I know this much is true

A series of The Office ends, a legend begins

This piece is part of a series on The Office (UK), running up to the 20th anniversary of its finale this Christmas. Don’t miss out by following me on Medium.

Hirings become firings, resignations handed in then withdrawn, redundancies confirmed then cancelled, promotions accepted and scuppered on purpose or otherwise… The Office was never a sitcom exactly nor a miniseries but it wasn’t not them either; and at the end of its first series it has its comedy-format cake and eats it: restored status quo and great changes in the offing both.

Episode 6, ‘Judgement’ starts with David Brent firing the man he hired at the start of the show: Alex (now in shot, played by Neil Fitzmaurice, who always makes his mark however brief, from DJ Ray Von in Phoenix Nights to Geoff’s-Doing-a-Joke Geoff in Peep Show). Incrementally the scene reveals that, as well as the two of them, there’s an IT guy at the computer; “How long you gonna be?” David asks but secretly he wants him there. Then the camera pans to show Gareth sitting on the windowsill. David’s brought back-up; this cowardice informs the rest of the episode.

It’s one of the best directed in the show, most of all for how it inserts talking-head sections to elide escalations of drama. From the mere cutaway to a…