In case you’ve been living under a rock in the bottom of a
Yamal crater for the past eleven years, The Office was a successful NBC show
about the workings of a paper company’s local office in Scranton, PA with a
cast of misfits stealing our hearts using genuine realness, charm, and an
astonishing sense of nuanced reactions and comedic timing. Steve Carell takes
the lead in this mockumentary-styled comedy based off the British show of the
same name (with a perfectly mastered David Brent from the mind of Ricky
Gervais. Seriously, if you haven’t seen it, check out the original right meow.
It’s on Netflix.) The show had an immaculately crafted group of caricatures
that gave each masterly line the delivery it deserved. There was the screwball
boss who everyone had to indulge, (think parents acting amused by their kid
doing a shitty summersault,) the ‘straight’ couple playing
will-they-won’t-they, the absurdist coworker who is a mix of a 19th
century beet farmer and a modern 12 year old boy, his severe hypocritical Christian
girlfriend, and a few more half-Normz to remind us this takes place in Anytown
USA.
The show is great; it’s one of my top 3 favorites of all time (seasons 1-5
tho….Seinfeld and Arrested Development are the other two..) But it started to
veer off track…..showing signs during season 5-6 (of an overwelcomed 9) when Jim
and Pam get engaged, Pam leaves the office to try college in NY, (I get it, the
character needed her creative justice. But the show felt the burn because of
it.) And Jim and Michael go through a painful attempt at co-managing the office
in an expected and rightfully owed endeavor to Jim and his effort to climb the
corporate ladder. The premiere of season 6 has Michael furiously trying to gain
popularity by spreading absurd rumors about his coworkers, forcing Jim and Pam
to admit she’s pregnant to alleviate the pain of Stanley’s true rumor, that
he’s cheating on his wife. (Oy.) One of the most cringe-worthy episodes is when
the office crew plays out a murder mystery scenario, it’s so campy it hurts. There’s
another terrible episode where Michael is forced to payout on an asinine
promise he made ten years before – to send an entire class of students to
college. Are these writers masochists?? This was so unbelievably painful it’s
possibly the worst episode in the series. I’d rather not view them all to
really find out if that’s true…
The show ultimately
chops off its genius head when Jim and Pam get married – more exactly, when the
show has its first musical number - the office drones goofily mimicking the
viral YouTube video of the wedding party dance number where they’re flailing
down the isle that you probably know what I’m talking about but cannot figure
how else to describe it but I KNOW you know what I'm talking about. Google it if you don't. "Wedding party dance viral video" maybe?? Or not. Ya know. It's painful. (It is my moral obligation to mention this episode’s
writing received an Emmy nom….UGH.)
Other signs of vitals failing – the show’s
star left at the end of season 6 when his contract ended, an injection of an
awkward and obvious attempt at a new ‘straight’-ish couple will-they-won’t-they
storyline (with Erin and Andy,) while the paper company goes bankrupt and was
literally bought out by a new company like a dying body desperately receiving a
new organ. If the buyout was an organ, the roster of new bosses coming through
acts as blood bags…… Or something like that. I dunno, I’m not fucking MD I’m
just a judgey TV viewer. This includes Kathy Bates, Will Ferrell, James Spader,
and Catherine Tate. Honestly it’s just comical to me writing those names in a
row like that. What was the show thinking? Why not shoot the horse once its
lame leg was established, like Dwight would accurately recommend? OH I KNOW.
Cuz I have this theory.
In the age of Binge Watching and easily accessible
online feedback from the idiot masses, TV execs are wide-eyed at the
information they can dissect and overanalyze. (Let’s remember a petition allegedly
kept Community from getting the initial studio axe. YES I SIGNED IT THANKYOUANDG'DAY.) Season 6
aired in 2009, balls deep in the up and coming shrine of Netflix Streaming
(2007) – what could be deciphered as the saturation of Binge Watching. I
personally feel that studios no longer call their own shots, and have started
to depend too highly on the new type of ratings and psyche of the viewer they
can gather with this new medium. Therefore, less integrity is involved in the
creativity and overall concepts of shows. These studios now feel the pressure
of supply and demand as we guzzle them in several days, DYING for more. Actually,
The Office might be the first example of a well-known beloved primetime TV show
lasting too long. (Any other
nominations??)
Let’s not forget the genius that is Michael Schur. (He’s that guy
I’m dying to have dinner with, dead or alive.) He was one of the head writers
of The Office, also played Mose Schrute, later co-created Parks and Rec with
Greg Daniels (we’ll get to him later), and co-created Brooklyn Nine-Nine. Parks
and Rec aired the same year as The Office season 6……. One can surmise his
departure of the show was a big catalyst in its decline. After reading through
the synopses of the last few seasons, the show ended on an overwrought, overacted,
desperate, absurd state. Mindy Kaling was a writer of the show from day one,
and I believe she was a big contributor to the show’s downfall. She co-wrote
the Jim and Pam marry episode, and certainly has a personal flavor of embracing
popular culture to a stylized degree. I cringed watching the “music video” she
and Erin (Ellie Kemper) made together in a cheesy attempt at charm. While the use of pop
culture was honed and restrained in Michael Scott’s hands during the first few golden
seasons of the show, it was exploited and shoved down our throats once Mindy
was more-or-less at the helm. Her technique didn’t quite fit the Office format,
but it thrives in her current show – The Mindy Project. (I’m actually not a big
fan but I gotta give it up, girl can write the hell out of a joke.) There’s a
chance that the birth of Glee (also 2009) contributed to the showrunners’ acceptance
of an 90% serious full-blown musical number. I can almost see Mindy’s
convincing Greg Daniels it was a good idea.
I recall feeling a strong sense of farcical
satire through season 6, as though the actors were playing themselves playing
their characters. Something wasn’t clicking. It was as though a sense of
self-awareness overcame the atmosphere of the once perfect dynamic between
characters. New bosses of the office were marched through as often as I shower.
(Actually….that’s not true…….. Do you know how hard it is to shower with two
toddlers in the house?? Kids = loss of hygiene. TMI. I DIGRESS.) Storylines
became tired and predictable. I tuned out around the end of season 6 I believe.
I did tune into the last episode of the show for nostalgia’s sake, and boy did
the writers know it. Michael Scott makes an appearance at Dwight and Angela’s
wedding – which – we knew would happen. How could it not? These writers had
people to please, and they were extremely aware of that.
Season 1 clocked in
with 5.4 million viewers, the series peaked at season 5 with 9 million viewers,
and ended on season 9 with a measly 5.1 million viewers. Ouch. History will
ultimately reveal the show as a lesson to creators and viewers alike as an
example of what happened at the crux of consumers over consuming, the show attempting
to satisfy our gluttonous appetite for watching something six hours in a row…..Don’t
pretend you’re above that, you know you’ve binge-watched. We all have. ‘MERICA
amirite??
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