The Office: Baby Shower

Last week’s Office episode was back to its old form. It was hilarious from the first second and just never stopped moving! It didn’t disappoint me once and I never wanted it to end! The writing in this episode was perfection because it kept you guessing as to what would happen and it ended perfectly.

The main storyline in this episode was that Michael was having a baby shower for Jan in the office. The episode starts with Dwight pretending to be pregnant and Michael is practicing what he is going to do when Jan calls to say she’s in labor. Dwight has a watermelon strapped to his stomach and is talking about having contractions and his water breaking and all sorts of graphic things. Dwight then proceeds to have the “baby” and when it comes out, Michael is supposed to catch it and mark it with a sharpie so they know it’s theirs. When Michael goes to catch the watermelon, he drops it!! Dwight said he put butter on it to make it slippery like a baby. It is a perfect scene and had me laughing the entire time!

So we see Phyllis acting as the head of the Party Planning Committee again and bossing around Angela. The tension between them is great and whenever Michael says he doesn’t like something, Angela will softly tell him that it’s all Phyllis’s fault. Michael then goes to talk to Holly and tell her that Jan is coming in and that she is pregnant and very fat and since Holly is pretty, he is going to treat her meanly all day just so he won’t hurt Jan’s feelings. He says he is treating Ryan the same way as well. Michael’s not-so-secret crush on Ryan continues to grow even when he has Holly there!

Jan then enters the office….pushing a stroller! Turns out she had already given birth to Astrid (Michael thought the name was Astird) and decided not to tell Michael; she said her birthing instructor did not think it was a good idea. You find out there was some tension between Michael and the birthing instructor because Michael says the guy had no sense of humor. Michael is obviously upset and you feel so bad for him when you see his disheartened face. Jan allows him to hold the baby, but only while she’s still in her carrier of course. He then proceeds to introduce the baby to everyone in the office by holding her above his head in her carrier like they do with Simba in the Lion King.

The baby shower starts and Michael wants to play games. Kevin says the games are ruined because the baby is already born but Michael won’t have it. So Kevin asks everybody the question, “So when do you think the baby will be born?” The games obviously were a letdown so Jan starts singing a song to her baby about a person losing their virginity by a church for at least 20 minutes. Jim goes to call Pam to tell her about it but she is in a Laundromat and can’t hear a thing. They had been playing phone tag all day and you can just feel the tension between them as they wish they could be together already and not have to get upset over little things. They both just admit that they must be having one of the off days.

While Jan takes a nap, Michael is allowed to actually hold baby Astrid and when he holds her, he feels nothing. He finds this odd and goes to talk to Darryl, another “baby daddy”, who tells him he obviously doesn’t feel anything because it’s not his baby!! Jan leaves and asks Michael to do him one big favor…not to date Holly. Michael awkwardly tells her that he has no feelings for her but then goes inside to Holly and just holds her. Holly’s eyes tear up and as he pulls away, he asks her if she wants to go out! He tells the camera that he didn’t feel anything when he held the baby, but he definitely felt something when he held Holly. I cannot wait for this interesting relationship to start, even though it may be very short-lived since Amy Ryan is not supposed to be in the season for too many more episodes.

It ends with Pam and Jim calling each other at the same time and so they get each other’s voicemail and leave a message. It is so sweet because they are talking about the same exact things in their messages and it goes back and forth between the two of them so it makes it seem like they’re having a conversation. The main thing I love about this show is that the writers keep it so close to real life and don’t necessarily try to please the viewers. They will make you feel mad at Jim or Michael or whoever, but they are just making it out like it would happen in real life. Any two people who were in a long-distance relationship would have their off days and it no matter how much we know that Michael should be with Holly instead of Jan, it would be hard for someone to figure that out on their own after everything they’d been through with that other person.

Favorite quotes/moments in the episode:

• Dwight: “I’m crowning!"



• Michael: “Andy, would you like to have my baby instead?”



• Michael dropping the watermelon and then eating it while Dwight puts his pants back on right next to him



• Andy thinking that Phyllis’s baby picture is Angela’s



• Stanley rubbing his nipples



• Dwight: “Jan had the baby and Michael wasn’t there to mark it so the baby could be anybody’…except for Michael’s.”



• Michael’s face when he realizes the baby’s name is Astrid, not Astird



• Clips of Michael holding other people’s babies…so cute!



• Dwight testing the baby stroller by trying to destroy it



• Jan sprawled out sleeping on the couch



• Michael holding Holly and asking her out
  
  This has definitely been my favorite episode so far and I cannot wait for more to come! If you haven’t seen it yet, you should definitely watch it now! I hope you enjoy!

The Office: Business Ethics

The opening was great in this episode! Pam reveals to Jim that she is angry at everyone in the office because none of them had called her to congratulate her on their engagement. Jim bashfully tells her that he hadn’t told any of them yet so he puts her on speaker phone and makes the announcement to everyone. The reactions are nothing but unenthused and somewhat insulting. Oscar says he thought they were already engaged and Angela points out that she had been engaged to Roy before, not Jim. Kevin also finds it necessary to point out to Jim that Pam is not a virgin. Jim’s face during all of this makes it obvious that he knew this would happen when he told them and that’s why he’d waited so long. But of course Michael walks in as they are all discussing this and he finds out the great news and tackles Jim!! The scene is nothing short of perfection because you see Jim in the middle of the screen and all of a sudden Michael is pushing him out of the frame and you see them go down together right as the theme song starts.

The first scene is a big moment in The Office history because Michael does one of his song parodies with another person: Holly!! Holly is to give her first presentation at the office and it is about ethics because of Ryan’s little run-in with the law while he was at corporate. Her and Michael start some music and walk into the conference room singing “Let’s Get Ethical” while wearing headbands and dancing something that they had obviously choreographed and practiced. There is a cut scene to Jim’s face during the song and it is of him smiling and nodding with approval; it made the scene even more perfect. But when they are finished and Holly starts to give her presentation, tension breaks out in the conference room. It is much unexpected because when she enters the room singing with Michael, you feel like she is going to have a great relationship with everyone but as she starts to speak and just read from the book, everyone starts to realize that they like the way Michael does things. They like the songs and dances and ridiculous seminars that he makes up; they don’t like the reading straight from the corporate binder. Michael tries to help her out and tell her that “this is a tough crowd. They expect humor and sudden twists and surprise endings.” He then proceeds to tell everyone they have immunity and asks them what unethical things they have done in the office. Meredith says that she sleeps with someone to get discounts and Outback Steakhouse coupons. Holly is very concerned, whereas Michael finds it hilarious.

Michael and Holly attempt to go out to lunch and figure out what to do about Meredith and we see the first conflict between them. Michael talks about the office being like a big family and how they have to take care of each other and he just wants to forget the whole thing ever happened. Holly, on the other hand, thinks they have to follow the rules and report her to corporate. This makes Michael so angry that he avoids her for almost the rest of the day. There are very funny scenes with him not giving her any coffee when she enters the break room and him running to get to the copier before she does even though he has nothing to copy. She tries to report Meredith to corporate but they tell her that the company is in a tough place right now and could use the discount and so they are just going to sweep it under the rug and pretend it didn’t happen. The HR rep from corporate tells her that she is just supposed to get signatures from everyone in the office saying they went through the seminar and he really puts her down and makes her feel like she can’t do her job. But she is also obviously thinking about if she wants to stay with this company or not because of their views on ethics.

During all of this, Jim starts to record everything that Dwight does during the day because Dwight swears that he never steals any company time like taking extra time for lunch or making any personal phone calls. Dwight does not leave his desk for anything that day, he even pees at his desk, but he then mysteriously disappears for 19 minutes and 48 seconds. We see Angela buttoning her shirt when they come back and we know where he’s been! Jim asks him if it is really ethical for him to use that much personal time during work and Dwight just looks at the camera with his mischievous grin and we know the he realizes what he’s doing with Angela is unethical.

I was a little disappointed with this episode because I wanted a little more from it. The only real story line was with Holly and Michael having conflicting opinions on the Meredith situation. I just wanted to see more of the other characters. But it was an important episode because it shows us the start of Holly disagreeing with how Dunder Mifflin does things and we can see why she might end up leaving within a few episodes, because she is only supposed to be on the show for maybe 3 more. I can’t wait for the next one and I hope we see more of Jim and Pam engaged! And maybe find out more about Angela and Andy’s wedding, I can’t imagine she’ll go through with it! But we will find out!