As you Office fans now, this is Steve Carrell’s last season on The Office. It seems like the need to end this season with a new manager, and also a fate for Michael Scott. I’d be interested in hearing what you guys think should happen, and also what you think will happen.
New Manager? Well, it seems like maybe Darryl is the obvious choice, but I’m kind of hoping they go with someone they’ve never even hinted at having that ambition, but could also be realistic in that position. Maybe Stanley?
As for Michael Scott, does anyone else think suicide might be his ultimate fate? I know it’s really, really dark, but then again the show is dark sometimes.
Pluses for this idea: I think it sort of makes sense with how much of a failure Michael’s life has turned out to be, and how alone and isolated he is (I don’t think he and Holly are going to get together)
Minuses for this idea: I’m not sure how much it fits with Michael’s character, as he seems to be something of an optimist. Also, this seems more fitting for a series finale than a season finale.
He’s clearly going to end up with Holly and ride off into the sunset. I don’t really see how that’s not a foregone conclusion. I’d bet large amounts of money on it in Vegas.
I brought up Darryl as the replacement manager as an idea in an Office thread a few weeks ago. I really like the idea. They’ve done the guest manager stuff before, and it was good. But to go into a second generation of The Office they’re going to need to make big character-development changes. Pushing Darryl that much further into management would be the right move. They’ll leave that as unresolved going into the off-season, though.
Not that dark. I don’t think there’s any way that suicide is something that they’ll ever deal with on this show.
I also think that Michael and Holly will end up together. When Michael leaves the show, they kind of need to assure the viewers that he’ll end up OK. None of the other characters are in danger of really being unhappy in the end. The hints about how Holly wants kids, and is feeling like she’s approaching too old to have them? This season will end with Michael and Holly together.
Jim is the elephant in room in terms of manager potential; he’s been Michael’s right hand for a long time. For that reason, I think he won’t get the job. Jim’s a great salesman, but he hasn’t shown himself to be a great manager. Dwight would be a good choice comedically, but I don’t think the show can plausibly go that far. Of course, Gabe is still around and kind of Michael’s boss, or at least Michael’s peer; I think Gabe might simply assume that role as well. Gabe and Michael don’t seem to actually work that much; I can see the home office consolidating the positions.
Nah. Michael gets promoted, which sends the entire Scranton office into a panic because they know just what kind of executive he will be.
Not only that, but Michael the VP gets to appoint his successor. Of course he can’t choose between Dwight, Jim and Darryl, and the three of them waffle between scheming to get the job and being deathly afraid of Michael being their boss again.
There’s still the unresolved issue of the psych testing from earlier in the season which portrayed Michael as unstable. I’m wondering if he gets let go because of that.
I think Kelly and Darryl will have to fight it out for the job. Clearly Darryl is the better choice, but Kelly went to the “executive training” and now thinks she has a brain cell. This could actually be funny, especially if Mindy Kaling writes it.
The actor who plays Darryl doesn’t have the range or the talent to carry it off. I’d shoot myself before I’d watch the Kelly actress for more than five second bits. Ed Helms is a contender. He’s annoying and clueless enough to be a Michael replacement.
C’mon, people. No votes for Ricky Gervais? He suddenly shows up, does a little “TA-DAAA” thing, announces “Where’re me minions?”, and as the rest of the staff look slack-jawed at their new boss, roll credits.
He’d have to play an entirely new character as David Brent was such an utter asshole that I can’t see the show lasting more than a few episodes with him in the lead.
Ricky has been very vocal in saying he doesn’t want the job. He’s happy cashing his fat sydication checks and doesn’t want to have to get to to the studio for makeup at 5am.
I don’t think it would be a good move for him anyway. There’s little chance that whoever they pick will be able to revive the show. This is likely the swan song for the series.
Agreed. This is almost guaranteed. No way it’ll be suicide. That fits for [unnamed British cop drama], not an American prime time comedy series.
The only other possibility would be if things DON’T work out with Holly and he just kind of loses it and walks away from his life. That also leaves a possibility for Carell to come back when his movie career finishes tanking.
I think we’ll get a manager from the outside - unless they make use of the comedic potential of Kelly being made manager. If she were to become manager she could end up being a fairly hilarious analog to certain real world figures. Idiotic, completely clueless, and a penchant for petty retribution against anyone who she feels doesn’t give her enough respect. And Ryan could be the puppet master who loses control of his puppet.
Since he’s (it’s a he?) in custody, it’s not going to be that one of our characters is the strangler. Or a victim.
Apart from Michael somehow ending up in witness protection…and if he was a witness he’d be crowing about it constantly.
I think it’s just some goofy background stuff in Scranton. They needed Holly back for a bit so they have to get Toby out of the way. The decide to make it jury duty. Make it something interesting so people can make Toby feel loved until they all turn their backs on him again.
I don’t think it’ll be that, but he should know soon enough.
I think Toby is a dark horse for getting the manager position. He probably wouldn’t particularly want it, but I could see him ending up with it. It would gel well with the flow of the other characters. He would basically still be harried and morose and buried with complaints, while the dynamics of the rest of the office stayed largely the same. Plus it would be one last aggravation for Michael if he had to train Toby in.
The most conventional choice would be Jim, as he has really become the de facto lead character on the show, and is already established as th most likely heir apparent. If Jim does get the job, I would like it if the show continued the theme of Jim slowly turning into Michael - at least as an office manager, if not in his personal life.
I would really like to see some kind of redemption for Michael - some kind of victory - some kind of accomplishment. It will not be satisfying if he goes away just as bumbling as he ever was, and I really hope they don’t replicate the ending of the original UK series. Even though David Brent was far less sympathetic a character than Michael Scott, that was hard to watch.
Michael and Holly will have a one night stand. She’ll leave when Toby comes back from jury duty and return at the end of season pregnant. Michael will propose to her as soon she realizes he’s pregnant with his child.
They’ll introduce some plot point early in the penultimate episode of the season that we wouldn’t have guessed or had any reason to foresee. Obviously, I can’t say what that is, but it will lead to Michael either being promoted or fired. If there is a God in heaven, Timothy Olyphant(astic) will then be promoted to manager, and every week I’ll get to see his gorgeous face. But since God rarely involves himself with sitcom casting, Jim will get the job, and like every other time he’s been given a position of responsibility, he’ll completely fuck it up and prove that on some level, he is Michael Scott’s intellectual and emotional equal. The humor of the show will then be in watching Jim’s sad decline into Michael Scott-levels of ineptitude and weirdness, all of which is motivated from an entirely different place but always ends in the same consequences, somehow. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss, etc.