Office Recap, "Prince Family Paper"

I think one of my favorite things in the world is when The Office cold-opens with a Jim/Dwight prank. Heaven! This time, Jim found some red wire at a flea market and strung it all through the office and up a telephone poll. Dwight chases it all the way up to the top. He'll be safe, though, 'cause Jim made it up, right?

Michael's on the phone with the C.F.O. (not his initials) David Wallace and he uses a line that I always knew would somehow make it on the show. "Whatchutalkin'bout, Wallace?" he asks, but I pictured him using the reference with Phyllis instead of Willis. Wallace is gonna fax over the details for Michael's latest assignment. It involves espionage, so we know we're in trouble. (And to be entirely honest, I've always felt that fax machines seem extremely outdated.) Anyhoo, "Prince Family Paper" was written by B.J. Novak and awesomely (or sadly) enough, if I hadn't known that beforehand, I still would have been able to tell it was written by him. He writes these awesome throw-away lines and has a way with callbacks.

Putting Michael and Dwight together is a car is a sure-fire formula for greatness. They ponder about what they'll do if they have to seduce the owner's daughter and code names (Michael Scarn!!!) and IHOP or Denny's? IHOP is socialist, so says Dwight. (Seriously, eight bucks for a plate of french toast? Over-freakin-rated.) He'll get pancakes and he'll like them, dangit! The signal to bolt is licking your lips and their rehearsal is somewhat disturbing. They will go in there and be sharks. cue theme from Jaws While scoping out Prince Family Paper, they notice the Princes aren't taking anyone out for a business lunch (valid) and that the clouds mean that it might storm. Michael never could get his cloud types right.

Business is like when the big sharks eat the smaller sharks and it goes down the food chain until the single-cell sharks are being consumed. In the scheme of business operations, Michael's always been something of a tiny shark, so what does he to eat a fellow tiny shark? The Prince Family Paper company is your average mom'n'pop paper store. It's exactly how Michael would run a business if he, y'know, had a family. Mr. Prince serves 80 clients...not too shabby. He also served in Vietnam and lets his grand-daughter do her math homework in the office. As his improv disguise, Michael pretends to be a lawyer. A lawyer who's also a paper genius! Laughter is his job, pain is his game, and law is his profession.

Dwight stumbles into the office exactly ten minutes later inquiring about a job. Mr. Prince's son already works for him, but Dwight's perfectly happy to take his place. He nearly ruins their cover and annihilates Michael during his interview. Michael takes advantage of the situation to take a picture of Mrs. Prince right by their map of clients. Sneakiness is not one of his main traits, which makes it all the more hilarious. One of my favorite scenes of the episode is when Michael helps the little girl with math assigment. "Why is that two so little?" Just times 4 by 2, that's right. Exponentials pretty much suck, so good thing Grandma was there for the save.While pulling out of the parking lot, the bumper falls off of the car annnnnnnd the boys are stuck. Oops.

Our B-plot this week is actually exponentially more hilarious (see what I did there?) than the A-plot even though the A-plot was very good. The office crew decides to settle that age-old debate: Is Hilary Swank hot? For what it's worth, I fall on the Not side of the argument. Great actress, just not attractive or hot or bangable like a painting. The debate is split between Stanley, Creed, Pam, Jim, and Kelly on the Hot side, with Kevin, Andy, Phyllis, Oscar, and Meredith for Not. Once parameters are set ("respect the game!"), they set forth their various sides.

Hilary Swank is a celebrity who we have built up in our minds and she looks like a female Boris Becker. (Who I guess is a semi-attractive tennis player?) On the other hand, she has a symmetrical face and Kevin would make out with her, however, neither of those things add up to hot. Swoon moment! Jim leans down and whispers the scenario about her coming into the office and offering to make out with Kevin. When a man can make that sound sexy to a girl, you know he's mighty talented. Gah. I'm going weak at the knees just thinking about it. Angela almost settles the debate (yes), but then Toby (definitely not) swoops in and ruins everything, AS PER USUAL. Kelly can't handle that Toby doesn't like her, because if Toby doesn't think she's hot then Kelly has no chance, EVER. Well-played, Mr. Novak. It's fun to see the office arguing over something so trivial and it's times like this that you wish you actually worked for Dunder Mifflin.

Also, Kevin has restricted internet access. Hee!

The Prince Family helps Michael patch up his bumber (with duct tape, no less) and brings them coffee. Small displays of affection will always win Michael over and these people literally handed him the list of their largest clients. Heart-breaking, really. Dwight tells him to be the bigger shark and Michael concedes, making a last-minute break for his car. The Cruiser is locked, so he runs back to get his keys and hurries back down to the parking lot. It's not a great chase scene, but what makes it is the instant cut to Wallace praising Michael on the phone for his efforts. For all his flaws, Michael Scott is a good person and this is going to tear him up inside. I sincerely hope they don't drop this plotline because there's room for some very interesting development.

Tag: Michael, walking into his office, notices a picture of Hilary Swank on the wall and casually remarks, "Oh, she's hot." Game, set, and match to Team Hotties!

The next episode will be shown at a special time and date. We got the time-slot following the Super Bowl on February 1st and the ep will run for an hour. This could be a good or bad thing, so I'm feeling rather apprehensive about it all. (Dear Paul Lieberstein, Don't screw the pooch! Hugs, Gretchen.)