Even though it came to an end in 2013, The Office has remained one of the most beloved comedies to grace our TV screens (despite the fact that it lost its way toward the end), and its success leaves little mystery as to why there would be interest in reviving it in some way. It now seems that is happening, as Greg Daniels, the man behind the American version of the workplace mockumentary, is moving forward with a “new take” on the series, and I’m not sure how I feel about this idea.
Greg Daniels is assembling a writers room for the new series, THR reports, but he has stated in the past that he doesn’t want to do a straight revival of The Office, for fear of disappointing its passionate fans. This new project will possibly exist in the same world as that of Dunder Mifflin, without involving the same characters or members of the original cast.
That’s obviously disappointing news for anyone hoping to catch up with Jim and Pam (John Krasinski and Jenna Fischer, respectively), or find out what the heck Michael Scott (Steve Carell) or any of the motley crew of paper pushers is up to these days.
Even though it’s been just over a decade since the series finale, so much has changed about the workplace since then. I also would have also been interested to see those zany inter-office relationships play out in a post-pandemic reboot, where cringeworthy Zoom mishaps would compound the destruction that always befell Dunder MIfflin. We know this concept is fertile ground — we’ve already seen two versions of it, as it was adapted from the similarly successful British series — so it’s a bit of a bummer that we likely won’t see Greg Daniels build on that.
That said, because we’ve already seen British and American versions of The Office, it seems like we’d be pushing our luck asking for more. That chapter has closed, and what Greg Daniels has said about this new series actually sounds kind of cool. He used The Mandalorian as an example for how The Office revival might work, saying in November:
The notion of maybe something like the way The Mandalorian is a new show in the Star Wars universe, you know what I mean? Something like the notion of this documentary crew doing a documentary about a different subject. That, I think, could be intriguing and creative.
Having the documentary crew that filmed at Dunder Mifflin take on a new subject is actually a really fun idea, and Greg Daniels has certainly had a few of those over the years. With other series like Parks and Recreation, King of the Hill and Upload, I think it’s fair to say that whatever he comes up with — no matter how much the show is like The Office — it's going to be worth checking out.
We’ll be keeping our eye out for developments on this project, and in the meantime, you can relive all of the Scranton fun by streaming The Office with a Peacock subscription.
