I don’t want to sound spiteful, because they’ve tried hard. Real hard. The boring sets, dull costumes, and even sticking (pretty much) to the UK plots. But somehow, from the promo at least, they just don’t ‘get it’.
A big problem is the incredibly stupid music that’s overlaid on top. Again, it’s just a promo thing, so I’ll reserve judgement. But the whole thing doesn’t look like a cheap documentary, it looks like a sitcom. Their David Brent is just – well – he’s too happy. Brent was never really a happy person, just desperate to entertain others. He would speak slowly in the talking heads section, trying to be a great philosopher rather trying to crack a joke.
This is all very hard to put into words, and I invite you to watch it for yourself. It’s not bad, in fact it looks like a good show, but that’s it, you know it’s a show. The original worked because it was painful to watch, horribly embarrassing, with all the crudeness of real life. In fact, watching ‘The Office’ was probably the greatest incentive I ever had to do well at school and avoid becoming Tim in 15 years time.
(On a different track – I’ve just printed the first (and, I dread, not the last) draft of my Maths coursework. Statistics sucks. And that’s coming from someone who actually enjoyed the other Maths coursework!)
