It Looks Like Another 'Office' Is Coming to Peacock 11 Years After The Hit Ended
"The acclaimed comedy series continues to gain popularity and build new generations of fans on Peacock,” said NBCU President Lisa Katz
Published May 9 2024, 3:16 p.m. ET
It was inevitable. Nearly since it went off the air, fans have been asking for a return of The Office. Be careful what you wish for, because a sort of new version of The Office is returning to television. Streaming television.
The Office, the American version of The Office, ran on NBC from 2005 to 2013. The show was so popular a spin-off was announced in 2008 (that spin-off never happened and became the equally fantastic Parks and Recreation). Since going off the air the popularity of the extremely bingeable comedy has skyrocketed.
'The Office' is coming back, sort of, because it’s just good business.
On Jan. 12, 2021 Variety reported that The Office was by far the most streamed show of 2020. In the first year of the pandemic, people just wanted to check in with their TV pals stuck at work. Not virtual work, but in an office. 57 billion minutes of the show were streamed. The next most popular show was Grey’s Anatomy, another show featuring people at work, with 39.4 billion minutes.
Grey’s Anatomy was also on broadcast television in 2020. Hell, it still is on broadcast television. But not The Office. While Michael, Dwight, Pam, Jim, Andy and everyone else may not be coming back to TV, a new/reboot of The Office is.
On May 8, 2024 Peacock, the current home to every episode of The Office, announced something that may please some Office fans. The press release titled, “Peacock Announces New Comedy Created by Greg Daniels and Michael Koman: The untitled series produced by Universal Television takes place at a daily newspaper and is set in the same universe as The Office” doesn’t promise a new Office, but a show in the Office universe.
The new show is not exactly a reboot or another season of 'The Office.'
The press release makes it clear that the show will be ‘filmed’ by the same people that ‘filmed’ the fictional documentary the folks behind the camera in The Office were making. “The documentary crew that immortalized Dunder Mifflin’s Scranton branch is in search of a new subject when they discover a dying historic Midwestern newspaper and the publisher trying to revive it with volunteer reporters.”
Why now? Popularity! “It’s been more than ten years since the final episode of The Office aired on NBC, and the acclaimed comedy series continues to gain popularity and build new generations of fans on Peacock,” said Lisa Katz, President, NBCUniversal Entertainment.
So no Dunder Mifflin, no Michael, Dwight, Pam, Jim, Andy, etc. in this new series. But the only announced cast are pretty great: Domhnall Gleeson and Sabrina Impacciatore. Domhnall recently co-starred with Steve Carell in 2022's The Patient on FX. The show was nominated for a Peabody. You may recognize Sabrina from her excellent performance on The White Lotus, a role that won her an Emmy nomination.
Sorry to any Office fans hoping to check in with their favorite characters. If you want to do that you'll have to just keep streaming the 201 episodes, listen to the Office Ladies podcast or be happy with the 2018 SNL mini reunion during Steve Carell's monologue.
