10 Worst Episodes Of The Office, Ranked

There’s no debating that “The Office” should be remembered as one of the most influential TV comedies of all time. Just as its British predecessor had done for its local sitcoms, the US adaptation (which first premiered in 2006) defined what American network sitcoms would look, feel, and sound like for the next decade and change.

The influence of “The Office” can be felt on future hit shows like “Superstore,” “Parks and Recreation,” and even “Abbott Elementary,” while the cast and crew whose careers it kickstarted have since produced the likes of “The Mindy Project,” the “A Quiet Place” franchise, “Brooklyn Nine-Nine,” “The Good Place,” and more. Suffice it to say, entertainment at large would look a lot different if “The Office” had never come to the states — though that doesn’t mean the show lasted so long without considerable hiccups.

If you ask Pam Beesly herself, Jenna Fischer, fans are wrong about the supposed decline in quality in “The Office” episodes during its later seasons. Even if some of the series’ singular magic had left since the sudden departure of Michael Scott and Steve Carell, the series maintained something of a technical baseline. Indeed, as we set out in search of the worst episodes of “The Office,” not all of them came from the show’s divisive final season. In fact, more than a few came during the golden age of Michael Scott.

These are the worst episodes of “The Office.”

Unfortunately, episodes like “Roy’s Wedding” in season 9 make Jenna Fischer’s above argument a bit difficult to believe. Admittedly, the premise of “Roy’s Wedding” is fairly interesting and perfectly fitting for the final season of a long-running sitcom like “The Office.”

Pam and Jim (John Krasinski) are surprised to be invited to the wedding of Pam’s ex-fiancé Roy (David Denman). Roy tried to assault Jim at the office back in season 3 and was thus written out of Pam’s life and the show entirely. He was last seen at this point in the season 5 episode “Crime Aid,” in which Jim runs into him at a bar, and the two have a tense but neutral conversation about Jim’s engagement to Pam. Flash-forward several years to his wedding, and it’s revealed that Roy has not only started a highly profitable gravel company and found a beautiful person to share his life with, but he’s also matured dramatically as a human being. This causes Jim and Pam to question whether their relationship and their lives at Dunder Mifflin have kept them stagnant.

Even ignoring how this level of emotional conflict feels out of place and forced for “The Office,” the episode itself just comes across as dramatically shallow. It also relies on the dynamic of distrust between Jim and Pam, with Jim having secretly taken a risky job in Philadelphia to kickstart arguably the series’ worst overarching storyline overall. The B and C plots also fail miserably to make up for the wedding’s lack of comedy. Dwight’s petulant feud with Nellie Bertram’s (Catherine Tate) charitable endeavors is so ridiculous that it breaks the reality of the show (at a time when it’s asking you to be more emotionally invested than ever). Meanwhile, the show tries to inch forward Erin’s (Ellie Kemper) relationship with newcomer Pete (Jake Lacy) by… having him limply interfere with his friend Clark’s (Clark Duke) gross attempt to take advantage of her sexually? Yikes.

By the seventh season of “The Office,” both the show and the fans were getting ready to say goodbye to Michael. The season overall is at its best when it’s aware of this fact, giving the character and the audience opportunities to reflect on how much he’s grown and to prepare everyone for an inevitable but satisfying exit. When the season is at its worst, however, it’s because it sends Michael back square one to fuel whatever cheap jokes it can muster to fill an episode. 

Case in point: “Viewing Party.” The episode essentially revolves around a particularly childish point: Michael is jealous of Gabe (Zach Woods), a relatively new character with whom Michael has the weakest relationship on the show. Michael is threatened by Gabe’s nebulous status in the office hierarchy, and he doesn’t behave himself when invited to Gabe’s apartment for a “Glee” watchparty.

Episodes where Michael finds himself in similar personal-professional conflict with one-time co-manager Jim (“The Promotion”) or even Andy Buckley’s distant CFO David Wallace (“New Boss”) work because they’re rooted in series-long character dynamics and personal gripes that have evolved to a climactic point we get to see in the episode itself. In contrast to Jim and Wallace, Gabe is far less realized as an antagonist in Michael’s workplace. 

When Gabe is first introduced, he’s basically a younger version of Paul Lieberstein’s human resources rep Toby Flenderson. Even when Woods and the writers start to experiment with weirder aspects of Gabe’s character, this need for him to be a serious authority figure in Michael’s life keeps him off balance, attempting to walk the line between stick-in-the-mud straight-man and a zany member of the core ensemble. Gabe could have worked as the latter if the writers fully committed to the bit, and viewers can even see some proof of this in Woods’ incredible performance as the Gabe-ish tech middle manager Jared Dunn on HBO’s “Silicon Valley.”

With everything in the last section being said, when season 7 did try to wrap up some of Michael’s loose ends, it didn’t always work. This was especially true when “The Office” attempted to explore one of the more unfavorable attributes of the show from its earliest episodes: David Koechner’s Todd Packer. From the pilot episode, Packer is presented as the epitome of the toxic office culture Michael idolizes and thus subjects his employees to. He’s never an enjoyable character to watch, but he could work (in very small doses) in service of the old cringe-comedy tone the series used to strive for before it found its footing as a sunnier contemporary sitcom. (The season 2 episode “Sexual Harassment” likely wouldn’t have been written in the same way as part of the show’s seventh season, if it had been included at all.)

Because of this, there’s something appreciably meta about “The Office” bringing Todd back for a self-titled episode, in which his appalling behavior is all meant to bring about a moment where Michael finally sees how disgusting his friend is, prompting him to turn his back on him (and, symbolically, the person he was in season 2), It’s all in service of his commitment to the adult he’s become over the past few seasons (especially through his relationship with Amy Ryan’s Holly Flax, whom Todd insults to Michael’s face), but this doesn’t change how much of a chore it is to spend 20 minutes focused entirely on Todd, nor does it make his cascade of lazy jokes any funnier.

When “The Office” began trying to pivot the show’s focus toward Ed Helms’ Andy Bernard, it was a deceptively unsafe choice. On the surface, Helms is a charismatic comedic actor who has led feature films, and Andy had been largely rehabilitated since his debut in season 3 to become one of the show’s most redeemable characters. He was someone audiences could root for, and indeed they did when he tried to win the affection of receptionist Erin after his toxic engagement to Angela (Angela Kinsey) seasons earlier.

The problem is, all of these character beats came about while Andy was a definitive supporting player, with the most important storylines of the season were spread between Michael, Pam and Jim, and Dwight, leaving Andy to be used only as much as necessary. In those small doses, it was easy to forget how awful Andy is as a human being.

By the time “Get the Girl” puts the full weight of the season’s emotional climax on Andy’s shoulders, audiences see too late why he was probably the worst choice to lead the show. Andy is entitled, immature, and inconsiderate, and though he shares these traits with Michael, both Andy and “The Office” itself seem to think they should be more forgivable or adorkable when embodied by a charismatic vessel. But as the show tries to get you to rally behind his mission to win Erin back and break up with his current girlfriend in a single road trip, viewers can’t help but yearn to be released from the ride.

One thing we will say in favor of Jenna Fischer’s argument that “The Office” maintained its quality throughout all nine seasons is that early episodes absolutely have the potential to be just as difficult to watch as those in the final season. It’s because of this fact that /Film readers may be surprised to see which season we ranked at the bottom of our official “The Office” season rankings — hint: it’s not season 9.

While the 1st season of “The Office” does have the charm of being shot in a real office — as well as a riskier tone that, even when it fails horribly, is hard not to admire for its audacity alone — there’s no denying that some of the episodes are simply unwatchable now. “Hot Girl” is by far the worst, as it subjects every woman on screen and in the audience to some of the laziest, “ironically sexist” humor that the show has to offer.

Amy Adams guest stars as Katy Moore (though she almost didn’t get the part), the titular “Hot Girl” who invades the office to sell purses to the staff. Michael and Dwight take turns harassing her, before Jim eventually decides to ask her out. “Hot Girl” isn’t even good as an example of cringe or black comedy, and it can easily be skipped by anyone watching the show for the first time.

Speaking of skippable episodes: “The Banker” has entered the chat. Surely readers remember this classic episode of “The Office” — just kidding, because it’s not even really an episode to begin with.

“The Banker” is what is known as a “clip show,” a lazy TV trope (especially in the age of streaming) where an episode of a series uses extensive flashbacks to previous episodes in order to fill the audience in on the plot and/or fill a slot in their season when they’ve run out of ideas for other episodes. Here, the clip show format was seemingly chosen to help transition viewers to the newest era of the show. In the previous episode, “Secret Santa,” David Wallace had revealed to the employees that Dunder Mifflin had been sold to another company. The episode after “The Banker” would then introduce the workers to their new employers at Sabre International.

The set-up of “The Banker” is that the titular character (played by a wasted David Costabile, of “Breaking Bad,” “Billions,” and “Suits” fame) needs to interview Toby to find out how much Dunder Mifflin is worth. As he speaks with Toby and an intrusive Michael, the series replays some of the series’ most memorable moments. In other words, it’s the only episode as boring as Toby himself.

In the early season of “The Office,” creator Greg Daniels established a rule that essentially promised one thing: The series would not spend every episode hyper-focused on the drama of Jim and Pam’s relationship. This was a sound and unfortunately prescient guide rail for these series, as failing to adhere to it would not only take focus away from the series’ main character Michael but change it from a unique and comedic exploration of a toxic work environment into a romantic comedy about two young people falling in love at an office. Whatever the internal purposes of this rule were, they were seemingly all but forgotten by season 9.

When “Roy’s Wedding” aired, the show had all but turned Jim and Pam’s relationship into the main storyline, with each episode’s increasingly dramatic A-plot revolving around their depressingly declining love for one another. In “Vandalism,” while Jim is off in Philadelphia living his dream and being a sloppy roommate with Daryl (Craig Robinson), Pam’s warehouse mural at Dunder Mifflin is vandalized by one of the new workers. Pam solves problems in true Jim fashion by pranking the offender — only for him to physically attack her in retaliation. She is then infamously saved by Brian the sound guy (Chris Diamantopoulos), who then immediately tries to position himself as an awkward point in a bizarre love triangle between him, Jim, and Pam. 

The parallel plot of Angela and Oscar (Oscar Nunez) learning that they are both being manipulated by the Senator (Jack Coleman) is equally depressing, leaving a void of comedy that really challenges you not to abandon the series entirely.

If “Vandalism” weren’t bad enough, things only got worse the following week with “Couple’s Discount,” a Valentine’s Day episode that sadly reveals how little there is to love about “The Office” at this point. It is seriously impressive how each of the episode’s intertwining serve to further assassinate the show’s most important characters, particularly Andy.

Having abandoned “The Office” (both the place and the show) to sail around the world with his brother (read: so that Ed Helms could film “The Hangover: Part III”), Andy returns to dutifully begin his manufactured descent into total madness, so that he can both chase that Michael Scott magic one last time and be so unlikeable as a character that audiences won’t revolt when he loses both his job and his girlfriend. Thus, Andy spends the runtime being uncharacteristically cruel and arrogant, while Erin tries to work up the courage to tell him she’s been cheating on him with Pete. Dwight, meanwhile, is suddenly positioned as the logical choice to be his successor, despite the fact that he nearly shot Andy when his gun went off in the office a season earlier.

Oh, and don’t think the show forgot about Pam, Jim, and Brian the sound guy, because hile all this is happening at the office, the three of them have the most uncomfortable lunch ever filmed for television. (Similarly to Zach Woods, the wasting of Chris Diamantopoulos as a dramatic antagonist here is even more offensive in hindsight given how incredibly he’s been showcased as a comedic actor in “Silicon Valley.”)

As easy as it would be to fill the bottom half of this list with episodes from the 9th season, there is one earlier episode so unbearable that it nearly netted itself the dishonor of being our #1 pick — and it’s from the Michael Scott era of the series. After being bought by Sabre halfway throughout season 6, a new dynamic is introduced to “The Office.” With David Wallace and Charles Miner (Idris Elba) both getting the boot, Michael’s new direct superior is Jo Bennett, the company’s founder and CEO. Initially, she seems better than her predecessors at understanding Michael’s unique management style and dealing with his immature behavior — at least, until it starts to affect her directly in the episode “St. Patrick’s Day.”

The entire premise of the episode is that, during her last day in Scranton (preparing to return to her home in Tallahassee, Florida), everyone in the office wants to impress Jo, especially Michael. When Jo makes a polite, off-hand, non-committal offer for Michael to stay with her if he ever happens to be in Florida, Michael embarrasses himself by getting too excited and actually making plans to visit her. It’s a brutal 20 minutes that leads to one of the most unfunny, cringey climaxes in the show’s history.

While Michael regularly gets into trouble because of his poor social skills, there’s something so sad and human about him genuinely misreading a sign of friendship from someone he looks up to. So much so that there’s nothing funny or satisfying about watching him be humiliated just because he missed a social queue. Given that the episode treats this as if it’s Michael’s failure to stand up for himself, this strange and subtle level of tragedy doesn’t feel intentional, just deeply awkward.

Finally, our pick for the worst episode of “The Office” ever released comes in season 9, with “The Farm.” After Michael was written off the show, there was some surprise among the writers that Dwight didn’t immediately replace him as regional manager of Dunder Mifflin Scranton. Some felt the network was more interested in Ed Helms, at the time a recently-minted movie star ironically thanks to “The Hangover,” the very film series that would ultimately pull him away from “The Office” for Dwight to take the top job in the final episodes of season 9. Other writers, however, justly wondered how successful “The Office” would be as a comedy with a character as strange and unlikable as Dwight taking center stage.

Unfortunately, we have to wonder no longer thanks to “The Farm,” an obvious backdoor pilot for a spin-off series that would focus on the day-to-day operations of Schrute Farms. In the episode, Dwight returns to his home with Oscar for his Aunt Shirley’s funeral, where we reconnect with old Schrute characters Mose and Ziek (writer-producer and future “The Good Place” creator Michael Schur and “Breaking Bad” co-star Matt Jones, respectively). On the farm, we are also introduced to newcomers Jeb (Thomas Middleditch, another wasted comedic talent who would be redeemed by “Silicon Valley”) and Fannie (Majandra Delfino).

“The Farm” sets Dwight up to lead the series with the latter two characters, none of whom have any chemistry with one another, nor enough substance for audiences to be interested in them individually. It’s a slog of an episode that goes nowhere, and it’s perhaps the only thing that could have one wishing “The Office” would return to the Jim and Pam soap opera unfolding at the same time back in Scranton — except, during this episode, the Scranton story centers on none other than Todd freaking Packer.