Spoilers for “Beach Games” below.

Things that happened

It’s another out-of-office episode, as Michael takes the entire Office gang (minus a tragic and unloved Toby, who Michael feels would ruin all the fun) to the beach. And, sure, the premises behind these are often strained and hard-to-believe, but, man, seeing everybody lounging around on a beach equals comedic (and, later, dramatic) gold.

Before Michael and the troops head out, he gets word from the CFO of Dunder-Mifflin that he’s been selected to interview for a new corporate job. As part of the interview, he also needs to name his successor at Scranton branch. Michael, of course, decides that the best way to do determine the worthiness of his potential replacement is through Survivor-style challenges at the beach.

After a little bit of (awesome) bus-ride singalong, and the promise of a Pam bikini that unfortunately never materializes (was she just messing with Toby? That’s kind of mean.), we arrive at Scranton Lake. Which is, according to Michael, “the eighth biggest American indigenous lake.”

Before we get a chance to really think about what that means, Michael’s divided his employees into four teams, captained by people he thinks could be regional manager after his departure. The teams are:

Team Griffyndor — Captained by Dwight, whose first pick is Ryan (after Michael rules himself out) and whose second pick I can’t quick remember. He pushes a little too hard in the blindfold egg-on-a-spoon challenge but excels at the sumo suit showdown, trouncing his Team USA opponent twice. He does, however, only do moderately well on the hot dog eating. Also, he plots with Angela (of Team USA) to sabotage everyone else’s chances. Because he is a little bit sinister.

Team Voldemort — Captained by Jim, with Karen and Kevin, named because Dwight takes that whole “He Who Must Not Be Named” thing quite literally and gets worked up over Jim’s liberal use of it. Jim pretty much does not care, and gets himself disqualified from the blindfold egg-on-a-spoon challenge because he thinks it’s fun to torment Karen. Then he gets his ass kicked at sumo suit showdown. Then I don’t think he even eats a single hot dog.

The Blue Team — Captained by Stanley, named because Stanley is apathetic, but hates Michael’s suggestion of “The Red Team.” Stanley doesn’t care at all until Michael spills the beans on the fact that the winner of these competitions will be his pick for Regional Manager. Stanley then ramps it up big time, and nearly kills Jim in the sumo suit showdown in a scene that features amazing facial expression. He also eats a lot of hot dogs, but not as many as the captain of…

Team USA — Captained by Andy Bernard, named because Andy is Andy, and because Michael likes the patriotism element. Andy spends most of the episode trying to resist being hyper-competitive, only letting his anger out when it comes to nearby ducks (“Mallards!”). He does, however, win the hot dog eating contest, beating out Dwight for the crown. But then he gets utterly decimated in the sumo suit showdown, and, worse, ends up beaten down AGAIN in an after-match spat with Dwight. And then he falls into the lake in his sumo suit and floats away. Angela could have saved him, but seems strangely okay with the concept of murder, as long as it leads to Dwight being made manager. Told you they were sinister.

By the end of the games, Michael still isn’t feeling like anyone is manager material. Really, the only thing all these competitions accomplished is that they got rid of Andy (presumably not for good — I am reasonably sure they will not leave him to die in Lake Scranton wearing a giant sumo suit). So he sets everyone up for a hot coals challenge, which involves… walking on hot coals. Because all managers can walk on hot coals. Michael even did, once, except that it wasn’t coals so much as it was a grill with bacon on it.

Nobody is really up for walking on the coals, mainly because even Michael himself is reluctant to do it. After a lot of stalling, Dwight finally ends up trying it out, going so far as to say that he will “stand on the coals until Michael gives him the job.” Michael refuses to give him the job, and Dwight kind of falls over and screams in pain for several agonizing seconds. (Erin screamed a lot during this scene.)

Michael is frustrated, having come to see no connection between hot coals and management ability. He decides to have one last challenge, which is initially known as the “Bob Hope” challenge but then gets changed to the “Hope/Bynes” challenge because Amanda Bynes was hilarious in What a Girl Wants. All the team captains who aren’t floating on the lake in sumo suits have to give a brief but entertaining speech.

None of them do, save for Dwight, who performs the cleanest version of “The Aristocrats!” ever. Stanley opts out completely, deciding to go sit on the bus until it is time to go home. And Jim decides to take the opportunity to announce that he can’t be in this competition, because he’s going to be interviewing at corporate for exactly the same position as Michael next week. (Karen is interviewing for the position too, but Michael never learns this.) Michael thinks this is mean and deducts points.

Meanwhile, however, there is Pam. Glorious, put-upon, angry Pam. She’s spent all day forced to take notes for Michael — so that he can review them and determine the best leader — and hasn’t been allowed to participate in anything. As the Hope/Bynes challenge is going on, she works up her courage and dances across the hot coals all by herself.

This imbues our dear girl with all sorts of confidence, so she prances across the beach and delivers a stirring speech that just might make up for the huge lack of Pam/Jim moments in recent weeks. She accuses all of the office workers of being jerks for skipping her art show and generally ignoring her. Then she turns her sight on Jim directly, telling him how she cancelled her wedding for him and now they’re not even friends. It’s not overtly romantic, but it doesn’t need to be — she just tells him that she wishes she could have her best friend back.

And, on that down note, we leave the beach, with everything upturned and Pam, in the lake, cooling off.

Things that were good

• The little things. God, the little things. This was a great episode for small moments, from Angela lip-syncing to Kevin singing Kenny Rogers to Michael wearing a “Sandals” hat to countless other moments, this is one of those episodes I need to watch again, just to catch all the references and call-backs.
• I loved the singalong on the bus, both times. There’s just something so appealing about this cast of characters together. It’s weird, but I think a lot of it is that, despite their differences, there’s a real sense that these people genuinely like each other.
• It’s been a while since we had a stand-out Stanley scene, and this episode gave us a whole bunch of them. The team captain concept in general was a great way to re-establish these characters.
• Andy floating away in a sumo suit was borderline too-wacky, but I think overall it worked for me. If only because Ed Helms did an amazing job with his slow slide into the water. Some great physical comedic acting in that scene.
• Similarly, the Creed thing was probably too wacky for me, but, man, did I laugh when he darted his hand into the water and pulled out that fish.
• Lastly, the Pam speech. I loved the writing here. It was so… un-TV, if that makes any sense. From the previews, it looked like it was going to be some great big tearful expression of her love, but instead it was just a jumbled mess of rage. It also served to remind us how deep the whole Jim and Pam thing is, because, really, the reality of the situation is that he loves her while she just loves having him as a friend. It’s complicated, like life is.
• They’ve given us a great set up for the season finale, with three major characters going for this new corporate job. There’s a lot of cues they could take from the British series from this scenario — and I bet they’ll be a lot of internet speculation about where they’re going to go with it — but I’m pretty convinced that, like last year, they’re going to surprise us.

Things that were not so good

• I felt so bad for Toby. And I swear, Pam, if you were messing with him over that whole bikini crack than I am going to be pretty mad. I know you’re fictional, but still. I’ll be pissed.
• What was up with Oscar’s comment about maybe trying women? That was just kind of weird and awkward.

Worth watching if…

You love to laugh. And you enjoy saying “That was a good episode!” Because you WILL laugh, and you will make a remark quite similar to that. This was quality TV that was satisfying both as a stand-alone episode and as a set up for something potentially even greater to come next week. AND it was part of an absolutely stellar night of NBC’s Comedy Night Done Right, with all three shows (even Scrubs!) turning in great efforts.

In Five Words

Yabba Dabba Gay Old Time