The Office: Mafia

Tonight's episode of The Office asked an interesting question. What would happen if both Jim and Pam, the strongest columns in what Oscar dubs "the coalition for reason", were absent for an entire week? Naturally, Michael goes off the deep end in his own personal version of reality. But something unexpected happened along the way: It was actually pretty boring.

I didn't realize until tonight's episode how important Pam was in the effort to save Michael from himself while Jim was working at the Stamford branch. Those were the early episodes of Season 3, one of which was the excellent "Convention" that didn't even take place in Scranton. Michael still managed to do a lot of damage in that short period, outing Oscar, standing amid particularly disloyal employees and cluelessly proposing to his short-term girlfriend (played by Carell's real-life wife Nancy Walls).

But it turns out that a lot of the humor on The Office actually depends on reasonable characters like Jim and Pam to react to the craziness of the more absurd characters. "Mafia" was an opportunity to let other, mostly reasonable characters shine in Jim and Pam's absence, but it was really just the Dwight, Andy and Michael Show.

When a sirly Italian insurance salesman comes to Dunder-Mifflin to sell Michael a policy he doesn't need, Dwight and Andy quickly come to the conclusion that he's a mobster, setting off what should be at least mildly amusing antics that are actually only occasionally funny. Oscar calls Jim, who is trying to enjoy himself in Puerta Rico, but the Tall One knows better than to get involved. This leaves Michael to assume he's being shaken down by a mafioso and rely on Dwight and Andy for a battle plan. The lunch scene was neither embarrassing nor funny, except for Andy's mechanic disguise biting him when a distressed mother needs a simple jump start.

The much funnier B-plot follows the tragic arc of Kevin moving into Jim's office. Originally using the space... well let's just say for temporary relief, Kevin soon finds himself working entirely from Jim's desk. It's all smooth sailing until Jim's credit card company calls to investigate some suspicious activity, namely a number of charges in Puerta Rico. Before he knows it, Kevin gets all of Jim's credit cards canceled. Dunder-Mifflin truly is an all-consuming force.

Best Moment: Kevin explaining how he moved into Jim's office. I always enjoy the voiced-over montages and there were a lot of nice, little touches like Kevin doing sit-ups on Jim's desk for some reason and the fact that Kevin thought to move his name plate.

Biggest Laugh: Dwight's criteria for identifying a mobster, namely having southern Italian heritage and seeming like a mobster.

Episode Rating: 3/5- It just wasn't very funny, at least by Office standards. Any plot involving Dwight and/or Andy really should be small dose affairs and they desperately need a straightman to make the jokes work. Take, for instance, "Prince Family Paper" from Season 5. The entire Prince family counterbalanced the innate wackiness of Dwight and Michael to great effect. With no "normal person" character, "Mafia" just fell flat.