The Office does its best work when it allows the harsh real world to intrude on the wacky tube city that is Dunder Mifflin.
We saw that last season when Michael battled a new boss, quit the company, and tried starting his own business.
And we saw it again last night with "Murder," in which he leads the entire staff through an elaborate Clue-like party game to take their minds off some grim-yet-vague (which is somehow worse) financial news about the corporate office.
Last week's episode had that "more like a drama than a comedy" feel to it as well, when Michael cruelly dumped Pam's mom on her birthday because she was too old, and his off-stated desire to have kids was revealed as a fear of death.
(In this episode, he mentions having a vasectomy, which at first I thought sounded illogical, given his wish to have children. But I remembered the operation was done by Jan's request/order. A sick, sad relationship, that one.)
But this week was better, because that sense of meanness was gone, and because it gave pretty much everyone in the cast something to do, if only for a little bit. (My favorite moment: Andy's lesson on the variations in southern accents.)
I'm sure there's even darker episodes ahead, considering the news Jim got toward the end of the episode (the company expects to be insolvent by the end of the year). Hopefully, the show will handle it with a mixture of the Michael and Jim methods.
Tom Coombe
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