Goodbye, Toby

"Goodbye, Toby"

"Goodbye, Toby" is the fourteenth episode of the fourth season of the American comedy television series The Office, and the show's sixty-fifth episode overall. Written by Paul Lieberstein and Jennifer Celotta, and directed by Paul Feig, the episode first aired in the United States on May 15, 2008 on the National Broadcasting Company (NBC).

In this episode, Toby spends his last day at Dunder Mifflin before moving to Costa Rica. Michael develops feelings for the new Human Resources Representative Holly Flax, who makes her first appearance in this episode. Jim's plan to propose to Pam gets ruined after Andy makes a proposal of his own.

Plot

File:Goodbyetoby2.jpg

Toby talking to Pam

Dunder Mifflin's Scranton branch is planning a going-away party for Toby (Paul Lieberstein) before he leaves for Costa Rica. Michael (Steve Carell) is extremely happy that Toby is leaving, but when Angela (Angela Kinsey) balks at his unreasonable party demands, Phyllis (Phyllis Smith) accepts the duty of planning the party. She does fantastically, ordering carnival rides and hiring a band.

Michael's hatred of Toby has been transferred to the new human resources representative, Holly Flax (Amy Ryan), and he and Dwight (Rainn Wilson) plan to haze her. When she playfully affects disdain for Toby, Michael takes her seriously, and suddenly falls in love with her. Taking advice from Jim, Michael succeeds in warming Holly up with small talk and jokes, and even tempers Toby's exit interview, which he had originally planned to be brutally insulting, because Holly attends. Dwight, however, continues the hazing, telling Holly that Kevin (Brian Baumgartner) is mentally challenged, and putting a raccoon in her car. When Michael catches Dwight trying to release a raccoon into Holly's car, he loudly proclaims his esteem for Holly.

Michael discovers that Jan (Melora Hardin) has artificially inseminated herself from a sperm bank when Kevin runs into her at the grocery store. She explains that she did this while she was dating Michael, but still wants him to be involved in the pregnancy. He initially is indecisive, but eventually calls and agrees to attend Lamaze class with her.

Pam (Jenna Fischer) reveals that she is spending the summer studying graphic design in New York City. Meanwhile, when Jim (John Krasinski) calls Ryan (B.J. Novak) about a huge sale that Jim has recently made. Patronizing as ever, Ryan instructs him to enter the sale on the company's website before abruptly hanging up. Jim takes this as another sign that Ryan is trying to push him out of the company, and leaves Ryan a voice mail proclaiming that he will fight Ryan's attempts to fire him. Shortly afterward, the staff finds a video on YouTube of Ryan being arrested for fraud in the full presence of his peers who are all recording his arrest on their cell phones. It is revealed that Ryan's website was floundering, so he double-counted office sales as website sales, fraudulently inflating the firm's figures. Although Michael is deeply concerned for Ryan, Jim is pleased and leaves Ryan a second voice mail mockingly telling Ryan to disregard the last because he had his "hands tied."

Jim contributes several hundred dollars to the party-planning fund in order to buy fireworks, later revealing that he has decided to propose to Pam, going back to their "first date". Pam notices the purchase and guesses his intentions; however, at the party, Andy (Ed Helms) ruins the moment by proposing to Angela, who bitterly accepts. Pam is visibly disappointed that Jim didn't propose to her. Michael has security escort Toby out of the office as a parting insult. Dwight is crushed that his ex-girlfriend is marrying someone else. In the last scene of the episode, Phyllis returns to the office, pleased at the success of her party, where she and the camera crew walk in on Angela and Dwight apparently having sex on one of the desks.

Production

"Goodbye, Toby" was the seventh episode of the series directed by Paul Feig. Feig had previously directed "Office Olympics", "Halloween", "Performance Review", "E-mail Surveillance", "Survivor Man", and "Dinner Party". "Goodbye, Toby" was written by Paul Lieberstein and Jennifer Celotta. Lieberstein is also the actor who plays Toby Flenderson. It took Lieberstein and Coletta four or five days to write this episode. Writer Anthony Farrell said that the idea for Dunder Mifflin Infinity to fail was inspired by the days that he was an administrative assistant for Countrywide Home Loans. Farrell recalled watching the company try new online initiatives and seeing them all be unsuccessful.

The members of Darryl's band are the actually members of actor Craig Robinson's band: Chris Rob played bass, Asa Watkins played drums, and David Sampson played guitar. On one take, Steve Carell grabbed Sampson's guitar and played an Eddie Van Halen guitar solo, but that scene was cut because it did not match Michael's character. The talking head interview where Michael compares Holly to a baker came after what the writers call "blitzes", in which all the writers write a talking head on a specific topic, such as "Michael's feelings to Holly". Then they'll read all of them out loud and see which one gets the biggest reaction. The YouTube video of Ryan being arrested was set on a private account. After "Goodbye, Toby" aired, the video was released to the public. When writing the story for the episode, the show originally planned on having Dwight put a badger in Holly's car, but after finding out that it was difficult to get a badger, it was switched to a raccoon. The script also called for the raccoon to attack Meredith, but that was decided against for safety reasons. After filming, the editors had about 72 minutes of material that they needed to cut down into 40 minutes.

Reception

"Goodbye, Toby" received 4.1/10 in the ages 18–49 demographic in the Nielsen Ratings. This means that 4.1 percent of all households with an 18 to 49 year old living in it watched the episode, and ten percent had their televisions tuned to the channel at any point. The episode was watched by 8.07 million viewers.

"Goodbye, Toby" was generally well-received by critics. TV Squad's Jay Black said that "The Office is at its best when its exposing the dramas that take place at every workplace" [sic]; Black went on to say that Angela's rudeness to Phyllis "was a small thread throughout the show, but a hilarious one". Kelly West of Cinemablend.com wrote that even though the episode didn't play-out "the way [she] expected", she's "definitely not complaining". Alan Sepinwall, a writer for The Star-Ledger, was critical of the proposal scenario, saying that "I really, really, really hope the writers aren't going to be foolish enough to try to create real strife in the PB&J (Pam Beesly and Jim) relationship over how long it's going to take Jim to propose." Sepinwall did wonder if "Goodbye, Toby" was the "best hour-long 'Office' ever?" The episode was nominated for an Emmy at the Primetime Emmys in the "Best Direction for a Comedy Series" category in 2008.

External links

• "Goodbye, Toby" at NBC.com
• "Goodbye, Toby", at the Internet Movie Database