Scott's Tots: The Best or Worst Episode of The Office

[Spoiler Alert! Small Spoilers For Season Six of The Office Ahead]

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Like there are comfort books and comfort food, there is also comfort television. For me, this cold, mean January, that means binge watching The Office. Nine seasons of a show that grants easy laughter, a show with a lot of comedy and a lot of heart. Having watched it in my younger years, and loving it, I now return to it often for some familiar laughter.

My ninth grade English teacher was adamant that “life is too short to read the same book twice,” and by default, too short to watch the same show twice. But I have always disagreed. Rereading and rewatching beloved media is a good way to check in with my fluid personality, my personal growth. No book is really the same twice, as no person is ever the same while experiencing it for a second, third, or fifth time.

For anyone familiar with the show, you are probably painfully aware of the episode entitled “Scott’s Tots,” the twelfth episode of the sixth season. While a highly rated episode, the secondhand embarrassment of this episode is usually too much to endure, and I typically skip over it. This time I did not.

The main plot point in this episode focuses on the the horrible realization that Michael Scott has broken a bevy of important promises. In this case, his promise to a group of underprivileged children that if they graduated from high school, he would provide the cost of their college tuition. He must reluctantly visit their school to break the bad news that he never became the man he expected to be, and is unable to pay for their college tuition. What ensues is the mortifying experience of the now grown children tearfully praising this man in dance and song before he can confront them with the truth.

As a sensitive person, I don't usually find this level of humiliation funny, and that is why I typically skip over this episode. Finding myself with a little thicker skin this time, I was able to watch it, and maybe it didn’t make me laugh as much as it made me cringe. But unlike other times, I was able to have a small amount of pity upon Michael Scott. His disastrous ends in this situation were only inspired by very good intentions. As more of my life unfolds, as I settle into adulthood, I too am familiar that life doesn’t always play out the way that we dreamed it would. Michael was genuinely entrenched in the belief that he would be a millionaire by the time he reached his thirties, and his idiotic deluision, while frustrating and embarrassing in the past, just rang as sad and pitiful this time around.

In a series that is so beloved by me and multitudes, it is this, my least favorite episode that always sticks with me. Some say that it is one of the best episodes of The Office, and even if I don’t like it, I’d have to agree. It’s the ones that stick with you that are the best.