The Office US spin-off officially picked-up but action is moving away from Dunder Mifflin

The long-in-the-works follow-up to The Office US has officially been greenlit.

It won’t be a reboot of the Steve Carell series nor is it technically a spin-off in that it doesn’t follow any of the beloved characters from the American series that ran from 2005 to 2013.

But it does exist in the same narrative universe with the link being the documentary crew that had been embedded within the Dunder Mifflin Scranton branch (the people person’s paper people) now following a “dying historic Midwestern newspaper and publisher trying to revive it with volunteer reporters”.

Irish actor Domhnall Gleeson and The White Lotus season two breakout star Sabrina Impacciatore have previously been reported as attached to the project from The Office US creator Greg Daniels. It’s set to go into production in July.

Daniels has been teasing the possibility of returning to the world of The Office for some years as fans clamoured for a reboot or the like. The Office, when it was streaming on Netflix in the US, was consistently among the most-watched series.

Before The Office, Daniels worked on iconic series including King of the Hill, Saturday Night Live and The Simpsons. He also co-created Parks and Recreation and since The Office, worked on the very good Upload and not so good Space Force.

The new series has been picked up by US streamer Peacock, which has no direct correlation in Australia. Peacock’s original programming has wound up on a raft of Australian services including Stan, Binge, Amazon Prime and 7Plus.

The Office had previously attempted a spin-off series that was to follow Dwight Schrute’s adventures on his family beet farm (Beets, Bears, Battlestar Galactica!). The project was to be called The Farm and it was the brainchild of Rainn Wilson and actor and writer Paul Lieberstein.

Wilson had said at the time, “It could be really cool because it would be on [Dwight’s] farm, which would be a bed and breakfast, and it would have a crazy menageries of characters. It would be even more far out and weirder than The Office.”

They shot a pilot with actors including Majandra Delfino, Thomas Middleditch and Matt Jones but the TV network, NBC, opted to not pick it up. The footage was then incorporated into the final season of The Office and aired as episode 17 with additional scenes filmed to tie it back into the main series.

And for any fans who want more of The Office, there’s also the Australian version still in the works. The project was confirmed last year with Felicity Ward cast as the lead and Shari Sebbens, Pallavi Sharda and Firass Dirani in supporting roles.

The series started filming in June 2023 and is the 13th adaptation of the original UK series from Stephen Merchant and Ricky Gervais. Other versions have been made in Israel, Poland, Sweden, Saudi Arabia, India and more.

The Australian series is due for release this year on Amazon Prime.