The Office New Season Slow, but Promising

The over-the-top NBC comedy has certainly attracted the reluctant attention of millions of viewers every Thursday at 8pm (Central) given its raw format and boundary-pushing humor. The show, set in a paper distribution and sales office known as Dunder-Mifflin in Scranton, PA is a notably original comedic series. But the new season premiere last week showed a lot of weariness in veteran cast members.

Steve Carell's portrayal of Michael Scott, Rainn Wilson as Dwight Schrute and even John Krasinski as Jim Halpert seem to have become almost robotic in fashion. While the show still maintains all its regular jokes and awkward moments, the dynamics of the show have slowed, perhaps due to overuse. Overall, the actors seem exhausted, not a good sign in the first show of the season. The energy among the entire cast seemed down from past seasons, a slight disappointment for many, perhaps, but nothing to worry about given the new plots and characters involved in the show.

The shining beacon of hope comes in the form of Holly, the office's newest employee and Michael's apparent new love interest. In addition other plot changes near the end of last season such as Andy and Angela's relationship and Pam's move to art school, Holly brings a fresh new character into the mix. Most of the employees at Dunder-Mifflin remain the same, but absent characters such as Toby and Pam will not play as big of a role in this season's episodes.

The first episode of the new season brings Dunder-Mifflin, Scranton into a direct competition with other Dunder-Mifflin branches in a weight-loss competition. While some apathetic employees attempt to sabotage the efforts of the rest of the Scranton team, Michael furiously encourages the entire branch to win the competition. Much to the dissatisfaction of the employees at Dunder Mifflin, Michael handles the whole ordeal very immaturely, as usual. While other characters resume their normal mishaps, Jim and Pam take another step in their relationship, as do Dwight and Angela, unbeknownst to Andy.

Michael has even grown a goatee in order to appear more like Ryan, only to have Ryan shave his off and Michael follow once again in suit. The only long-running cast members that did not appear in the new episode were Jan and Toby, though Toby does have a sad scene right at the end of the show.

Next week we can be expecting an episode on Business Ethics and according to NBC a scandal by Ryan, the former temp of the office, now a corporate executive.

'The Office' airs weekly on NBC during the Thursday 8 Central time block.

More information on the show can be found at www.nbc.com