Season 8, Episode 5
I feel like I’ve
seen this before…
“What am I up to?”
-Robert California
Apparently The
Office is just content to repeat itself. And I don’t just mean in a
season-to-season since, like continuously doing holiday episodes (which I rather
like, actually) or making Andy the new boss because he’s the closest to Michael
Scott (which I don’t). No, I’m talking about the episode-to-episode copying
that just won’t seem to go away. If “Garden Party” showed us that Andy’s trying
really hard to impress Robert California, and the Erin may or may not still
have feeling for Andy, “Spooked” showed us…exactly the same thing.
I already talked last night about the danger of back-to-back episodes that repeat a formula
in the guise of Community, but at
least in that scenario, even if the format was the same, the stories and
characterization were different, and it helped that both episodes were still
pretty great. With The Office, neither
of the two episodes was all that good, and they’re hurt even more by the fact
that the second one fails to build on the first.
Look, I could see a universe where “Spooked” was meant to
build on “Garden Party”, where the former furthers the plots introduced in the
latter, but that’s not something the show seems interested in doing. Andy’s
still afraid of Robert California (a name that I must always spell out in full,
apparently), and there relationship hasn’t really changed since the premiere,
even thought that episode ended with Andy supposedly showing his boss all that
he’s capable of.
As to the Erin and Andy front: I used to like the idea of
the two to them getting together, once. I thought it was one of the few bright
spots of season six, even if it was more or less just a retread of Jim and Pam’s
arc from the earlier seasons. There was something sweet and endearing about watching
the two circle around each other, and I must admit I was somewhat invested in
their fate. But for whatever reason, the show mostly dropped the arc in season
seven – or at least put it behind the narrative wall that is Gabe – and I
stopped caring about them as a couple. Now, the show is trying to revive those
tensions at a pace that is far too slow, and trying to throw in “drama” by revealing
that Andy’s been dating some mysterious woman on the sly (what?) just feels
like there reversing the Gabe-maneuver from last year. This is one of those
plots that just needs to be resolved already.
And then there’s Robert California, who got more to do this
week than in week’s past, but we still don’t know enough about him to justify his
presence, or James Spader’s role on the show for that matter. I get that he’s
the new scary boss that’s supposed to shake things up, but I don’t feel as if they
use him to that effect as well as they could; apart from the employees becoming
nervous when he’s around, nothing’s really changed at the Scranton branch of
Dunder Miflin, and something tells me that the producers like it that way. So
the weird insights we got into him tonight – how he likes to tell scary stories
that play on everybody’s greatest fears, and the fact that he’s got a kid who
has a weird obsession with the weather – are frustrating in the fact that they
don’t tells us more about him or his relationship with his employees. There just
there to make him seem weirder and even more distant.
There were of course some nice moments in the episode –
the show has always been good at getting good laughs out of people’s costumes,
and I enjoyed Angela and Phyllis being bitchy about Erin’s Halloween
decorations. (Pam’s belief in ghosts? That was just stupid and undeserving of
the character.) But even those few laughs didn’t help to cover up some serious
narrative overall flaws in the show’s eighth season.
Quotes, Etc:
“YOU’RE THE REAL PEOPLE’S PRINCESS! DIANNA’S GOT NOTHING
ON YOU!”
“Everybody, this is my son Burt. Burt, this is a paper
company.”
“Yeah, she also has boobs.” “Yeah, but she’s doesn’t have
nipples.”
“Gabe?” “Sweet Erin…”
“That’s rude. I don’t tell you hurricanes suck, even
though they totally do.”
“WHY…ON EARTH…WOULD A MUSEUM PUT A MUMMY IN IT?”
“The name of the game is Pecker Poker, the game of cards
that gets you ha-.”
“Is she Asian?” “She’s from somewhere, I bet. Maybe she’s
from the forest.”
“You don’t live as long as I have without a healthy fear
of snakes.”
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