Shareholders Meeting

  By Just Jammy

So Michael was up to his old tricks again in “Shareholders Meeting.” That is to say, he was hogging the spotlight, sticking his foot in his mouth, and generally being unaware of what a moron he is. Typical Michael behavior … funny, as always, but honestly, not such a good time. Maybe I would have enjoyed it more if I didn’t feel like I’d already seen this ten times this season. Literally. It’s almost as if every episode is designed simply in order to answer the question, “What new place can Michael make an ass of himself?” Read More

 Murder at Dunder Mifflin!
    By Just Jammy

There’s been a Murder at Dunder Mifflin!  And no,  Michael didn’t kill Toby.   More surprisingly, no one killed Michael.   So who was murdered?  Why, I do declare it was Bill Bourbon of Savannah, Georgia … of course.    How did he come to be murdered at Dunder Mifflin?  Well, because Michael keeps a game of Belles, Bourbon, and Bullets in his office cabinet, right next to Connect Four.   And since the only logical thing to do on a day that you and your employees discover that your perpetually troubled small, regional paper company is now teetering on the brink of bankruptcy is play a murder mystery game, Michael whipped it out.  In an effort to supposedly distract the employees, but really because of his own need to avoid the troubling news at hand, Michael opts to spend the day in a refreshing fantasy world of … murder. And so we, characters and viewers alike, are all transported to the historical world of 1950s Savannah … well, as 1950s Savannah as a couple of props and some bad southern accents can make the conference room.  But hey, there’s finger sandwiches and baby carrots, and if that doesn’t say mid-century Georgia like bottled lemonade says Mexican fiesta … oh, wait.  

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Double Date Disaster
By Just Jammy

If there are any two people in the world (including the fictional world of Dunder Mifflin) that most would not want to go on a double date with, I would have to say it would probably be Michael Scott and their own mother. But that’s exactly what Pam had the pleasure of dealing with in last week’s episode of The Office, not surprisingly, titled “Double Date.” If she thought that discovering that Michael was dating her mother was her personal hell, I can’t imagine how she felt about having to witness it first hand. Well, I can imagine. Horrified probably covers it. And, as it turns out, she had every right to be leery of this particular lunch date even if Michael thinks that a birthday lunch is the cure-all for … well, everything. And he’s just sure that this is his chance to win Pam over. And while Michael is busy trying to win Pam over, Dwight is busy trying to win over the rest of the office staff, in a bizarre game of one-upmanship. So, pretty much standard procedure for Dunder Mifflin Scranton.

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Koi Pond: Michael Fell Into One: Why Am I Not Surprised: He’s a World Class Moron: A Review
By Just Jammy

So Michael fell into a koi pond on last week’s episode of The Office, aptly titled “Koi Pond.” This really shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone … as this man once drove his car into a lake. To be fair, he was following the GPS directions, but nonetheless, he drove his car into a lake. And now he’s also gone for a dip in a koi pond. Again, not terribly surprising for a man who hosted a Halloween haunted house for CHILDREN and donned a costume that was apparently … (his) junk in a box? And then he pretended to hang himself to send the Halloween message to young children that suicide is never the answer. I, for one, was unaware of the high suicide rate among the trick-or-treating set, but leave it to Michael to be proactive.

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Mad Love for “The Lover”
By Just Jammy

The Office is back! And so am I. So I know what you’re thinking … “What do you mean The Office is BACK? Where did it go?” Well, nowhere. But with last week’s episode, The Lover, it was back in fine form, the likes of which I had yet to see this season. As you might remember from my other reviews, there were lots of things that I liked about Gossip, The Meeting and The Promotion. But as much as I liked them for their humorous moments, plot advancement, and character development, none of them felt like truly classic Office episodes to me. So I was still waiting for one of those ultimate episodes that made me think that I was watching The Office at it’s best. I was expecting that episode to be Niagara, but as it turns out, that’s not the way it was for me.

You might be wondering (you’re probably not) where my Niagara and Mafia reviews are. Well, here goes: Niagara was a great episode of The Office full of the usual antics and off-the-wall humor, unfortunately, in my opinion, it was a horrible episode of Jim and Pam’s wedding. And since, honestly, all I cared about in that episode was Jim and Pam’s wedding, and not Andy’s balls or Kevin’s feet, or Dwight’s complete inability to eat pancakes in non-disgusting fashion, I was rather bitterly disappointed when the much-hyped nuptials turned out to be nothing more than 30 seconds woven into a Chris Brown video. Oh, I loved the wedding-related moments that we did get, including the ones with ‘Forever’ in the background, I was just upset that we got so few of them, and so little Jim and Pam for it being their … you know, wedding. Not to mention not getting to hear any vows and really anything much else romantic. I loved the way the story played out, with Jim and Pam running off and getting married just the two of them, and even the wedding dance, I just didn’t love what they chose to show us, and how they showed it … like interspersing the scenes from the actual wedding ceremony with the wedding dance. It would have all been great, and a gotten a completely different reaction from me, if they’d just shown us some real vows before or after the video. Or something sweet and loving and happy between Jim and Pam and the baby. But they chose not to, presumably in favor of showing us more bar hopping, and that didn’t sit very well with me. But based on the fact that everyone else seemed to love the episode, I didn’t want to play Debbie Downer and talk about how much better it could have been. But it could have been better. Trust me, though, you wouldn’t have wanted to read a detailed review. And I didn’t particularly want to write it in my fragile (? more like livid …) emotional state.

A Tale Of Two Bosses
By Just Jammy

So this week on The Office, a few things changed. Dwight was angry, Oscar was snarky, Stanley was sarcastic, Angela was judgmental, Michael acted like a child, Jim got frustrated, and Pam just wanted cash. Oh wait, that’s a pretty standard day at Dunder Mifflin Scranton. But there was a specific reason for the usual petty bitchiness and immature behavior this week; it seems there’s a new boss in town, and his name is Jimothy. That sounds weird. Good thing he’s fine with being called Jim. “The Promotion” dealt with, not surprisingly, the fallout from Jim’s promotion. And this was our first chance to see the newly restructured Scranton branch with its two co-managers. As Oscar so sardonically points out, it is somewhat unusual to have a power structure headed by two people. No, we don’t have two Presidents, and there aren’t two Popes, but if ever there was a place that needs to two leaders, it’s Dunder Mifflin Scranton. Because in this case, after all, what they really will have is one leader and … Michael. That’s not entirely fair. Michael is really good at some things. Like taking constructive criticism well. Oh, wait … he’s not known for that. But he is good at … napping. Obviously Michael does have some strengths, aside from his ability to act childish at every turn, or he wouldn’t have been the boss this long. He is good with clients, the consummate salesman. And he’s got experience. And no one has died on his watch. Except maybe Tom. Still, there’s room for improvement in the Scranton branch leadership. And Jim sets out to prove it. Unfortunately for Jim, he seems to have forgotten the troops he’s attempting to lead. These are not people known for the rationality. They’re not known for their open-mindedness or generosity. What they are known for is being generally self-serving and somewhat rancorous. So when Jim came out swinging, attempting to take a firm stance on a tough decision, he should have known it was going to be ugly. Poor Jim learned the hard was that it’s not always easy being the boss.

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The (Un)expected Meeting
By Just Jammy

So an age old question was finally answered in, “The Meeting,” last week’s surprising, in a very expected sort of way, episode of The Office: yes, Jim is Big Bird. See, I’ll bet you’re surprised. And yet, would we really expect anything much else from Michael, but an assertion that Jim is Big Bird? Because he is tall. And yellow. Yellow? Really, Michael? Now, I’m not sure if Michael meant to imply that Jim is cowardly (in which case, he really should have described him as a lion) or if he just has a problem with his colors. But I’m not at all shocked that Michael envisions his staff as Sesame Street characters. I am a little shocked that Michael so willingly threw Jim under the bus … but then again, I wouldn’t really expect anything else. This is Michael we’re talking about. But that is the beauty of this show; they constantly manage to throw the unexpected at us, and yet somehow, the unexpected really comes as no surprise.

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