After the jump, please join me for a critical two-pack. I start by analyzing what’s working on The Office this season, which leads me to the ways Dirty Sexy Money is sliding off the rails. 

Good times!!

To begin… 

Is it just me, or is Holly Flax exactly what The Office needed this year? Last season, I was concerned that the show was becoming too relationship oriented, but now I realize my frustration wasn’t with relationships per se, but with relationships that were getting stagnant.

But in Holly, Michael finally has an ally–someone who thinks his sex talk is alluring and feels his staff meeting hip-hop is wicked cool. That’s an excellent new dynamic, since previous seasons have mined laughs from people’s disdain for Michael… or from Michael’s disdain for those who like him (like Dwight.)

Now, we get to see Michael in a healthy relationship, and that’s leading to a different, yet equally satisfying kind of humor. For instance, when Michael asks Holly, “Are we having sex tonight?”, we’re primed to expect her to say, “Eww. Gross.” Instead, she says, “Absolutely.” And then, she can’t even wait that long! They start doing it in the office!

That’s funny because it’s surprising. After years of expecting Michael to endure cruelty, we’re bombarded with Holly’s enthusiasm for him. We laugh because the show thwarts our expectations. And that’s great, because we chuckle at the punch line we’re expecting, but we guffaw at the one we didn’t see coming.

However, the unexpected isn’t all that counts here. Crucially, the show positions Michael and Holly to be comic characters. They operate outside the realm of “normal behavior,” so we can laugh as they do things we wouldn’t do, either because we don’t want to do them or because we’re too socially conscious to follow those impulses.

Michael and Holly’s zany joy is also a clue to why Jim and Pam’s relationship isn’t that funny. 

As in… it wouldn’t be funny if Jim and Pam did the unexpected, because that would mean treating each other like crap.  It would suck to seem them change their behavior, because they’re generally so healthy and supportive.

And also?  Jim and Pam are our stand-ins on the show. We can live through them, relate to them, imagine that we are them. Almost all of their jokes are rooted in their commentary on how insane the people at Dunder-Mifflin are. If they started to get too crazy or cruel–if they did the unexpected–the show would lose its center.

Think about it: If Jim started loving staff meetings, or if Pam gave up art school and became a belligerent drunk, we’d lose our touchstones on the show. There would be no one on our side, grounding us in some kind of reality. The latter essentially happened with Ryan, who has transformed from an average guy into a drug-addled, power-hunger ego freak, but that’s cool because we still have Jim and Pam as buffers.

If we didn’t have those buffers, then The Office would be like Dirty Sexy Money. Because seriously… now that Nick has become a complete tool and is obviously manipulated by Tripp Darling’s every whim, there’s no one left on the series who is wrestling with the allure of wealth and power.

Well, there’s Lisa, Nick’s wife, but she’s a whiny brat. If she’s my only representative, then count me right out. Dirty Sexy Money needs a Jim or a Pam. Stat.

It could also use a Holly Flax: Someone who can give positive reinforcement to another character’s unusual behavior. Maybe that person will be Carmelita, who returned last week. If she and Patrick can develop a supportive, quirky relationship, maybe they can offset the rather heartless shenanigans that are clogging up the rest of the show. Maybe they can give us an unexpected relationship to follow.

Then maybe Nick can learn from their behavior, get his head out of his ass, and start resisting some of the insanity that’s swirling all around him.