I just finished watching Seasons 1, 2, and 3, which I got off of Netflx. I'm desperately waiting for Season 4 to come out on DVD.
I think it's Season 5 that's on TV now (can anyone confirm this?) but I don't want to watch it because I don't want to have it spoiled... (Jim and Pam...) Gaahhh!! So fustrating!!! They're actually worse than Kaylee and Simon...
Gosh, I'm really addicted to this show now.
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I tried, once. I found it awkward, unfunny and boring. Ah, well. At least I tried.
If you watched the first season, I'd suggest trying again and starting with the second season. I started on the second season and then went back to watch the first and found it wholly disappointing and unfunny. It CAN be awkward at times since Michael is so...well..Michael, but it's hysterical starting with the second season.
I think this season is the best yet...So far.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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I tried, once. I found it awkward, unfunny and boring. Ah, well. At least I tried.
I don't like the show too, but only because it pales in comparison to the original.
It's funny noting the differences between the UK and US versions. For instance, in the UK version, the characters look realstic and average--like in real life. In the American version, the majority of the characters are more attractive than their counterparts.
Another glaring difference is that Steve Carrel always comes off as an exaggerated comical character rather than as a realistic person you could have pitty for like with David Brent. And Carrel's character is nowhere near as patheticly human and desperate as Brent. He's merely a wacky boss.
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quote: Another glaring difference is that Steve Carrel always comes off as an exaggerated comical character rather than as a realistic person you could have pitty for like with David Brent. And Carrel's character is nowhere near as patheticly human and desperate as Brent. He's merely a wacky boss.
Well, there are some moments here and there when you feel sorry for Michael. For example, there's a place somewhere in Season 2 (I think?) where that woman Carol falls in love with him -- I think it's when he's playing with her kids at the ice rink. He comes off as a genuinely caring and funny guy at some points.
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quote: Another glaring difference is that Steve Carrel always comes off as an exaggerated comical character rather than as a realistic person you could have pitty for like with David Brent. And Carrel's character is nowhere near as patheticly human and desperate as Brent. He's merely a wacky boss.
Well, there are some moments here and there when you feel sorry for Michael. For example, there's a place somewhere in Season 2 (I think?) where that woman Carol falls in love with him -- I think it's when he's playing with her kids at the ice rink. He comes off as a genuinely caring and funny guy at some points.
That's one of the differences I should've mentioned. David Brent was a total jerk in almost everyway--for instance, in the finale of the first series, it's revealed that he was only out for himself all along and all that talk about caring about his employees was just...talk. Yet despite this you just pity the guy as you see him repeatedly crash and burn (one of the most painful ...and funny...scenes in the show is when in the second series he tries to introduce himself to all the new employees by performing comedy for them, but no one laughs and he gets angry and sits down embarrassed.) In the American version, Michael is almost always a good but wacky person.
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Michael can be pretty loopy, but throughout the first two (and most of the third) seasons, I found him consistently believable as a human being. He is, however, very different from David Brent- whereas Brent is a douchebag that you can't help but feel sorry for, Michael is a good person who just doesn't have a working filter between his brain and his mouth. When David Brent says something horrifically offensive, I get the feeling that it's because he actually believes it, because he's a mean little man. When Michael Scott says the same thing, it's because he's trying to make his coworkers laugh, and just can't tell the difference between actual humor and cramming his foot down his throat.
In addition, whereas David was depicted as being genuinely incompetent at his job, Michael is consistently depicted as a good salesman, but a terrible boss- not an uncommon situation in real life, and one aspect wherein I think the American version actually beats out the UK version in terms of "realism." Michael's just a guy who got promoted past the position to which he was actually best suited. He's trying the best he can with the limited faculties at his disposal, and he always has the best of intentions (if not always the most mature of dispositions). Sadly, his skill set just doesn't match up with what makes for a good boss. It also doesn't match up with what is necessary to be a likeable human being (at least to your friends/ coworkers/ lovers, not necessarily to those watching your TV show). In that sense, I find Michael to be an extraordinarily tragic character- he tries so very hard, but despite his best efforts, he just can't make it past the deep, deep faults in his personality. Michael is his own worst enemy.
Anyway, I generally think that Season 2 of the American Office is the best season of either show, while Season 3 was erratically good- it had some truly brilliant episodes ("Traveling Salesmen" and "Branch Closing" in particular), but some pretty crappy ones as well. I was worried at the start of the fourth season that they were making Michael and Dwight too zany, but last week's episode eased a lot of my fears. It perfectly nailed the delicate balance between humor and pathos that was the hallmark of Season 2.
quote:For instance, in the UK version, the characters look realstic and average--like in real life. In the American version, the majority of the characters are more attractive than their counterparts.
quote:For instance, in the UK version, the characters look realstic and average--like in real life. In the American version, the majority of the characters are more attractive than their counterparts.
What??
The main actors in the American version are prettier than the main actors in the original. This is because Americans can't tolerate normal looking people on TV.
Edit: Or pobably because tv execs don't like average looking people.
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Yeah, pretty much the only remotely attractive female regular I've seen (I've only been through season 1) is Pam, and her barely-above-average physical attractiveness is heavily outweighed by all her frustratingly negative qualities.
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Heh... I'll defend the American Office to death, but I gotta side with Somalian, at least where Pam is concerned. She's easily the most attractive woman on television right now. But then, I like the "girl next door" look. Posts: 1321 | Registered: Sep 1999
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quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: Really? I think the office is a pretty good mix of unattractive and attractive people.
For instance, Gareth Vs. Dwight. Gareth is uglier.
Dawn Vs Pam. Pam is prettier.
Michael Vs David. Michael is more attractive.
Jim Vs Tim. Here we have an equal degree of handsomeness, but clearly Jim has more of a pretty boy look.
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Creed is my favorite character. Every line is pure gold.
I have a strong disconnect with people who don't laugh at this show. I've seen every episode more than once.
And--coming from watching the UK version also, I have to say that the American version is more ENJOYABLE than the UK version, whether it's as realistic or not. The UK version was more painful to watch, with fewer laughs from me.
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quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: Really? I think the office is a pretty good mix of unattractive and attractive people.
For instance, Gareth Vs. Dwight. Gareth is uglier.
Dawn Vs Pam. Pam is prettier.
Michael Vs David. Michael is more attractive.
Jim Vs Tim. Here we have an equal degree of handsomeness, but clearly Jim has more of a pretty boy look.
Pam isn't superhot. I think she's attractive, but I also think part of that is because she's so funny, and I find funny attractive. I think Dwight is fairly unattractive, at which point I think someone being UGLIER than ugly is kind of a goofy assertion. Considering all the pretty people on American television, The Office is a huge abberration from the norm.
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quote:Originally posted by Launchywiggin: Creed is my favorite character. Every line is pure gold.
I have a strong disconnect with people who don't laugh at this show. I've seen every episode more than once.
And--coming from watching the UK version also, I have to say that the American version is more ENJOYABLE than the UK version, whether it's as realistic or not. The UK version was more painful to watch, with fewer laughs from me.
Creed is hilarious. I especially love when Jim sets up his "web page" on MS Word. CreedThoughts or whatever it was. That was hysterically funny.
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quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: Really? I think the office is a pretty good mix of unattractive and attractive people.
For instance, Gareth Vs. Dwight. Gareth is uglier.
Dawn Vs Pam. Pam is prettier.
Michael Vs David. Michael is more attractive.
Jim Vs Tim. Here we have an equal degree of handsomeness, but clearly Jim has more of a pretty boy look.
Pam isn't superhot. I think she's attractive, but I also think part of that is because she's so funny, and I find funny attractive. I think Dwight is fairly unattractive, at which point I think someone being UGLIER than ugly is kind of a goofy assertion. Considering all the pretty people on American television, The Office is a huge abberration from the norm.
I didn't say Pam was super hot. I said that compared to Dawn in the original, Pam is hotter. In general the main characters in the original are homelier, even Gareth when compared to Dwight.
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quote:Originally posted by Launchywiggin: Creed is my favorite character. Every line is pure gold.
I have a strong disconnect with people who don't laugh at this show. I've seen every episode more than once.
And--coming from watching the UK version also, I have to say that the American version is more ENJOYABLE than the UK version, whether it's as realistic or not. The UK version was more painful to watch, with fewer laughs from me.
Creed is hilarious. I especially love when Jim sets up his "web page" on MS Word. CreedThoughts or whatever it was. That was hysterically funny.
It's Ryan that sets up a 'blog' for Creed.
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Perhaps compared to the original the characters are more attractive, but Dwight, Meredith, Stan, Andy Bernard, Jim and so on, almost everyone actually, isn't attractive. David and Ryan are, and so is Jan, and Pam as well, but most of those people are not in the office.
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quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: Really? I think the office is a pretty good mix of unattractive and attractive people.
For instance, Gareth Vs. Dwight. Gareth is uglier.
Dawn Vs Pam. Pam is prettier.
Michael Vs David. Michael is more attractive.
Jim Vs Tim. Here we have an equal degree of handsomeness, but clearly Jim has more of a pretty boy look.
Pam isn't superhot. I think she's attractive, but I also think part of that is because she's so funny, and I find funny attractive. I think Dwight is fairly unattractive, at which point I think someone being UGLIER than ugly is kind of a goofy assertion. Considering all the pretty people on American television, The Office is a huge abberration from the norm.
Pam is like Baily from WKRP in Cincinnati.
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I don't think that the American version pales in comparison. One immediate point of difference that leaps out is that the secondary cast members in the American version are uniformly superior to the British ones.
Last night's episode was a good example of this, I think.
And last night's 30 Rock was laugh out loud hilarious.
Posts: 3423 | Registered: Aug 2001
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I think they took great care when casting The Office to populate the show with people who look like real people. A tradition carried on from the UK version. I don't think in either case anyone said to themselves, "Let's cast ugly people!" Indeed I don't think of any of these people as being unattractive; it adds greatly to the reality of the show. I found it much easier to buy-in because of this. I find the argument that the US version has a more attractive cast to be very surprising. Sounds like a matter of personal taste to me....
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Hour-long episodes can be nice on occasion, like for a season finale. Four in a row at the beginning of a season is way too much, I think.
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I wasn't ready for a 30 minute episode, so didn't like last night that much. I got to admit, though, the Dunder Mifflin ad was pretty good.
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Last night was great, although I think "Money" is still the best episode of the season so far. Michael's director's cut was a perfect example of what I was describing above- it has all the hallmarks of Michael's skewed perspective of reality ("Limitless paper in a paperless world," Stanley-as-ex-convict), but was actually a better concept, as far as selling of paper goes, than the "official" ad. And it worked beautifully as a very sweet conclusion to the episode, with lots of the little character-centric touches that The Office does so well. I can't decide which was better, "Bad news: You have a son. And it's me." or "A second chance to score" (re: Jim).
Posts: 1321 | Registered: Sep 1999
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"Last year i came to work with my spud gun in a duffle bag, I sat at my desk all day with a rifle that shoots potatoes at 60 PSI. Could you imagine if i was derranged?" Dwight K schrute
"this morning I nocked mysef in the head with the phone" Dwight (Danger) Schrute
"Beer me! hand me that water, I always say beer me, it gets a laugh like a quarter of the time" Andy Bernard
Sort of a guy's night out. A G-N-O, if you will. A guh-no. Actually, it's more like a guy's afternoon in... a G-A-I. A gay. Not... not it's, uh, not gay. It's uh.. just a... it's a bridal shower for guys. A guy shower. An hour-long shower with guys.- Michael Scott
Posts: 856 | Registered: Jun 2007
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I do not seem to like the American version or the British version of the office. Perhaps I hate that kind of humour. I definetly like Coupling, the English version a lot better. That show cracks me up.
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Yes, and the weird thing is that the Scrubs episode felt the perfect length. I guess I just got used to the 1 hour office format, so was let down.
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I just watched an episode of the UK Office and I didn't get it at all. It just didn't seem to be funny.
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The American office is much easier to get into, if u havnt all ready, try season 2 to start, mostly jokes, little re-occuring story line
Posts: 856 | Registered: Jun 2007
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I went to NBC.com, and they only seem to have 5 episodes of Season 4...or am I just missing the other ones somewhere? It's a pretty confusing website.
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