Counseling (The Office)

"Counseling" guest stars Eric Zuckerman as a store clerk, Vincent Angelo as a vendor, and Michael Schur as Mose Schrute.

The series depicts the everyday lives of office employees in the Scranton, Pennsylvania branch of the fictional Dunder Mifflin Paper Company.

Meanwhile, Pam Halpert (Jenna Fischer) attempts to finagle a promotion to office administrator and Dwight Schrute (Rainn Wilson) boycotts the Steamtown Mall after a shop owner refuses to serve him.

Unaware he is even undergoing counseling, the method works, and Michael opens up to Toby about his personal history and relationships with people.

At one point, he mentions seeing a baseball game with his stepfather where he was told that the team's manager deserved respect and how he never forgot that, and Toby makes an important discovery that Michael needs to be liked.

Dwight Schrute has decided to boycott the Steamtown Mall after a shop owner refuses to serve him, going so far as to cancel orders to businesses there, including that of the other salesmen.

Using tips from the rest of the office to make himself appear more sophisticated, Dwight, with Jim and Andy Bernard, return to the shop.

Dwight, flustered from the truth of the situation being revealed to him, stumbles over his words before finally saying the line he had come all the way there to say, "You made a big mistake.

"Counseling" was written by B. J. Novak, a producer and screenwriter for the series who also portrays the character of Ryan Howard on the show.

[2][3] "Counseling" features Eric Zuckerman, Vincent Angelo and Michael Schur in guest appearances as a store teller, a vendor, and Mose Schrute, respectively.

"[6] During Michael's counseling session, he sardonically tells Toby that he was probed by ALF, the alien star of the eponymous television series.

[9] Joel Keller of AOLTV called it a "vast improvement" from the previous episode "Nepotism", because he felt that "everyone at Dunder-Mifflin [sic] Scranton acted like themselves".

McNutt's largest complaint with the remainder of the episode was that neither ended in "a logical place"; he felt Dwight's plot featured a disconnect from the character, and that Pam's story was "lazy".