I'd like to help, but my hands are tied
30 Rock
30 Rock is hilarious, but it hurts to watch with limited Tracey Morgan/Jordan. With the Tracey presence, it is a joke carousel about to fly off the wheels creating a dizzying euphoria where you don't have to think about everything too much because it has that screwball snap and lunatic absurdity. These jokes could be uncomfortable if they didn't fly so fast and take place in show biz, satirizing a community that is uniformly crazy while being both hypersensitive and brutally mercenary and calloused.
So far as I know, the show is written by a Benneton conglomerate of top notch New England joke slingers. Something in the show, in the dialog and the "wacky" situations, is almost unbearably misanthropic. This is impossible to overlook without the active participation of Tracey, himself a brilliant racist caricature. What goes on there? It is strange and beyond my comprehension. Donald Glover came through the show in its better years. In this episode, Hannibal Burress, current in-house black comic genius, had a walk-on as a prison inmate Jack was going to put in a Trading Places kind of scenario.
Why is this how they put Hannibal into the show for a single line of dialog? This is a cartoon show, but every cartoon beyond the single comedy writer lady trying to have it all and the bluebood titan of industry forces its characters into buffoonery, malice, criminality, and so on and so on. So of course it is funny. Funny and deeply troubling. There is no black male life in 30 Rock between Harvard snob, celebrity lunatic, and criminal/homeless. That is the triangle, and within it, a void. Gay men don't fare much better.
Unless they are played by Will Arnett, who is always a delight here, reducing Alec Baldwin to gossiping like a schoolgirl. Even better are the schoolboy imagination games they play in confrontations, this time jockeying for metaphorical roles in "The Itsy Bitsy Spider".
Very funny episode, and not as egregiously hateful as the show can be (which is still pretty egregious). They seem to think the LA uprising is a good setting for a cutaway flashback, which it could have been if it meant more than a lame "out-of-towner-in-LA-doesn't-know-how-to-refer-to-the-freeway" gag (okay, still funny thanks to Fey's performance).
Beneath all this ranting about the hate coursing through 30 Rock's well-educated witty veins, I think the problem is I don't give a rat's ass anymore. Liz and Jack have a nice dynamic, and everything else is a vehicle for laughs and zaniness, which hit hard once but have a bitter aftertaste. Maybe I shouldn't speak since I haven't rewatched an episode in a year or so (not like my glorious love affair with the program in season 3).
But back to the hatestream. I'm mad at it, because it is messing up my default love of Tina Fey. And my type adoration of the pretty smart girl with glasses. The show avoids a lot of questioning on the front of its queasy regard of society beyond this rarified existence. Because we all know it is smarter and prettier than us and will embarass us if we dare question it.
I've granted the show enough satire licences. Truth is it hates (and not in that delightful Virginia way). I'm sure it hates you, too, and has a lot of cruel, brilliant gags to throw at yr lifestyle and demographic. And you should love it because it is presided over by a lovable mess of a clever lady.
Still, very funny.
Well that's Dallas
The Office
Yeah, I cried a little, so what? Yr heart's made of stone?
So the exit strategy is official for the moment. Michael Scott should be marrying Holly Flax and heading up to Colorado to help look after her parents. This was set up well. Michael has no idea how real humans talk, so he's going from notions he's picked up from his still juvenile media intake, and he makes an awkward call to Holly's father to request approval to propose to her.
Remember when Pam was the receptionist? When transferring calls, she would fake him out and let him work out his first greeting instinct, which would usually involve mean-spirited sarcasm and/or a bad impression. Of course, calling Holly's dad, he opens up by insulting her and threatening to fire her. Then he asks the real question. Then we learn he was talking to voicemail.
The fallout of this indelicate message, when Holly hears back from her parents, is her realization that her father is beginning to suffer from senility if not outright dementia. Even in a delightful episode such as this, good Office always leavens the merriment with something real.
Oh, yeah, the delight! The staff is holding a garage sale in the warehouse amidst the big proposal plotline. Oscar gets to pawn off all of his Will & Grace crap that was mistakedly given to him as gifts. Ryan relishes bragging about conning his mom into preparing foodstuffs that he has now bottled for sale. Also, he has appropriated the likenesses of Phyllis and Oscar in his packaging. I rilly love writer BJ Novak's portrayal of Ryan, quietly shifting through the seasons into several shades of douche (excepting his glorious star arc in season 4 climaxing in "Night Out").
Dwight masterfully scams all of his co-workers through trade. One weakness he notes is Ryan's misuse of co-worker's faces, and he uses this to trade Stanley's photo album to him. Dwight works his way from a thumbtack to a telescope, which Jim manages to trade from him for a bag of magic beans.
This season has been a bit off as the writers deal with Carrell's impending exit and try to shift to the rest of the cast, but it has been doing better lately. The highlight of the garage sale plotline was Darryl, Andy and Kevin staking money on Dallas (the TV show): The Board Game. Darryl and Andy as a team are a recent surprise. It turns out Darryl, following up on his occasional role with Michael, rilly takes to mentoring dim white men. Kevin slides in easily as he jammed with them on the novelty frog song earlier this year and he has a gambling problem. He gets to give good exasperated victim through much of the game before sneaking away with victory. "Well that's Dallas" becomes The Office's equivilant to "Forget it, Jake. It's Chinatown".
Incidentally, I hope Michael Scott burns something down before he leaves our lives. Preferably Utica. To the ground. We almost have this pleasure tonight before Pam intervenes. Michael's first proposal gesture involves sloppy gasoline writing very close to the office building and the automobiles of its workers. Pam is still very good at being a maternal firewall for Michael's most destructive instincts.
Speaking of that bitch, she's not as much of a bitch anymore. After her initial vulnerability and sadness, Pam had a period with Jim as the smuggest asshole couple in the paper company. Now that child rearing and grown up bills have humbled them, Pam has returned to lovability as the office manager, a title she fraudelently created for herself. She even organizes the office to help Michael craft a more sensible proposal plan.
This is where the (slight, I promise) crying comes. Michael takes Holly on a walk through the building, up and into the office. Along the way, he points out the moments he and we remember. Some that he didn't see (Toby's announcement that he's leaving for Costa Rica). Some that we didn't see (those two crazy kids have done some sweet and freaky things up and down the staircase). Some more memories as we stroll through The Office proper. Then they get to stroll past the cast fake proposing (I would also pay to see an Angela-Holly erotic encounter).
Yes, this is fan service, but it is fan service done well in comparison to "Threat Level Midnight" earlier this season. Finally, Michael does get to start his fire in a way. Several candles surround Holly's desk when he finally gets down on one knee and presents his awesome ring to her (he went by the "three years' salarie" rule). The sprinklers go on and our favorite lovers kiss soaked after a proposal spoken in some strange Yoda-Kermit-? language only they get.
This show loves showered proposals, because a loving couple making out in the rain (or the sprinklers) is beautiful. So beautiful that the supporting cast, acting as our surrogates, can't help but eavesdrop and barge in for hugs and high five/fist bump miscalculations. Then the news that Michael will be leaving shocks them. As it did us.
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