Can the Office Survive Without Michael Scott?

There have been rumors of Steve Carroll's character on The Office, Michael Scott, leaving the show for over a year now. E-Online confirmed this devastating news late this summer. However, the good news for Office fans is that the network confirmed that the show will still go on without our beloved Michael Scott.

Will The Office find success without Michael? We will soon find out as Steve Carroll's seven-year contract expires in the spring of 2011. I for one believe that The Office could continue to be a success under the right circumstances. There have been rumors of Ricky Gervais joining the cast as office manager. If the network was looking to replace the hilarious office manager Michael Scott, who better to take over and give us some gut busting laughs than Ricky Gervais. After all, Gervais is no stranger to the roll being the office manager of the original BBC version of The Office (2001) and one of the creators of the American version of The Office.

There have been speculations of other actors stepping into the role of the office manager. I honestly can't see anyone else other than Gervais stepping in to be the funny office manager. However instead of being the dopey and hilarious office manager that makes you think how in the hell did this guy become a manager...the Steve Carroll version. I can see Gervais still being the hilarious office manager but more of a quick witted, smartass kind of funny manager.

Although, the cast is a strong cast that works well together and many of the best episodes are those that consist of several cast members as part of the storyline rather than the office manager being the main character in the story. I think they could slip any type of character in as the office manager and focus the storylines on the office employees the cast could carry this serious for several more years.

As long as the show has the characters of Dwight Schrute played by Rainn Wilson and Jim Halpert played by John Kransinski, the show still has a lot of potential. There are two things that I would bet the beat farm on...there will NEVER be another Dwight and fans will NEVER get enough of Jim's office pranks on Dwight! Remember in the very first episode, the pilot, when Jim puts Dwight's stapler in a mold of Jell-O. Was there anyone watching that didn't laugh out loud at that office prank? Or in season two when Jim comes to work dressed like Dwight and starts to act like him. And who can forget the best prank of all in season two...

In the opening of episode 11, Dwight goes to the vending machine and finds the items for sale are items from his own desk i.e. pencil cup, picture frame, name plate, etc. At first he is mad and refuses to pay to get his own things back. Pam comes into the break room and buys his pencil cup and tries to fight for it but Pam insists that it's hers because she paid a dollar for it. So Dwight reaches for his wallet so that he can buy his stuff back and finds his wallet is in the vending machine as well. Jim then hands him a bag of nickels so now Dwight has to spend his time feeding the machine nickels and purchase each of his items back one dollars worth of nickels at a time.

When I first saw this clip it was laugh out loud funny! Then I started to picture people I had worked with at different offices and how they would react if that would have happened to them. My only regret is that I never had the chance to do this to someone I knew. I have been a part of many office pranks and have to say this would have been in one of the top 10 best pranks to do to someone at the office!

Steve Carroll will be deeply missed on The Office but rest assured we will continue to be blessed with his comedy through his outstanding movie career that has really taken off since he started working on this television series. Carroll is quickly becoming one of the funniest comedic actors on the big screen.