The Tragedy of
Andrew Bernard:
I still don’t
and will never understand why Andy Bernard does not end up marrying Erin in the
ultimate episode of the Office. His romance to her is by far more relatable and
beautiful and desperately nail-biting than Jim and Pam. I understand the
schtick that Jim is The Guy Who Gets Away With Things Inexplicably, hence
questions arise surrounding his mental health. But how is it that Jim gets away
with being gone so long (pursuing a career instead of upholding a tradition or
seeking enlightenment in the Caribbean Islands) in Season Nine and the Nard
Dog, who is only gone for three months (DURING WHICH TIME THE COMPANY PROSPERS,
BY THEIR ADMISSION, AS THE OSTENSIBLE RESULT OF HIS CHOICE) is ABANDONED by his
girlfriend? I was totally unmoved when Erin’s birth parents showed up to the
Seminar because it was totally devoid of meaning. Not only does the formerly
perfect girl embrace them with total abandon devoid of righteous fury.
Throughout the entire forty-minute finale she pays absolutely NO HEED TO HER
LOVER ANDY, preferring the company of the Nameless Douchebag Alcoholic whom she
ended up cheating on Andy WITH. This mystery is only seconded by the fact that
all of this happens in the wake of Andy’s bold act of vulnerability going “viral”.
I do not understand how it is possible that the second-most-heroic character in
the series is LAMPOONED for his breakdown before the impersonal and inhuman
judges, which include the grossly untalented Clay Aiken. Dave Grohl wouldn’t
put up with this. Why should Andy? When I watch or read Hamlet, which the
nard-dog probably has memorized, I feel every heartstring quiver with every
line. And this is how I feel for Andy Bernard. And it is not just because I
sympathize with him, whereas I do not remember my past lives in orphanage.
Ethics are impersonal (in the positive sense of the word) and they are
objectively universal to all rational beings. There is simply no Universe in
this Multiverse wherein Erin can forgive her parents for having abandoned her
for thirty-something years, only to take out her feelings of abandonment on a
man who was coping with the disintegration of his own family. There is nothing
that can really make this story sentimental or relatable. I’ve only known a few
people in my entire life who wouldn’t have their heads spin at the thought of
it. And all for what? For HAPPINESS? Andy honoured his Family tradition and
returned a Changed Man, but no less intense is he then than when he took his
leave of the Office and drove all the way down to FLORIDA to find Erin. If I
wrote a sequel for the Office, it would follow the demise of Pete and of course
Toby’s adventures in Europe, chasing Nellie. Andy’s respect for the traditions
of a family that visibly DEPLORED him is by FAR more sympathetic a sob story
than Erin’s quest for “Happiness” (Again: how do you MEASURE that? And don’t
you DARE say endorphins) or her abandonment by a Mother and Father who never receive
their due come-uppance. Much less comprehensible is the rise of Daryll to the
top, alongside Jim, even when he CONFESSED to an aversion to Work Itself. Even
less so is Toby’s being single. Even less so is Nellie’s ongoing and irrational
aversion to him. Even less so is that Oscar, whose sodomistic affair (WHY DOES WORD
NOT RECOGNIZE THIS WORD?!) with Angela’s Husband, by no means selfless or
principled, even by his own hypocritical standards, is allowed into Public Office
and even becomes GODFATHER TO ANGELA’S SON. How can the ends justify THOSE
means? How is Dwight rewarded for his aggression towards Andy but Andy is only
caught where he began: at Cornell University? Why is Erin’s Happiness greater
than his Rights? A hero MUST uphold those same values with which he defends
every woman he has ever been with and every organization that he had ever
pledged his loyalty to, even if contemporary cultural complications compel him
to choose love over station, tradition over love, or station over tradition,
from time to time. The Underdog even had his ARSE TATTOOED, yet in the end the
World won’t THROW HIM A FUCKING BONE.
If it seems
like I am unraveling, I am. I might have nothing left to live for. The
prosperity of every other character on this show, against all odds and decency,
only makes Andy’s Tragedy that much higher when weighed on a Scale of Justice
that hoists it in proportion to the weight of his adversaries. May he ascend to
Heaven if he kills himself in such times as these. May the Internet forever
bewail the Irony of his Loss of both Angela and Erin, to say nothing of the
family name that was his birthright. May we forever remember the Tragedy of Andrew
Bernard, borne pure into the only true poverty, in a wasteland that mistakes it
for wealth even as it sees him as its victim and that overlooks the irony of
its own envious contempt, which should be considered the first symptom of its
OWN poverty. And if my own envious contempt casts doubt on my sincerity, may it
be remembered that I did not deny my own poverty. Andrew Bernard is the only
true hero next to Michael Scott, hence Michael bestowed upon Andy the burden of
Management. Jim and Pam are nothing compared to Andy and Erin, the two lost
orphans, like the Gemini twins, one of whom dies in war. Andy is not a
cis-white-male. He is the only man who never played the race card and who even
had the courage to defend his ancestors, who were only ever moral middle men in
a slave trade that started on the African Continent. Like them, he performed
his duties to the best of his worldly abilities. They simply outweighed those
duties that one elects arbitrarily, as does an entrepreneuring sociopath like
Jim Halpert, because he was BORNE INTO THEM, and hence they are closer to God
than any career choice for which a man may be blamed. Virtue is inescapable,
and Andy makes no attempt to run from it. Yet every step he takes in one
righteous direction, prompted by his fellows, is mistaken for treachery, not
because it does any harm to any one (which it invariably does not; even when
Erin misses him to the point of fury, she has to live with having prompted him
to do so) but because it is MISTAKEN FOR BEING ARBITRARY by a gang of ARBITRARY
PEOPLE who feel INCONVENIENCED BY IT. At no point does the Nard Dog break a
promise, violate the Categorical Imperative, create an adversarial situation,
(except to spite Erin, just to prove a point, and rightfully) betray a friend,
or disobey an order or social cue. (Except when he stands up to a Panel of
Judges that dismiss him without cause.) Andy DOES EVERY THING RIGHT. And he is
left empty-handed as all of his fellows prosper. Perhaps he NEEDS Erin in order
to ground him. Perhaps Erin needs to be grounded. Pun intended. But how many WOMEN would HONESTLY judge of a man
in need that they would not themselves volunteer to help? If Woman is EQUAL to
Man, is she not burdened by the same altruistic task? Is that not the
life-blood of Society and Human Compassion?
When people
like Andrew Bernard are condemned for doing the RIGHT thing, it only opens the
floodgates for degenerate sociopaths, without either noble birth OR moral
conviction, to be praised and comforted for doing the WRONG thing. Phyllis is
pardoned for blackmailing Angela. Dwight is rewarded for bullying Andy. Jim is
praised for hitting on Pam in spite of Roy. Etc.
What did Jim
ever do right? He only PRETENDED to be AMBIVALENT to Pam when it so pleased
him, rather than STANDING UP FOR HIMSELF as he ADMITS HE SHOULD HAVE. Andy is
the Old Soul of the Office who, like Michael Scott, is capable of seeing the
finish line before the rest of the crowd knows it is running a race. And ironically
enough he is the least competitive of any of them. He only craves that which
all of them receive as a reward for their own sloppiness. He is condemned only
for his own cleanliness. And as Pam Beasley said: wanting things to be clean
has nothing to do with being rich. Andy is the only TRULY ENTITLED character,
and he KNOWS it. No one can hold a candle up to him, yet all of them enjoy the
fruits of HIS labours and even the prosperity brought on by his calculated and
inspired absence. HAD Jim and Pam NOT WASTED TIME that they REGRET HAVING
WASTED, would they not all so have appeared self-entitled? Andy suffers not
from excessive Desire but from Conviction. Yet any TRUE Drama or Comedy REWARDS
that Conviction when it is properly oriented. It does not confuse it for vice
as it treats actual vice as though it were virtue. So may it last of all be
remembered that at no point am I opening the gates of sympathy that they might
flood out the flame of justice in its persecution of the narcissist and
deviant. I would rather that it buoy us up to an altitude from whence we might
again recall the distinction between TRUE entitlement and the passive
aggression of a silent, manipulative self-interest. There is a reason that
Hamlet stabs Polonius behind a curtain. In a more decent time, Jim would have
met his come-uppance, and Andy would have died a beloved Prince. The sword of
discretion must again be used not to defend one’s self when one is in the
wrong, but rather to segregate virtue from vice. And insofar as Andy wields it in
accordance with a just assessment of his own value, his service to Humanity as
an Artist, and in the overlying context of a civilized culture and rich
tradition of principles, he has earned that right that Americans mistakenly consider
a Universal Entitlement for which one does not have to fight: to fend for one’s
own self. To defend oneself.
Dm.A.A.
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