Calling all Office fans! The Office is, in my opinion, the best show ever, and I know many people agree with me. One of the things that made The Office the best show is, simply put, Michael Scott, and more specifically, the crazy antics Michael pulls. Michael, despite what he’ll tell you, needs to feel appreciated, funny, and always be the center of attention. Sometimes this is done is a horrific manner that is legitimately hard to watch. With that, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, Office fans from all over, I present to you, the most cringeworthy Michael Scott moments.
- Diversity Day
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The company has a representative come to the Scranton branch to take a course in diversity due to some “recent incidents.” Michael keeps trying to run the meeting and says some very offensive things, and after the representative leaves, Michael decides to hold his own diversity day where he only makes things more offensive…including getting in Kelly Kapor’s face (an Indian woman) and imitating an Indian convenience store owner with the thick accent. Michael got a slap to the face. Also, “the incident” was Michael impersonating a Chris Rock routine complete with stereotypes, accents, and multiple uses of the “n” word.
- Comparing his foot injury to being crippled
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Honestly one of the funniest episodes to me was when Michael burned his foot on a George Foreman grill early in the morning (because who doesn’t want to wake up to the “smell of crackling bacon”), and then frantically called work saying he needed someone to come get him and take him to work. The rest of the day Michael says he is crippled and tries to get people to do everything for him, very upset when they don’t seem to take to it. To inspire them, he invites their landlord in who is wheelchair bound to talk about life as a person with disabilities, of course Michael saying to all the employees they have no idea what it’s like to be crippled. A cringeworthy yet hysterical moment.
- Michael’s birthday
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As I mentioned before, Michael loves to be the center of attention, therefore his birthday is a very special occasion. Unfortunately, Kevin isn’t having as great of a day as he is waiting to hear from his doctor if he has skin cancer. Michael can’t seem to understand why everyone (except Dwight of course) is so glum and so not focused on him. When he finds out Kevin is waiting on test results, his response was “….that sucks, great, that’s…wow, that’s good timing, that’s, sorry, that’s terrible, terrible, terrible news that’s terrible news…terrible news for both of us,” walking away from Kevin with his cake and closes his office door.
- The Kiss
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Michael finds out that Oscar is gay. A fun piece of Office trivia, this wasn’t an original idea of the show, mid production the producers ask Oscar Nunez if he was okay with his character being gay. Once the switch was made, the producers had a field day with it. Michael seems to be a little confused about gayness, so he tends to send some mixed messages to his employees. To prove he’s okay with Oscar’s gayness, he outs him and then makes him kiss him in front of the entire office. After that we see the same diversity day representative once again having to give a presentation in the various branches.
- Proposing to his girlfriend Carol on their 9th date
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Who remembers Carol? Michael’s realtor who he has a short fling with. Another fun fact of Office trivia for you, Carol is played by Steve Carrell’s real life wife, Nancy Carrell. After going on a few dates, Michael and Carol attend Kelly’s Diwali celebration. After talking to Mr. & Mrs. Kapor about their life and romance, Michael decides he wants to spend the rest of his life with Carol, and he doesn’t want to waste any time. Michael grabs a microphone and takes the stage and proposes to Carol in front of everyone. She said no but they kept dating. Nevertheless, it was pretty hard to watch.
- Cropping himself into his new girlfriend’s family photo.
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Shortly after the proposal conundrum, Michael takes the liberty to take one of Carol’s family vacation photos with her ex-husband and crop his face onto the face of her ex-husband…ouch. Carol then decided to break up with him…luckily the real Nancy and Steve Carrell are having more luck than their characters did.
- Trying to steal the spotlight at Phyllis’ wedding
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Phyllis decides to ask Michael to push her father who is wheelchair bound down the aisle with her at her wedding (Phyllis said it was the only way she could think of to get 6 weeks off for her honeymoon, no one else has gotten 6 weeks before). Michael is pretty excited, but when Phyllis’ father miraculously gets up and is able to walk Phyllis down the aisle, Michael is very upset and continues to noisily push the wheelchair down the aisle…not to mention announcing their marriage mid vows, and trying to steal the speech.
- When Michael holds the pizza delivery boy hostage
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When his coupon isn’t validated the way he hopes and Michael is already in a bad mood, he decides the best course of action is to kidnap the pizza delivery boy until he gets his discount, and it’s probably a few hours until he is finally released.
- Dinner Party
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Michael and Jan finally have Jim & Pam, Andy & Angela, and eventually Dwight and his date/former babysitter for dinner. Michael and Jan spend the entire night fighting and eventually the cops are called for a noise complaint.
- Sleeping with Pam’s mom
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After a fling at the Beesly-Halpert wedding, Michael starts seeing Pam’s mom Helene. He and Pam had a large squabble, and at Helene’s birthday lunch, right as Pam starts to be open to the idea, Michael breaks up with Helene on her birthday.
- Scott’s Tots….
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Honestly do I need to say more? Because I can’t.
- “A woman as Santa???”
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Michael is upset when Jim lets Phyllis play Santa at the Christmas party. He decides to put his hat in the punch bowl, turn his outfit inside out and play Jesus Christ, and say inappropriate things about everyone’s gift during secret Santa. A Christmas to remember, no doubt.
- Andy’s Play
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Honestly, I feel like this episode is so underrated. It’s hysterical in a very cringeworthy way. Honestly most of it comes from Andy, but Michael has his share of cringe. He auditioned for the play and didn’t get a part so he was very callous about the whole thing, including stealing a bottle of alcohol to drink during the play which he dropped and loudly rolled the entire way to the stage, having the balloons he brought pop in the middle of the scene, and boo-ing the main character.
Despite all the moments that are hard to watch, The Office is such a quality show with unmatched comedy. Now if you need me, I’ll be binging my favorite show for the 10th time around. Happy watching!
HCXO,
Lyss
*All photos courtesy of giphy.com