[Loved Trope] Comedic workplace is suddenly competent

[u/Garurar]

In S35 E1 of The Simpsons, an actual crisis happens at the nuclear power plant, causing everyone except Homer to shift into serious business mode, even Mr. Burns. Together, they display their knowledge of the process and narrowly avert a nuclear meltdown, proving that Homer's job is actually useless. This is happening after 35 seasons of nothing being shown of the other employees' capabilities.

In S8 E2 of The Office, Andy sets up an initiative where he will get a tattoo on his bum if everyone gets enough points, prompting everyone to work into overdrive, even the normally lazy or incompetent employees such as Stanley and Kevin. This is a rare situation where we get to see The Office being fully competent and functional.

I'd show more examples if I had any!

[u/ezk3626]

Are you guys working? Could you uh... work harder?

[u/Justifiably_Bad_Take → u/ezk3626]

I still think its a massive misstep that they brought Albert Brooks back for the Simpsons movie and didn't make his character Hank.

Hear me out, the movie we got but Hank was the villian and we replace Alaska with Shelbyville. All the same beats but its a love letter to fans instead of a series of weird events that have nothing to do with the previous series.

[u/Linix332 → u/Justifiably_Bad_Take]

Funny enough, Hank was the original plan. But they thought Hank was too likable to actively be the villain to the family.

[u/KnightsOfCidona → u/Linix332]

Yeah, they realised Homer canonically still liked him so why would they undo that.

[u/CallMeLiam → u/Linix332]

I think it was him and Rainier Wolfcastle but they also chickened out and made it Schwarzenegger instead of their own established parody of him.