watching the office for the first time

[Midas]

drunk. (i'm not ashamed!)

they've put the office on iPlayer, presumably to cash-in on all the recent (l)after strife (s)advertising.

i'm on episode two. it's alright so far, which has surprised me, but all two of the episodes i've watched so far have opened with (roughly) ten minutes of Really Annoying™ celebrity "talking heads" retrospective guff about how "genius" The Office (apparently) is. i've been fast-forwarding through this dross. but i've just had a thought. is this tedious shite some sort of ironic thing that i should actually be watching? is this part of the mockumentary? it's Not Funny™, but i need to know. my time is precious!

also this thread can be used for any other chat related to stephen merchant's "the office".

[Midas]

every time i see the purple pair, i think "this is shite"

[lauraxsynthesis]

I've never seen it either and just can't be arsed. I think the drab colour scheme of the drab office and smugness of the tone when I caught the odd bit put me off back in the day.

[Mr. Ssmsslth]

is this tedious shite some sort of ironic thing that i should actually be watching? is this part of the mockumentary? it's Not Funny™, but i need to know. my time is precious!

In case this is a serious question, no, it isn't.

[Midas]

In case this is a serious question, no, it isn't.

thanks, i'll keep fast-forwarding through it then. tried watching it in earnest but it was genuinely annoying the f*ck (fuck) out of me.

[beanheadmcginty]

They've put a talking head bit at the beginning? Why would they do that?

[Midas]

hang on, it's gone now!

is mr bbc reading my posts?

[Midas]

merchant and germ were at the beginning of the first two episodes i saw - dressed in purple (for some reason) - and they were introducing all these tedious clips of celebrities droaning on about the first time they saw the office, which seemed to go on for ages before the episode would actually start.

[Ballad of Ballard Berkley]

drunk. (i'm not ashamed!)

they've put the office on iPlayer, presumably to cash-in on all the recent (l)after strife (s)advertising.

i'm on episode two. it's alright so far, which has surprised me, but all two of the episodes i've watched so far have opened with (roughly) ten minutes of Really Annoying™ celebrity "talking heads" retrospective guff about how "genius" The Office (apparently) is. i've been fast-forwarding through this dross. but i've just had a thought. is this tedious shite some sort of ironic thing that i should actually be watching? is this part of the mockumentary? it's Not Funny™, but i need to know. my time is precious!

also this thread can be used for any other chat related to stephen merchant's "the office".

You're watching some sort of tribute to The Office thing. Presumably the tenth anniversary Office Night from 2011. I know you're drunk, but really. You must be aware that you're not watching The Office as it was shown at the time.

Apologies if I've misunderstood a funny joke.

[Midas]

I know you're drunk, but really. You must be aware that you're not watching The Office.

Apologies if I've misunderstood a funny joke.

with the first episode i initially wondered, "fuck's this???" but when i checked iPlayer and saw "The Office - 1. Downsize", i just skipped ahead and kept watching.

when episode 2 began i suddenly thought "oh, i get it!" and somehow half-convinced myself they'd actually committed to opening each episode with a fictious retrospective of itself, as an oh-so-clever mockumentary within a mockumentary.

[Midas]

anyway, i sacked off this series after episode 2 and watched a documentary about a concentration camp instead.

[Noodle Lizard]

anyway, i sacked off this series after episode 2 and watched a documentary about a concentration camp instead.

Bold choice to skip straight ahead to Derek.

[Ballad of Ballard Berkley]

with the first episode i initially wondered, "fuck's this???" but when i checked iPlayer and saw "The Office - 1. Downsize", i just skipped ahead and kept watching.

Apologies for my snippy reply to your post. I was in a bad mood as I couldn't sleep. Sorry again.

[Captain Z]

I can confirm that I've watched a couple of episodes of The Office on iPlayer and seen the same thing. They've done it with Extras on iPlayer too. It is just some talking heads stuff recorded for, I assume, a previous anniversary celebration of the shows.

[idunnosomename]

id watch the office for the first time if i could for free. I remember just thinking it was shit fly-on-the-wall crap in the day with the bloke off the 11 o'clock show I hated.

I have seen bits and laughed at it but probably not seen one whole episode. I really have hated Ricky Gervais for decades

[Noodle Lizard]

The Office is very good, let's not be silly. I know with internet hindsight, it's easy to point out that it's not as uniquely groundbreaking as once thought, but we have to remember whereabouts it came in the UK comedy canon and how important its popularity was. It hadn't yet been feasible for Iannucci and Coogan to try a more understated format (I'd argue the first season of IAP would've been just as funny without a laugh track, but nowhere near as popular), and The Office absolutely paved the way for creators and networks to take a gamble on other "low-concept" things like Peep Show, for instance.

Very much a "right place at the right time" sort of thing, but it was one of the first shows that proved the public would be open to a more "boring", realistic setting, with "boring", realistic characters. It captured the drudgery and tedium of (British) office environments, and the kinds of people they're comprised of, more keenly than almost anything else I can think of, even to this day. As great as plenty of other British sitcoms had been, I don't think anything really managed to capture something quite as relatable as The Office was. It's honestly astonishing that "a show about people working in a branch of a paper company" was ever commissioned at all.

Of course when we watch it back now, we see a lot of Gervais's developing tics and tropes; "awkward glance to camera", "oo, disabled" etc., but even today it seems remarkably understated for something that got as much attention as it did. I don't think it would get very far nowadays, the same way Fawlty Towers or Blackadder wouldn't. Again, right place at the right time, but I'm very glad it existed.

EDIT:  Another thing that sometimes gets forgotten is that it was an impeccably well-cast and -directed show too. No big names (at the time, anyway), but each actor seemed to inhabit their character in a way that made you think they must have had direct experience of someone exactly like that. Ralph Ineson and Patrick Baladi are especially good examples. There was nothing "actory" about any of it - including Gervais, to be fair. You could absolutely believe they were real people, for the most part (Big Keith got a bit much by the end of it). I still haven't found anything that's quite matched that authenticity in a sitcom - including Curb or Larry Sanders etc.

[Midas]

Apologies for my snippy reply to your post. I was in a bad mood as I couldn't sleep. Sorry again.

No worries! Take care.

[Replies From View]

The back-slap-a-thon is how they presented a repeat of series 1 for the tenth anniversary, yes, and if you ever bought the complete series 1-2 and specials on DVD, that augmented version is how series 1 is presented on it.  The opening titles and credits often end up with someone talking over them even if you are trying to skip all the self-congratulation; it's quite weird.

[the science eel]

Are you getting any big laughs? I never found it very funny. 'well observed', 'groundbreaking', 'influential' is what you usually get

[Replies From View]

I liked The Office when it first appeared, but I find it hard to sit through now.  It's very much of its time, with its rhythm and pace designed as a response to emerging reality television of the era, like Driving School.

I go back to the US version quite routinely as comfort telly, whereas the original places me back in the early 2000s and makes me feel quite sad about things.  And that's not to its credit; I know that in a fictional interview about this Gervais would confess that it's one of the genius aspects of the show, but he'd be wrong if he did that.

[aunt mildred]

This was on bbc2 just before christmas and you're not going mad, the purple pair were on before every episode  with talking heads going on about how genius it was. It looked like they were in a stately home with limited chairs. They must have dragged those talking heads bits from years ago because Matthew Perry looked quite healthy.

Anyway I watched it for the first time since broadcast and thought it held up.

[Replies From View]

I wonder why the retrospective framing has become set into it permanently.  I'm guessing the BritBox version is just the episodes, so maybe this is a BBC-only privilege thing.

[MrsWarboysLover]

I watched the Office again within the last year expecting to find it dated or be put off by the gervaisisms, but it was better than I remembered it being. Tim even looked at the camera far less than I thought he did.

Ralph Ineson and Patrick Baladi are especially good examples. There was nothing "actory" about any of it - including Gervais, to be fair. You could absolutely believe they were real people, for the most part (Big Keith got a bit much by the end of it).

Those two you singled out are amazing in their performances, totally believable. When Finch is ripping shreds off Brent during the quiz it feels uncomfortably real. Neil managed to make me hate him without actually doing anything. And both of them are a certain "type" of person that exists, that isn't normally portrayed on TV, and especially not that realistically. I'd say all this applies to the guy who played Lee too.

Gervais is a plonker, we all know that, but even his performance in the Office is brilliant. Very believable, apart from maybe some of the more extreme parts in season 2. And, now that I've had experience working for someone not that dissimilar, Brent is far more well observed than I first thought.

[paruses]

I think Stirling Gallacher also deserves an equal mention. She doesn't get as much screen time (from memory) but she nails the part and the part is brilliantly written too. I think @Sebastian Cobb had a friend who described the show as "about an office but written by people who have never worked in an office" and I've come to agree with that (will have to rewatch to check my terrible memory). But having said that Merchant and Gervais do get The Types down really well.

I haven't watched it in about 5 years but remember the last time I did I thought - yea this is really good.

I do struggle a bit with the nostalgia of the early 2000s like @Replies From View says and it can be a bit of a depressing viewing if I watch it as an exercise rather than just because it's on. Agree totally that tubby Ricky Gervais would probably frame that as intentional but it's just the passage of time.

[Jockice]

Lest we forget, the brief cameo of the IT guy. I'm still not totally sure that he didn't work at the same place as I did.

[paruses]

Lest we forget, the brief cameo of the IT guy. I'm still not totally sure that he didn't work at the same place as I did.

If I try anything new - particularly martial arts or sports type stuff - my friend and I always end up exchanging messages that go:

- how did you get on last night?
- was OK. The bloke came over and said oi no professionals. I said I'm not a professional. He said well you should be.

[Jockice]

If I try anything new - particularly martial arts or sports type stuff - my friend and I always end up exchanging messages that go:

- how did you get on last night?
- was OK. The bloke came over and said oi no professionals. I said I'm not a professional. He said well you should be.

If I try anything new - particularly martial arts or sports type stuff - my friend and I always end up exchanging messages that go:

- how did you get on last night?
- was OK. The bloke came over and said oi no professionals. I said I'm not a professional. He said well you should be.

Just watched that bit, and as usual I laughed. It is absolutely fantastic. Probably my favourite minute or so of the whole programme. And there's no Ricky Gervais in it.

[Lisa Jesusandmarychain]

Yeah, I've rewatched that bit, too. I might rewatch that bit from the Christmas special now, where he tells Finchy to fuck off, and Finchy is shocked into silence. Very realistic scene that, that is definitely what would happen.
I'm also going to pitch in with my usual criticism of The Office being thoroughly overrated and not all that funny, and way too vulgar to deserve fond remembrance.

[sevendaughters]

think my favourite minute of the Office is the failed 'headliner' speech after Neil has them chuckling in S2E1, from defensiveness about being gay to the Eric Hitchmough stuff to crumpling with defeat at it all. Perfect capture of hubris. That's how I feel about his stand-up now.

[Replies From View]

One disturbing aspect of rewatching The Office is finding that Tim has gone from being ten years older than me to ten years younger.  Transforming from quite a mature person into someone who is barely even a child yet.

I mean that applies to most of them I suspect, but Tim is the one you're meant to connect with so the audience identification stuff clings to him.