frankie responsibly controlled all of Greendale now). Instead of telling this to the men and threatening them by firing them, Frankie let Jeff realize and point it out to the others himself, leading them to relinquish paintball ("Modern Espionage").
During the Committee's pre-party for Garrett Lambert's wedding, Frankie attempted to bond with Annie and Britta in an effort to be more sociable. When the group descended into awkward and self-centered behaviour during the wedding, Frankie retained more self-awareness than others in the process. She recognized the group's co-dependency and identified Annie's need to help others, a trait which Frankie admitted she shares ("Wedding Videography"). At the end of the school year, Frankie continued working at Greendale after Abed and Annie left for summer internships. She was last seen at The Vatican sharing a drink with the remaining committee ("Emotional Consequences of Broadcast Television").
== Development ==
In an interview with Yahoo, Community creator Dan Harmon spoke at length about the creation of Frankie Dart. He drew upon his own life experiences as the basis of her character, even adding that she had a developmentally disabled sister like he did whom she had to look after. Harmon imagined a backstory for her where she was the sanest member of a very large and crazy family. Her highly organized, problem-solving nature was already used to eccentricities that she would encounter at Greendale. This would make her a good fit for the schools and the over-the-top personalities she would interact with there.
== Trivia ==
=== Debra Chambers ===
Actress Paget Brewster was previously on Community in the Season Five episode "Analysis of Cork-Based Networking". She played Debra Chambers, the head of Greendale I.T., who was bribed by Annie with a better parking spot to give the custodial staff unrestricted access to the Internet. In the Season Six episodes "Queer Studies & Advanced Waxing," Frankie attempts to contact Debra, but Frankie's emails "get bounced back to me in Aramaic, and when I call, I hear an undulating high pitched whistle that makes my nose bleed.
=== Bon Appetit! ===
A running gag throughout the sixth season was the question of Frankie's sexuality. This first comes up in "Queer Studies & Advanced Waxing" when she offers Dean Pelton advice on whether or not he wants to make his sexuality a part of his public life, noting she herself does not. Instead of listening, Jeff and the Dean are silently left pondering if she implied she is, in fact, a lesbian. The question is never answered, although the two seemed to have passed on their speculation to the rest of the study group as they often interrupt a conversation with Frankie to ask about her romantic life.
== Quotes ==
: “Oh God no, I never hope. Hope is pouting in advance. Hope is faith's richer, bitchier sister. Hope is the deformed attic bound incest monster offspring of entitlement and fear.”— Frankie Dart
“All right. This is the first I've heard that I'm a character on a show. I'm excited to be one, but I agree, I'll be a boring one. Quirks are not my strong suit, results are. I love quirky people. I come from a big family of people who are literally insane. I moved down here to take care of one of them. But I myself am exceptionally boring, and I am quite proud to be that way, because it allows me to help the less boring people turn quirks into results.”— Frankie Dart
Category:Selfless
Category:Freedom Fighters
Category:Comedy Heroes
Category:TV Show Heroes
Category:Live Action Heroes
Category:Sitcom Heroes
Category:Female
Category:Jerks
Category:Disciplinarians
Category:Unwanted
Category:Officials
Category:Protectors
Category:Friend of a Villain
Category:Loyal
Category:Leaders
Category:Lawful Good