Trivia / The Office USS 1 E 1 Pilot

• What Could Have Been: When he began developing the series, Greg Daniels considered having an original pilot, with the plotline of what would eventually become the Season 2 premiere "The Dundies" conceived for that purpose. However, in consultation with the network and the other producers, he decided to just have the pilot be a rewrite of the UK pilot. One factor was the worry that the characters and setting would be too confusing if they were introduced cold, so an Americanized version of the UK pilot would give first-time viewers something familiar to help ease the transition. The other big factor was simply that it would take less time to adapt a pre-existing script than to write a new one, so they could produce the pilot more efficiently.