The Boat (The Office)
The series depicts the everyday lives of office employees in the Scranton, Pennsylvania branch of the fictional Dunder Mifflin Paper Company.
In the episode, Andy Bernard (Ed Helms) must help his family when his dad loses all of their money, Dwight Schrute (Rainn Wilson) is pranked into thinking he is a guest on a radio show, and Kevin Malone (Brian Baumgartner) learns of Oscar Martinez's (Oscar Nunez) affair with Angela Martin's husband.
Back in the office that evening, Pete Miller asks Erin to join him for drinks, and she accepts.
Kevin Malone overhears Oscar Martinez confessing to the camera that he is having an affair with Angela's husband Robert Lipton.
During the day, Angela constantly makes unconscious double entendres and foreshadowing, sorely tempting Kevin to let out what he knows.
In the first 57-second clip, Dwight gets mad when Jim is called a superior salesman and when Nellie claims beet farmers and Battlestar Galactica fans have low IQ levels, during the radio show prank.
[14] In its original broadcast, "The Boat" was viewed by an estimated 4.83 million viewers and received a 2.4 rating/6 percent share among adults between the ages of 18 and 49.
[16] The episode tied with the Fox series Glee for third in its timeslot, being beaten by an episode of the ABC series Grey's Anatomy which received a 3.3/8 percent rating and an entry of the CBS drama Person of Interest, which received a 2.9/8 percent rating.
Club reviewer Erik Adams called it "another solid late-period episode", praising Rainn Wilson's commitment to Dwight throughout the main plotline.
He also complimented the Andy-Erin subplot, and considered it superior to the previous episode for featuring more consistency in Andy's characterization.
He also complimented Dan Sterling and John Krasinski's work on the episode, saying that the script made "good on previous hints that Andy and Erin's story won't end like Jim and Pam's" and that Krasinski's direction added "just enough energy not to feel overwhelming".
[17] IGN writer Cindy White called the episode a "pleasant surprise", for its use of the supporting characters and its development of the season's plotlines.
She complimented most of the subplots, and compared Pete and Erin's romance to Jim and Pam's from the early seasons of the series.
He also complimented the fact that Jim and Pam's bickering from the previous episode was not expanded upon, and praised their prank on Dwight, calling it a "great bit" and "an excellent comedic balance to the more serious story of Andy's inner demons.
He also praised the plotlines, writing that "what made this episode so great was that not only did every plot line work ... but every moment positively sang".
