The Office, Episodes 9.24-25: "Finale"

Even Greg Daniels can admit that everyone involved in The Office's final season might've gotten a bit too cocky. Did you know that the documentary was originally supposed to air in the seventeenth episode? That sure didn't happen! Trying to create a season-long story arc without having any idea how to actually structure that season? Yeah, that's the definition of cocky! The important thing, of course, is that they realized it, and they at least managed to steer things toward a satisfying conclusion. A very satisfying conclusion. This is pretty much a master class on writing a finale for a series that has gone seriously off the rails, without selling any of it out. Not even Andy plowing or possibly being plowed by Carla Fern. (Flag on the play!)

The Office has been on quite a long journey over the last nine years. (Obviously, since most nine-year journeys are rather long by default!) From its famously cringeworthy beginnings, to that middle part where it still did cringe comedy once in awhile but inconsistently enough that it just felt odd when it did, to season eight which was cringeworthy in the sense that it was terrible. And now we have season nine, the final season, and it's rather fitting that it's been an odd mixture of all three. Some truly stupid shit has happened to some of these characters this season, but the finale manages to mostly give them closure that....mostly makes sense. And now, I say my final goodbye to a show that has been, if nothing else, comforting to me over the last eight years, by examining the journeys that these characters have made over the last....ten years, I guess? (They're making this harder to keep track of than they probably needed to.)

The Office, Episodes 9.22-23: "A.A.R.M."

I am so mad at you, The Office! You made me spend two seasons watching Andy blow chunks as manager, proving equally intolerable in Michael's old chair both as a well-meaning but spineless (Nard) puppy and as the most selfish prick on the show by a long shot? Two seasons? And now you act like you pretty much knew all along that the show would've been better with Dwight in Andy's place? You had this in your pocket and you waited this long??? I oughta SMACK you!

And then I'll hug you because, in the process, you've at least given me the best episode since Michael fled to I'm-Getting-Off-This-Sinking-Ship Township, CO. Suck it, Livin' the Dream - you've been topped! And like Michael's farewell, it's at its best if you fast forward through the Andy plotline. (At least he's not hanging with Deangelo Vickers this time?)

The Office, Episode 9.21: "Livin' the Dream"

Livin' the Dream really says a lot about Andy's worth as manager, versus Michael's. When Michael left the office, the show went out of its way to hit every possible emotional note that they could with the guy, following him around for almost the entire episode. Sure, there was some business with Gabe and Erin and Andy, but that was short and largely irrelevant even then. Naturally it's moreso now. Flash forward two years, and Michael's successor (well, his successor's successor) is leaving the office too....and his departure just reads as a subplot in an episode where Jim and Pam and Dwight and the somehow always comforting David Wallace are up to Far More Interesting Things.

And yet, Livin' the Dream is perhaps one of the best episodes the show has done in the post-Goodbye, Michael era. Don't take what I just said as a slight to this episode, because I believe its focus was in the right place. Because Andy is just kind of a useless lump. Or, at least, one could be forgiven for thinking that he's a useless lump, because everyone in the office would agree. (Because he fucking IS.)

The Office, Episode 9.20: "Paper Airplane"

I'm a terrible pessimist. Anyone who knows me will confirm this. "That Jesseh is such a negative Nancy!" But there's one area where I seem to be a little too optimistic: final seasons of TV shows I like. For some reason, I'm willing to cut them a lot of slack! When things happen that I'd normally dismiss as kinda contrived, instead I come up with a satisfying explanation of my own and run with that! Because surely that's what they meant, right? Nobody would want to fumble something so final and therefore so important, I tell myself!

"Paper Airplane" should be thrilled about that.