The show's first Valentine's Day Episode sees the office celebrating. Phyllis receives a ton of presents from Bob Vance, Vance Refrigeration. Dwight seeks advice from Pam about what to buy for Angela (without naming her). Michael travels to New York City to give a presentation on the branch's financial performance to new Dunder Mifflin CFO David Wallace, and hopes to kickstart his relationship with Jan as well.
Air date: February 9, 2006.
Tropes
- The Ace: Josh Porter from Stamford comes across this way in his presentation, complete with pie charts and exact figure quoting, compared to barely competent Cloudcuckoolander Michael and dim-witted Craig.
- Actually Pretty Funny: David Wallace chuckles in agreement when Michael says that Craig from Albany isn't "the sharpest tool in the shed."
- All Love Is Unrequited: Thrown into sharp relief on Valentines Day, with Kelly pining after Ryan, Jim after Pam, and Michael after Jan.
- Analogy Backfire: Dwight compares women to wolves.
- As Himself: Played with. Michael mistakes a woman with glasses for Tina Fey. Meanwhile, Conan O'Brien walks by without Michael noticing.
- According to
Word of God on the commentary, this is also a Casting Gag. John Krasinski, Mindy Kaling and Angela Kinsey all started their careers as Late Night interns during the O'Brien era (so did future cast member Ellie Kemper). O'Brien is also a longtime friend of showrunner Greg Daniels (who directed the episode), having been classmates at Harvard and serving together on the writing staff of a bunch of shows, including Saturday Night Live and The Simpsons.
- According to
- Aside Glance: At the end of the episode, Michael has defused the situation he started by spreading gossip about Jan. Against her better judgment, Jan gives in to her attraction to Michael and kisses him. Michael turns to the camera (which is filming the scene through a window looking onto the lobby) and gives it a look of pleasant surprise. Jan then turns to see what he's looking at, realizes she's been filmed, and gives the camera an Oh, Crap! look.
- Big Applesauce: Michael has some time to kill before the meeting, so he takes a walking tour around the city.New York, New York, so good they named it twice. Its other name is Manhattan.
- Deliberately Bad Example: Craig, the manager of Albany, is even more incompetent than Michael is. While Michael may have made a weird movie, he at least bothered to bring all of the sales data corporate wanted.
- Department of Redundancy Department: In Michael's narration.Stanley's dedication is no doubt one of the hallmarks of foundation of the business we're hoping to build our basis on.
- Did Not Think This Through: Ryan made the rather bad decision to hook up with office romance obsessive Kelly on February 13th. The day before... well, just look at the episode title. Naturally, she's acting like they're practically married on the day itself, much to his chagrin.
- Early-Bird Cameo: Josh Porter is featured in this episode as one of the branch managers. Next season, he becomes Jim's manager when Jim transfers to Stamford.
- Hidden Depths: Michael shows unexpected competence and persuasive skills when cleaning up his mess at the meeting, managing to quickly convince the necessary people that he and Jan aren't an item. He also shows selflessness and humility by falling on his sword and "admitting" that it was an inappropriate joke
- Hypocritical Humor: Michael says he prefers to go to Times Square, while others go to the Empire State Building and he finds that "pretty touristy." Times Square is perhaps the most visited location in New York City.
- Idiot Houdini: This episode was partly intended to show how Michael remains employed at Dunder Mifflin despite all the trouble he's caused, with how he handles the fiasco at the meeting. He's good at thinking on his feet, saying the right things to the right people, and as demonstrated by Craig, other branch managers are even more incompetent than him.
- Know-Nothing Know-It-All: Michael demonstrates a complete lack of knowledge about New York City. For instance, when seeing a river, he says it's either the Hudson or the East, which is unhelpful because these rivers are on opposite sides of Manhattan. He also thinks Manhattan is just an alternate name for New York City (rather than one of its five boroughs). Finally, in a city with hundreds of quality mom-and-pop pizzerias, his "favorite New York pizza place" is Sbarro, a worldwide Italian fast food chain associated with places like mall food courts and airports.Michael: Times Square! Named for the... good times you have when you're in it!note
- Large Ham Title: Bob even signs his Valentines as "Bob Vance, Vance Refrigeration".
- Literal-Minded: Dwight's gift idea.Pam: Sometimes a gift is about what it means, instead of what it is.Dwight: You mean, like a ham?
- Parody Product Placement: Michael decides to go to his "favorite New York pizza joint," which is actually Sbarro's instead of the hundreds of local pizzerias, demonstrating his lack of taste and how little he knows about New York.
- Shout-Out:
- Michael is very happy to pull this one off:Michael: I'll talk to David.Jan: Surely you cannot be serious.Michael: I am serious. (smiles wide) And don't call me Shirley. Airplane!
- Michael's presentation video uses the intro of "With or Without You" at the beginning, and ends with the credit "A Michael Scott Joint" and a vanity card for Great Scott Films International, which features pictures of Steve Martin and Robin Williams.
- Michael is very happy to pull this one off:
- Stunned Silence: After Michael's video finishes playing, no one knows what to say.
- Stylistic Suck: Michael's "introduction" video about the Scranton Branch. He's also baffled why people don't like it.
- This Is Your Premise on Drugs: Michael compares Scranton to New York.Scranton is great, but New York is like Scranton on acid...no, on speed...no, on steroids.
- Travelogue Show: Rather than talk about the Scranton branch's financial numbers, Michael's presentation is a film about the branch and its employees, done in this style.Michael voiceover: Life moves a little slower in Scranton, Pennsylvania. And that's the way we like it.
- Valentine's Day Vitriol: Meredith finally can't stand not getting any Valentines gifts, so she gets drunk and passes out in the office.
