OK. Now we know the consequences if we don’t watch this show. So we all know where we need to be in March of next year, right?

Starz new comedy “Party Down” has been a lot of fun, despite my initial worries about it being yet another show about show business. But the show, which revolves around a crew of a catering company who all have other aspirations (or once had them, in one case), nicely reflects the outer edges of the Hollywood dream. Meaning: you might as well not be having one. There’s a little talk about audtions and scripts but very little about showbiz egos, power or anything of that sort.

The amazing cast helps a lot here to including the State’s Ken Marino as Ron, a former druggie now cleaned-up and responsible for managing the employees. Even his aspiration to be a franchise owner of a all-you-can-eat soup and salad restaurant seems as far away as selling a script or getting a role. Also a part of the crew is Jane Lynch who has pretty much stolen scene from every great comedy from the past five years.

Plus, being on the premium cable channel Starz, they can get away with a bit more than your network sitcoms. But there’s a slight test of that tonight as the show tilts into risky territory with the grew catering the after party for a porn industry award show. A real danger for cheap gags ahead there.

Despite advertising they can’t show you much of this episode in their own promos, Starz seems to have no problem throwing a lot of it up on the old YouTube. This clip below made me think they might avoid those traps. It’s the aforementioned Ron getting asked about becoming a porn star because of his large penis, but the producer is played as more of an investor than a sleazeball.

We’ll see tonight when Party Down airs on Starz at 10:30 PM.

You can find the find the full first episode of the show after the jump.

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HBO’s given the second season premiere to Funny or Die to share for free a month early. I had actually forgotten where we had left the boys, so I was glad for the reminder at the beginning. Murray’s a successful manager of the The Crazy Dogggz and the Conchords are his second most important clients - i.e. not important at all.

I know the show is meant to be a bit more episodic, but I was actually a little bummed to see everything returned back the way it was. Not that there isn’t a lot to do with the regular situation of Bret and Jermaine being managed by an equally unsuccessful Murray, but having a successful music group to pay against might have made for some fun storylines.  Particularly with Mel, who changed her allegiances (right? the burning of the merchandise played to me like jilted Dogggz fan rather than loyal Conchord booster). It probably be a little difficult to have Todd and Demetri for those episodes anyway.

But that’s the balance of something like this - the fun isn’t necessary in plotlines - it’s in letting the little world get broken and fixing it again every week. It even become part of the joke, with references to Bret leaving the band every week. You have to pick your playground.

A good way for two comedy nerds to kill an hour is to argue if the American or British version of The Office are better. Though most of my love is for the American version, one of the few flaws in it I think are the result of how prime time is divided. For something like the Office, a 30-minute block just won’t do and the hour is just too much (mainly because it has to be structures to split in half for syndication).

I think many could argue that the British version has more depth and more pain, but from what I’ve seen of the deleted scenes from the American Office, they got it. They essentially are writing the British version and then having to slice it out.

What’s brought this to my mind isn’t newly-posted producer’s cut of last week’s “Frame Toby” episode. Though it definitely demonstrates some of the flaws of trying to keep the show contained to thirty minutes with commercials time. At a little over 14 minutes in, having Toby siting at his desk, wishing that he had punched Michael is a wonderful little joke fully within the character’s pathetic sadness and instantly relateable.  Just these brilliant little moments - which to me are what The Office is all about. They give me that recognition laugh that’s kind of rare in TV where I go, “Yep, I’ve been there.”

What brought this to my mind mostly was this cut scene from the previous episode where Pam shows Jim her design class work from New York. Here it is:

Now so much with the jokes in here, other than anybody-could-make-it joke that Jim does about sleeping with the professor. What I love about is how the little scene highlights that talent is really hard to direct, to put in the right place. That being good at something doesn’t mean you know exactly what to do with it.

But even more frustrating to me is how, as it stands with the just TV watchers, Pam isn’t good at art. They didn’t catch this little moment which tells you that Pam is talented and makes her decision to stay in Scranton and not explore more questionable. (Sure her art school buddy said she was good, but that scene could just as easily read that he’s trying to get with her).

It’s something that I’m sure they’ll address in a later episode, but I’d rather have it now in all its complexities.

Though the DVD Set for 30 Rock’s second season collects far fewer episodes due to the writers’ strike from earlier this year, this is one extra on the set that burst directly from the strike. As a benefit for some of the crew earlier this year, the 30 Rock cast had a benefit performance of Episode 208 “Secrets and Lies” (at the time an upcoming episode) at the UCB.

It was a highly-sought ticket. But it’s available in full on the disk. As Tina Fey warns, the audio isn’t perfect, but it’s a real kick to see people like Alec Baldwin on the UCB Stage. Here’s a small, small snippet of it featuring Tina Fey and Jane Krakowski.

And here’s just a favorite deleted scene, where Alec Baldwin looking for an executive position at a dot com.

Though I love the Office, I believe a half hour is the right dosage. Good to see it back, don’t stay so long when you show up again.

The construct of this episode was clever: Dunder-Mifflin is holding a weight loss contest for each of its branches, the prize being extra vacation days. Each act gave us one week in the life of the employees. So for once we can see the whole summer rather than getting what happened dealt out over the course of an episode. Less surprises, but a bit more real.

Michael & Holly: The major dorkiness (“Exsqueeze Me” and “Dreadmill”) and parallels between this pair are wonderful, even though when Holly embarrasses herself it comes more from her humanity - she’s actually well-meaning rather than clueless (with Oscar but more disastrously with Kevin). They’re not as funny as Michael’s mistakes, but you can’t have her be a carbon copy of him. It ruins any shot of rooting for Michael to be with her rather than Jan.

With Holly as HR person, I think we’ll probably see Dwight or someone else be the cause of sudden Office staff meetings for some time. If Holly has to go through what Toby went through, there’s no way they could make this work out either. She’ll just have to get hints about how clueless Michael is by having him miss perfectly good opportunities with her - like tearing up those tickets. Sigh.

Pam & Jim: It’s hard to keep a stable relationship like this interesting without introducing tension between the pair, but thankfully they still don’t want to go that way. There’s still good fun to be had by Michael getting involved in it (Michael trying to kiss Pam, Michael stealing their live chat session, Michael throwing condoms at Jim)

Of course, that doesn’t mean they’re not going to misdirect us on by making it look like there’s already another love interest in Pam, along with the typical problems with long distance relationships. But in the end Receptionitis and Jim9334 got engaged. Good for them.

My favorite thing in this episode came from this story. When Pam discovers she’s in the wrong class, she can’t bring herself to leave because the teacher draws attention to her. It’s a wonderful telling detail about who Pam is - that despite her own new-found confidence and excitement, it’s not a natural to her. And she can very easily fall back to a default setting of comfort in something that’s not working. Foreshadowing? Good bad font joke too.

Angela, Andy & Dwight: Strangely one of the things about hour episodes is sometimes not much happens. This storyline in particular was just repeating the same beats over and over again. Andy excited about wedding plans shares them with Angela. Angela Pavlovian dials Dwight. They have sex downstairs is the shipping area. Repeat. (I kind of wish they put Andy’s line about wanting to have washboard abs the first time Angela sees me naked around one of these - it’d up the sad funny. She’s not even sleeping with Andy!)

Repetition is a great tool for comedy, even when its abused - see Austin Powers - but here’s its not really played for laughs, it’s story. I don’t think it helps much that we see very little of the human side of Dwight throughout much of the rest of the episode. Angela has a couple moments of regret, but they go nowhere. There’s no reason to explode this story with Andy finding out… but something?

Still great lines from Angela: “I have a finaceé I very much like!” and “I have a nice comforter and several cozy pillows. I usually read a chapter of a book and it’s lights out at 8:30. That’s how I sleep at night!”

Others: Ryan’s back. And he hasn’t learned anything. Love how Jim can see right through him. Seeing him trying to grovel back to his initial status with Kelly gave me more than a little joy. And the goatee stuff means we’ll see more of Michael’s strange attachment and also Dwight’s desperate attempts to curry favor.

The runners were hit and miss. Stanley’s weight loss didn’t make me laugh much. But Kelly’s crazed attempts to lost weight were given a little poignancy in Michael’s “this big fat pig is beautiful” meeting (of course they’re immediately undercut in the next act). That one alone makes me glad they have such a deep bench for when NBC makes them do an hour like this one.

Best Dark Joke I’ve Heard in a While: Jan expressing disappointment that her candles won’t be used for any more midnight vigils: “Oh, they found her?”

Longest Payoff After a Setup: Holly’s revealing that she believes Kevin is mentally challenged while defending him from Angela. Is there a worst person to have judging you than Angela?

Most Pathetic Man in the Universe: Toby. No Costa Rica beach for him. Christ, it’d be sad if it wasn’t so funny.

Obscure Reference I’m Going to Make You Re-watch the Episode For: What the hell happened to the Nashua branch? They were up by like 8 pounds at one point. I guess Karen in Utica is a real good motivator.

Oh and speaking of the Nashua Branch. They sort of fit into this cut clip from the episode:

Sitcoms haven’t had much luck in recent years, so the exception of something like “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia” makes me wonder why more shows aren’t following in its footsteps. The refreshing non-Hollywoodness of the setting and the completely willingness to have the characters take actions that are beyond the pale, like tonight’s episode where characters get addicted to human flesh. Here’s a clip that sort of teases that setup.

It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia premieres its 4th season tonight at 10 PM on FX.