“Did I Stutter?”
May 1st, 2008
I’m in the process of preparing an article for Always Watching on what I consider to be one of the Office’s most definitive qualities, and I am always glad to see when something pops up to prove my point for me. In this instance, “Did I Stutter?” manages to portray a version of the Office where no one is an abject idiot, and things which were funny without being sensationalist or over-the-top. It was the best possible argument for a version of this series, and its characters, which resists caricature in favour of subtle, yet brilliant, development.
A lot of this is dependent on the version of Michael Scott that we see, and here he is at his most naive, desperate and yet also honest – this is a Michael Scott who of course doesn’t know how to handle an employee being insubordinate, but when tasked with addressing the problem searches for advice and inevitably comes across a decent, if eventually overused solution.
And if The Office can be both funny and logical while maintaining this characterization, I’m on board.
Stanley is a character who, since at least “Traveling Salesmen,” has never really had a showcase episode; you could argue that he played a role in Beach Games (I still laugh thinking about his sumo attack on Jim), but really here we see Stanley in his element: doing crosswords, yelling at Michael, and generally being far funnier than we often give him credit for. Leslie David Baker did a great job with these moments, subtly crossing the line from his normal insubordination to something that results in Toby going to Michael about it.
I don’t particularly understand Toby’s motives here: at this point, I always expect him to avoid any of this stuff out of fear for his self-esteem (So much for Costa Rica, also), and yet here he is throwing himself into the line of fire over, as far as I can tell, for the sake of the working environment? It’s a weird stand for Toby to take, but in this instance it gets through to Michael: using the comparison to his daughter’s fears manifesting as fake illness, Michael knows he has to deal with this.
His process is as we’d expect it to be: he goes to Dwight for advice and gets a ridiculous takeover plan (Which Michael is smart enough to reject), he goes to Daryl to get a more urban perspective. I loved Daryl’s immediate recognition of this opportunity the second Michael said it was “an advice thing” – that he was a member of the Newsies and suggests a tickle solution is fantastic. Michael, of course, settles on his own course of action, it crashes and burns even worse.
And then something strange happens: Michael does something logical. Faced with an extremely angry Stanley (For good reason, Michael’s fake firing was an awful plan), he makes everyone leave the office and we eavesdrop on Michael cutting through the madness to just say “Dude, can’t we just not fight like this? For the sake of everything?” It’s such an easy solution, but the actors play it well, and it reflects well on Michael as a character.
I love him when he is in this mode: illogically telling the people in the office so that they will be surprised (thus ruining the surprise), ignoring Toby’s suggestion as idiotic, but eventually coming to terms with the right plan. It made for an enjoyable storyline, one with some drama and also some great comedy at the same time – to end on Michael’s protracted and humorous comedy routine summed it up perfectly, and then the fantastic “Everyone out except Phyllis” coda was icing on top of icing.
On top of all of this, we get three whole subplots and a great cold open – Dwight flipping Andy’s X-Terra to continue screwing him to the wall for the Angela situation was sharp and quick-witted, Pam having to wear glasses was deceptively simple but resulted in one of the best talking heads of the night from Creed, and Ryan arriving to question Jim’s job performance over his discussion with Wallace about the effectiveness of the website (but on paper, about his fraternizing with Pam, which results in another great talking head from Toby). That’s a lot for one episode, but it all felt well-paced.
And the Cold Open started things off right: Michael’s panicked excitement at the prospect of wet cement, Phyllis being unable to spit out her answer, Pam’s deciphering of Kelly’s ramblings, and eventually Michael’s excitement over his face being remembered by his children. Short, sweet, funny – a nice opening to an episode that follows the same edicts.
Cultural Observations
- Creed gets the talking head of the week with his elaborate commentary on whether Pam’s near-blindness without her glasses could make her a jazz savant, and then his somehow related desire to seeing her topless. I love Creed so very much.
- I didn’t really realize it on first watch, but hiding Angela Kinsey’s pregnancy is certainly getting more and more difficult – this isn’t to say that she’s becoming gargantuan, but it’s just noticeable enough that her reactions shots are changing.
- Toby’s obsession with Pam (Hell, the office’s obsession with Pam) remains a charming turn, even though it really should have ventured into the realm of the creepy by now. It’s definitely getting there, but for now I remain entertained.
Cultural Learnings 