Those who have had the stomach to sit through the post-departure of Steve Carell from The Office know that the show hasn’t had the same excitement and originality it had when he was attached. Since Helms and newcomer James Spader have taken the lead in the show, it’s become less about the boss and more about the employees of the Dunder Mifflin Paper Company.

That’s probably why NBC is contemplating taking the show’s standout character, Dwight Shrute, and giving him his own spin-off, a la NBC’s move with Friends and Joey. We all remember how that ended. THR has the scoop.

Reports of NBC eyeing a potential spin-off centered around Rainn Wilson’s quirky Dwight Schrute character are indeed true, according to a well-placed source. The idea would be to further explore the Shrute family farm, with multiple generations of Schrutes involved. The comedy concept could get a test of sorts on an episode of The Office later this season.

Never underestimate the power of experience.  Fresh off directing a couple episodes of King of Queens, Michael J. Weithorn make his feature film debut with A Little Help. I’m all for new talented writer/directors (Mark Webb), but unfortunately, while I do see potential for some creative ideas in this film, he probably should have tried out a few shorts before diving head first into a feature.

It felt like highly produced sit-coms episodes strung together.

In the film, Jenna Fischer plays Pam…. sorry, Laura, a dental hygienist who must deal with the aftermath of the sudden death of her unfaithful husband.  With her family almost forcing comfort and support down her throat, she soon discovers that her son has been lying about his father’s death to his friends at school to make him sound cooler.  The film has all the elements in place, a solid story with good casting, but ultimately fails to come together as a cohesive unit that keeps the audience engaged the whole time.

When people talk about movies they are most excited to see, they will normally stick to the big budget action adventures, raunchy comedies, or thrillers.  It is rare to see a grown adult get publicly excited about the newest children’s animation or cheesy chick-flick.  But when all is said and done, and we are alone in our living rooms browsing Netflix, most of the time we are actually in the mood for something light and fun.  Just admit it, we all love the occasional cartoon for family comedy.

This week we have two classic family franchises getting rebooted, a trailer for a superhero film that just doesn’t seem to want to ever come out, and a guilty pleasure indie flick.

Once in a while there comes along a show that not only is able to entertain audiences week after week, season after season, but relate to people on a very personal level. The Office is one of those shows.  Besides having one of the strongest ensembles casts on television and an original mockumentary form, one of the biggest reasons for this show’s success has been Steve Carell’s performance as Michael Scott.

To get a complete picture of what Carell has brought to this character over the years you must start at the beginning. The pilot episode was shot using the same script as the pilot to the original British version with Carell mimicking the awkward, incompetent boss as Ricky Gervais played it.  Seven seasons later, what we find is a much more likable, sympathetic character that the audience genuinely roots for and cares about.

But what exactly defines the perfect Office episode?  Is it the episode with the most laugh-out-loud lines?  Or is it the one with the cutest Jim and Pam moments?  No, what ultimately takes the show from a regular sit-com to an Emmy Award winning show are the episodes that give you a glimpse into the humanity and vulnerability of Michael Scott.

“You get what you get, now don’t throw a fit”-Ancient kindergarten teacher proverb.

I am constantly amused when people attend a Farrelly Brothers film and are SHOCKED to find out that it is filled with bathroom humor and precious little in the way of plot. What do you expect people?  When you go to a Farrelly Brothers film, you know exactly what you are going to get.

Peter and Bobby Farrelly carved out a new niche for comedy in 1998 when they released Something About Mary. The film’s raunchy humor was dubbed “gross-out humor”, and though they have replicated the formula many times, they have never really duplicated the level of success they had with that first film.

It’s doubtful that this will be the film to do that, though it is a nice departure from their usual fare. Don’t worry, you’ll still find male protagonists suffering from man-child syndrome, plenty of tits, dirty jokes, poop humor, and the like. Not that I’m complaining. I’d be disappointed if those things were missing.

Who doesn’t love a good Farrelly brothers comedy? Let’s leave out a few small films like Heartbreak Kid, Fever Pitch, and Stuck On You. But outside of those, they’ve got some pretty great comedies under their belts. Now, they’re teaming up with Owen Wilson and SNL funnyman Jason Sudeikis for a brand new comedy called Hall Pass.

Basically, the film features Sudeikis and Wilson as two married men who can’t help but look at the sea of attractive women before them. Here’s the breakdown:

Rick (Owen Wilson) and Fred (Jason Sudeikis) are best friends who have a lot in common, including the fact that they have each been married for many years. But when the two men begin to show signs of restlessness at home, their wives (Jenna Fischer, Christina Applegate) take a bold approach to revitalizing their individual marriages: granting them a “hall pass,” one week of freedom to do whatever they want…no questions asked.

At first, it sounds like a dream come true for Rick and Fred. But it isn’t long before they discover that their expectations of the single life-and themselves-are completely, and hilariously, out of sync with reality.

Of course, the phrase “hilarity ensues” isn’t used here, but you can imagine that it’s necessary. Check out the full trailer after the jump and be sure to catch Hall Pass in theaters next February 25.

A host of  recent indie films have specialized in caustic characters and unlikable leads.  Greenburg, Mother and Child, and Please Give have all featured some of the most unpleasant fictional characters of recent memory.  However, none of their characters can hold a candle to Ben Kalmen in Solitary Man, played with gleeful abandon by Michael Douglas.

The former movies at least  allowed us to believe that those characters wanted a chance at redemption.  Those characters would have liked nothing more than to assuage their guilt over their toxic actions toward others.  Not Ben.  He gets a couple of opportunities to redeem himself,  he thumbs his nose at said opportunities. He is one of the most narcissistic characters ever brought to life on film.  He’s also a misogynistic pig.

Ben is sixty years old, yet he won’t even look at a woman over twenty.  The lone exception to this disturbing rule is his current girlfriend (Mary-Louise Parker) who he keeps around because she is wealthy and has a well connected family. Ben is trying to rebuild his life and fortune after an embarrassing career-ending swindle he pulled when he was a car-salesman guru.

Disgraced and penniless, Ben tries to make up for his shortcomings by bedding as many women as is physically possible for a man his age. He treats the women with cool disregard and cruel contempt after they succumb to his charms.  He is truly awful. He espouses offensive observations such as, “No one over forty is stick-thin.”

If there’s one tv program we enjoy watching around here it’s The Office. The weekly hijinks of our favorite paper company characters never cease to bring the funny. We had a recap of last week’s episode “New Leads” for you a few days ago and as good as that episode was, we felt like there was still something missing.

Fortunately, NBC responded and has sent us three deleted scenes from the episode we can share with you today. These scenes including Stanley’s story about his wife poisoning him, Creed’s unique demands of Andy and more. In short, some pretty darn funny stuff.

The Office returns tomorrow night with a brand new episode. In the meantime, check out these deleted scenes after the jump.

I’m probably not alone in this, but the moment I saw “New Leads” listed as tonight’s episode, I was half-expecting, half-hoping for a Scrantonian send-up of Glengarry Glen Ross. Who’d be Shelly? Stanley? Or Phyllis? Would Michael perform his own version of Alec Baldwin’s monologue? Heck, Baldwin’s on 30 Rock, at the very least he could make a guest appearance…

Well, for fans of David Mamet’s Pulitzer Prize-winning play, the only resemblance is that there are new leads in, they’re gold, and the sales staff can’t have them—and it’s probably for the best because parodies are like Betty White hosting SNL bacon-wrapped Peeps: in the end, never as funny as the idea.

Also good because it would’ve weighed an otherwise very good episode down.

The titular new leads are $50,000 worth of names Sabre has spent to be doled out to the sales staff as per the corporate office’s new “Sales is king” policy.  Naturally the power’s gone to the salesmen’s heads—Phyllis refuses to answer Angela’s e-mails; Andy (while on the phone, no less) flaunts his supposed dibs to everything in the office, including Darryl’s pencil; and Dwight believes he’s in the same company as Jesus (“If sales is king, and I’m the king of sales, that makes me the King of Kings).

A classic staple of the sitcom, aside from the clip show (hmm, they covered that one a few weeks ago, right?) and the Big Wedding (that one, too) is the Baby Episode. Staples, yes, but also synonymous with jumping the shark.

Fortunately, The Office writers seem aware of this and made the wedding episode, Niagra, one the season’s strongest. On the other hand, the clip show, The Banker, was one of the weakest.

The Delivery, The Office’s Baby Episode falls somewhere in between. In this hour-long installment, Jim and Pam, on the verge of joy-bundling, are determined to hold off on getting to the hospital until the very last minute since their health insurance covers only two nights’ stay. As Pam begins contracting, Michael calls a conference to get her mind off the little fella inside her clawing to get out. Andy performs the evolution of dance (sans music, as it’d just throw him off), Erin recites Kentucky Derby winners, and Michael usefully suggests doing the opposite of 10 Things to Induce Labor.