As Andy flaunts a discovery he made about his ancestry, Darryl struggles in his new role. Meanwhile, Dwight teaches a language to Erin, who wants to impress her boyfriend's educated family and Jim reveals a secret.
Tropes
- Accidental Truth: Zig-zagged. Nellie made up Andy being related to Michelle Obama, and thus the implication that Andy's family owned slaves. However, when Andy calls up his mother to confirm this, he finds out that although the Bernards never had a plantation, they did transport slaves.
- Becoming the Mask: Pete and Clark notice that Andy appreciates enthusiasm, so they made a habit of clapping whenever he does something remotely cool. However, it's causing a reverse effect now where they genuinely think anything he does is awesome.
- Brick Joke: In order to maximize his efficiency, Darryl asks the camera crew to pre-record several talking heads to be played whenever something happens. Later, when Andy is confronted about his family being slaveowners, one of these very clips is played.Darryl: Whoa! That person has really gotten him or herself into quite a predicament.
- Comically Missing the Point:
- Pam shares with Nellie her suspicion that Jim is hiding something from her, and Nellie immediately insists that Jim must be having an affair. Having a conversation with Darryl about Jim "really needing this" and saying Darryl could get in on it too just makes her even more disgusted.
- Erin hears the news of Andy saying he's related to Michelle Obama and rants about the pressure of having to meet the First Lady on holidays now.
- Gaslighting: Jim and Pam get their friend Steve to come in and pretend to be Jim, to make Dwight start questioning whether Jim had been Asian all along and he just never noticed. They even replaced the family photo on Jim's desk with one of Pam, Steve and some Asian children.
- Innocently Insensitive: When Andy flaunts his status as the regional manager along with his supposed relation to Michelle Obama (and then unknowingly makes whipping motions while telling everyone to get back to work), the staff is already tense from the possibility of his ancestors being slave owners, forcing Oscar to talk him out of his behavior and explaining the possibility to him, sending him into a Heroic BSoD.
- Nazi Grandpa: As Andy is dishing even more (fake) dirt on everyone else's families, he starts to say something about Dwight's grandfather, to which Dwight cuts him off to say he was a member of the Bund, which is technically not the same thing as the Nazis.Andy: I was gonna say he was a tax evader.Dwight: Oh. I was... joking about the whole Bund thing.
- Late to the Punchline: When Phyllis cracks a joke to Andy requesting some water from a ladle, he is initially confused why she asks him until he realizes the insinuation.
- Ripped from the Headlines: Nellie got the idea of saying Andy has a distant relation to Michelle Obama from a real headline
that circulated at the time about Michelle Obama's ancestry. - Soul-Crushing Desk Job: Darryl confides in Jim that Dunder Mifflin has become this for him, feeling like the higher up he gets the stupider his job description is. Realizing Darryl is in the same rut Jim was in of seeing no worthwhile future in the company, Jim tells him about the job opportunity in Philadelphia and convinces Darryl to pursue it with him.
- Unfortunate Implications: In-Universe. Andy flaunts his relation to Michelle Obama thinking everyone will be excited for him. However, Oscar is quick to note that usually when a white person has a distant relation to a black person, it means slavery was involved in that person's family past.
