MarKeting McKenna

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“Sometimes I’ll start a sentence, and I don’t even know where it’s going. I just hope I find it along the way.” Greatly said by Michael Scott. The television show “The Office” shaped comedy in so many different ways, in my opinion. This show is literal comedy gold and is one of the most rewatched shows. The creativity, camera angles, humor, and storytelling make this show genius.

One way the Office has shaped comedy is how it made making awkward silences, zoom-ins, and “talking head” interviews part of mainstream humor, popular for comedy. There are moments in this show that makes you absolutely cringe, but you cannot look away because it is so funny. Now you see comedy just like this in different shows and through any media. It also has also shaped it in the way toward discomfort and relatability rather than just simply telling jokes. It proves that jokes don’t always need punchlines to be funny. Sometimes it is the awkward situations that we have experienced in our lives. What is more relatable than a random nine-to-five job with regular people? Although it is a television show, and that means it isn’t all true, and we can’t take it literally. But I will admit there are characters on that show that are so relatable.

Another way the Office has shaped comedy is how it influenced other popular television shows such as Parks and Recreation and Modern Family. Which are also such great shows, but The Office walked so these television shows could run. With that being said, the show did redefine sitcom pacing. You notice that they don’t need to be relying on laugh tracks but rather more on subtle reactions and timing. You can see this switch from before the Office, when most comedy shows did have laugh tracks, such as Friends and Boy Meets World. But you can see that the television shows above don’t have laugh tracks and are edited in a way that keeps your attention and keeps you laughing without needing the background noise of a laugh track. It allows you to feel the humor more and the awkwardness. Silence speaks louder than words.

It is obvious that the Office did shape comedy. Are you a fan of the office, and do you believe it shaped comedy? Why or why not? Leave me a comment.

Date Written: February 12, 2026