Narrative Criticism: "The Office"

Narrative Criticism

The Office does not have an evident main character or main protagonist, but has a cast of many characters, some of the main ones including Michael, Dwight, Pam, Jim, Stanley, and Angela.
Michael is an interesting character because it is difficult to categorize him as a protagonist or antagonist. He is often ignorant, selfish, insensitive, arrogant, and egotistical. Yet, the audience may also feel sympathetic towards him because he is insecure, and values personal relationships with his employees that are not always reciprocated.
Dwight is another interesting character, who deeply values hard work and is dedicated to the work in their office. He is quite competitive, serious, and superstitious. He is a valuable character in the show because he is rarely outwardly humorous, friendly, or easygoing in comparison to the other characters. This contrast makes Dwight appealing to the audience and the humor in relation to his character is more about how dramatically serious and competitive he is.
The array of extreme and dramatized traits of the characters in this show makes it appealing to the audience as they compare their expectations of those who work in a corporate paper company in reality to the personalities portrayed in the show.

The setting of The Office is a corporate location of a paper company called "Dunder Mifflin" in Scranton, Pennsylvania
It an be assumed that Scranton is a more suburban area of Pennsylvania based on scenes shot outside of the office's interior.

It is particularly evident that Scranton might even be a more rural area given that Dwight lives on a farm.

The majority of the Office is shot in the interior of the "Dunder Mifflin" office, which is significant in the show because it highlights the daily events that take place in the office, which is where the majority of the entertainment and comedy can be found.

One of the most significant techniques in The Office is the way the show involves the office. The camera work and the way it freely moves places the audience as a viewer participating in the actual office.
The show includes separate interviews where characters directly talk to the audience, displaying their internal thoughts. There are also moments in the show where you can see characters (most particularly Jim) directly look at the camera in the middle of dialogue to emphasize an event in the plot as being awkward or surprising.
This narrative technique assists in the story-telling and comedy depicted in The Office and makes a connection with the audience.
Both the characters, setting, and audience in this narrative all contribute to the theme at hand, which has to do with the humor and entertainment that is found in this seemingly mundane paper company office. While the characters are nearly caricatures to produce comedy, and the events in the office may not be "realistic" it allows for the audience to reflect on their ideas of this common setting of a corporate office in contemporary society.

I think Narrative Criticism is a valuable form of rhetorical criticism because it recognizes how many forms of rhetoric can be understood as narratives or stories, even if they aren't explicitly stories as they were in this analysis of The Office.
I think since narratives are often complex, Narrative Criticism also accounts for the complexities of rhetoric by looking at so many different rhetorical elements such as theme, audience, chronology of events, and cause-effect.
Yet, Narrative Criticism can also be restricting because it is difficult to apply it to all pieces of rhetoric, whereas there are other forms of rhetorical criticism that can more generally analyze many different types of rhetoric.