Spin-offs are a common move when popular shows approach their expiration date. Some work, some don’t, and still others never see the light of day. “The Farm” was an attempted spin-off of NBC’s smash-hit comedy “The Office” that falls into that last category. The proposed sitcom would have followed Dwight Schrute (Rainn Wilson)on his beet farm outside of Scranton, Pennsylvania, but the show never got picked up — and the pilot barely made its way to the streaming screen.
While there never an official statement as to why “The Farm” failed, the general consensus is that it just wasn’t a great idea from the get-go. “Everyone I spoke to felt it was a bad idea,” explainedAndy Greene, the author of”The Office: The Untold Story of the Greatest Sitcom of the 2000s,” in an interview oninterview with Jeremy Roberts on Medium. “You don’t want to spend that much time with Dwight on the farm. He’s funny at an office with people that are his total opposites.”
Wilson had previously described the concept to The Hollywood Reporter as “more far out and weirder than ‘The Office,'” which begs the question as to what episodes of the potential spin-off might’ve entailed. In the end, “The Farm” pilot was reworked into the Season 9 episode of the same name. While it had its moments, it also proves that there is such a thing as too much Schrute.
What was The Farm going to be about?
The original plan was for “The Farm” to get in motion well before “The Office” wrapped up its ninth and final season. Its broader purpose was to follow Dwight Schrute back to his life on his beet farm where he would oversee a bed and breakfast. Quirky shenanigans would evidently follow. In January 2012, Deadline reported that a spin-off starring Wilson was slotted for a midseason 2013 launch, with Wilson and showrunner Paul Lieberstein at the helm. By October that same year, Wilson offered an update to fans onX (then Twitter): “NBC has passed on moving forward with ‘The Farm’ TV show. Had a blast making the pilot – onwards & upwards!”
But rather than ditching the effort entirely, the backdoor pilot was retooled to air during “The Office’s” final season. In it, Dwight’s Aunt Shirley has died, bringing his siblings, Jeb (Thomas Middleditch) and Fannie (Majandra Delfino), home to discuss the future of their deceased relative’s massive agricultural estate.”We’re not going to air exactly what it was, because it has certain aspects that were appropriate for a pilot of a new show,” showrunner and executive producer Greg Daniels told TVLine at the time. “We’re going to shoot a little additional material to make it fit into the season more.”
The Farm episode wasn’t exactly a hit
Reinforcing NBC’s decision not to pick up the show is the fact that the episodic version of “The Farm” ended up being lackluster at best. While superfans could enjoy the inside peak into Dwight’s larger life, the footage felt disjointed and incomplete. Many felt that the episode-in-lieu-of-a-spin-off was generally half-baked and unimpressive.
Even worse, the “Farm” concept would have ruined Dwight and Angela’s (Angela Kinsey) happy ending, especially since the “other woman” in Dwight’s life, Esther Bruegger (Nora Kirkpatrick), was in “The Farm” episode and presumably would have remained a tension point. When Daniels weighed in on the idea of Dwight remaining involved with Esther or finding a happy ending with Angela, he told TVLine, “We’re into the [latter] scenario.”
Based on “The Farm’s” tepid reception and the chart-topping rating of the series finale (where Dwight and Angela finally tie the knot), fans tend to agree. Fortunately, when a true sequel spin-off finally happened, “The Paper” was largely about a completely different group of peoplein Toledo, Ohio. The separation from Scranton (sans Oscar Nunez’s Oscar Martinez) gave the Peacock sitcom a chance to find its own identity, even as it attempts to channel the spirit of “TheOffice” once more. It’s no wonder it’s already been renewed for a second season.
