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When Jeff Zucker isn’t firing 700 employees, he seems to love squeezing thirty-minute programs into 40 minute blocks. He calls it– get this– “Supersizing!” C’mon, Mr. Zucker. Haven’t you heard that America is horribly overweight? What makes you think a nation that can’t handle a pail of fries could possibly stand FORTY-MINUTES of The Office? And yet here we are yet again, staring at a lineup of three shows where we all know four were suppose to reside.

Honestly, I kind of like the idea. Not so much the name. That is completely asinine, but the concept works for me. If you think about it, in the day of time-shifted programming, why do we have to adhere to the 30-minute-comedy/60-minute-drama rule? If you need extra time to tell the story, take the extra time. If you can make an episode of Grey’s Anatomy in 38 minutes, do it. Now, I understand this will never happen, and that broadcast television is built around a model of maximizing advertising revenue and never would never allow such tinkering, but I’m just saying. In any case, tonight NBC showed 40-minute episodes of My Name Is Earl, The Office, and 30 Rock. I had a good time watching. Read all about it by clicking below…

My Name Is Earl — Actually, I don’t watch My Name Is Earl. Sorry.

The Office — If I watched previews for television programs, I assume the focus for this week’s episode would have been about the reunion of Pam and Jim. The preview would be played in slow-mo with a Coldplay song quietly building underneath. This preview would be used, obviously, to remind the television viewing populace that The Office is a deadly serious show about people struggling with relationships. Because that’s what the show is about.

The show is NOT about the image of Michael Scott and Dwight trying to life a large “Keith-esque” gentleman onto a table. Really, that nonsense shouldn’t even be mentioned (or Creed’s new computer desk-top featuring in-office-breast-pump-action). No sir. The show is about Jim and Pam and Karen. At least I’d think this if I watched television promos– which I don’t.

You might be surprised (hardly), but I found the episode to be quite funny. Better yet, I found the episode to provide much fodder for the rest of the season (Is it weird that there has all ready been eight episodes? We’re over a third of the way through the whole season). The Andrew/Dwight battle will be a nice counter to the well-worn Jim/Dwight battles from season’s past, and Jim’s role as Michael’s #2 should make for some interesting business practices.

And yes, there’s the Karen/Jim/Pam thing, which was broached though shrugged off by all the principles– basically the exact way any of us would have handled the situation in real life. So, has everyone picked sides?

Funny/tragic reveal of the night: Michael describing how everybody hates the lunch-lady, but how, eventually the lunch-lady is your best friend– at least it was for him.

30 Rock — With all the nauseating Studio 60… talk this season, 30 Rock has managed to slip by under the radar (exactly what you DON’T want in a television program). What’s interesting is the show is doing the “Not SNL (but SNL)” thing exactly as it should be done. What we see of the sketches on “TGS” is, if anything, a parody of the type of humor found on SNL. Though more telling is how the working environment is presented. Studio 60… wants us to think that late-night sketch comedy is all about the tortured artist. 30 Rock rightfully illustrates that late-night sketch comedy is just a job. You show up, you do the job, and, like The Office, the humor comes from the situations that arise on that job.

Tonight’s “supersized” episode was good, maybe great. Sure, the meta-natured commentary on GE’s very real/very obvious product placement scheme might have been a tad “wink-wink” for my tastes, but there is no denying that the Jack Donaghy blooper-reel almost knocked me out of my chair. The image of Baldwin not knowing what to do with his arms while walking is making me laugh as I type this. Funny that it’s also precisely the type of scene that would have easily been cut down in a normal 22-minute episode. Instead, the takes just kept on coming, each funnier than the previous. Alec Baldwin deserves an award for his role on this show. Not an Emmy though. Something better. Like a Latin Grammy.

This entry was posted on Friday, November 17th, 2006 at 4:29 am and is filed under 30 Rock, My Name Is Earl, NBC, The Office. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.