It's the big wedding episode, and it's huge in every way. Everyone, but everyone, is coming up to Niagara Falls for the weekend, and rule number one is to not say anything about Pam's pregnancy, since her uptight grandma still doesn't know. Of course you know it's going to come out, but the surprise is that it's Jim who spills the beans. And that's just the first of many disasters. Andy suffers a horrific dancing injury and has to have Pam take him and his torn scrotum to the hospital; Dwight loves and leaves Pam's best friend; Pam's dad shows up with a blonde young thing, embittering her mom; Jim's brothers are themselves; Kevin makes the scene with a new toupee and Kleenex boxes on his feet; Angela is herself; and Pam tears her veil, the one thing she was counting on to be perfect. It all culminates when the bridal party and the Dunder Mifflin staff decide it'll be hilarious to turn the ceremony into that YouTube video with the dancing up the aisles. But Pam and Jim are even fine with that, because they already got married, secretly, alone, on a boat at the falls. They had their perfect wedding moment, despite everything, despite everybody. Let's hear it for Plan C.
Of course, when Pam finds out that Michael had sex with her mom, she is going to shit.
Jim and Pam make a request of the bullpen in general -- with her pregnancy, could everyone please stop being so stinky in their various ways? Although they're just slightly more polite than that. In a talking-head shot, Dwight's actually kind of impressed: "A three-ounce fetus is calling the shots! That's so bad-ass." Except that back in the bullpen, he's refusing to stop peeling his boiled eggs at his desk, and Meredith won't give up her afternoon cigar, either. "I guess it's just the end of courtesy in the workplace," Pam THs, saying it just dorkily enough to not come off completely obnoxious. Later, Dwight eats his egg at Pam, and she retaliates by throwing up in her wastebasket right in front of him. This triggers a chain reaction of vomiting that spreads through the whole office -- except Creed, who continues eating his noodles, and Dwight, who looks around almost abashed. Pam just looks at him and wipes her mouth. Now that's bad-ass. Don't fuck with the Beesly, y'all.
Michael proudly shows off his car to Pam and Jim, which he has decorated with cans and a back windshield reading "GOING TO A WEDDING." "It's just a really important day for me," he says modestly. Jim congratulates him on the occasion.
Everyone in the office is in casual dress as Erin records an outgoing voice mail greeting saying the branch is closed for a "company wedding." Then Jim and Pam are running a meeting of Do's and Don'ts, for the wedding. In addition to the flip chart that shows the don't column includes firecrackers and talking to their families, the most important thing is to not mention Pam's pregnancy, particularly to her "old-fashioned" grandma. Why not just say "Angela-like"? Pam and Jim take off, and Michael tells everyone else not to embarrass him up there. That starts a whole riff between Andy and Dwight about how "What happens in Niagara stays in Niagara," which Michael harshly shuts down, saying this is exactly what he's talking about. "So I will see you there in Viagra Falls."
Michael and Dwight are looking forward to the wedding being a big hook-up destination, and Dwight goes over a creepy little dossier he's compiled on Pam's cousin. Fortunately all he has is that she sold a mountain bike online a couple of years ago. Michael stops being creepy with Dwight and says, "Okay, you're an idiot." He's right, just a little slow.
Michael's Sebring pulls out of the parking lot, with Dwight in the shotgun seat. The cans tied to his bumper pop open and spew foam everywhere, because nobody told Michael you're supposed to use empty cans. In the parking lot, Kevin THs that he's going to be debuting a new image for himself: namely, a toupee. Angela honks at him to get out o t the way. And then honks at him again as she drives by just to emphasize the point that she sucks, I guess.
The two Kellys ride in the back of Andy's car, sharing an iPod and both refusing to come up front with him. Later, when the girls are asleep, Andy whispers to us, "Not only is Erin sweet and cute, she smells like my mom."
Jim and Pam drive along, joking about her aunt's suggestion to take mental pictures of the high points of the weekend, so they can remember them. Jim mimes snapping a photo, then gives her a hard time for blinking right when he took it. I'm sure Pam's aunt will be touched when she sees this.
Michael wakes up from behind the wheel (yes, you read that right), and Dwight puts in a mix CD for when Michael gets a woman to his hotel room. Except it's not music, but Dwight talking up Michael Scott's lovemaking. "That's not how it works," Michael says angrily. But you know what? We never see him give the CD back to Dwight.
.Jim and Pam get to Niagara Falls, and are checking into the hotel. They've got separate rooms for tonight, but will have the Honeymoon Suite tomorrow. Pam asks to see the suite now, but it turns out Andy already checked in for the night. "I'll break in the bed!" he smarms. Jim and Pam are less excited by his offer than you might think.
Michael and Dwight show up at the front desk, but Michael didn't make a reservation: he's just expecting to get one of the block of rooms, but those are all full up. Dwight does have a reservation, having specified a room with two safes (?). Michael asks to crash with Dwight, saying he'd do the same for him. But when Dwight looks at the reservation and says it's got Michael Scott's name on it, Michael shuts Dwight out, in case he gets to come back to the room with a woman. "It's going to turn her off if she looks in the bathroom and sees you brushing your teeth with butter and clay." But Dwight was just testing Michael, and Michael failed. And he's not staying in Dwight's room, either.
Stanley shows up with Cynthia (the nurse he was having an affair with, you'll recall), and when Michael tries to glom into their room, Stanley shoots him down. So do Erin and Kelly, even more rudely than Stanley. But when Toby offers to put Michael up, he's told. "You are going to be sleeping alone for the rest of your life so you might as well get used to it."
Jim and Pam point out her "Meemaw" to Jim's dad. "She's the only 80-year-old with no smile wrinkles." They remind him not to say anything about Pam's pregnancy, and Michael insinuates himself into the conversation, trying to lock up the third slot on the toast order. Jim shuts that down, not that they haven't already discussed this. "That is going to seriously impede my ability to hook up with our female relatives," Michael stage whispers. He figures if his lips didn't move, nobody heard him say it.
There's a sign for the "Beesly-Halpret" rehearsal dinner outside the hotel ballroom. Inside, Meemaw tells Pam that she and Jim are perfect. Pam thanks her, but says nobody's perfect. "I wouldn't care to live if I thought that," Meemaw grumps. Prove it.
Pam's dad introduces a young, hot blonde to Jim as his girlfriend, Christy. Pam's mom glares from across the room, and I can only presume she's wearing some kind of contact lenses that must be the only thing preventing Christy from literally bursting into flame. Dwight talks shop at the kids' table, referring to Jim as "The Bad Man."
Pam introduces Oscar and Kevin to her even hotter sister, who is surprised that it's Kevin and not Gil. "She thought I was your boyfriend," Kevin sniggers to Oscar. "You thought I was dating this?" Oscar asks. "What the hell is wrong with you?" He's really offended, to the point where he demands an apology. Kevin wants to know if Pam's sister is seeing anyone. She is. That little grouping breaks up pretty quickly. Maybe Kevin should be wearing his toupee already.
Ryan's talking himself up to another woman, which is tricky with Meredith there salting his game. Kevin and Andy wonder why Meredith is at that table, and Kevin thinks she switched cards with someone, "Like I did with Erin." Realizing Erin should have been to him instead of Kevin, Andy struggles to choke back his rage.
During the wedding party speeches, Michael is bitter about not being at the head table, even when Dwight busts out his dossier on the bridesmaid who's speaking. He overhears Jim's douchebag brothers planning their douchebag speech, and is even more bitter about that. When they start, they do indeed offend everyone in the room, and Michael whispers. "That's not appropriate." Fortunately, he know just what to do: he stands up, calling for attention and saying he's just going to do some comedy, and people can toast if they want. Way too long into a lame routine about the Smart Car (which only Dwight laughs at), Jim stands up, and his brother coughs. "Douche." Thanks Pete, that was really nice. He starts a speech of his own, saying that years ago, he had a crush, and all he could do was wait, and flirt. "I had little moments with a girl who saw me as a friend. And a lot of people told me I was crazy to wait this long for a date with a girl I worked with. But I think even then, I knew that I was waiting for my wife." "Aww"s all around. He tells everyone to raise their glasses. "Not Pam, for obvious reasons, but..." Whoops. Meemaw asks why it's obvious, and Jim tries to play it off. But for once, his legendary cool has abandoned him; he's so flustered at his own faux pas that he ends up stammering and joking Michael-like about Pam being an alcoholic. Finally he comes clean. "The real reason is that, um... Pam's pregnant." As waves of horror crash around the room -- okay, around Meemaw -- It's Michael to the rescue again" "The had an accident, and you know what? These two people, they're living together, they were having lots of consensual sex..." All of which is also news to Meemaw. "You can't expect them to be careful every time, because, frankly, it's just a different sensation." Jim tries to shit this down, but Michael keeps talking, until Pam snaps at him. Finally he stops talking, and Jim finishes his toast: "To waiting." That was probably a better toast before.
Later, Pam sits with Meemaw, who talks about being subjected to the move Bruno on the TV in her hotel room unable to turn it off, wondering how they could pick such a hotel. "Now I know," she says, getting up and leaving. Yeah, she should totally hang with Angela.
Michael tells Jim he thinks they saved it at the end, but Jim is too mortified to even be mad at Michael. "I can't believe it was me," Jim says. Neither can Michael. "It actually takes a lot of pressure off of me," he says. Pam comes up to them, saying, "Hey, smooth guys," and breaks the news that Meemaw's leaving in the morning and skipping the weeding. All Michael hears is "Free room."
He knocks on Meemaw's door, and she remembers him from before. "You're that foul man who kept talking about intercourse." He usually is. She lets him in, and says she can't go to bed since she still can't turn off the TV. Michael takes care of that for her, and they sit down so he can tell her to chill out. "It's not 1890 any more, it's modern day... I know in your day, she would be considered a whore." Always count on Michael to smooth things over. He may actually be onto something when he adds that Jim and Pam plan to name the baby after her. "They're gonna call her Meemaw."
Andy tells Kevin and Oscar that there's a party in his room (why waste the Honeymoon Suite, after all?), and Kevin asks what they can bring, "$40 dollars for beer, and any hot chicks you know, because that would help me deliver on some promises I made," Andy answers.
Pam encounters Angela in the hallway on her way to the hotel bar. Angela wants to shut that down, and then insists on going with her to chaperone. Which is, like, just about the nicest thing I've seen Angela do in years. Pam's like, never mind.
In Dwight's room, he's changed into a three-wolf-moon t-shirt, which does not impress Michael (who I guess is sleeping in there after all). That is, until Dwight howls at the moon ling enough to make Michael join in.
Down in the bar, Oscar tells Kevin, "There's no such thing as a good hairpiece." Kevin pets Oscar's hair, just as Pam's blonde sister walks by.
Dwight is talking about his farm to Michael and a couple of chicks. Michael wants to shut this down because it's not relatable, but they want to hear about the horses. He has 9 ¾ of them, you now. He THs about his "burger-on-the-go" that allows you to get burgers from a horse without killing it." I don't know if he shares that part with the ladies or not.
There's a dance party going on in Andy's room. Ever since "Café Disco," I don't recap dancing on this show.
Michael is telling a blonde about how Pixar movies make him cry, until Dwight comes up and tells him to abort. "I found twins!" Michael ditches the blonde. "I'm sorry, you understand. Nice to meet you." Oddly, she doesn't seem to. And then the twins turn out to be a couple of dudes. "Aren't they magnificent?" Dwight marvels. "Something's wrong with you," Michael says.
Back to the honeymoon suite, and I'm still not recapping dancing. Suffice to say that Andy hurts himself pretty badly doing the splits, at least going by the girl-shriek he emits. For some reason, Erin and Kevin drag him to Pam's room, where he knocks on her door and tells her, "I tore my scrotum. I need you to take me to the hospital." Just what Pam needed.
Andy ices his crotch in Pam's room, telling her that everyone else is too drunk to drive. Pam gets Jim on the phone to help, and did you know they could say someone is "icing his balls" on TV? Jim's having a little trouble processing what Pam's telling him, to the point where she snaps, "Please stop saying 'what?'" IT turns out that Jim's also drunk, out with Michael and Dwight. "Are you pushing me off the phone?" she demands. "No!" Jim insists. "Let's talk for a long time!" Good answer. And it gets her off the phone.
At the bar, Michael and Dwight mock Jim's future married life.
Pam drives Andy to the hospital, and they're sniping at each other. He complains that every bump hurts his ballsack even more, and Pam reminds him that the splits weren't her idea. Andy claims he was trying to "liven things up, doing your job." Pam takes exception to that, but Andy says it's also to make sure everyone has a great time. So she swerves to hurt him more. Seriously, don't fuck with the Beesly.
Michael stands Dwight's hotel room, contemplating the sock on the doorknob. Back down the hall he goes.
morning, Andy wakes up on the floor of Pam's room, camera-gloating that he got to spend the night with the bride, but she stepped on his hand going to the bathroom. If only she wore shoes to bed. "Did I dream that you were crying through the night?" she asks him. Not exactly.
A guy comes in to the hotel vending machine room and catches Michael with his pants down. Okay, actually they're up, because Michael is pressing them on the ice machine. At least he's a boxers man.
Kevin presents himself at the front desk, wondering where the shoes he left in the hall last night are gone. The manager informs him that they're gone. They smelled so bad they were destroyed. "It became a safety issue, sir," he says officiously. Kevin is now shoeless for the duration, but the clerk placates him with a complimentary breakfast. It's like she's known him for years.
Dwight and a hot bridesmaid come out of his room after what was clearly a night of sexytime. What's even stranger is that she's clearly smitten with him. Michael comes in, bitching about how long he's been waiting and the condition of the room. "Hadn't noticed. Too busy knocking boots," Dwight smugs. It may be time to reconsider the three wolf moon t-shirt.
At breakfast, Michael is lying about his own night, having invented a hook-up of his own, from Europe. Please let it not have been Meemaw. Michael is shocked that Dwight isn't interested in Pam's best friend. That right there would be enough for Michael to date her. "You could double-date," he projects. "Swap, maybe." Dwight suggest Michael ask her out then. "I already have a European girlfriend," Michael snaps and storms off.
It's the wedding, at last. Stanley complains about Phyllis's hat feathers, and Phyllis retaliates with a crack about Stanley's wife, in front of Cynthia. Kevin does indeed make a new impression, with his new toupee on his head and Kleenex boxes on his feet. He sits to Oscar and Angela, and it's actually not a bad rug, as rugs go. Erin, sitting to Andy, is sympathetic about his injury. Meredith leans over to commiserate about crotch injuries, which of course she has experience with, and asks if there's still anything there. "Nothing got torn off," Andy insists. "Who told you that?"
"I may have told somebody that," Jim says outside in his tux, pleading nervousness as an excuse. Not that he feels all that bad about it anyway. Back inside the church, Erin gives Andy her folded up shawl to sit on, for his "damaged penis." He corrects that it's his scrotum, but he's clearly touched. He'd better heal fast.
Michael comes in with a big framed picture, THing, "They asked for cash, but you know, I give them cash every week. How much cash does a person need?" He shows off a giant "portrait" he painted of Jim and Pam, which looks like he did it in third-grade art class. "I have another one of them in the nude, but that one is for me," Michael adds. Dwight adds his gift to the pile, telling us it's a pair of turtle-boiling pots, a shell-hammer, and bibs.
The bridal party waits for Pam to come out in her dress, and when she does, she looks fantastic, of course. Her mom's still acting bitter about Pam's dad's girlfriend, and Pam's best friend Isabel excitedly says, "I'm going to go out and talk to Dwight." Pam's like, okay, but then literally says, "Wait, what?" Starting to follow her, she snags her veil on the door frame and tears it a bit. She calls Jim for help, and her voice sounds serious. Serious enough for Jim to disregard the superstition about seeing the bride before her wedding, which nobody except people on TV cares about any more anyway.
Dwight is chatting up another woman, and when Isabel comes up to ask how she looks, he's pretty much cuts her dead. I mean, he literally says, "Fine... What do you want?" She gets the hint, and Dwight turns back to his conquest. "He's not sitting with me either," Michael commiserates to Isabel.
Pam and Jim meet in one of the Sunday School rooms, and she's in tears over her torn veil. It's clearly just one of those last-straw things. She starts talking about all the disappointments this five-months-pregnant wedding entails, in terms of what she'd hoped to wear. Jim assures her that she's "so pretty." She frets more about the veil, so Jim grabs a pair of scissors and cuts off his own tie at the fifth rib. "There, we're even," he says. She takes a mental picture, but even Jim's vandalizing his own outfit has failed to make everything better. "Everyone's driving me crazy," she says. "I know way too much about Andy's scrotum. Mom won't stop freaking out about my dad's new girlfriend." She wonders why they invited all these people. An idea visible comes to Jim. And then we see them dashing off together, while Meredith enjoys her afternoon cigar outside the chapel, oblivious.
Back at the church, people are getting restless. Angela and Phyllis are already judging Pam, and Kevin's wondering if he has time to pee. Oscar wonders how long it takes, anyway. "The pee is fast, Oscar." Kevin says. "It's getting my tie back on." Sitting behind Pam's mom, Michael begs her for a purse-snack. Erin asks Angela if the wedding has been called off, and Angela says she'll get her shot at Jim. "Those two treat the whole office like a 1970s key party." Oh, if only she had made that comment to someone besides Erin, the only person who doesn't know about Angela's past with Dwight and Andy. Michael tells Pam's mom that he was hoping to meet someone, and ended up sleeping with a vending machine. "It was loud, but it was warm." Sounds like Michael's ideal woman. Plus the love of his life is dating someone else. Pam's mom starts to seem interested in Michael, and just when Michael is talking about having his sperm frozen, Jim's brothers come up to him, having heard that Michael might have a whoopee cushion they can borrow. Well, of course he does. No, I'm serious; he does. Some of the other Scrantonites are discussing the etiquette of when to loot the gift table, and Dwight is distracted from complaining to Toby about Jim when he sees the turtle has escaped from his gift. He stuffs it back in. Toby looks happier than we've seen him for a long time as he THs about the wedding not happening. Which is of course right when Pam and Jim return, happy and together. It's on after all.
As the ceremony begins, Michael and Jim's brothers and Dwight exchange signals. The organ stops, a radio starts, and suddenly the wedding turns into that obnoxious YouTube video. You know the one, with the wedding party dancing up the aisle. Pam's sister apologizes to Pam, saying she begged them not to, but Pam tells her to go ahead and take her turn. Yes, Pam is cool with it. And it proceeds from there. Except that as the song plays, and the Scrantonites dance up the aisle together in twos and threes (Andy with a walker, and Dwight doing a high kick that connects with Isabel's face), there are clips of Jim and Pam boarding the Maid of the Mist, the boat that goes out to the falls so tourists can see them close up and also get spattered with them. Out near the falls, they take off their provided rain ponchos and tap on the door of the pilothouse, and the captain marries them right there on deck. And then I guess they had enough time to get dried off and cleaned up before coming back for the official ceremony.
Afterward, Jim says, "I bought those boat tickets the day I saw that YouTube video. I knew we'd need a backup plan." Wise man. "The boat was actually plan C, the church was plan B, and plan A was marrying her a long, long time ago. Pretty much the day I met her." They look out over the falls, wet, bedraggled, and thoroughly happy. The end.
Except the tag. Kevin walks back to the vending machine room, telling us what a great time he had and how he got six numbers. "One more would have been a complete telephone number," he says excitedly. He adds that his Kleenex shoes were a big hit, but now his feet are so sore that he sticks them in the ice machine and swishes them around. How's that for a safety issue, Mr. Hotel Manager? And as if this weren't horrifying enough, the camera pans up the hall, to where Pam's mom is inviting Michael into her hotel room. Oh, Pam just got a whole new nightmare and she doesn't even know it yet.
Wow, can you believe I got through this whole weecap without once using the word "bridezilla?" Oh, shit.
M. Giant is a Minneapolis-based writer with a wife, a son, and a number of cats that seems to have settled at around two. Learn waaaay too much about him at Velcrometer, follow him on Twitter , or just e-mail him at m.giant[at]gmail.com.