Now that word about Sabre's pyrogenic printers has hit the media, Jo Bennett is in town, and she's loaded for bear on the hunt for the whistleblower in the Scranton branch. Michael insists none of his people did it, but everyone else thinks it was Andy. But as events unfold, we learn that it was actually Darryl. And Pam. And Kelly. And David Wallace. Michael tries to talk Jo down before revealing the names of the first three, but she ends up taking him on her plane (without it taking off) and the two of them have a little therapy session. Michael still doesn't reveal the names, but the resolution is that the humiliating public apology Jo's been dreading having to make will be made by Michael instead, gleefully. And then we find out that it was really Andy all along.
Also, Dwight plans to buy the office park. We'll see how that goes. We'll also see how it goes now that Michael has asked a grateful Jo to transfer Holly back to Scranton.
Watch this episode here, discuss it in our forums, then see Michael Scott's greatest career moves!
See what made the cut in this list of TV's 50 most shocking moments ever.
Want to immediately access TWoP content no matter where you are online? Download the free TWoP toolbar for your web browser. Already have a customized toolbar? Then just add our free toolbar app to get updated on our content as soon it's published.
Michael is in his office, using his computer to watch a clip of himself avowing to last week's TV news crew that there is nothing wrong and will never be anything wrong with Sabre printers. His phone rings ("Michael Scott, as seen on TV," he answers), and a falsetto voice says, "I saw you on the news and I want to pinch your tiny wiener!" It's Packer, obviously. Michael talking-heads about "allegations that Sabre printers can cause a fire." So he was asked to give a statement, and now it's all over the media, including the request line he called to talk about it on the radio. "It's like, come on, people, enough," he says, pretending to be weary of all the attention. And pretending badly.
Michael announces to the bullpen that he's the second-most watched clip on the local news site, after "that teacher who was wrongfully accused of being a pedophile." He tells everyone to fluff his viewing stats. But then they get distracted by a clip of a new baby otter at the zoo. Michael whining-heads about how it's not even that interesting, but then ends up nearly moved to tears from watching it himself. He otter get back to work.
Jo Bennett is in the house, complete with her two great Danes towing guys that, unlike Gabe, actually look like matches for them. Jo waves a news clipping around, doing a slow-burn (no pun intended) about how the media wants to tell a story about cheap foreign printers killing Americans. Kevin starts to volunteer that he knows what happened. "I'm not sure you do, Teddy Bear," Jo Medusas at him. "Well, now I think I might not," Kevin concedes. Jo goes on a rant to everyone (including us) that they had discovered the defect and were about to send out a software patch, as well as a letter and a bunch of free toner to all their customers, but then "somebody here, they like that first story better. The one where we lose half our clients for no damn good reason!" she punctuates the rant by slapping the news story up on Pam's drawing of the office park. Pam looks wounded by this attack on her one successful work of art ever, and Jo tells whoever squealed to come forward now. Not remotely intimidated by her display, Michael smoothly assures her it wasn't any of his people, and asks anyone who talked to raise their hand. "Raise your hand, Norma Rae," Phyllis murmurs to Andy. In return, Andy threatens to maim her with her own glasses if she says anything. In a TH, he complains, "Even if I thought that our printers killed baby seals, I would not be a whistleblower. The Bernards, for generations, have silenced whistleblowers. It's how we made all our money. Woody Guthrie wrote a song about us." Which he of course sings.
Back in the bullpen, Jo is having her goons pass out an "I Didn't Do It" form for everyone to sign. Michael vouches for everybody, so Jo decides to start with him, in the conference room. Before we see how that goes, Jo does one of her TH interviews that always tell us so much about her: "When mama was working as a prison guard and something went missing," she THs, "she'd ask one question: 'What do we do when we find the guilty party?' And if they said, 'Come down on them with that swift hammer of justice,' innocent. A clear conscience don't need no mercy. But if they said, 'Officer Bessie, they may have had a reason, blah blah blah blah,' well, nine times out of ten, that's the anus they check."
Michael answers Jo's question by suggesting the perp receive a one-way ticket to Montego Bay, "where they keep the Al Qaeda." Jo corrects that to Guantanamo, and Michael goes on to add that the guilty person should suffer and die, almost as if he saw her TH from a minute ago. Obviously Jo's more than satisfied Michael's not the whistleblower.
Nick the IT guy wants to get at Dwight's computer. Dwight lets him, and then pins his head to his desk while holding one of Nick's arm in the air. "What the hell?" Nick grunts helplessly. "Apache persuasion hold, that's the hell," Dwight sneers. "What are you doing to my computer?" Oscar chimes in that the lawyers are searching all the hard drives. "Thanks a lot, Big Brother," he adds. Dwight lets his buddy Big Brother go. Overhearing this, Kevin sprints to his desk. "I already got to yours, Kev," Nick says, and Kevin sprints back, explaining, "Sometimes I run. I'm a runner."
In Michael's office, Oscar, Angela and Phyllis are hanging Andy out to dry. "Like I'm gonna believe one of his spermed lovers," Michael tells Angela. Phyllis backs her up, and Michael looks out to see Andy calmly, if dorkily, flossing at his desk. Can't blow a whistle if you have tooth decay.
Dwight bursts into the conference room, brusquely telling Jo, "I didn't do it." But he has a list of people Jo should fire, which seems to include everyone else in the office, from Michael on down. Jo approvingly comments on how much money Dwight's made this year, and asks, "Are you turning that money into more money?" Dwight gets serious, and quietly asks, "Are you referring to alchemy?" In comes one of the goons, as Jo advises Dwight to buy property.
Michael grills Andy about whether he talked to the press. "I didn't do that," Andy protests. He even swears on the graves of his (still-living) parents, and suggests Michael have a look at Darryl. "He was more bothered about it than me." Well, that's true enough.
In Darryl's office, Michael asks Darryl if he told anyone outside the office. Darryl admits that he was talking to a girl at a bar, who he later found out was a copyeditor at the Trib. Michael looks sick. "Was she cute?" he asks. "No," Darryl says, which makes Michael even more upset. Now Michael THs that he swore to Jo that none of his people did it, and he just found out one of the best ones did. "And now he's probably going to get fired for it. And if that is not poetic justice, I don't know what is." Funny thing is, that last sentence is actually true.
It's Toby's turn on the hot seat, but Jo's satisfied in advance that he wasn't the one. She does, however, have some questions about a thick printout that she slaps down on the table. This would be Toby's mystery novel that he's been working on. "Why would a man who hates people want to have a relationship with a maid?" Jo asks, totally engaged. "The way I look at it, there's only one of two reasons: He knows a secret about her that she doesn't know herself, or he wants to use her services to mop up after a murder." Toby smiles at her like he's flattered at her interest, but back at his desk, he carps, "Write your own damn novel."
In the stairwell, Pam tells Jim, "It was me." Apparently she was so intimidated by another day-care mom's story about a trip to Vietnam that she spilled about the fiery printers. "Her husband's a reporter... So now everyone hates Andy and it's this whole mess and I don't know what to do." Jim suggests relaxing. Pam suggests telling Jo or Michael. "Good, let's get all the bad ideas out now," Jim says sincerely.
In Michael's office, Pam has just finished confessing to Michael, who doesn't know what to do. "My mind is going a mile an hour," he stresses. Michael marveling-heads, "I always thought Darryl and Pam might get me fired for something I said."
Later, Michael presents himself at Pam's desk and does a little dumbshow: pointing to Pam, then to himself, than to Meredith, then miming drinking something, then miming driving, then pointing to his wrist and holding up five fingers. "I weirdly know exactly what you're saying to me," Pam says. "See you in Meredith's van in five minutes," Michael unnecessarily whispers.
Down in Meredith's van, Michael gets their attention off the ream of parking tickets and the actual parking boot inside the vehicle to ask them for ideas. Kelly joins them. "She also whistleblew," Michael explains to the other two. "Of course I'm the leak. I think I Tweeted it," Kelly THs. "I can't control what I say to people. I spend the whole day talking. I video chat, I Skype, I text, I Tweet, iPhone, I Woof--"
Woof?
At his desk, Ryan explains how Woof is his own social networking service to end all social networking services, connecting all your messages to all your communication portals. Then he sends himself a Woof, and his computer goes nuts, his printer spits out a page, and Erin is heard on his phone saying, "Ryan, you have a Woof on line one." "Woof!" Ryan says. I'd like to know how many users he's got, but he'd just lie about it anyway.
Michael's idea: smash all the computers to destroy the evidence, which they point out will also get them fired. Darryl points out, "All you need is one scapegoat," cutting his eyes to Kelly. Before everyone can turn on each other, Pam suggests Michael convince Jo to cut the perp some slack, and then they'll all confess. "You can count on me," Michael says. That's already worrying, but the fact that it's the last line in the scene makes it even more so.
Toby is in single combat with the vending machine. Dwight gets up to help him, and they both have it tipped pretty far forward when Dwight answers his cell phone, leaving Toby to hold up the machine on his own. The call is from a realtor, who tells Dwight about a property with a basement office. "You mean like a lair?" Dwight asks. Come on, Dwight, how many lairs do you need?
Later, in the break room again, after the vending machine has either been righted or had Toby Windexed off the front of it, Michael tells Jo, "I was up all lunch thinking about what we should do to this individual." His plan? Twisting his face cruelly, he says, "We make 'em come to work, and we work 'em, and we make 'em sit to all the people they screwed over, and we pay them, but we make them feel like they did something really wrong." This goes on until Jo looks at him and asks in a whisper, "Michael Scott, what do you know?" The good news is that the answer won't take long.
Back in the conference room, she's demanding he tell her, "because I want to deal with it the way I deal with it." "Deal with this," Michael sasses, folding his arms stubbornly. She orders him to speak. Michael actually endures the long silence, which is more than one of her great Danes can do. She ends up putting him in her car and driving off, while Gabe wonders, "Should I continue with the investigation?" Like it matters what Gabe does, ever.
She ends up driving Michael to the airplane hangar where her jet is parked. "Are you gonna kill me?" he asks. Jo just gives a low, slow, Annie Wilkes cackle.
Dwight's outside on the phone with the realtor and suddenly looks around himself, and the building he's in front of. "Cancel it," he orders. "I want you to make an offer at 1725 Slough Avenue. Make 'em an offer they can't refuse. No, on second thought, lowball 'em. Don't call me till you have it." What is he up to?
On board the parked corporate jet, Michael continues asking Jo nervous questions while she pours them drinks. "I have an early dinner that I need to get to," Michael tries. "With the Chief of Police."
Creed tells Gabe after his interview, "Very relived to learn it wasn't you." Gabe calls Stanley up. "It wasn't me," Stanley rumbles without moving. "What a rich timbre your voice has?" Gabe observes nervously. I would describe the timbre of Gabe's voice as reedy, in case you're wondering. Gabe announces his conclusion: "You did it," he tells Andy. He doesn't really have anything to back that up, but suggests everyone go with it for now. Jim speaks up that this seems unfair. Andy agrees, "For all we know, it could have been...Jim!" Jim: "Really?" Well, what did he expect?
Jo is taking a different tack with Michael, acting as his therapist instead of his scary, angry boss. She remarks that he doesn't seem like his usual self, and Michael admits that he's going through a rough patch. "Mama Jo knew there was something up," she says. She's empathetic as he says it's been going on all year. "My favorite restaurant closed down. Me new favorite restaurant sucks." He finally says, "I miss Holly." Jo asks who that is. "Holly Flax, from the Nashua branch," Michael says. "Best HR rep that Dunder Mifflin has ever seen." So all the other branches were bought by Sabre as well? I'm not sure that was made clear before, but I guess now we know. Michael adds, "It's also not been a blockbuster year financially; my Blockbuster stock is down." Yeah, that investing folk wisdom about buying what you like probably shouldn't apply to Michael.
Back at the office, Kevin boils it down to the one vital question that they should all be asking: "Who is the whistleblower?"
And here's David Wallace, on the front step of his home, with his dog, wearing a yellow hoodie that reads "SUCK IT" on the front. Of course he smugly tells us about how he started spreading the word about the printers as soon as he heard. "But I'm not here to talk about that. I'm here to talk about Suck It. Suck It--" And we cut away without hearing anything more about his revolutionary product.
Andy reminds Gabe that he was the one who brought it to Gabe's attention in the first place. As always, people quickly start turning on Gabe (except for Creed, who flips a coin that comes up "Angela"). Enter Nick the IT guy, happily announcing that he's joining Teach For America in Detroit. "Uh, not now," Gabe snots. There's a whole long bit about how everyone always forgets Nick's name, and Dwight even calls him Lurch. That's when Nick gives a little seminar on one of the most valuable business skills that nobody ever teaches, which is Don't Piss Off The IT Guy. Dude was in their hard drives just today, after all. To Ryan, he says, "You're not a photographer, and [Kelly] definitely can't fit into a size two. Darryl, man, you're on Facebook? Why you been telling people you're not on Facebook? People want to be your friend, man!" And then he tells Andy that he was the one who snitched; Nick found his letter to the editor, as well as the Quicktime version of the video Andy made with Darryl. "This guy's the snitch. He's the snitch. So, that's it, check it out." He flips everyone the blurred (that's a middle finger, pixilated out) and stomps out. Into the silence, Andy asks, "We're gonna believe that guy?" Everyone nods in unison.
Jo is making a confession of her own to Michael, saying she once hoped she'd be such a respected business tycoon that they'd make a Barbie out of her. Michael's at least smart enough not to make a comment about that. "I hate that I sell cheap printers," she says. But if I have to go out there in front of the press and make one of them public apology recalls... it's all I'll ever be remembered for. Nobody'll ever want to play with my Barbie." Michael offers to do that for her. By which he means make the statement, not play with the Barbie. "Oh, honey, surely you don't want that," Jo says. "I surely do, and don't call me 'honey,'" Michael cracks. Jo actually laughs. "Airplane II," Michael misattributes. Well, look who's his usual self again.
"I'm about to buy this building, you know," Dwight tells Hank the security guard. "Enjoy that chair for now. Because pretty soon, you will be on your feet. At Buckingham Palace." I still don't know what's going on here, but neither does Hank.
As everyone leaves for the day, Andy wonders where his bag is. Phyllis points up to where part of it is sticking down from the ceiling. "You deserve it," she adds meanly. Andy refrains from snapping, "Maybe you're in the ceiling!" Instead, he THs, "Look, I don't want houses and schools to burn down. Does that make me a hero?" "No, it does! Not!" Kevin snaps from somewhere offscreen. "Well, it doesn't make me the worst guy in the world, either," Andy adds lamely. "It does!" Meredith yells from somewhere else offscreen.
While Andy's up on his desk trying to retrieve his bag, Erin comes up to say she thinks it was brave of him. She even puts a supportive hand on his leg. As Andy steps down, he modestly says that it seemed like the right thing to do. And then he walks away with a nervous cringe-smile. So the day wasn't a total loss.
Michael reads a statement to a press gaggle in front of the building, enjoying the spotlight so much that he can't resist smiling in a way that's totally at odds with the abject message of betrayal of trust that the statement is written to convey. He wraps it up: "There will be no questions. Are there any questions?"
Later, While Michael's in his office, Jo sticks her head in to thank him for reading the statement. "You looked pretty up there," she adds. Michael says it was fun, and when she says she hopes he gets through his rough patch soon, he says today helped. "Give a shout if I can brighten your life," Jo says. Michael half-jokingly suggests, "You could transfer Holly back from Nashua." He gives a little shrug like he knows it could never happen, but Jo promises, "Let me see what I can do." Michael is left standing there catching flies. What hath he wrought?
Watch this episode here, discuss it in our forums, then see Michael Scott's greatest career moves!
See what made the cut in this list of TV's 50 most shocking moments ever.
Want to immediately access TWoP content no matter where you are online? Download the free TWoP toolbar for your web browser. Already have a customized toolbar? Then just add our free toolbar app to get updated on our content as soon it's published.
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.