Imagine you’re in highschool, it’s Friday night and everyone is putting “Who wants to hangout this weekend” or “HMU to make plans this weekend”. Multiple friends have contacted you, and really want to hang out with you. You tell them that you’re “Busy” and “Sorry”….Ok so now you’re on Netflix (or whatever you watch tv shows on) looking for something to watch. You see many options that are either very well known or just there to fill in spaces, we all see you Boss Baby. You are thinking you can watch The Office for the millionth time, which is probably going to happen. But then you see a show called Parks and Recreation under the “Because you watched The Office(U.S)” and you say “Why not”. Mistake number one. You say “Hey this isn’t too bad”. Mistake number two. Finally you binge watch the whole series over 4 days. Big fat mistake number three.

The real problem with this is because you have no friends(Me) so you constantly rewatch your favorite show, The Office, and now you have a show that almost matches up to The Office. So you ask your acquaintances(Not friends, please) and they start spewing out random comments like “Parks and Recreation is better”, and you’re thinking, no its not, stop trying to trigger me, it’s a good show but not Michael Scott and Dwight Schrute good.

Netflix and Chill from freestocks.org

The premise of my post is that The Office is superior to Parks and Recreation, due to its many situations that provide insight into various characters lives, abilities to provide unique content for 9 seasons packed with episodes, and the crazy scenarios that are just enough crazy and realistic unlike Parks and Recreation.

Their Spontaneous Lives!

In The Office we see a relatively large cast of characters, focussing on 4 or so main characters. While some may see it as a weakness it is a great advantage that The Office took advantage of. In season 2, episode 12 of The Office Michael scott calls the Office in Scranton, in a frenzy due to his unusual accident. In an article by Nicole Gallucci and published through Mashable, she explains the situation perfectly. Gallucci states, “Season 2, episode 12’s “The Injury” is one of the greatest The Office moments. Michael burns his foot by stepping on a George Foreman grill, which he places on his bedroom floor because he likes to wake up to the smell of bacon”. Although, it’s very silly making bacon to on the floor to wake up to after you have already woken up, it isn’t that crazy.

The silliness of Michael really is nothing when you look at his “Equivalent” Leslie Knope. Leslie Knope is a overly boring character that many people can connect with, there’s an entire post on Odyssey titled “15 Reasons To Embrace Leslie Knope’s Lifestyle In 2017”. This post by Sofia Panzica tells of 15 reasons why people should act like Leslie. This depicts 15 reason why Leslie was a relatable character, but in the sense of cinematic influence she doesn’t bring enough to the table for being the main protagonist. [perfectpullquote align=”left” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]Parks and Recreation had to implement a whole other character whose sole purpose was to have a funny life.[/perfectpullquote]

 That was until they got their footings as a show, then they started giving him a more profound personality.

This character is of course Tom Haverford. In Paste, an article by Stephanie sharp states 25 of Tom’s best quotes. One of the best ones in my opinion is “Whenever Leslie asks me for the Latin names of any of our plants, I just give her the names of rappers. Those are some Diddies. Those are some Bone Thugs-N-Harmoniums, right here. Those Ludacrises are coming in great”. Without Tom and Ron, Parks and Recreation would be very bland, although without their characters lives being so involved in all of the episodes it would have created a better variety of content that The Office provided.

Content Creators at a Godly Level!

The Office ran for many years and consisted of 201 episodes while Parks and Recreation Ran for a shorter time only producing 125 episodes. While it’s true both shows had some amazing episodes, some better than each other, The Office as a whole just provided more in the long run. Both shows have been criticized for their length. In an article by Brian Beltran it expresses this opinionated topic very well, “The Office is sometimes criticized for going on longer than it should have, but Parks and Recreation are not exempt from this same critique”. The Office had an amount of episodes that reflected its success the same goes for Parks and Recreation.

Picture from ANGERY Sonic

While The Office did go on for many years, its success went on even longer. Face it, weather or not you like The Office or not, you’ve seen the “NO” meme, or you have watched a clip on instagram from The Office. Quite honestly a big reason for its growing popularity is due to the fact that: “All nine seasons of The Office are streaming on Netflix, and the show constantly appears on the “Trending Now” tab (at least when this writer signs in to his account). Audiences keep coming back to it or discover the show for the first time”. I completely agree with Chris Harnick in his article. It’s how i’ve been able to watch The Office so many times without interruption. I had never even heard of Parks and Recreation until I watched it. On Netflix, if a show isn’t getting enough views it gets removed from Netflix. Mid-way through Parks and Recreation Netflix removed it, and brought it back later in the year. This just expresses the difference in popularity between the two shows, even after they had their finales.

There is however one place where Parks and Recreation out-did The Office, that being Rotten Tomatoes. Rotten Tomatoes is a highly respected cinema critic. They reviewed Parks and Recreation at an overall 91%, and The Office at a 88%. Some would see this as a huge win for Parks, which it is, Rotten tomatoes influences a lot of people’s opinions. But 3% isn’t that big of a gap, and it is a matter of opinion. It also is affected by the amount of seasons, causing the averages to be different.

Crazy Times!

To wrap up my reasoning behind why The Office is better than Parks and Recreation, The Office is out there, but not as much as Parks and Recreation. An article by Cullen Abelson elaborates on this topic in more detail, “The Office features generally realistic characters in silly situations, and Parks and Recreation features silly characters in silly situations”. If you have ever seen The Office AND Parks and Recreation you know this to be true. Even those of you youngsters who are “Ride or die” with Parks and Recreation know it.

There really is a connection between the overall silliness of the two, for instance The Office explains why there is a camera crew following them around. Parks and Recreation does no such thing, and it’s very irritating because the point of a mockumentary is to show why its occuring.

The Office has many heartwarming moments using this film crew idea. One that hits me hard every time I watch the show is the teapot note. To sum up what happens, Jim is in love with Pam but she’s engaged so he gets her name, for secret santa. He gets her a very personable gift including various things inside a teapot. Michel their boss decides to play a game of white elephant instead, due to him being mad about his gift he got. Jim goes through many fiascos to get it back, he gives it to Pam. Before he does, he takes the note out. Fast forward many years forward to when the two are married and are in a very rough patch. He presents the note : “(along with a DVD of highlights from their relationship) to save their marriage”. Gallucci doesn’t mention that this video is made using footage from the documentarists. This alone explains it for The Office, once again Parks and Recreation mentions NOTHING!

My cool down…

To summarize everything in the most simplistic way, The Office overall is better than Parks and Recreation, due to the many ways it is superior. So next time you’re on Netflix just do yourself a favor and watch The Office. But in the mean time listen to “Netflix Trip” by AJR.

Featured Image: Hollywood.com