Current State: The Office

As we watch this season, we have to constantly remind ourselves that Michael Scott is leaving. With that layering of knowing, The Office has fans such as myself speculating on every little occurrence the show. So let's do that.

Andy has had a major plot implications every episode so far this season. I like that his plot involves other characters (his budding friendship with Darryl, Phyllis' genuine like of him, and the Gabe/Erin "love triange"), and Ed Helms is in movies and came from the Daily Show. So he's different enough from Michael Scott with the same Steve Carrell breeding.

Though I don't think Andy is taking over as boss, he's clearly not good enough, I do see him taking over as the source material in future episodes. The boss, well, we can argue that we already know. The past episode, "Viewing Party", pretty much established that Gabe is in command. Maybe once Michael Scott leaves, Gabe takes on more of Michael's business duties, while passing along the blander day-to-day things along to the office administrator (she knows Michael's job better than anyone else, and she has a sales background (something Michael alluded to when she walked on coals). There's also the wildcard of Daryl, who has big plans at this company, and is an established idea man with a succesful track record. Oh and Jim? Well, Jim is fucking up more. Jim is turning into the Michael with his emotions in check. Just the 'fuck-up' part, not 'fucked-up'. So with Andy's idiocy, and Jim's bumbling- we'll pretty much have the same office in tact.

But what about the exit for Steve Carrell? There is a precedent of David Brent saying 'Fuck off' and believing in himself. Goodness, knows that'd be good for Michael. But he needs something deeper. Is his relationship with Erin that something? History of the two: they had nice bonding during Scott's Tots (she was there for Michael), Michael can be nice to her (the ending of Secretary's Day), and now- Erin views Michael as her father, which he accepts. Michael always wanted to be the best friends with his co-workers, his "family". Jim and Pam have always rejected that notion, despite Michael's best efforts. That was symbolized in the christening to a degree, but I believe there is much more to be mined between Jim, Pam, and Michael. Michael does look at those 2 as perfect, and he does find Erin "a bit of a rube". Michael doesn't realize he is just as bit as a rube. The Erin and Michael relationship is one of the best things the show has going for it right now (Dwight taking care of CeCe has the potential to be the best thing the show has ever done- fingers crossed- not jinxing), and that is exciting. Ellie Kemper and Steve Carrell are 2 amazing improvisers. Just look at their father-daughter scene. Throw in the improv skills of Zach Woods (The World's Most Awkward Boy) and the information we just learned about Gabe (he's in charge, he likes throwing parties) and we have something there.

Michael's been pretty self destructive and even more immature lately. Now, Michael Scott has a chance to be involved. He saw the Pam, Roy, Jim thing play out in front of him. Now he has the Gabe, Erin, Andy problem presenting itself, with people on his own level. Couple that with giving Dwight (who is one of the best left-field character's in TV history) something to do, and we have the makings here. About a half a season left- don't waste it.

Review: 2010 NBC Thursday Night Season Finale

The Swanson on The Swanson

TV loves its season finales. Its' inherit epic quality and heightened emotional depth just plays out to the fan quality of the show while still setting up the something to happen for the future. What? I can't understand what I just said. OK- A lot of things happen to a lot of our favorite people. Easy enough. Anyway, this post is just going to take my favorite joke from each episode and dizcuzz it to some extent.

Community - Star Burn's Video Yearbook Comment

This joke comes in the PS of the episode. John Michael Higgin's professor was in this episode and Troy ate a giant cookie (remember Kramer's lollipop?), but Star Burns is always pure gold. Initially I thought the line read, 'I just want people to remember there was a guy with these things', making an amazing explanation for the existence of Starburn's starburns. But the real line is quote: "I just want people to remember theres a guy in between these things". Adding an emotional depth to a side character that we really don't care about? Awesome, as long as it's Starburns. The notion of Starburns is such a shallow man whose claim to fame and source for social acceptance are stars that are hair that are on his face. That is hilarious. And giving him a line revealing that he just might be more than that? Nice try, he's Starburns. Please note my inherit bias to Dino Stamatopoulos, one of the funniest people in known existence (Conan, Moral Orel, TV Funhouse, he wrote the Pre-Taped Call In Show on Mr. Show). I am all for him being everywhere anytime probably more than anyone ever, save for real life relationships.

Parks and Rec - Freddy Spaghetti Songs

You know what show nailed it this season? Parks and Rec. I think we'll be talking about the 2nd season of Parks and Rec way on down the line. It is well on its way to being an Arrested Development level of genius situational comedy. So many characters with so many layers of interaction between them. Best scene of the night: the Brandanowitz farewell. Kept it straight, and we really know what these two people feel about one another. My favorite joke from tonight's episode comes from the episode's namesake, Freddy Spaghetti. Not so much a joke, as an existence of character. Freddy Spaghetti writes children's songs to the tune of other popular songs (remember when John Redcorn did that?) but he also adds in a callback to his own name of Italian themed food. For example- "she made an itsy-bitsy teenie weenie yellow polka dot linguini". Kids entertainer's are always ripe for weird, creepy businessmen (see Krusty the Clown) and they established Freddy as in it for the money within his first line. The real payoff is that how lazy he is in turning a song about a bikini into one of his own. Kids don't know and shouldn't know that song, but Freddy is making money. "What was your favorite song?" Leslie asks. "Penne and the Jets". And wow- that song really is all about saying the word Benny, and Freddy Spaghetti is smart enough to rip that off for his own. His other song was also just a call and response with the audience where Freddy yelled: "Spaghetti! Fusilli! Egg Noodles!" O the last one always gets ya. Freddie was played by 'force of nature' actor Brian McCann who helped carry Conan O'Brien the past decade with such characters as Fed Ex Pope, Johnny G: a guy who thinks Max Weinberg is hilarious, Randy the Pyloric Sphincter and Preparation H Raymond. Now he's one of the great minute characters on Parks and Rec. Now go on and win some Emmys, you great massive show you.

The Office - Meredith's Van

As pre-established, I am a huge sucker for Dwight, and tonight we got to see him work. The episode was a lot of Jo and Sabre's interrogations of the employees, which I hope they have deleted scenes of the lot of them, but none of them would be able to outshine Dwight's. We also got to check in with 2 of our favorites via one joke each- Todd Packer making a prank call, and David Wallace using an opportunity on TV documentary he used to be on to talk about his new product, Suck It (of course the sweatshirt was yellow, its for kids). We were also treated to one of the finest scenes in The Office lore- the IT Guy scene. Just remarkable on all accounts- no one really caring, even insulting (accidently: Jim not remembering his just announced name. on purpose: "...they use it for games and porn"), sprinkles of character in Oscar's nodding agreement with Dwight's assessment that the old IT guy was a terrorist or Daryl's face when it was revealed he had Facebook. Andy also sang a Woody Guthrie song, and Michael made me incredibly sad at points. But for one joke that stood out: Meredith's Van. This is the place where Michael meets 'the leaks'. Meredith's Van is a safe haven, a secret place, even though it apparantly is never locked. It seats 4 people comfortably though. The joke plays out like this- cut to scene in Meredith's van: With hand full of yellow sheets of paper, Pam: "I've never seen so many parking tickets." Daryl, holding a parking boot he found in the backseat: "This is just messed up." Read into this: Meredith is a classic alcoholic and she drives drunk. She drives her mini van, which she owns because she has kids, drunk enough to accrue a pile of parking tickets, likely from many different violations, and, worse, she is legally allowed not to drive, but took the device of her car anyway. Was she smart enough to hide the evidence, no just lazy enough to put it in there. Meredith has a sordid life- her kid plays soccer and she frequently has group sex with any number of disheveled souls looking for anything. Meredith is a bottom rung kind of women, one who drinks at work and has shown parts of her body to everyone at work. She works at this place, this dark, deeply perturbed character is part of Michael and Jim and Pam and everyone's everyday life. I love that. And she wasn't even in the scene. Kudos.

30 Rock - "...the current tattoo situation in the NBA"

First I want to get the something off my chest. 30 Rock is insane and it really tried pushing the comedic envelopes and has been more closer to 12-16 seasons of The Simpsons but earns triple times the points for not being animated, and is truly in another category all its own in TV history--- so I don't care that you already used Will Forte already as Price Gerhardt's messenger. I don't care because he is an on screen darling, sucking the viewer in with every charming smarmy breath and movement and welcoming vulnerabilty that this man is (MacGruber IN THEATERS NOW). You already used Rachel Dratch multiply, so established semantics over. I would love to give my favorite joke tag to the Jenna Maroney walking in on him as Cher scene: "this isn't what it looks like." Or when he can't control his Cher voice, "that came out wrong." Those jokes work on so many levels, each one hilarious. Everyone did a great at being their characters and when Kenneth becomes so drunkenly depressed that he reveals his true feelings: "Kiss My Face"--- is a totally validating an existence of a character just so we can have him play out that wonderful scene. My favorite joke goes to something bias once again: Carol is just meeting Liz and divulges information about life as a pilot leading to the exchange of him saying, "I don't know what's wrong in this country." Liz: "I know. People wear flips flops to church. And the NBA tattoo situation is out of control." That situation is out of control! In the 80s, those were men playing a team sport. The 90s crept in some individualism (Rodman, pff) and now its just a matter of fact thing that NBA players have tattos. LeBron had them in high school. Our country used to have its star basketball players be respectful and endorse nice products, now they thrive on individualism and making asses of themselves via stupid tattoos that compromise why they are really out there. Sure there is a dress code, but they ain't making up for tattoos. Sure, be yourself- but dammit- you're an image to people. Dr. J didn't have any tattoos probably. (Even Fundamentals Duncan has a dumb tattoo!) Also, flip flops in Church speaks to the lack of conviction in faith based religion. Church is about simply going to church, not about sticking to any higher power code. So much context hidden behind so much funny in one line.

So cool, inherit bias all around. That's how you're supposed to watch TV- for yourself. Develop a relationship with the characters, and like in real life, you'll have ones you like better and marry one of them and watch them with her for just an enjoyable evening of yourselves. That actually made sense, and I am only half patronizing here. Look, great TV inspires, and this inspired me to try a little more. You could tell that by the length of this entry as compared to others.

Review: Last Night's The Office "The Delivery":

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.