Quick Take: The Office, “Training Day”
“Deangelo is great. I love the guy. But I’m not sure he’s a great fit for the office. And I’m not sure I love the guy.” – Michael Scott
Review: The Office, “Training Day”
(S0720) I am not ready to say goodbye to Michael Scott, but unfortunately this episode marked the beginning of the end. Will Ferrell came along this week as Deangelo Vickers, the new manager of Dunder Mifflin Scranton. The cold open between Ferrell and Steve Carrell was fantastic and I wish these two would do more projects together.
After meeting for drinks, Michael automatically likes Deangelo, but the fact that he is the new boss starts to get real for Michael when he introduces him to the employees. Everybody immediately transitions into a mode to impress Deangelo. Kelly tries to use her “meet cute” technique to win his affection, Jim and Pam (Jap) try to discuss babies with him, but Deangelo finds it annoying ("I'm telling you, that baby could be the star of a show called 'Babies I Don't Care About”), Kevin wears his toupee to try to be more impressive (“no it’s not Ashton Kutcher, it’s Kevin Malone”), Darryl tries dressing as a cowboy when Deangelo tells him he loves southwest America, and Andy somehow becomes the “office funny man” to Deangelo -- and when he can’t come up with a joke on the spot he uses methods of hurting himself to make the new boss laugh.
Dwight is the only one who doesn’t try to suck up due to the fact that he wanted to be the one that was made new manager. He tricks Michael into going out in the hall with him by telling him there is a turtle, and soon learns that Michael didn’t recommend him to corporate. Dwight changes his tune and ends up wanting to be Deangelo’s right hand man.
As soon as Michael starts to see how much everybody likes Deangelo, he starts to resent him and is not happy with the changes Deangelo is trying to make. He asks Erin to take her name out of her phone greeting (Dunder Mifflin, this is… I like it”) and Michael doesn’t like it. Deangelo wants to change the office decorum and Michael doesn’t like it. When Deangelo has his barber come into the office and shave his face, Michael asks Erin to shave his face. I found this moment the funniest with Erin covering the whole lower half of Michael’s face with shaving cream and then tries to shave his lips. Michael even goes as far to make peanut butter sandwiches for everybody after Deangelo tells them he has a peanut allergy. He tries anything to sabotage or to be better than Deangelo.
Deangelo then tries to have a meeting and Michael gets even more frustrated when everybody listens to him and heads to the conference room. It was a little sad to see Michael in this state, but he started to realize his reign was finishing with Jim telling him, “you're the one who decided to leave. He's our new boss” and with Dwight going to the meeting even after Michael asked him not to. Deangelo changed things around though when he asked for Michael’s advice on how to start a meeting. In the end, Michael had to give in and accept his choice that he made. I loved their front to back hug and Michael’s line of “why did you have to be so damn good?”.
Overall, I thought Ferrell did a nice job as Deangelo. He and Carrell work well together and it is a bummer that we only get to see the pairing for a few episodes. Ferrell’s stint is only supposed to last for another few episodes, but I kind of wish it would last longer. There is still no word on who is officially going to replace Michael and I have a feeling they won’t reveal that secret until the end of the season.
Video: The Office, “Training Day"
Check out Will Ferrell's introduction to The Office in full from Hulu, while available:
I enjoyed the opening as well, and/but it shed light on one of the major problems of the last several seasons. Michael has seen a measure of growth in terms of his relative maturity, and it's frustrating and even annoying when he reverts wildly to his "old ways," as he does in resenting Deangelo's appearance. The opening was great in my view as we saw the "new Michael" if but briefly before the old one took form.