Baby Talk
Hercules at Ain't It Cool News thought the hourlong Office episode where Pam had her baby was the funniest of the season so far. (Faint praise if true.) I thought it was the worst.
Having a baby is a classic jump the shark moment, but it's actually the culmination of jts moments. Two characters pining after each other is great fodder for comedy. When they start having a relationship, the tension goes down, and it's generally bad for the show. (So they sometimes break them up, which just gets annoying since we're back where we started.) Getting married is even worse. Then comes the baby, which is the end.
Even under the best circumstances, it's hard to stop a show from going stale. But taking characters from the situation where we originally found amusing and moving them to a different--and more cliched--situation is generally worse. There are some shows that can handle introducing a baby, but usually because they mostly ignore the child, or give it to secondary characters. Imagining episodes built around Pam and Jim dealing with their kid is not pleasant to contemplate.
Having a baby is a classic jump the shark moment, but it's actually the culmination of jts moments. Two characters pining after each other is great fodder for comedy. When they start having a relationship, the tension goes down, and it's generally bad for the show. (So they sometimes break them up, which just gets annoying since we're back where we started.) Getting married is even worse. Then comes the baby, which is the end.
Even under the best circumstances, it's hard to stop a show from going stale. But taking characters from the situation where we originally found amusing and moving them to a different--and more cliched--situation is generally worse. There are some shows that can handle introducing a baby, but usually because they mostly ignore the child, or give it to secondary characters. Imagining episodes built around Pam and Jim dealing with their kid is not pleasant to contemplate.
posted by LAGuy @ 12:23 AM
3 Comments:
Worst episode of the year, definitely. The brief Erin/Kevin arc went precisely how anyone who's watched the show knew it would, with nothing particularly funny said, Erin/Andy has none of the appeal of Pam/Jim and feels manipulative (hey, fall in love with this couple falling in love too!), and the new-parent tribulations were not really interesting or handled in a particularly funny way. The only good moments were feeding the wrong baby, drawing up the contract, and -- particularly -- the lactation consultant.
It was a little thin on the humor but some funny bits (The "Dwight" at the end of the Policemen's PA announcement was the kind of nice touch) Some key points I thought- JIm is funny as a nice-guy wisecracking smartass teasing people -trying to broaden his character into making him crazy funny like the rest of the cast is not working (Pam however works in her little crazy parts). Watching Jim lose it is not funny. He's the cool cruel "ironic" guy we identify with- he should stay separate from the others
The show is about the Office- the occasional offsite is fine but this is not another family comedy.
There is lots of room for Andy Erin tobe funny which hasn't been fully used yet- they need to stay crazy. Jim and Pam were the "normality" (OK Oscar too)around which the crazy characters revolved.
NEG
Trying to build up Erin/Andy seems inevitable, but is probably a mistake. The original Jim/Pam axis could work because it was a part of the generally office situation. The runarounds Michael had with women was a little less interesting, but at least his characters could handle it. Now trying to get us excited about Andy/Erin shows they're starting to run dry.
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