The Office: Casual Friday

casual friday

Bravo to the writers on The Office for not focusing too much on Michael himself on his return to Dunder-Mifflin. "Casual Friday" was a true ensemble episode. Really, everybody at the Scranton branch got to have some excellent moments. What better way to return to the status quo than a half hour highlighting why each of these characters are great?

Of course, Michael was still the center of the show, but he's always been. His triumphant return to the branch manager's desk brought with it a little bit of conflict. Apparently, Pam and Ryan have been allowed to keep the clients they stole from the sales people at Dunder-Mifflin, so the old sales team is on the edge of mutiny. This is where Dwight gets his moment. He decides to communicate with the other disgruntled workers via hidden messages written in his own urine. Between that and his pony sandwich, it was a stellar night for everyone's favorite proponent of the mustard-colored shirt.

While the mutiny is being planned, Jim hides out with Creed playing board games all day. That resulted in an episode-long stream of Creed-isms, which was wonderful. Meanwhile, the rest of the office is forced to contend with Michael's decision to re-institute casual Fridays. Predictably, very few of the Scrantonians are dressed appropriately. Kelly is fully blinged-out "like J-Lo", Oscar is driving Angela crazy with his besandaled feet, and Meredith is fueling nightmares with her five-sizes-too-small dress. Poor Toby has to hear every complaint that comes through.

Speaking of Toby, I can't remember a single episode that spent so much time with the guy. He's such a great character, so it was nice to let him deliver some of the laughs. Apparently his purgatorial existence in Scranton is the result of an ill-fated decision to drop out of the seminary in order to chase the tail of his future-ex-wife. And just like that, his character makes sense.

The mutiny in full swing, Michael is forced to return all the stolen clients to their original handlers. This means that Ryan and Pam have to vie for the single remaining sales job. After some not-so-scientific deliberation, Michael settles on Pam, but not before dusting off one of the oldest jokes in the entire Office franchise: The Fake Fire. Just like David Brent in the first episode of the original series and Michael himself in the US pilot, Michael makes Pam the recipient of a false but cruel dismissal. Pam takes it a lot better this time around.

Oddly enough, so does the new receptionist, Erin. I'm really liking this character and I hope they keep her on. It seems that her function in the cast is to approve of everything everybody else does. No matter how weird, creepy or annoying it is, Erin is just tickled pink about. It hasn't stopped being amusing yet.

Best Moment: I'm going to use this space to list all the other character-specific moments I didn't have space to fully acknowledge in the article. Kevin's amazing, chili-centric cold open; Darryl- "What I tell you about building forts in my warehouse?"; Andy fantasizing about lunch; Phyllis and Pam wearing the same top. Heck, the entire freaking episode.

Biggest Laugh: Really, the whole episode was consistently funny. I'd feel bad singling out just one moment.

Episode Rating: 5/5- Solid all the way through. This is why The Office has been the best comedy on TV for so long.