oh my God, she's acting kind of smug. LET'S CRUCIFY HER!!!!
So, if you can remember from a few posts ago, I'm not so much a fan of all the wank in the online Office community, especially when it comes to poor Pam. Yeah, I know it's rampant in every community, but the community of The Office is by far the one I'm most familiar with. So, here's my attempt to explain the way I feel about Pam Beesly this season and other seasons, and why I understand people defending her so passionately, and why I doubt the anti-S5ers are ever really going to convince me, especially since their entire response to S5 seems to be "it sucks because it's not S2." Seriously, I've seen Pam be attacked for saying "So suck it" in (I think) "The Surplus"... do people not REALIZE that was a call-back to "The Fire," where everyone freaked out when she first used it?!
First, a really big confession, and one that's really unpopular in Officeland: In S1, S2, and S3, I did not love Pam Beesly. Jenna played her really well, and of course I felt terribly sympathetic for her at times, but I was simply so frustrated at the way she treated Jim in S1 & S2 and the way she seemed stuck in a relationship that was clearly awful for her about 90% of the time. The way she was so passive and downright mopey and pathetic in S3 (up until "Beach Games") annoyed me. Like, honestly, when people crow about how great it was that Pam went back to get the beer she wanted in "Cocktails," that honestly doesn't do much to show me that they don't just want her to be a wallflower with horrible hair forever, because that's the way it was in S2.
I only got into The Office during the writers' strike, but I watched from the beginning until what they were up to in mid-S4 without reading any spoilers, and I was SHOCKED that it was Pam that broke things off with Roy. To me, that seemed more out-of-character than anything else she's done (except for a horrible deleted scene, my least favorite from the series actually, from "The Deposition" where she yells at Jim at his desk). I honestly thought S3 was going to be, I dunno, Pam would push off the wedding again, and Roy would get continually angrier at her, while Jim stayed at Scranton and subtly tried to win her over. Again, I didn't read any spoilers, so obviously I was horribly wrong, but whatever.
Pam changed in S4 and S5 (though not to the point where you can't recognize her, and I honestly think if she hadn't changed her hair and sort of her clothes, people wouldn't be so hostile). There's absolutely no doubt about it. But the thing with most of the community is that they seem to think change is BAD!!!! because it makes things NOT LIKE S2!!!!! The thing is, and here's sort of my thesis here, Pam made an effort to change. She got out of her shitty and emotionally-damaging relationship, made her own life, made an effort to get better at something she loves, got a great new boyfriend directly because of the positive changes she made. The show never seemed to look down on the way she was beforehand, though it did, understandably, look down on the fact that she was with a man who was clearly no good for her at all.
Pam's changes mirror changes of anyone who genuinely changed their life for the better, by dumping something that was badly holding them back and just... going out for something that, again, was better. Even if Pam wasn't with Jim now, she would be better just for gaining confdence. I think she's also been affected by the way her boyfriends have treated her; Roy treated her like crap, so she acted like a woman who deserved that, and Jim treats her like a princess, so she acts like a woman who deserves that.
Ugh. As ever, when I try to explain my point-of-view, it's not so articulate. Basically, though, it's unfair to criticize Pam for changing. Of course she changed; she made herself change. It's just like when people quit jobs they hate, or stand up to frenemies who make them feel badly about themselves. But to me, she's still the same person underneath that she always was: kind if somewhat snarky and possessing a rather dry sense of humor, and above all, capable of immense love and sympathy. Almost all of us will change during our lives, but we'll also all be remarkably similar to the people we were originally.
And that's that, however inarticulately expressed.
