Or How I Learned to Start Watching Dwight and Love the Schrute
Hereby will be referred to as Morpheus.
Dwight Schrute stole last night's episode of The Office. From tip to tail. Last night was a special night in the The Office paradigm because of the occasion of Pam and Jim's baby. Special thing indeed. Season 6 of the show has given us many great moments in the Pam and Jim personal blend, which makes for great Michael Scott moments to catapult off of. Blah blah blah. They're in love, Michael doesn't know how to handle his emotions, while all along we have Dwight being a comic bulldozer taking down any emotions we have in place and replacing them with comedy on a comedic sitcom. Fuckin' A.
Now, this is a review from one night of watching TV stoned, so, basically, nothing new. It does always seem like I'm never critical and always shining light on certain aspects of a certain thing, but- again- this is a dumb review (like all reviews are). Be that as what have that may- Dwight Schrute has forever been the lynchpin to the success of The Office. For me anyways. While the other main Office cast gets sappier- Pam and Jim, or learns lessons- Michael Scarn- Dwight ultimately gets darker. The more we see of Dwight, the more exposed we are to his creepy world. That dark, dark life of aggression and 1890s farming technique.
Let's go through Dwight's adventures last night. Cold opening saw his contempt at the adorable Jim and Pam for using their baby and their life to help make sales. Dwight then tries using his own life experiences for a sale, which gave us a line about fungal goat disease. Dwight then decides he wants a baby for business reasons- pause- (love Rainn Wilson's timing) he remembers that he has a gaping hole in his life. The caricature of Dwight at that moment is Dwight at his creepiest. Fast forward some- we see Dwight proposition his former fling Angela for a business agreement on having a baby. This leads to a very precise contract, full of feeding specifications, gender specification, and the hilarious fact that Dwight uses a typewriter. The specific contract is a comedy staple, and very much within Dwight's repertoire that the scene felt all too natural when panned out. Which is the M.O. of Dwight. All his detail makes him seem all too real. I'm losing track. OK. Here is some insight into the world of Dwight- the entire escort scene to the hospital. Dwight would love to escort people in his loved car - allowing him a display of his strength (he also would not know what an escort service was). When doing so for Pam and Jim, he still allows himself to get his priorities straight and show Michael where he saw a deer. Then, as classic as Dwight as ever, we get to see him over step his delusional power, which leads to him being pulled over- which has become a routine to him that includes jettisoning all his weaponry as the cop becomes annoyed that he yet again has to deal with Dwight. "Pull the car over, Dwight." I love every time Dwight deals with the cops. He gets to show off his vast knowledge of the law while still showing his respect and reverence for them, which the local Scranton authorities don't give a shit about. Where did Dwight go from here? Pam and Jim's house, where he slept naked in their bed (framed pictures down), took a sledge hammer to their kitchen (friends and metal music in tact), and brought endless joy upon himself in extracting some revenge on the Halpert's. We also got to see Dwight be the alpha male on Pam's sister and on Angela, both in separate ways, but both left wanting more from Dwight. OK, there is a baby being born and Pam and Jim are having fun with that. And Michael, who loves a good baby, is taking reins as the person with the most invested in all this. All good and fun. But man, did Dwight bring this episode home. He gave us tension while Pam and Jim were baby-ing and a new story arc involving 2 women with Dwight was hatched. Not to mention the little things Dwight can do for an episode, like using his own personal tape measure to see how dilated Pam is.
We were hyped into this as a classic episode in the legend of the Jim and Pam pantheon, which it was, which always leads to the assumption of how Michael can hone in on that to make it his own. Dwight is always the wild card, and last night he stole the whole damn show. Honorable mentions go to Kevin for saying "Chicken Tandoori from Born into Brothels" and for jumping out from behind a door, Erin for naming the winners of the Kentucky Derby, Creed for crying, Stanley for making them hold the elevator, and a great sarcastic line from Oscar ("the hospital will provide Dictionaries, bring a Thesaurus"). But leave it to the brilliance of Rainn Wilson, one of the finest actors in comedy today (see him pull out the impossible task of making The Rocker tolerable or his light shining on Tim and Eric). Dwight is if not one if the most absurdly over the top characters in TV history (along with Lutka, Kramer, Tracy Jordan), and he perpetually grows his character without alienating the core of who Dwight is. He is a bold character based on farm raised, cold heartedness- something a PC audience to laugh at begrudgingly, but Rainn has us laughing with him because, really, who is the joke ultimately on? Dwight still is Dwight will always be, sadly, Dwight. The Office can trudge through worn sitcom fare- weddings, babies- but thank god we have Dwight to break the tediousness of it all. Rainn Wilson, you are the Susan Lucci of sitcoms.
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