The Office Retrospective - Where's The Love

[jess stone]

A cursory check and I do not believe I saw any posts which is a rather
ignominious slight for this nine year run. I stopped watching some two
plus seasons ago. I may have sampled some of the eps after SC left but
truth be told it was hit or miss for me for a year or two even prior
to SC's departure. Interesting to me I always thought that there was
too much of SC and not enough of the extraordinary secondary
characters until SC left and while P (No one in recent memory was
better cast than Jenna Fischer) and J might have been the life blood
(Dwight the soul) MS was certainly the heart of The Office and he was
sorely missed. I have no hesitation in selectively putting the early
years of The Office in (if i had a list) my top 25 tv series of all
time. I teared up right along with JF during the retrospective. Fair
weather fan that I am I did not bother watching the final ep just the
retrospective.

[Jim T.]

On Sat, 18 May 2013 08:17:21 -0700, jess stone <jess...@gmail.com>
wrote:

>A cursory check and I do not believe I saw any posts which is a rather
>ignominious slight for this nine year run. I stopped watching some two
>plus seasons ago. I may have sampled some of the eps after SC left but
>truth be told it was hit or miss for me for a year or two even prior
>to SC's departure. Interesting to me I always thought that there was
>too much of SC and not enough of the extraordinary secondary
>characters until SC left and while P (No one in recent memory was
>better cast than Jenna Fischer) and J might have been the life blood
>(Dwight the soul) MS was certainly the heart of The Office and he was
>sorely missed.

While I never thought there was too much Carell, I too thought the
supporting cast was strong enough that he wouldn't be missed that
badly. Boy was I wrong. The qualilty of The Office had been declining
the last couple of years of Carell, but when he left it fell off the
cliff.

>I have no hesitation in selectively putting the early
>years of The Office in (if i had a list) my top 25 tv series of all
>time.

Yep.

[Ashton Crusher]

On Sat, 18 May 2013 11:34:09 -0400, Jim T. <x@y.z> wrote:

>On Sat, 18 May 2013 08:17:21 -0700, jess stone <jess...@gmail.com>
>wrote:
>
>>A cursory check and I do not believe I saw any posts which is a rather
>>ignominious slight for this nine year run. I stopped watching some two
>>plus seasons ago. I may have sampled some of the eps after SC left but
>>truth be told it was hit or miss for me for a year or two even prior
>>to SC's departure. Interesting to me I always thought that there was
>>too much of SC and not enough of the extraordinary secondary
>>characters until SC left and while P (No one in recent memory was
>>better cast than Jenna Fischer) and J might have been the life blood
>>(Dwight the soul) MS was certainly the heart of The Office and he was
>>sorely missed.
>
>While I never thought there was too much Carell, I too thought the
>supporting cast was strong enough that he wouldn't be missed that
>badly. Boy was I wrong. The qualilty of The Office had been declining
>the last couple of years of Carell, but when he left it fell off the
>cliff.

It did for the first season or two without him but this season has
been very very good IMHO. Personally I always found him to be
cringe-inducing and overacted.

[EGK]

I think cringe-incuding is exactly what they often went for with Michael
Scott. They made people uncomfortable watching him. He was alternately
funny and uncomfortable but, In the end, people rooted for him.

[Seapig]

I think you made the right call. I enjoyed the retrospective a lot
more than the finale. The finale felt too much like more
retrospective/reunion show. Too many talking heads - I wanted to see
the characters talk to each other, not to me.

[Seapig]

On May 18, 8:34 am, Jim T. <x...@y.z> wrote:
> On Sat, 18 May 2013 08:17:21 -0700, jess stone <jessst...@gmail.com>

> wrote:
>
> >A cursory check and I do not believe I saw any posts which is a rather
> >ignominious slight for this nine year run. I stopped watching some two
> >plus seasons ago. I may have sampled some of the eps after SC left but
> >truth be told it was hit or miss for me for a year or two even prior
> >to SC's departure. Interesting to me I always thought that there was
> >too much of SC and not enough of the extraordinary secondary
> >characters until SC left and while P (No one in recent memory was
> >better cast than Jenna Fischer) and J might have been the life blood
> >(Dwight the soul) MS was certainly the heart of The Office and he was
> >sorely missed.
>
> While I never thought there was too much Carell, I too thought the
> supporting cast was strong enough that he wouldn't be missed that
> badly. Boy was I wrong. The qualilty of The Office had been declining
> the last couple of years of Carell, but when he left it fell off the
> cliff.

I wish they would have put more faith in that supporting cast, instead
of trying to turn Andy into Michael Scott, version 2.0 (or David
Brent, version 3.0), and continually bringing in new cast members. I
thought Carell's departure was an opportunity to reverse the slide,
but it accelerated it.

> >I have no hesitation in selectively putting the early
> >years of The Office in (if i had a list) my top 25 tv series of all
> >time.
>
> Yep.

Double yep.

[Ashton Crusher]

I feel about the same. The finale seemed like an extension of the
retrospective for about the first 30 minutes. Overall I enjoyed both
but thought the Finale could have been better.

[Dimensional Traveler]

I didn't. I wanted someone to finally get fed up with the asshole and
off him.

--
The 'Enterprise' crew in the 2009 Star Trek are adrenaline addicted,
hyper-active teenagers with ADD whose Ritalin got replaced with
methamphetamine, displaying a level of discipline that a Somali pirate
wouldn't tolerate.