Review: The Office: Season 03
Oh much do I love this show? Let me count the ways...okay, I will in a second. This show is definitely one of my absolute favorites. Another in the untraditional humor camp, it represents the dynamic of working in an office so perfectly. The different personalities. The workplace issues. And of course, the inter-office relationships.
This season, despite a slightly rocky start for me, has been fantastic. When I do these reviews, I go over the episode titles for the season to refresh my memory of what happened. Usually, I have to read up on a few, because I don't remember them based on episode title alone. No such problem with The Office. Maybe it's because the titles reflect perfectly what happens in the episode, but there's also the fact this show just embeds itself into my brain, and after this season, I'm an amazingly happy viewer.
Okay, for a moment, I want to put my giddiness over Pam/Jim aside. Really. I'm going to be objective here. :)
I've always said I identify with Pam, and this season has been FABULOUS in terms of her character really growing and coming into her own. After season two's kiss, I had NO IDEA where they would take that relationship and Pam's character.
It was handled pitch-perfect on every level: Jim, broken that Pam refused him, took the job in Stamford, where he tried to start over. Pam, however, realized that her life needed a serious change, and she broke off the wedding. No doubt, she had no idea of Jim's move, and probably intended to keep palling around with him, so his absence really forced her to take a look at what she wanted and why.
The Stamford office was fun, but I'm glad we didn't spend too long there. The show was good, but once the two branches merged, the season just CLICKED, and everything worked beautifully.
Where to start?
Michael, as always, is a bumbling goof. He means well, fucks up, and doesn't even realize it half the time. "Gay Witch Hunt," where he accidentally outted Oscar as being gay and then tried to prove how pro-gay he really was, was PAINFUL. Funny, but it definitely represented the OMG-I-can't-believe-they're-getting-away-with-this moments of the show. Seriously: so much happens on this show that if it happened in real life, Michael Scott would've lost his job a long time ago. And I really love how the relationship with Jan evolved. He started out the season with Carol, which fell to pieces when he got overly inspired at Diwali and proposed to her, despite the fact they hadn't dated for very long, and the final nail was placed in the coffin around Christmas time, leaving Michael with two tickets to Jamaica and no one to go with. Which led to him asking Jan, who actually said yes, and from there, we learn just how fucked up Jan really is. Maybe fucked up is the wrong phrase: she's seriously mental. Broken. Out of control. Her sexual fetishes firmly placed her in the man's shoes, while Michael's needs put him in the woman's role in the relationship. It's no wonder he wanted out, and it's no wonder, especially after hearing him say twice on his list of cons about Jan, that she has no boobs, that he got back together with her once she got a boob job.
Oh, the hilarity. :) Jan is truly a work of art, and her freak-out at corporate was great, her suggestion about staying at Michael's condo even better. I can't wait to see how this plays out next season, with Jan no longer his boss. This is going to be a great sub-plot for season four.
Dwight is always a delight. My favorite opening skit, aside from Jim's impression of Dwight, was the "fax from the future." I laughed so hard I cried. Great moment, and totally classic. He and Angela continued their secret (but not so secret to Jim and Pam) relationship, which is unique as it is disturbing. I wonder where this couple is going, and how long the secret will play out. They've been together for at least a season and a half, and I wonder what it'll take for Dwight to propose. The writers of this show do a great job letting relationships play out naturally and realistically, so I'll be interested to see where this one goes. Dwight had a lot of great moments this season, and a lot of painful ones as well. He can never seem to land Michael's job, can he? Poor guy. But the best moment was his initiation of Ryan into sales. Talk about uncomfortable, but fabulous. He exposed Ryan for the jerk Ryan really is, and that was great.
Ryan and Kelly remain the most dysfunctional couple in the office. But this season was telling. Kelly wasn't quite as oblivious to Ryan's asshole-ness, especially later on in the season. I wonder how she'll deal with Ryan's promotion, and what they'll do with her character. It's not that I want to see her "grow up," or as Michael would say, "get a brain," but rather, I'd like to see her take charge a bit. It was great when she trained accounting in "Product Recall," because we got to see for all her fangirliness, she really is a great customer service rep. So we'll see.
Ryan's promotion, though, earns the SHOCK OF THE SEASON. OMG, I nearly DIED. I kept expecting Karen to get the promotion, but let me tell you, this is so much better, and realistic. So what if Ryan's never had a sale? For those of you who've never worked in the corporate business world, corporate is all about the educated business monkeys who have little real-world business experience, but who tell all the people who DO have experience how things should be done. So Ryan's the perfect candidate. Not to mention, HE'LL BE MICHAEL'S BOSS!!! I can't WAIT to see the fallout from that, as well as the power struggle, especially after three years of suffering from Michael's abuse.
Moving on to the newer members of the cast: Andy's a great addition. I loved the friction between him and Dwight during the merger, but that quickly turned jerky, as Andy aimed to get Dwight fired. That was low. But putting the guy in anger management was fabulous, and the new Andy (Drew, if you will), is just as great. "Beach Games" was the highlight of the season as far as his character goes, where Angela finally got her revenge for what Andy did to Dwight.
And of course, Karen. How can we not talk about Karen? I'll be honest: I like her. There's actually a lot about her that reminds me of me: she's realistic, not sentimental, and has a mean sense of humor that doesn't sit well with everyone, but is meant to be harmless. I love how they didn't paint her to be a bitch, how she made an obvious and good fit for Jim. And Jim needed her, I think. Not only to get some distance from his feelings for Pam, but also, well, he NEEDED to be in a serious relationship. Because if he didn't have Karen, he'd be faced with Pam, and he wasn't ready, I don't think, to accept that their friendship had the chance to become something more. He wasn't ready for the possibility of having his heart broken, again.
The thing with the Karen/Jim relationship, from my POV, is this: had Jim never met Pam, let alone have feelings for her, Karen and Jim would've worked just fine. They're a decent couple, they fit, but with a little friction. Karen doesn't quite play off Jim as well as Pam does, but that's not her flaw. She's insecure, and that in and of itself isn't bad, but it's how she displays her insecurity: by ordering Pam around to put Pam in her place. By hashing out how Jim really feels about Pam night after night after night, instead of taking him at his word. I can't BLAME Karen for being insecure or even jealous, because it's obvious that Jim and Pam have a seriously stable friendship, romantic feelings aside. But there's something to be said about trust in a relationship, and if you can't trust your SO, talking to him night after night will never help. Asking him to move with you to NYC when you get that promotion is the wrong avenue, even though I'm sure Karen meant well in terms of Jim furthering his career out of Scranton.
But here's what I don't like about Karen: she's self-serving. It's not a sin to want a promotion, but all her bluster about GETTING that promotion grated on my nerves. It was more than self-confidence and cockiness: she favored herself over Jim getting the promotion. I don't think that the serious idea of him getting the promotion over her even crossed her mind. That bothered me.
Also bothersome was Karen would worry about the relationship when she viewed Pam as a threat (there's just one too many people in Scranton, you know?), but she didn't think twice about making lunch plans with friends of hers while Jim's waiting on his interview. Would it have been so hard to wait with him, make late lunch plans, and introduce your friends to your beau? Apparently so.
There are so many little reasons, ultimately, why Jim and Karen didn't work. Like I said, had Pam never been a part of Jim's life, it might've been fine with rough patches (we all have rough patches), but I'll be honest: Karen's bitchiness by making Pam make COPIES of sales report (I'll put you in your place, you receptionist you, I'm a SALES REP) was far worse than Pam apologizing if she made Karen uncomfortable during her Beach Day speech. Pam was at least being honest at that moment. Karen was being vindictive.
And speaking of Pam. Talk about a roller-coaster of a ride this season. She's come a long way. The break-up with Roy felt just right, and while I cringed when the two got back together, they needed that, and the true colors of Roy's temper, in order to make the final break. The coffee house scene when Pam and Roy said good-bye was perfect.
Pam, too, also has a way (like Jim does) of reaching out to her fellow co-workers. She supported Michael too many times to count, but most hysterically, in "Grief Counseling" when she helped with the bird funeral. She supported Dwight when he was in charge of the office. She even reached out to Karen, despite her own feelings of jealousy, to make the Christmas party a success, as well as encouraged Jim to give Karen the go-ahead to move close by, even though it broke Pam's heart. And she reached out to Angela during Christmas as well, by making peace between the competing Christmas parties.
I say this to point out how similar she and Jim are. Despite their love of tormenting Dwight, they both know how to reach out when it counts, like Jim did to Andy during "Product Recall".
So I could gush and gush about Pam this season, but I'm not. But I'm so proud of her, so proud of her speech when she said to Jim the words I'd been wanting to hear all season, "I called off my wedding because of you." Appropriate or not, Pam finally found her courage, her own two feet, and realizing she may not get Jim in the end (despite her comment to Karen about getting the promotion, Pam OBVIOUSLY wanted Jim to get the promotion), she was still happy with it. Maybe she was trying to convince herself, but anyone who's watched this show from day one knows what Pam looks like when she's trying to convince herself of something, and this last time, she was at peace. She didn't have any regrets, and that's what was important.
And I have to say, when Jim asked her out on a date, I felt the exact way Pam looked. That. Was. Awesome.
But I am curious how all of this will play out. Jim's got to break up with Karen, and that's not going to be an easy pill to swallow, since she didn't get the promotion (the latter serves her right, for all her bragging and worse, slamming Michael in her interview, even though it was off the record). I know Rashida Jones' show for Fox got picked up, but there's no telling what that'll mean for Karen. Some actors do double-duty, and we all know that Fox shows don't fare well if they aren't immediately popular. My guess is that Karen's going to be around for a while, and that will make things INTERESTING. And I hope, if her character does stick around, that her story won't be focused on hating Jim and Pam and/or trying to break them up. That's too soap-opera-y, and also, Karen needs to have her own story that isn't part of the love triangle. Hell, maybe she'll take Ryan up on that date. I think those two would be a better fit than her and Jim, to be honest. ;)
Not that Pam and Jim's relationship will be easy. Getting those two together won't be the downfall of the show by any means, because it was time. First, Jim had to work up the courage to tell Pam how he felt, but then in turn, Pam had to come to terms with her own life, how she felt about Roy, how she felt about Jim, and do the same to Jim. Keeping them apart at this point would be ridiculous and not natural. But it won't be perfect. I'll be curious to see how the writers play this out, and what'll bring tension into the relationship aside from evil looks from Karen.
And to anyone who thinks Karen got the short end of the stick, and how what Pam did wasn't fair or right or whatever, remember Roy: Jim waited too close to Pam's wedding to reveal how he felt about her, and the revelation itself wasn't bad, but his kiss was, because Pam was still with Roy. No one complains about this because Roy was truly a jerk and Pam didn't need to be with him, but still, it's the same situation. At least Pam didn't plant a big one on Jim when they were alone. It was Jim who had to decide what he wanted now that he'd laid his heart on the line, rebound with Karen, and learned that Pam would probably love him, if he let her.
And at least Pam didn't wait until Jim and Karen got engaged or something. That would've been bad.
And I want to say, letting Pam and Jim explore their potential as a couple will not ruin the show. There's too much greatness when it comes to Michael's and Dwight's antics, and the supporting cast is great. There's lots of gold to mine, there, and trust me, Jim and Pam will have to earn their happy ending.
So three MILLION cheers for this season. It ended on a perfect note and provided us with plenty of questions and sub-plots for next season. Of all the comedies I watch, this is by far my favorite, and the one I look forward to most.
I can't wait for the dvds. And the deleted scenes. I know I could watch them on the NBC site, but it's so much more fun on dvd. And if season three's deleted scenes are anything like the previous two seasons, they will do more than enlighten what's already happened in the episode.