Apparently, a salesman named Danny Cordray (played by Timothy Olyphant) has been stealing Dunder Mifflin clients for years, but when he beats Jim, Dwight and Michael out of a sale, that's the last straw. The three of them set up a sting operation, tapping Meredith to play the part of a potential client so they can watch Danny work his magic. Unfortunately, Meredith just wants to get tapped. Michael rolls up the operation and comes clean -- and offers Danny a job as DM's traveling salesman.
Unlike all the other salespeople, Andy isn't threatened by Danny, but by the news that one of his old a capella buddies seems to actually have some kind of sad little music career. Andy decides on the spot to form his own band (Darryl on keyboards, Kevin on drums), which meets in the warehouse during work hours and mainly has terrible lyrics.
Oh, and did I mention that Danny once dated Pam?
Everyone's down in the parking lot to greet Oscar, who has taken up cycling to the office and is obnoxiously happy about it. "A horse is a bike that pedals itself," Dwight points out. Kevin notices that it's a Lance Armstrong model, which offends Kelly as a member of Team Sheryl Crow, so nobody notices that Michael has gotten on the bike until he topples over. He talking-heads that of course he can ride a bike: "I take spinning classes three times a month." Plus, the one he gave to that Benihana waitress was pretty worn out. Pam and Jim carefully launch Michael across the parking lot on the bike (and Oscar's okay with this?) while he starts up his own supportive chant, until he crashes into a car. "You never forget!" he whoops triumphantly as he limps away.
Jim and Dwight are doing a sales call together, to a guy named Steve Nash. "He's not the Steve Nash," Jim points out waggishly in the parking lot. Dwight thinks Jim is being condescending, and then asks who the Steve Nash is. Jim asks if Dwight ever heard of the point guard for the Phoenix Suns. "No, Mr. Jock Hipster," Dwight says. Jim remarks that he's neither of those things. Sorry, I'm with Dwight on this one. This sales call is going to go great.
Andy's looking through his Cornell alumni magazine (oh look, someone remembered), which includes the shocking news that one of his classmates died falling off Mount Kilimanjaro, and the even more shocking news that his old friend "Broccoli Rob" recorded a song for some dairy council ad with Trey Anastasio from Phish. "I forget about milk, this is a terrific reminder," Phyllis says, obliviously twisting the knife of jealousy that's already buried so deep in Andy's guts it's coming out of his eyes. Andy takes it even harder in a TH, saying it should have been him; "In Here Comes Treble, I had four solos. Broccoli Rob had three."
Dwight and Jim are entering the lobby, Dwight assigning Jim to alert the lady at the front desk to their presence. "You're good with receptionists," he zings. Suddenly Jim spots Timothy Olyphant sitting in the waiting area and immediately reverses direction to duck back out of sight without even taking the time to turn around. I know he's pretty intimidating, Jim, but you know Deadwood, Justified, and The Girl Door, and Go aren't actually real, right? Okay, maybe one of them was, a little. Jim calls Dwight's attention to the man, and Dwight also recognizes him and hisses, "Crap!" They do a joint TH in which Dwight says that "Danny Cordray is the worst." By which he actually means that Danny is the best salesman ever, an employee of Osprey Paper who has stolen more clients from Dunder Mifflin than anyone. "So the situation is the worst," Jim clarifies. "Also, he slept with Pam," Dwight adds. Wait, what? Jim says he didn't, but Dwight silently nods, yeah he did.
So now there's a joint talking-head with Jim and Pam back in the conference room at the office, in which an annoyed Jim invites her, "Tell 'em." Pam explains that nothing happened: "We went on a couple of dates. He never called me again." That last bit is news to Jim, who thought it "fizzled." Pam explains that someone has to start the fizzle, which Jim thought she did. "No, I liked him," Pam says. Wrong thing to say. "For a couple of days. Four years ago." When Jim was in Stamford, in other words. Jim's just nodding at the camera. "You know I have a kid with you, right?" Pam asks him. "Eehhh," Jim scoffs. It's not like we ever see her.
Dwight informs Jim that he plans to intimidate Danny. Jim agrees, "I'll...watch." They walk in together, Dwight talking about a dating triumph that starts with a woman commenting on the largest penis she'd ever seen and ends with the story taking place in the Penis Museum, where tickets are a thousand dollars. "Well, hello, Danny," he smarms. They shake hands, Danny acting all friendly and charming, joking that he's just here for the coffee. He's not fooling Dwight, though. I mean, he's not trying to fool anyone, but Dwight doesn't know that.
Back at the office, Michael's got everyone else in a brainstorming session when a cell phone goes off. It's Michael's though, and he's happy to take Jim's call, annoying everyone by saying he's not busy. Jim asks Michael to come over, and Michael agrees, figuring they're calling in "the big guns." Before heading out, he proudly tells everyone, "The only reason I got out of the sales game was so I could be reluctantly called back in." Pam says he looks more eager than reluctant, and he eagerly ducks out.
Andy pays another unsolicited visit to Darryl, to draft him as a keyboard player for the band he's starting. Darryl declines, saying he plays for pleasure. Andy offers him sixty bucks a session. "That's crazy money," Darryl says. "I'll take forty." Andy's thrilled. Darryl really does treat him better than he deserves sometimes, and this week that's just getting started.
Michael has joined Jim and Dwight in the lobby by the time Danny comes out of his sales call, and upon first sight of the guy, thinks he's a male model. But then he pops up and introduces himself. "Three of you guys for one sale," Danny remarks. "We call it overkill," Michael says. "Why am I telling you my strategy?" Danny takes off, and Michael tries to take over the sales call with his whole "Showtime!" bit. "Not doing that," Jim says. "I've been in showtime mode since breakfast," Dwight agrees. Michael lets it slide, but then Jim says, "Showtime!" anyway, just to be mean.
Inside Steve Nash's office, Michael is trying to wear him down by offering to deliver on weekends, and selling their paper at cost, to the shock of even Jim and Dwight. But the account is gone, to Danny.
"Jim talked too much," Dwight post-mortems in the hallway. Michael tells them not to bicker; they did what they were supposed to and just got beat. But he's in a fury about losing the sale, as he THs once he's safely back in his office. "It's like if Michael Phelps came out of retirement, jumped in the pool, belly-flopped, and drowned." Wait, did Michael Phelps retire? I'm not exactly a jock hipster.
Back in the office, Michael has assembled the sales staff for a meeting on how to keep Danny from eating their lunch. Stanley's barely participating, and although Michael's first attempt to kick Stanley out fails, he succeeds in evicting him with a digression about the diabetes he assumes Stanley has. Phyllis has an idea for dealing with Danny: "I could try to seduce him." Michael's loudly and vocally not up for that. Dwight gleefully raises a hand, volunteering, "I know how we can learn his tricks."
Dwight leads Jim, Michael, Stanley, and Phyllis into the office park's Batcave, which is actually just a tiny surveillance room with a monitor showing a live feed from four cameras in Dwight's landlord office. Dwight, why you got four cameras in your office? Never mind that; it's part of Dwight's plan, which consists of: "We lure Danny to it and watch him sell." This is too much for Stanley and Phyllis, even though they've lived more of their lives on camera than the entire cast of any given season of Big Brother combined. Michael's in, though, because he thinks this is like that Paul Newman/Robert Redford movie The Stinger. Jim and Dwight straighten him out on the title.
Erin leads Danny into Dwight's office, whose door now bears the legend "Pennsylvania Solartech." "Your two o'clock," Erin tells the "boss" behind the desk, who is none other than Meredith. Jim THs that Meredith was the perfect choice to play the company head: "Her lunch break lined up with our appointment with Danny and...that's it. That's really all we were looking for." Good thing she dressed up today. Of course the three guys who hatched this harebrained plan are watching the live feed from the security room as Danny and Meredith shake hands and she introduces herself as Meredith Van Helsing. "Van Helsing was a respected professor before he was a vampire killer," Dwight explains to Jim. "Okay, but what is he more famous for?" Jim points out. Michael shushes them both, and Meredith takes a sip from a familiar "World's Best Boss" cup. "Hey, that's my mug!" Michael says excitedly. Jim asks Michael, "You know this isn't real TV, right?" Michael pretends he knew that. I'd be a little worried about Meredith drinking out of my mug, but I think we saw last week that train already left the station for Michael.
Andy was apparently so keen to get the band started he couldn't even wait until the end of the day. He, Darryl, and Kevin (on drums, of course) are all set up in the warehouse, and they're already falling into disagreement. This is mainly because Andy's using a falsetto voice to sing in the character of a little girl, and Darryl thinks that's dumb, and Kevin wants to sing it himself. Andy smugs, "Okay, three-way argument between a drummer, a keyboardist, and the frontman-lead singer. Wonder who's gonna win this one?" He counts off again, and I don't know why Darryl's even still there.
Claiming it's pretty warm in "Meredith's" office, Danny decides to take off his jacket, if Meredith doesn't mind. Meredith opposite-of-minds, actually singing out, "Hello!" Even Michael sees what's gong on, and Dwight remarks, "People can't keep their true natures hidden for long and this guy is smoldering like a tire fire." Jim tries to say Danny isn't that good looking, but he's powerfully overruled by the other two. Meredith is remarking on Danny's shoulders when she gets a phone call. "Pull it together, all right? Stop looking at him," says Michael into her ear. Meredith hangs up and gets back on track, telling Danny she understands he's there to sell her paper. He chuckles and says no, he's there to meet her and see if they'd be a "good fit." Michael color-commentates, "He's making her sell to him!"
Andy's playing the track up in the bullpen. They already recorded it? This is the fastest-moving band I've ever heard of. Oscar gives his opinion: "It's pandering, and it makes me think you think I'm stupid." Andy wonders if it could be famous, which, to be fair, is not the question Oscar answered. Pam echoes Darryl's concern, but Andy's still hoping it could be in a car commercial or skated to in the Olympics. Ryan thoughtfully scratches his head and offers, "I don't think they usually...skate to such...bad songs." Creed says he likes it, which is the worst news Andy's heard yet.
Danny is seriously flirting with Meredith, saying they should compare this to a first date that's going really well. Meredith says she's thinking third date and fussing with her blouse buttons, which for her is probably an exquisite level of subtlety. This time when the phone rings, she picks it up and snaps, "Shut up and let me do this!" before hanging up. thing the guys know, Meredith is around the desk, offering Danny a drink. "We gotta get someone else in there right now," Jim says. A little late for that.
Dwight and Jim have drafted Oscar to take over, and they brief him as they hustle him down the hall to Dwight's office to act like Meredith's being called away. "And remember, you're not gay," Dwight reminds him.
But then when Oscar walks in, Meredith interrupts him before he can say a word and introduces him to Danny as "Manuel, my cleaning man. He doesn't speak any English." She puts him to work cleaning the window. "Who else we got?" Jim asks from the Batcave.
Up is Ryan, who shoots down Dwight's suggestion of pretending to be from Stark Industries because it's fake: "I run Google." But the minute he enters the room, where Meredith has her skirt hiked up nearly over Danny's head, she drafts him as another non-English-speaking cleaning man, and puts him to work on "el flooro." From "el window," Oscar shrugs at Ryan helplessly. Danny finally figures out that something's up and tries to politely escape, but Meredith grabs him by his tie and starts talking about their connection like a particularly desperate contestant on The Bachelor. Or I guess just a standardly-desperate one. So Michael goes rushing in to put a stop to everything. "Michael Scott?" Danny says, recognizing him. "I said stop," Michael reminds him.
After the ads, Michael kicks Meredith out of the room ("Get out of here. Go. Forever.") and tells Danny the truth. Danny's pretty blown away, especially the part of the plan where Michael hired a homeless woman to impersonate an executive. "It's the sincerest form of flattery," Michael tries. "Or crazy," Danny suggests, and gets ready to go. Michael totally rolls over on Jim and Dwight, who are still cowering in the Batcave. Danny knocks on the shared wall and wishes them luck as he heads for the door. Because he wants to save this interaction for reasons that aren't yet clear to me, Michael keeps following Danny down the hall, saying they just wanted to copy his tricks. Danny's almost to the door as he says his only trick is being a good salesman and you can't copy that, but Michael blocks the door and says he wants Danny to work for him as his traveling salesman. "Sure, you seem like a fun, professional guy," Danny says. Michael: "So you will?" Danny: "NO!" Danny makes another break for it, but Michael's trying to be all inspirational about how Danny has a chance to make his life better, make it worse, or have it stay the same. Danny actually threatens to hit Michael, then apologizes, like he's the first person who's ever done that. Michael offers him more money than he's making now, and more freedom in his job. "You already know Dunder Mifflin has the best service and the best prices, but you beat us anyway. And imagine how well you would do selling our stuff?" Danny seems to be hearing it. Well, well, well, look who can still sell after all. I suppose it helps that there's not any sign whatsoever that the Sabre merger actually ever happened in this episode.
Upstairs, Michael introduces Danny to everyone, and tells them to say hello. Nobody says that, per se, but Kelly does mutter, "Fuck me." Michael tries to nip tha
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t in the bud, saying that he respects Danny for who he is because he reminds him of someone. "Josh Duhamel," Kelly says. Michael means someone in the office. "He's like a better-looking Andy," Kevin tries, which Andy takes as the biggest compliment he's ever gotten. When Dwight interrupts to ask to talk to Michael about this, Michael refuses until Jim backs Dwight up. Yes, that surprised me too.The sales staff (save Andy) corners Michael in his office, and he asks them the same question he asked Danny: "Do you want your life to be better, or worse, or stay the same?" "Stay the same," they chorus. He says their lives will get better, but Phyllis points out that he'll steal all their clients. Michael says he would have, but he can't now because he'll be working with them as their traveling salesman. Michael actually says something that makes sense: "I am not going to exclude good people from our staff simply because they are threatening to you. And unless you have a better argument than that, I suggest you leave." And since Dwight has nothing but questions about where Danny will sit and where he'll park (both moot as Danny will be traveling), the discussion is over. Even Jim doesn't have a good argument. I suspect he could have talked Michael out of this with a bad argument, and you probably know what that argument is, but even in an episode where Jim called on Michael to help him save a sale and participated in a plot better suited to Three's Company, there are things he still won't do.
Down in the warehouse, Darryl is asking Andy what he really cares about, preferably something more universal than "reverse snobbery.". "Sometimes I feel like life has passed me by," Andy admits. Darryl gets him started on a song that might actually be a song, even if it's a little corny, and just when Andy's about to ask Darryl how much he'll charge for another half hour, Darryl tells him not to worry about it. "So we're just, like, jamming as friends?" Andy asks excitedly. Darryl's only answer is to count off. If Darryl's character is going to keep going in this direction, Andy's going to have to call his band Magical Negro.
Up in the bullpen, Danny casually informs Jim, "Your wife and I went on a few dates." Jim kids like it's news to him, and Danny remarks that Pam wasn't into him. Well, either one of them is wrong, or there was a miscommunication somewhere. Which means unresolved whatever, which I don't think is going to be resolved in the few minutes left in the episode. "You snubbed her," Dwight hisses at Danny, and quickly warms to his subject as Pam wanders in behind him. "You probably thought that Pam was too meh, or thin without being toned, but I want to tell you something: she is one of the plain, hearty women of Scranton that make this city great. And so what if she doesn't wear makeup? We like her better that way." Neither Jim nor Pam seem sure how to react to this bolt from the blue, except for how Pam mouths to us, "I wear makeup!" "And you steal clients, don't you?" Dwight snaps. Danny says that's a different issue, but Dwight presses it and calls Danny a thief. "In fact, where are my keys? Oh, they're in my pocket. False alarm." That kind of took the wind out of his sails, to the extent that Dwight welcomes Danny aboard. Jim quietly asks Dwight, "Hey, crazy...so you're fine?" Dwight says it's five o'clock and he's not going to take it home. He shakes Danny's hand and heads out. Guy's got a beet farm, a bed & breakfast, and an office park to run, after all.
Michael smugly says in his office that Danny stole a sale from him, so he stole Danny. "The sale that mattered, I made." He laughs at the irony, adding, "We don't even need him, we've already got Packer on the road... Crap, I forgot about Packer." Finally, a healthy response from Michael on the subject of Packer, even it's for the wrong reasons.
The tag is Andy's band performing some goofy novelty song about froggy love. I'm not getting into it.
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.
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