First of all, the opening for this episode was---bar none---the best ever. The only close contender was the "Dwight-Will-Salivate-for-Altoids" one from Phyllis's Wedding. The last scene is EQUALLY awesome. Because of moments like this, I-Tunes downloads are SO worth it, ya'll. You can watch them over and over!
Second, I am hoping that the general direction and tenor of this episode is pointing toward a resolution for the season I am really hoping for: Michael gets demoted and someone else (Jim? Cocktail Party, I thought, sort of hinted at this) takes over as boss. I say this because this was a major theme in the show I'm sorry but I just can't help still thinking of as The real Office and a very successful one. Being placed under Neil really brought out David Brent's dark[er] side. Why not Michael's? We've seen enough of Michael behaving [relatively] well [some of the time]. And the comic possibilities arising from the reactions of Dwight, Andy, Karen, and Pam are endless (showing that I hope Karen will still be with us). I think the show could benefit from a bit of darkening, frankly.
THE OPENING. Jim marches---quite, quite literally----through the door. I noticed right away that something was definitely off about him---though it took me longer than you'd probably guess to work out why.
For one thing, he's carrying one of those old-fashioned boxy briefcases that you carry by the handle Furthermore, his face looks as stiff as his posture, as if he were dead and stuffed. . Pam's eyes widen as he stalks past. Is she or is she not in on the joke? You be the judge.
When he sits down at his desk we see that he is wearing a short-sleeved peach-colored shirt and a more or less matching tie. (When did it start to be dorky for men to wear short sleeved shirts to work? Because, you know, it definitely is). Furthermore, his usual floppy do---so beloved by us all--- is slicked down flat and parted in the middle. Yes, there's something definitely different about Jim. What could it be?
With the minimum change in expression humanly possible to allow this, Jim squints at his computer screen. "Kinda blurry," he mutters. He pops open the briefcase and takes out a pair of giant glasses. "Jim's got glasses!" I said to Nick. Which is when I realized. I bet you were way ahead of me, weren't you? "That's better," he says to himself. Dwight looks up at him incuriously, still not seeing what it took me---but not you, of course---all this time to realize.
"QUESTION," says Jim. "What kind of BEAR is BEST?"
Dwight looks up, faintly puzzled. After reflecting briefly, he says, "That's a ridiculous question."
"FALSE," says Jim. "BLACK BEAR."
Dwight takes the bait. "That's debatable."
"FACT," Jim interrupts. "BEARS eat BEETS. BEARS. BEETS. BATTLESTAR. Galactica." He Dwightishly smacks his lips over the initial explosive "B" in each word, as if finding the savor of his own words delicious beyond expectation.
"Bears do not eat beets----" Dwight begins. Realization dawns. "What are you doing?"
Cut to Jim in the conference room, still wearing the dork specs. While shopping at his local drugstore, Jim saw the glasses on sale: "Four dollars." It only cost him seven dollars "to recreate the rest of the ensemble" for---he beeps the calculator button on his multi-functional digital watch---a grand total of "eleven dollars." He holds up his wrist to the camera so that we can check out the twin to Dwight's black digital watch.
Dwight has decided to take the position that "imitation is the most sincere form of flattery (sic)." Jim just smiles, opens his briefcase and takes out...a Bobblehead. He sets it down next to his keyboard.
Eyes waving about on stalks, Dwight shouts that identity theft is not a joke. "Millions of families suffer every year!"
Jim stares at him, then bellows, "MICHAEL!" He jumps up from his desk---his spine still completely perpendicular--- and stalks out of the screen, in search of Michael.
"Oh, that's funny," says Dwight. Then he bellows "MICHAEL!" He scampers (herkily-jerkily, natch) after Jim. John Kraskinski could totally have played the Dwight role (which---if memory serves---he read for).
And the opening credits roll! Lots of fake accents and yelling in this one, hurray!
"UNSPEAKABLE ACTS." The show opens with a montage of Pam and the sales staff apologizing over the phone to DM's customers.
Pam "understands" and offers to transfer the caller to customer relations. Jim "couldn't be more sorry." Stanley says blandly, "I am upset. Don't I sound upset?" (Nope.) And so on. Sorry...sorry....sorry. Why, what could have happened? The camera pans in on Michael saying, "It's disgusting...I totally agree....We're going to be recalling all of that paper."
In his office, Michael explains the crisis. A disgruntled employee at the papermill thought it would be funny to put an obscene watermark on Dunder Mifflin's high quality cream letter stock. We see Michael holding the paper up to the overhead light and squinting at it. The watermarks shows a certain "beloved cartoon duck" performing "unspeakable acts" on a "beloved cartoon mouse...that a lot of people like....I've never been a fan." Heh.
We get to see the watermark, which kind of surprised me, though the point of contact, so to speak, is x'd out. Five hundred boxes went out. That's a lot of obscene watermarks out there.
"QUALITY ASSURANCE." Michael has summoned everyone to the conference room (of course). His expression is grim and purposeful, filled with grim purpose. Everyone, especially Meredith, is looking pretty pissed off----though maybe it's just Meredith, who never these days ever seems to make it past the cutting room floor.
Michael says: "Cri-man-squad, F & C, double-time." "Cri-man squad?" Dwight repeats. My thoughts exactly; I thought for a second that a spring had broken in my brain. "Crisis management squad," Michael explains. "F & C?" Ryan asks. "Front and center!" Michael translates. A discussion begins between the staff about whether these time-saving abbreviations are actually saving time since, you know, nobody knows what he is talking about. "Actually, I think you could make the argument that it wastes time," Karen says. "She has a good point," says Pam earnestly and carries on wasting time with the argument that time-saving abbreviations waste time if you have to keep explaining them till Michael covers his eyes and bellows incoherently to stop her. Pam smiles, presumably at Karen. Interesting little interaction there between the girlies.
Michael asks where Creed is. Creed reluctantly raises his hand, then closes his eyes like a kid who thinks if he can't see the monsters they can't see him. Obnoxiously shaking his finger at Creed in a way that makes me wish I could bite it off, Michael singles him out as the responsible person from the DM office: Creed is meant to be in charge of "quality assurance." Creed? Really? Quality control? The hell you say. Anyway, Creed clearly "screwed the pooch," since 500 boxes of obscene cartoon-bearing paper went out on his watch. Creed winces and gulps through the scolding and sighs "Yeah" when Michael tells him that the entire company is in jeopardy because of him. Creed's mouth droops.
In the conference room, Creed confides to the camera that he is supposed to make four-hour spot-checks once a week at the paper mill. Naturally, this had to happen the one year he blew it off.... Poor Creed.
"THREAT LEVEL MIDNIGHT." Because it's "threat level midnight," Michael wants everyone on the phones, including accounting, to deal with the angry customers. Oscar immediately points out that this is not their job. Michael: "MIDNIGHT, Oscar." He tells them that Kelly (customer service) will train them. Kelly expresses her joy by doing a little cheer: "This day! Is Bananas! B-A-N-A-N-A-S!" . (Bananas? Lately, I've noticed that "bananas" is---or seems to be--- the new "def" or "bad" or "cool" or "groo-vay." Can that be right? It's so sort of dorky.)
Angela: "Kelly is training us?" As Kelly is dancing, Angela is breaking out the mega-ginormous sized bottle of aspirin. "I don't have a headache," she tells the camera unhappily. "I'm just preparing."
Putting one foot up on the conference table---because he's the boss and it's his table---Michael tells Jim that one of his clients, a high school, used the obscenely watermarked paper for prom invitations. Prom invitations? Whatever: it's a "big fire in [Jim's] house." Jim already has a call in to the high school, but Michael wants him to go there in person since it's a "keystone account." He also wants him to take a partner. Ryan volunteers, but Michael---addressing Ryan as "Sweet Cheeks"---says impatiently that they need someone who has "actually made a sale." I guess he's still pissed off with Ryan?
He tells Andy to go with Jim and Andy responds by saying something I didn't understand a really, really, really garbled British accent that nevertheless contains a nod to David Brent of the original Office in the only part I did understand: "A/k/a "will do."" "Yeah; I'm definitely going alone," says Jim, but Michael isn't having that. "I need two men on this!" he bawls, shaking his finger some more. "That's what she said!" Michael interjects." " No time!" yells his inner drill sergeant. " That's what she said!" Michael says again. "No time! No time!" Everyone stares as he wrestles publicly, though not for the first time, with his multiple personality disorder. You'd think he would like Andy better. They have so much in common.
"ALERT THE MEDIA." Michael puts Dwight in charge of the press conference. Press conference? Bugging out his eyes at the camera dementedly, Dwight hisses, "Yessss! You are entering the NO SPIN ZONE." Pam wants to know why they're having a press conference. Michael explains to her and to us that if they don't tell the press, the press will find out on its own. He wants to control the story! "Alert the media and you control the story. Wait for them to find out...and the story controls you." Uh-oh. "That's what's happened to O.J.," Michael concludes. Whoa, double uh-oh!
He tells the employees that he has invited Barbara Allen, one of their oldest clients, to come to the office to receive his personal apology as part of the press conference. "If the media wants a story, I'll give them a story." I don't see how this could possibly go wrong, do you? Unless, of course, Michael omitted to check with the client to see whether she is likely to accept the apology.
Jim wants to know whether the press actually asked for a story, but Michael ignores this. In his mind's eye, he sees the saving headline: "Scranton Area Paper Company Dunder Mifflin Apologizes to Valued Client: Some Companies Still Know How Business is Done."
So where, I wonder, is Jan in all this? Are we to believe she wouldn't have been on the phone to Michael at first light, instructing him on exactly how to proceed? Or that Michael has somehow succeeded in keeping this a secret from her?
Next, we see Creed on the phone to the paper mill. He says he was supposed to meet the week before with one of the floor managers for a quality inspection but she wasn't there! "I'm trying to remember who it was," says Creed. He asks who wasn't there the previous week. He learns that Debbie Brown wasn't there on Wednesday the 11th. Ha! If loving Creed is wrong, I don't want to be right.
In the conference room, Creed explains to the camera that he'll do whatever it takes to salvage his job and , like a homeless man, to survive...just like he did when he was a homeless man.
"NO LONGER LOSERS." Kelly has the three accountants cornered in the break room. She tells them she knows that the reason they became accountants is because they aren't good at interacting with other people----Kevin pouts at the camera while Oscar and Angela carry on staring at her stonily---but starting today, they are no longer losers! She tells them to give themselves a round of applause and starts clapping. A thrilled Kevin claps enthusiastically. Oscar wonders aloud how many calls she is missing while she wastes time teaching them? Angela wants Kelly to wrap it up so they can go.
All they have to do is say, "Customer Service; Kelly speaking!" except without saying "Kelly"! They can just make up a name! She once pretended to be Brigitte Jones and "I talked like this for the whole conversation!" Her English accent is way better than Andy's and the Renee Zellweger imitation isn't too bad either, considering.
Even more excited than before, Kevin raises his hand. In an Andy-level Aussie or "Aussie" accent, he asks if he can be Australian! "Absolutely!" Kelly carols. She and Kevin talk back and forth in their fake accents. Angela closes her eyes.
"BEER ME." Andy is driving to the high school. To Jim he says, "Beer me!" This is his frat boy way of asking Jim to pass him a bottle of water. "It gets a laugh like a quarter of the time," says Andy.
The next part is interesting, because it provides a possible, or seeming, update on the state of Jim's relationship with Karen. Andy asks how "what's-her-name" is. "You know her name," says Jim flatly. Remarking that Karen is one of his oldest friends, Andy asks Jim how "the apartment" is. Does this mean that Karen---who initially Jim didn't even think should move into his neighborhood---has moved in with Jim or vice-versa? Inane chatter from Andy follows and Jim---unwisely----asks if Andy has any music. Naturally, this causes Andy to burst into song.
When he winds down, Jim clarifies that he meant music performed by someone else, though he is more tactful and explain that he meant music on a CD. Unoffended, Andy says, "Your call, dude." I was totally expecting him to switch on a CD of "Rockin' Robin" or some other arrangement of his own, but instead he says that his "girlfriend" (girlfriend? Girlfriend?) made an awesome mix, and I was conscious of a slight twinge of disappointment, since having an actual girlfriend is a bit more normal than I like my Andy to be. Hang on, though, if you feel the same, because the full weirdness is about to be made manifest.
Jim gets out of the car, looking fed up and as if he's just finished a prolonged eyeroll. Oh why can't Jim learn to appreciate the awesomeness of Andy? He shakes his head and does another eyeroll for the benefit of the camera. "Lord, beer me strength,"he says.
Rather sweetly, I thought, Andy says to Jim as they weave between attractive adolescents, presumably in the process of changing classes, "When we get in there, let's do a really good job!" Jim wonders aloud if this really needed to be said. Shut up, Jim. Andy says, and I totally agree, that not everything one says really needs to be said. "Sometimes it's just about the music of the conversation." At which point Andy gives a sort of yell of consternation. "Why is my girlfriend here?"
And he doesn't mean the teacher, as Jim and I try to assume: he means the literal girl ("part-time yogurt chef") with long blond hair and the green hoodie opening a locker. "Wow," says Jim and his means it in the way you and I mean it. Andy wonders if maybe she is---he gulps---a guidance counselor? "No," says Jim. Maybe, then, a tutor? The girl turns her pretty, pretty head to talk to a pretty, pretty boy. Jim: "Nope."
Andy stares after her with shocked and wounded eyes.
"THE MONEY BEETS." Dwight is organizing the press conference. Because he is Dwight, this means a lot of pointing and ordering people around. "Pam, run a comb through your hair," he says in a disgusted tone. Pam looks chagrined, but he's sort of right; this once, lovely Jenna Fischer's lovely hair does look a bit stringy. Dwight explains that the first rule in roadside beet sales is to put the most attractive beets---i.e., Pam, Ryan, and Karen--on top. The attractive beets are the ones that "make you pull the car over and go, "Wow. I need this beet right now."" He gives the same sort of salacious little wriggle we've seen him do on the (rare) occasions when he discusses his sex life. "Those are the money beets," he tells the camera. In a world in which people pull their cars over to buy beets from Dwight's roadside stands, Jenna Fischer's hair might sometimes be stringy. At least he thinks she is one of the money beets. He actually moves one of the plants next to Phyllis's desk to screen her from the visiting reporters.
Meanwhile, a reporter is introducing himself to Dwight as The Scranton Times columnist for "The Lighter Side of Life" and obits, rather than the journalist from The Washington Post Dwight was expecting. "Oh dear God," Dwight mumbles, before hanging a large tag around the man's neck and telling him that he's been granted "Level 3" security clearance. The man looks impressed and sort of tickled to hear it. "Oooh," he says. Seeing this, Dwight curtly tells him not to get excited. "That's out of 20."
NOTHING ILLEGAL. Andy catches up with his girlfriend in the corridor. He asks if she is a student there. Caught off balance, the girl ---"Janie"---responds with an embarrassed shrug. "This is weird," she says and starts to walk away, explaining over her shoulder that she has to go to Spanish. She actually does look quite a lot older than 16, which is a nice touch and helps to validate Andy's gobsmacked reaction. She has one of those pointy, worldy-wise little faces like Jennifer Aniston's. At least it's clear that Andy isn't intentionally preying on downy adolescence. Andy just stands there gaping.
As the hall clears, he turns slowly round---gasping--- to look at Jim. "OH MY GOD!" he yells. "Oh my God," Jim confirms. "I had no idea," Andy says. Jim says that this isn't going to hold up in court. I'm not in love (TM the Geico caveman) with Jim's little smirk as he says this.
At which point Andy tells us what we need to know in order to keep regarding this show as a comedy. "We didn't do anything illegal," he says disgustedly, turning away.
APOLOGIZING. Speaking as someone who has worked the crisis hotlines for a number of local organization, I'm here to tell you that Kevin is doing a kickass job dealing with DM's customer service crisis. Empathetic...genuine...willing to let the person at the other end vent his or her outrage on him....and not even in an Aussie accent. "That's a valid point," says Kevin, and "I am so sorry." Slightly less appropriate, but not necessarily less effective, is Oscar, who is having a nice chat with the person on the other end of the line.
Then we hear Angela. Do I have to tell you that she is arguing with the customer and ends by slamming down the phone? "I don't know what you want from me!"
The camera pulls back and we see that Kelly is standing behind her, looking unusually solemn. Kelly sits down on the desk and tells Angela, who really is looking a bit shaken up---she isn't, after all, used to being blamed for anything since she almost never does anything wrong---that she is doing "so, so good." Very tactfully she tells Angela that since she has "so many good qualities," the one she should probably work on is actually apologizing, but her voice goes up on "apologizing" so it comes out sounding pretty sarcastic. I can't tell you how much I admire Angela Kinsey's ability to express extreme tension and the beginnings of a bad headache without ever saying a word. She actually looks as if she is about to burst into tears which---as we know from past experience---is Angela's usual response to extreme stress.
Meanwhile, Creed is launching his nefarious scheme to keep his job whatever it takes. In a voice conveying both sadness and outrage, he tells Dwight that when he went for his spot check the previous week, the floor manager told him she had an emergency dentist appointment.--- Dwight smirks at the lameness of an emergency dentist appointment as an excuse (and he if anyone would know; remember The Coup?). Looking grieved---except for one funny little deprecating glance at the camera--- Creed says he is a trusting guy, but if Debbie Brown had been there, they'd have caught the problem. Dwight nods along with this; he's buying it.
"EVERY CLIENT IS IMPORTANT. " A pretty but pissed off middle-aged lady comes steaming through the door and brusquely announces that she's Barbara Allen and that she has an appointment with Michael.
In the meantime, Michael has recovered almost all his complacency. He tells the camera that Ms. Allen, though not really that important a client, is their most important client...because all their clients are important. His face as he says this is a study. He's got that pleased look he gets when he's come up with what he considers to be a particularly adroit turn of phrase and is clearly trying to stop himself from smiling. You can see from this how much Michael is secretly enjoying this crisis.
Cut to the conference room where Michael, standing next to an unmollified Barbara Allen, is wrapping up his press conference. As the camera pulls back we see that he and Barbara Allen are standing at the front of a room filled with empty chairs, except for Dwight and the reporter from The Scranton Times. Barbara Allen's arms are folded and her face set in grim lines as Michael talks about deeply regretting etc. and presents her with a gigantic "novelty check" for 6 months of free paper or 25 reams, whichever comes first.
"Let us consider this matter ended," Michael intones. But Ms. Allen isn't prepared to do that. She says she could have lost business and doesn't accept his apology. When she makes it clear she isn't backing down, Michael's smug expression becomes thunderous. They stare at one another over the giant check.
WHO'S THAT GUY? Jim and Andy are waiting for the principal. Hilariously, they are seated in front of a bulletin showing, I guess, the beginnings of the human race; Andy, staring glassily into the distance, has thrust out his jaw so that he distinctly resembles one of the very early hominids shown on the bulletin board. After a minute he asks rhetorically who the guy was that his girl friend was talking to. Jim suggests that this is probably not important since it is a felony for Andy to date her.
TOURETTE'S. The principal is telling Jim and Andy how serious is "the issue of the watermark." Jim agrees that it is; Andy, preoccupied, is fiddling with the things on the principal's desk, staring into a rather pretty piece snowglobe as if it were, say, a magic 8-Ball that could answer what is currently the most pressing question in his life. The principal explains that they teach their students that character counts. Andy shakes the snowglobe. When he notices that Jim and the principal are both staring at him, he sets it down and shows that he's been following the conversation by remarking that the school obviously isn't teaching character well enough since "one of your students is a BITCH." Jim overrides this, or tries to, by saying that Andy is having a really rough day.
There's usually one scene a week that I have trouble believing in and this week, this is the one. It's just so hard to imagine what happens next. Does Andy blab to the principal about his little liaison? Does Jim somehow succeed in quelling him? This is such a strange track for the show to be going down that I'm kind of afraid it really does spell the end of Andy, though having him hauled off on felony charges would be a bit too dark even by the standards of the British version. I just have no idea what this is about.
Kelly is coaching Angela through another call. This time, Angela manages to say, "The company has already apologized," but can't bring herself to say she's sorry. She hangs up on the client. "I think he had Tourette's or something!" she tells Kelly.
Michael, still holding the giant check, is trying to reason with Ms. Allen. Dwight is standing at his shoulder with his hands folded and head bowed, like a man standing next to a grave. Michael tells Ms. Allen that they are going to make sure that nothing like the watermark ever happens again, but Ms. Allen doesn't care about that. "It already happened to me," she insists. Man, I'd like to know the backstory on this. She says that cartoon characters having sex is disgusting. At which point Dwight chimes in, helpfully pointing out that since both animals were smiling, "the sex appeared to be consensual."
In an inteview, he says that he grew up on a farm and has seen a lot of animals (not cartoon characters, though) have sex. Here are some of the scenes he has witnessed: chicken on goat; goat on chicken; "couple of chickens doing a goat, couple of pigs watching..." Well, as long as it was consensual.
Michael asks Ms. Allen what he can do for her. She wants him to resign. He says it wasn't his fault, but she thinks as "head of the company" he should take responsibility. Loud squabbling ensues, with the forgotten reporter eagerly taking notes. Michael finally orders Ms. Allen out. She says she is going to call the Better Business Bureau; he says he is calling "the Ungrateful Beeyotch Hotline." Michael remembers the reporter and apprehensively inquires if he got all of it. "Everything," the reporter assures him.
In his office with Pam, Michael is panicking. Things are spinning out of control. Pam points out that it's just The Scranton Times but Michael is worried that Newsweek and various other news organizations will pick it up. Hey, nowadays, it isn't impossible. For once, he's right. And we still haven't heard a word from or about Jan.
Pam thinks it will blow over in a week or two. Michael pulls himself together. She's right, he tells her, only it's not going to take a week or two. He takes out a little videocamera. Double uh-oh! Pam interviews that Michael likes her to run the camera for his "apology videos" because he needs a woman's touch. Cut to Dwight spraying enough hairspray in and around Michael's hair from an aerosol spray can to open a brand new hole in the ozone. There's a really badly made American flag in the background.
Michael begins his "apology," reading from the card Dwight is holding up. "I bet you're really sick of hearing about Dunder Mifflin and its embarrassing watermark boner." Afterwards, he goes way, way off script---if you want to see what he was supposed to say, you'll have to watch it again or invest in an I-Tunes download----saying that he is NOT leaving and that a SWAT team couldn't make him go. He and Dwight get into an argument about this and they have to start over.
Is he planning to upload this to YouTube, or what? It's never really clear.
"SORRY YOU'RE MORONS." The accountants are back at their desks. Angela snipes at Kevin for making a mistake in addition. Ooooh, Kevin's pissed. "At least I didn't SUCK at customer service," he grates. He and Oscar grin at one another and give each other---since they're two far apart to actually make contact---air fives.
Angela says, "You two are apes" and shakes her little pony tail in disdain. Oscar's smile fades and he demands an apology. She tells them she's sorry they're morons. They point out that she actually said the words "I'm sorry." Air fist bops!
"YOU HAVE ONE DAY." Michael's having another go. It would be unfair for him to resign---to his clients, his workers, and "especially to me." Dwight's cue card shows that Michael's supposed to talk here about his mortgage and other obligations but he goes off script again. He says that "they're" trying to make him an "escape goat." He swears that if he is forced out every single piece of copier paper in Scranton will have the F-word on it. "You have one day," he concludes.
TRAGIC. Creed is getting everyone to sign a farewell card for the now fired Debbie Brown, the escape goat for the watermark scandal. He is also taking up a collection. "She got fired because of Dwight," says Creed, so we know that Dwight ratted her out. Creed feels just terrible, he assures us. As he's leaving he counts the money he's collected, sticks it in his pocket, and tosses the card into the garbage can. You do whatever it takes to survive, Creed! In voiceover he asks why bad things always happen to the good people. "It's just tragic."
Andy and Jim are driving back to the office. Andy looks as if he is about to start crying. Jim tries to console him by telling him he'll be okay in a couple of days; Andy says hollowly, "Yeah." I'd sure like to know what happened in the principal's office, but this is one of those times when the writers just decided to leave well enough alone.
Jim, moved to compassion by Andy's shellshocked glare, starts softly chanting "A-weem-a-wet, A weem-a-wet, A weem-a-wet,"which is the best I can do at rendering the background singing from "The Lion Sleeps Tonight." At first, Andy resists, but finally he breaks into a smile and starts to sing the descant or whatever it's called. They look at each other, grinning. It's very cute. Have I mentioned I love Ed Helms? John Krasinski too, of course, but that goes without saying.
OH MY GOD, THE LAST SCENE IS AS AWESOME AS THE FIRST. Dwight comes through the door. There's something subtly different about him. His glasses are gone. He's wearing a dark suit and instead of his 1960's briefcase, has a nice leather case with a shoulder strap, slung over one shoulder. His hair is parted on the side. He gives a hilarious little glance over his shoulder at the camera.
"Dwight, you look really nice today," Pam says to him as he leans over the reception desk. This is too much for him; breaking character, he straightens up. "I look like an eeediot," he says.
But he pulls himself together again. Smirking, smoothing down his hair, and stepping slinkily along like a runway model, he slides past Karen and Jim to his desk. "Lookin sharp!" Karen says. Dwight says that that's because he's her boyfriend, "Jim Halpert." With a sneer evocative of Elvis rather than Jim Halpert, he asks her if she wants to "have sexual intercourse 'cause you're my girlfriend?"
"Do you?" Jim asks her. "No," says Karen. "I'm good, thanks." "Okay," says Jim.
Dwight sits down; Phyllis, whose desk is behind his, turns round to watch him "imitate" Jim. Wriggling, preening, glaring scarily, he smirks into the camera in very distant emulation of Jim's patented silent communings. "Spot on," we hear Jim say. "Wooooh woooh li'l comment," says Dwight, shaking his head. "Wooooh."
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