The Office
Cast & Key People
▶
Our Review
The American Office was supposed to be a disaster, a remake of a beloved British series starring a guy from The 40-Year-Old Virgin. Instead it became the most rewatched sitcom in history, the show a generation streams to fall asleep. The mockumentary frame gave it a documentary’s patience: jokes build across seasons (the cold open of Kevin dropping the chili is a four year setup), and cringe comedy gradually gave way to actual love for these people.
Michael Scott is the miracle. Steve Carell took a character David Brent made unbearable and found the do or die, human heart under him. Garbage Island-era Michael proposing to Holly is genuinely moving TV. Season 2’s Dinner Party might be the single funniest half hour of the 2000s. Jim and Pam’s slowly building romance (before it overstayed) defined workplace romance for a decade, and the supporting cast. Creed’s nonsense, Dwight’s beet farming supremacy, Stanley’s pretzel day joy, is a bottomless well.
Seasons 8-9 dip hard post-Carell, but the finale sticks the landing.
Verdict: Essential. It’s the show against which all other sitcoms are measured, and most fail.
