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While I evenually puked my guts out, I never puked my heart out.

Did anyone else while watching Thursday’s season premiere of The Office feel a pervasive though unfounded sense of imminent dread? Luckily the episode was an hour long and thus that fear had plenty of time to dissipate before things became too wrapped up. When all was said and done I had had a good time and was glad the show was back on the air. Still, I have this feeling that the aforementioned dread will continue to haunt this series. In a way, it has to. How long can the creators possibly keep things going, especially after the bar was set so high last season? More after the break…

Back in May we were given a fabulous season finale (with the exception of the ludicrous decision to promote Ryan to corporate) inverting a lot of our favorite storylines. Michael, having not gotten the corporate job and falling helplessly into a Jan emotional freak-out, is still in Scranton, but now with a live-in unemployed girlfriend. Jim ditches his corporate prospects (as well as his girlfriend) to head back to Scranton and ask out Pam. Everything seemed both completely right and completely wrong with the world, and certainly promised interesting character developments in the coming season.

But as I watched the twenty-minutes-too-long premiere I couldn’t help but think how none of this felt right. They did what they could to build suspense around the ambiguity of the Halpert/Beasley combo, but ultimately caved in the second half hour letting us know their relationship was very much alive and wonderful. One has to suspect this will last for a good part of the season barring some crazy, unexpected shenanigans that could force them apart. While it’s nice to see two very likable characters happy, it certainly doesn’t create the best drama. What purpose does Jim serve now aside from looking at the camera? Michael’s situation is much more interesting. He would have us believe living with Jan is his dream come true (and he might have even convinced himself of this), but we know otherwise. The sight of her sprawled out on the bed as he prepared to leave for work was as depressing as it was expected. The development obviously has narrative potential. Even Michael’s actions this week, on his slow decent into madness, has to be inspired as much by his new home-life as his traditional obliviousness to those around him. After all, hitting Meredith with his car didn’t just spur some quickly-though rationalization but went on to trigger an existential reflection and, ultimately, a fun-run. That was around the point where I stopped fearing the series would suddenly and abruptly spiral into awfulness.

Whenever you’re dealing with a show that is this consistently good, it makes sense to fear that at any minute it will start to suck. Luckily for The Office, they’ve built a pretty solid line of defense against potential suckiness. With the exception of Pam and Jim, who are currently living happily ever after, the supporting cast is given more and more to do each week, increasing the potential storylines exponentially. In fact, the drama surrounding Angela, Dwight and Spinkles was played with as much levity as the Pam/Jim romance from seasons’ past. Who would have thought this background gag would be given the full dramatic treatment?

Still, when the dust settles, you have to love an episode where Michael can say, “It’s not like a compulsive need to be liked… like my need to be praised,” or Pam telling him a 5-K is five kilometers, not 5000 miles, before accidentally seeing his Great Scott.

Sure, I worry for the show’s future, but only because continues to deliver when other shows fail.

This entry was posted on Friday, September 28th, 2007 at 6:41 pm and is filed under 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.