Meanwhile, the study group attempts to figure out if Abed's student films are predicting their futures and Pierce tries to help Britta quit smoking using hypnotherapy "Debate 109" first aired on NBC on November 10, 2009, to an audience of 5.09 million live viewers.

Shirley tells Jeff and Annie about their characters kissing in Abed's film, which leads to awkward tension between the two.

Pierce and Britta have another hypnosis session; he realizes that she's been awake and goads her into revealing her deception by telling her to picture a threesome with him.

Britta, who had pulled out a cigarette to cope with the stress of watching the debate, feels suddenly repulsed and tells Pierce she can't smoke without imagining a threesome with him in a hot tub.

Entitled Community College Chronicles, they were released by NBC as promotion around the time of the episode's premiere and include an appearance by Sandeep Parikh of The Guild.

[10] "Debate 109" stars Joel McHale and Alison Brie as Jeff Winger and Annie Edison respectively, alongside Danny Pudi, Donald Glover, Chevy Chase and Gillian Jacobs as, Abed Nadir, Troy Barnes, Pierce Hawthorne, and Britta Perry respectively.

She praised the parts about Abed's films, remarking that he "turned the show's meta commentary into a plot that was as much about himself and his keen observational powers as anything else" and that the concept "found a way to both make fun of itself and justify itself within that plotline".

She also enjoyed the chemistry between Alison Brie and Joel McHale, which "made the whole plot less creepy than it should have been (the age gap between the two characters should be troublesome).

He remarked that Abed's plot "doesn't have so much resolution, which is kinda nice" and liked the "Annie/Joel thing" [sic] and its potential for future storylines.

While he enjoyed Abed's film series, he was unsure how to feel about Jeff and Annie's "budding attraction" and thought Britta and Pierce's story "felt completely tacked on and had little bearing on anything else."

[15] Andy Greenwald of Vulture remarked after the episode that "the simultaneously best and worst thing we can say about the show is that it remains promising".