The Best Show on TV?
I’m going to go on the record: The Office is the best show on television (right now, that is; ask me this again when Lost and Battlestar Galactica are on in a few months). I was worried that once Pam and Jim got together, the show would just flounder about without purpose or direction. I’m happy I was wrong. Season 5, of which we are currently 4 episodes into, has been nonstop hilarity. Even the characters that were struggling to find their purpose on the show, such as Andy Bernard (who does not lose contests…he wins them or he quits them, because they are unfair), have developed into fully-blown freaks worthy of their positions in the Dunder Mifflin empire. The addition of Amy Ryan to the cast has been a great boon; she’s the perfect complement to Michael’s self-centered obliviousness (the one exception is Ryan Howard; that character has no place on the show; I has happy when he left, and sad when he returned).
More Than Just Paper
The Office is a perfect example of a show that is not only bringing it’s content online, but using the web to further engage audiences. The show has an extensive website. Over the summer, NBC produced a series of webisodes starring some of the minor characters (Malone’s Cones), and has launched several websites that are related to happenings on the show, such as Angela and Andy’s Wedding Page. Many of the actors blog regularly, some in character, and some as themselves. All these efforts, especially those that continue in the off-season, help audiences connect with and stay attached to their favorite show.
Performance Evaluation
We’ve been busy in the NoMoreTV labs, working on a set of evaluation criteria for online television shows. The Office is probably one of the best shows out there, not only in terms of the quality of the show, but in the show’s availability online. Let’s take a look at how The Office performs against the NoMoreTV standards:
| Criteria | Grade | Notes |
| Previews (Online) | A | |
| Clips (Online) | A- | Clips on NBC aren’t customizable; Hulu clips have customizable beginning/end points. |
| Extras (Online) | B | Deleted and behind the scenes; some extras aren’t interesting though (i.e. Angela’s trailer). |
| Full Episodes (Online) | A | |
| HD Full Episodes (Online) | B | via Hulu 480p |
| Time till Online | B+ | usually within 12 hours |
| RSS Feed (w/ enclosures) | B- | via Hulu |
| Shareable/Embeddable | B | |
| Advertising | C | Pre-roll ads on clips |
| Show Website/Social Media | A+ | Actor/Character blogs, off-season webisodes, alternate reality game. |
| Full Episodes (Download) | A | $1.99 |
| Full Episodes (HD) | A | NBC Direct, iTunes |
| Ubiquity | A | iTunes, Netflix, Amazon VOD, Zune |
After accounting for weighting (a secret NoMoreTV formula), the overall grade for the office: B+
(We have to leave some room for improvement. ;))
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Eric 10.20.08 at 8:35 am
I concur. While I still watch The Office on my Tivo, I like having the clips online to share with friends. As for ads, I like the Hulu tells you how long the ad will be, but unlike Tivo, I can’t ffwd around it. I prefer more of the brand-awareness typoe stuff where logo’s appear on the bottom the screen throughout the program or a 5 sec “Sponsored by” type ad.