re: Best to worst characters on “The Office”

Best - Kevin
Worst - Kelly



I really wish the office had done a series finale like St. Elsewhere, and the entire office's existence had been in Kevin's imagination.


ETA:

Pam is usually pretty low, though she does have a couple of really great moments with Michael. The art gallery episode is pretty touching.

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Jim is pretty bad. He literally tortures a guy who obviously has Asperger's. The interaction with Dwight in "The Fire", when Dwight is listening to REM in his car, shows just how shitty Jim and Pam acted toward others.

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I don’t know man, I don’t see a lot of redeeming qualities in Pam outside of aesthetics. She’s engaged to Roy and openly flirting with Jim without concern so they turn Roy into an abuser as some type of justification. She is also quite the narcissist for being a damn receptionist at a struggling paper company. Then toss in her lack of support for Jim and messing around with the boom mic guy, I think Pam is pretty shitty.

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Do people not understand that they have to put these characters in positions to create story lines? If they just go around acting like nice, kind people, you are going to miss out on all the funny.

When I think of worst characters, I think of characters that didn't bring anything to the show. One's that didn't click with the story line (see the revolving door of replacements for Mike). Not ones that I have some personal reason for not liking what they did in a fictitious office setting.

AS Mcgruff wrote above, Michael was not a realistic portrayal. He was low IQ moron. could never make it to any position in any company. Funny? yes. The other characters have shreds of believability

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One thing that was repeatedly shown time nad time again in the series was that Michael could absolutely be a great salesman, and many times woudl come through in the 11th hour to make a huge deal.

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This is correct.

There were definitely times when they made Michael out to be too silly/stupid/inept. shite like tube city with the hamsters or him taking literal directions from the GPS and driving into the lake (which was the most egregious and by far the worst thing they did with Michael) are good examples of that.

But there were also times when he would flash brilliance and knock it out of the park. Like when he stole Dwight's client out from under him with the Michael Scott Paper Company, or how he negotiated their jobs back from David Wallace ("I don't think I have to wait out Dunder Mifflin; I think I just have to wait out you."). Or closing the deal with Tim Meadows in early seasons at Chili's. Or when he closed the deal with Hammermill when josh thought they were exclusive with Staples (maybe next time Jan will estimate him?). Let's not forget that Scranton was always their "most profitable branch" under his management too, so much so that the company sent him on the road to train and teach other branches how to be successful.

Here is a montage of a lot of those things with him being really good at his job.

So yeah, Michael was an idiot sometimes. But that was mostly him being silly and trying too hard. But when push came to shove he actually was a pretty good boss/leader and you could see how he made it that far in his career.

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I mean, some of them sure. Kevin being actually retarded and unable to put a couple coherent sentences together, yet he's somehow also 1)an accountant 2) a musician 3) a WSOP champion seems a biiiiit more unbelievable to me.

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They ruined Kevin. It was funny when he was sort of slow, but also sharp on things (like winning a WSOP bracelet and being a good gambler). One of the best things they did was pranking Holly into thinking he was retarded, because not knowing him it would be sort of believable. But then they swung too far and made him actually retarded too often.


As for best and worst characters. For me it's Deangelo Vickers as the worst by far. But if he doesn't count because he wasn't around long enough, I'll choose Nellie. The best is likely Michael, but Gabe has to be up there. That character was so great.

I don't get the Robert California hate. He was an outstanding character, and he helped rebound from the awfulness that was Deangelo.

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They ruined Kevin. It was funny when he was sort of slow, but also sharp on things (like winning a WSOP bracelet and being a good gambler). One of the best things they did was pranking Holly into thinking he was retarded, because not knowing him it would be sort of believable. But then they swung too far and made him actually retarded too often.

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Michaels last scene with Kevin "Don't be a caricature"

Then they did exactly just that. One of the few things I hated about the show.

Best--1. Dwight
1a. Jim and Dwight

Worst--Andy. Can't stand to watch any episode featuring him,