Sushiksha

This week’s topic: ‘The Office (US version)’: A Review

Be it Michael’s “That’s what she said” or Stanley’s “Did I stutter?!”, Be it the Pranks on Dwight or Jim and Pam’s adorable love story, ‘The Office’ ticks every box there is of being the perfect sit-com. ‘The Office’ was the most watched TV show on Netflix in 2019.  It was also nominated for almost 145 awards out of which 42 were Emmys and won 29 including 5 Emmys. It is also ranked number 1 on The Best NBC TV Shows of All Time.

The Story

The office is a Documentary Style sit-com based on the daily lives of the employees from the Scranton Branch of a Paper Company called Dunder Mifflin Inc. based in Scranton, Pennsylvania. The Branch Is managed by the very amicable and self-proclaimed ‘Best Boss in the World’, Michael Scott (played by Steve Carell) who considers the employees to be his family rather than just mere employees, which in turn comes as a major disappointment to the employees themselves who, instead of working, find themselves as targets to pranks and unnecessary conference room meetings that eat up their productivity at work, often causing life problems. Apart from Michael, there are around 24 other characters out of which around 16 are major and the others have recurring roles and guest appearances.

Jim Halpert (Played by John Krasinski)

Jim Halpert is the Chocolate boy of the office. Tall, lean and handsome, he is a salesman with a very good record. He spends most of his time pranking Dwight, another salesman and near the reception, talking to the receptionist Pam Beesly, with whom he later falls in love.

Pam Beesly (played by Jenna Fischer)

Pam is the office receptionist who spends most of her time bearing tantrums and as a target of pranks from Michael. She also loves sketching and painting, but isn’t brave enough to try pursuing it as a career. She is engaged to another employee from the office, a warehouse worker called Roy, for the past couple years. She too likes speaking to Jim a lot and eventually falls in love with him.

Dwight Schrute (played by Rainn Wilson)

Perhaps one of the weirdest and most unique characters ever written for a TV series. Dwight is a Beet and poultry farmer at his own farm called ‘Schrute Farms’ which he takes care of along with his brother Mose (played by Michael Schur, who is also the creator of the series) when he is not selling paper at Dunder Mifflin. He is the top salesman of the entire company, usually getting him out of the difficult situations he keeps putting the company in. He considers himself to be the Assistant Regional Manager of the branch, in spite of being reminded time and again that he is Assistant to the Regional Manager. He also has an on-again-off-again relationship with Angela from the accounting department.

There are 3 more people in the Sales department, Stanley Hudson (played by Leslie David Baker), Phyllis Vance (played by Phyllis Smith) and Andy Bernard (played by Ed Helms)

3 in the accounting Department, Angela Martin (played by Angela Kinsey), Oscar Martinez (played by Oscar Nunez Rainn Wilson) and Kevin Malone (played by Brian Baumgartner)

2 in Customer Service, Kelly Kapoor (played by Mindy Kaling) and Meredith Palmer (played by Kate Flanery)

We also have a HR rep, Toby Flenderson (played by Paul Lieberstein), a quality assurance manager, Creed Bratton (played by Creed Bratton) and a Temp, Ryan Howard (played by B. J. Novak)

Apart from other characters. Out of these, Mindy Kaling, Paul Lieberstein and B. J. Novak have written, produced and/or directed several episodes as well.

The Office is a hilarious series, with pure acted comedy. No background score or music to help. The actors are phenomenal at what they do. Shooting a series like you’re shooting a documentary but you aren’t is a whole new concept that is unique to the Office franchises. If you enjoy edgy humor and are not offended to several taboo references often, then you should definitely consider watching The Office, I bet you will NOT regret it. But, if you are easily offended by edgy humor, then the show might make you uncomfortable at several occasions, but you are definitely going to crack up very soon.

Overall, The Office is an all-in-one package. There is comedy, romance, more comedy, some emotional moments, and some bittersweet. But one thing is for sure, The Office is going to leave an everlasting impression on you, all memes on Instagram that have references to The Office. It is indeed the perfect sit-com for people who love laughing their hearts out.

If you have watched The Office before, I would love to know your favorite characters or favorite moments from the series down below in the comments section.