I cry foul! What an utterly crappy way to ride back in from break. The Office has been a tremendous disappointment this season, and to not even bother to try for a week? Sure I was laughing last night, but does that make it right? Not in my book.
I didn’t hear a single quotable original line, nor do I recall seeing Jim in any of the current scenes. What the hell? This is how shows start to fall apart — the actors have other places to be, and the scenes become filled with only “B” players. I’d be the first to say that they’re all strong on The Office, but that’s not going to help its ratings or its future. The loss of headliners would be the beginning of the end, so lets get Jim back inside next week. For an original episode. That’s funny.
I got the concept: an investment banker (was it a sign of the economy that he was doing a first-year’s job?) comes around to do due diligence, and the clips are the mental answers to his questions, the ones no one dares actually speak. The idea that Michael is the highest ranking employee of Dunder Mifflin … a bit fishy, because someone has to be at corporate to facilitate a sale, someone has to be at corporate to work investor relations, someone has to be at corporate to head the compliance department — they’re bankrupt, not de-listed from the stock exchange (as far as I recall).
Hiding the office’s liabilities was certainly rather amusing, what with Fake Stanley, closing Ryan’s closet up, and Dwight sitting in for Toby. It was actually a joke that might have been really funny if played out for the entire episode. Of course the trip back to the annex was all about starting the clips rolling. Which, like I said above, was a bad move by a show that’s already struggling to keep people happy.
Of course the segments were funny — this show has been hilarious for years. Showing old funny clips is going to be funny. There were the outstanding safety liability issues, which of course are numerous (although not outstanding), mainly because Michael likes to play in the warehouse. The non-safety related liability issues, like sexual harassment? There’s a reason that Michael had to sit down with the warehouse guys and watch a video — a clip they actually didn’t include. Playing “That’s what she said” over and over didn’t really do it for me.
Toby is clearly the wrong person to ask about people’s happiness (“Happy is a funny word.”). But I wouldn’t say that the majority of the people in the office are unhappy. They certainly all waste a tremendous amount of time, and another moment that was missed was movie Monday, a colossal time-waster if ever the show scripted one.
And until they were all in one place, I guess I hadn’t realized just how prevalent the office romance was in Scranton. There’ve seriously been a ton of them, and I think the segment even left out some, like Phyllis and Bob.
So yeah, I definitely laughed, but was it a worthy episode of The Office, with or without it’s cloudy history this season? No way. Try harder next time. A lot.
Clacked by Aryeh S.
on Jan 22, 2010 @ 11:00 EST5EDT
I didn’t mind the clip show much; almost every show that runs long enough has one. It made me laugh, and that’s what I’m looking for on a Thursday night. I look forward to them getting to the new storyline, with the new bosses, next week.
*POST AUTHOR*
Like I said, it wasn’t the content that bothered me as much as its timing, both after the hiatus and following a poor season. Plus next week’s a repeat! Come on! :)
All things in perspective, the clip show was not the worst thing to happen yesterday. We did have a threat of a tornado after all, but it was certainly an irritation. I was really looking forward to a new episode and I was let down.
They can make it up to me.
*POST AUTHOR*
I don’t know … “threat” of a tornado vs. this episode?… :)
I think you failed to appreciate the metatextual subtleties of inserting previously recorded footage of the faux documentary into the “mind’s eye” of each character in the scene as they imagined it, while said documentary was recording new footage of said recollections simultaneously.
Which is bullshit, because this was a fucking clip show.
I like the theory I read on the other board that Greg Daniels shuffled this show together quickly when he heard about his old friend Conan being canned, so if any viewers were holding off on boycotting NBC solely due to The Office, then this would push them over the edge.
Actually, I enjoy the secondary characters so much that I wouldn’t mind if all of the principal five actors were missing for an entire episode. And we’d have to ask Brett, but I don’t think the show’s ratings are down substantially from last year, especially when compared to NBC’s ratings slide averaged over all programming. Even 30 Rock and Chuck don’t come anywhere near The Office‘s numbers.
The “That’s what she said” montage was my favorite one.
*POST AUTHOR*
I know its not fare to use this as a basis for anything, but if you really evaluate the webisodes, which are just “B” characters, they really suck. It’s fun to get more Office, but they suck. I think the “B”s are awesome “B”s as long as the “A”s are still there. Now if the show, or even one episode, wholeheartedly moved onto them, I think things would be fine. But as far as plugging the holes when the “A”s blow in and out? I don’t think so.
I don’t go to the trouble of tracking down all the online content, unless it’s podcasted out to me, so I’ll have to take your word on the suckage. It’s odd, because I really enjoy the B-character only storylines on the show itself.
30 Rock has been really hit-or-miss for me this season, with some very strong, tight episodes, and some horrible ones.
*POST AUTHOR*
They’re also extras on the DVDs. It could just be me (I also really hated the whole Erin/Kelly singing thing), but I thought they were terrible.
Met too. Ever since Danny/Jack came along.
Funny enough I was talking with my carpool buddy about clip shows on Friday morning and when I watched “The Office” later that day I really had to smirk.
Only letdown? The church performance – since I know now that the whole think was a marketing schtick to get the singer )who was beating his girlfriend and had some really bad press) some good press, watered the whole thing down for me. Sometimes it’s better not to know and simply believe that people really still are that creative *sigh*
It was great to see all the old memories. I (again) was close to tears when I saw the whole Jam think happening, also because I basically skipped the whole first season because it simply is too harsh for me. It’s how real life is but it’s just nothing I really can take.
Anyway, I liked this episode very much and I don’t really think this season is all that bad. It’s just that other Comedy Shows are currently doing much better story-wise and it’s really hard to top last season I think.
Just compare it to Friends Season 10 *shudder*.
*POST AUTHOR*
I feel like The Office has even done a clips show before, at least in a limited fashion. Does that ring a bell?
I’ve been so disappointed with this season of The Office that I’ve been enjoying 30 Rock more than it … then Danny/Jack came and course-corrected 30 Rock to sucking, but still, for a while I was terrified! ;)