Dan Harmon’s Community was a love letter to TV and its frequent use of tropes and homages. Though having many meta and self referential episodes, the most reoccurring was the use of Bottle episodes. 

Introduced in season 2, through the episode 8 Cooperative Calligraphy, the trope is called lazy and boring by Abed Nadir who keeps pointing out the study gang is at a risk of “doing one”. However Bottle episodes, an episode that takes place entirely in one setting, are known to create some of the best character interactions and development. And the series ends up having several Bottle episodes, some of which make the best episodes of the series. 

Here is my ranking of Community’s Bottle episodes:

  1. “Remedial Chaos Theory” S3E4

Taking place solely in Troy and Abed’s apartment, we watch the events of the study group be split into alternate timelines, all through the chance of rolling a dice.

  1. “Advanced Dungeons and Dragons” S2E14 

As an intervention for a lonely, severely depressed classmate named Neil, derisively nicknamed “Fat Neil”, who is suspected of actively contemplating suicide. To make Neil feel valued, the study group organizes a Saturday session to play through a fantasy campaign, with the hidden agenda of ensuring Neil triumphs over a dragon to reclaim his will to live.

  1. “Cooperative Calligraphy” S2E8 

The episode introducing the trope, Annie doesn’t let anyone leave until she finds her pen, forcing the gang to stay stuck in the study room for the entire episode. 

  1. “Applied Anthropology and Culinary Arts” S2E22 

During the archeology finale, Shirley ends up giving birth and everyone is held from taking the exam until her delivery.

  1. “Cooperative Polygraphy” S5E4 

Pierces funeral leads to the gang undergoing a lie detector test before his will can be read. 

Honorable mentions that were not completely in just one setting- 

“Paradigms of Human Memory” S2E21

Actually a clip episode but takes place in a fake psychiatrist office, for Abed needing to get checked for claiming the Dean and Greendale is fake.

"Competitive Ecology" S3E4 

Then study group splitting into pairs for a biology project leads to them arguing on who should be partners all night.