Tip jar

If you like CaB and wish to support it, you can use PayPal or KoFi. Thank you, and I hope you continue to enjoy the site - Neil.

Buy Me a Coffee at ko-fi.com

Support CaB

Recent

Welcome to Cook'd and Bomb'd. Please login or sign up.

March 29, 2024, 07:14:07 AM

Login with username, password and session length

Been bingeing the American Office

Started by Cuellar, October 16, 2019, 07:26:34 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

alan nagsworth

It's fuck all like Derek you prannock

Cuellar

It's very similar for the reasons I have given.

Examine your conscience, you know it to be true. If you like The Office but hate Derek, you are lying to yourself.

Quote from: ajsmith2 on October 17, 2019, 09:47:19 AM
you're just about to come up to James Spaders run which imo is filled with brilliance. He's marmitey, but he's certainly different from what went before, so I'd say worth hanging on for that at least.

Totally agree with this, I thought he was fantastic.

Cuellar

Actually yeah I've seen a clip or two of him in it and thought it looked interesting. Might persevere.

dissolute ocelot

Quote from: Cuellar on October 17, 2019, 10:32:19 AM
It's actually very like the Office (US). Everyone is horrible to each other all the time but then someone does a talking head to camera saying how great everyone is and how they're the best of friends and they wouldn't want to be anywhere else. Despite working in a place that would have been closed down  almost immediately and several of the main characters sent to prison.
Most of life is endlessly squabbling with people but then being weirdly sad when they leave/die, whether it's families, workplaces, or groups of long-time friends you've really outgrown but don't want to admit to it.

Utter Shit


Cuellar

It's heavy-handed, mawkish, filled with outlandish nonsense under the guise of a 'documentary'.

I'm sorry that CaB can't handle the truth.

Bad Ambassador

Quote from: Cuellar on October 17, 2019, 10:24:27 AM
This is, need I remind, SERIES SEVEN. FIVE years after the first series. That line might have made sense after the first series. I get the feeling that, after five years of filming (and filming everything, people in bathrooms, dinner parties at peoples' houses, people on trips to New York, and Utica, and so on, seriously, how vast is this project), it would a) probably already have been aired or b) have definitely got the green light from some network. Why carry on filming for so long if it might not get made.

My thinking, until the series contradicted it, was that it was a local college project. A new group of students each year takes over as the documentary crew as they learn filmmaking techniques. Although really if you're thinking about this so hard you're missing the point of the series.

Cuellar

What IS the point of the series then?

mrpupkin

Can't watch it. Has one of those theme tunes that violently rams home how idiotically you're wasting your time on earth. Is it normal to feel shamed by theme tunes?

Quote from: Cuellar on October 17, 2019, 11:44:04 AM
What IS the point of the series then?

The fact that it is a documentary is a MacGuffin.

Hat FM

the documentary thing annoys me much more with modern family? is it a documentary? No? then why do they talk to the camera every so often? just lazy exposition i spose.

the

Quote from: Hat FM on October 17, 2019, 01:35:41 PMthe documentary thing annoys me much more with modern family? is it a documentary? No? then why do they talk to the camera every so often? just lazy exposition i spose.

Yep, I was bemoaning redundant mockumentary shtick recently in a Peter Kay thread:

Quote from: the on September 04, 2019, 09:32:42 PM
Quote from: Gurke and Hare on September 04, 2019, 09:20:26 PMDo we know why they changed from the fake fly on the wall to the straight sitcom format?

The fly on the wall conceit was the basis of TPKT, being a spoof docusoap series. Phoenix Nights being a sitcom, they probably dropped it because the documentary conceit would be unnecessary and restrictive to the scene-setting and storytelling.

Which is a good thing, it's highly irritating when sitcoms have a completely superfluous documentary conceit just so they can do awkward looks to camera and 'interview' exposition. (And usually get very sloppy with the logic of what ends up being captured by the camera anyway.)


You could also argue that it's (still just about) 'trendy'.

Lisa Jesusandmarychain

I've mentioned it before, but a lot of the characters on " The Office" seem to be suffering from mental instability of some kind...Michael Scott and the Unbreakable Erin both appear to be mentally retarded, Dwight ain't exactly stable, and Creed's actually more or less clinically insane, isn't he?
Also, they ( especially under Michael Scott's rule ) never appear to actually do any fucking work, they have parties every other fucking day.
And Michael Scott didn't get the fuck sued out of him when he knocked that old slapper worker down in his car, and put her in hospital. In fact, she was there with the rest of 'em singing to Michael before he left # You knocked me down in your car, LOL #
They all seem to have decent houses paid for by their crappy office jobs , too. Bollocks.


up_the_hampipe

The US Office has always felt like a blindspot for me. It's such a huge part of comedy in the last like 15 years, just quoted and GIF'd everywhere. It feels like not watching 90s Simpsons episodes with how ingrained it is, at least on the internet. I've tried numerous times, even in the company of friends who adore the show, but it has never really amused me at all (apart from the scene where Will Ferrell does invisible juggling to Evanescence's Bring Me To Life). I feel like it's also contributed to a lot of crappy cutesy humour that infests forums and Reddit and whatnot. Parks & Rec was miles better. Ricky Gervais was miles better. Imagine that.

weaseldust

i binged the us office last year and really enjoyed it but i hated nellie, nellie has to be my least favourite character in anything. i thought it would just be a cameo but then she came back again and again and again for three seasons, fuck

Cuellar

...who the fuck's nellie?

edit: ahh, haven't got that far. Thought I'd completely blanked out an entire character.

lankyguy95

Quote from: up_the_hampipe on October 17, 2019, 02:25:59 PM
The US Office has always felt like a blindspot for me. It's such a huge part of comedy in the last like 15 years, just quoted and GIF'd everywhere. It feels like not watching 90s Simpsons episodes with how ingrained it is, at least on the internet.
If there's a worst thing about the show, it's that. I watched it before I was aware of most of that craze so I was able to enjoy it for what it was. But I think you can make a case for saying that it started to dip once it became a big popular show, fans got obsessed with the characters and the writers started hamming it up. Characters became very exaggerated - Dwight turns full psychopath, Kevin becomes caricature dumb guy, Creed is brought out once every episode to say something mad, Jim and Pam become extra smug. By the last season, it's a cartoon.

I think during season two and three (and at points for a couple of seasons after - I haven't rewatched it for a few years so I can't recall exactly), it's a really well written, well acted show, broader comedically than the original but with its own subtleties and much more of an ensemble show. Everyone's shown sympathetically at times without it being mawkish and the laughs are regular and consistent. It's so good actually that there's one episode around that time written by Gervais and Merchant which really sticks out as being noticeably weaker and pretty one dimensional.

ajsmith2

Quote from: weaseldust on October 17, 2019, 02:41:01 PM
i binged the us office last year and really enjoyed it but i hated nellie, nellie has to be my least favourite character in anything. i thought it would just be a cameo but then she came back again and again and again for three seasons, fuck

She's only in it as a regular for the last wee bit of season 8 (the shite bit) and all of season 9, but I agree she is shark jumpingly poor. She's only in one season 7 episode for one scene.

Actually she's ok when she's a villain in the season 8 Florida episodes, but when they make her a regular and try to make her sympathetic it ain't good. I've no idea why they added her. I do wonder if one idea when Carrell left was to get Gervais in to reprise Brent (as he does cameo as same in 2 episodes) but when that didn't pan out they settled for Catherine Tate pretty much doing a Gervais impression to get some of that British authenticity.

ajsmith2

Quote from: up_the_hampipe on October 17, 2019, 02:25:59 PM
The US Office has always felt like a blindspot for me. It's such a huge part of comedy in the last like 15 years, just quoted and GIF'd everywhere. It feels like not watching 90s Simpsons episodes with how ingrained it is, at least on the internet. I've tried numerous times, even in the company of friends who adore the show, but it has never really amused me at all (apart from the scene where Will Ferrell does invisible juggling to Evanescence's Bring Me To Life). I feel like it's also contributed to a lot of crappy cutesy humour that infests forums and Reddit and whatnot. Parks & Rec was miles better. Ricky Gervais was miles better. Imagine that.

If a Will Ferrell scene is your highlight of the US Office then it definitely isn't for you. No knock on him at all, but it wasn't a good fit for either party.

Can't agree about Parks and Rec. Imo it's much more cloyingly cutesy that the US Office. It also must be the most quickly dated comedy TV show of all time, given it aired in a hermetically sealed smug liberal temporal bubble exactly between Obama's inauguration and Trump announcing he was running. And also since two of it's stars were Me Tooed.

New folder

Quote from: Cuellar on October 17, 2019, 09:39:38 AM
Brooklyn Nine Nine.

Watched a bit of this one. Dire. No need to watch the American Office, it's obvious it will be a similar wacky mc wackyfest. Jim fell through the stationary supply cupboard and then steve carrell made a face

Cuellar

To be fair, I suppose Brooklyn Nine Nine was heavily influenced BY The Office. So it's no surprise it's shit!!!!

up_the_hampipe

Quote from: ajsmith2 on October 17, 2019, 03:27:28 PM
If a Will Ferrell scene is your highlight of the US Office then it definitely isn't for you. No knock on him at all, but it wasn't a good fit for either party.

Can't agree about Parks and Rec. Imo it's much more cloyingly cutesy that the US Office. It also must be the most quickly dated comedy TV show of all time, given it aired in a hermetically sealed smug liberal temporal bubble exactly between Obama's inauguration and Trump announcing he was running. And also since two of it's stars were Me Tooed.

I've seen a handful of episodes of The Office over the course of several years, one of them being a Will Ferrell episode. Can't speak on how he fit into the show, but that scene is a great piece of physical comedy. It's the only thing I recall really liking.

Parks & Rec could stray into cutesy a fair bit, but the characters, performers and writing of the show was much more my cup of tea overall. The cast just seemed to be full of natural comedic talent that clicked together so well. Outside of Community and Always Sunny, they are one of the best sitcom ensembles in recent years.

Bazooka

Quote from: Replies From View on October 16, 2019, 08:16:17 PM
After season 1 it's better than the UK version.

C'mon son, it's time we sat down and learned some home truths.

Dog Botherer

whoever mentioned James Spader is right actually, i retract my earlier statement. he makes quite a few episodes all by himself, especially the halloween episode with his scary story.

Gurke and Hare


Cuellar

Quote from: Bazooka on October 17, 2019, 08:26:23 PM
C'mon son, it's time we sat down and learned some home truths.

Yeah. I've read some wrong opinions on here, but that is possibly the wrongest.

Replies From View

Quote from: ajsmith2 on October 17, 2019, 09:47:19 AM
Will Ferrell was fucking useless in The Office

Only thing I have seen Will Ferrell doing that I have liked.