The Office’s Stanley Hudson said the things we always wanted to say
By John Buhler
Stanley Hudson is known for never holding back
Nobody on The Office spoke his mind more clearly than Stanley Hudson.
Stanley may have awoken every morning in a bed that was too small, driven his daughter to a private school that was too expensive and then headed to a job where he was paid too little, but earth be damned, he was going to celebrate most extravagantly for Pretzel Day. The man lived for that day. He still had a sliver of hope in his life. God bless him.
Did he stutter? No, because Stanley never had a problem speaking his mind under any circumstance. To look a colleague in their face and say, “have you lost your mind because I’ll help you find it”, knowing awkward confrontation was inevitable takes a special kind of person to execute that phrase. You are a better man than me, Stanley Hudson. You are the gold standard.
Stanley Hudson always wanted you to know that you were not special
Swimming in a sea of professional idiots, all we wanted for him was to amass enough Stanley Nickels so he could go full-blown Florida Stanley and never have to speak to Dwight Schrute again. Everybody knew that Stanley Nickels were the preferred Dunder-Mifflin fiat office currency over Schrute Bucks. I’m pretty sure a billion allows you to relocate to sacred Tallahassee.
Stanley always called it as he saw it, as he was The Office’s undisputed point guard, blessed with the handles we can only describe as the Bob Cousy of Scranton. One hand, that’s all. Why bother passing to someone you know is going to fail you? Keep in mind that you are the star of your own reality show. Stanley never forgot what viewpoint mattered the most to him.
So with The Office leaving Netflix for Peacock to hang out forever with all other NBC properties, we must remember all the times Stanley just let it rip in that office. Were most of his patented remarks ill-willed and mean-spirited? Oh god, yes, but that is why we loved Stanley so much. He was there in-person to help us navigate through the Clown Show of Life.
Stanley is proof that not all superheros wear capes. Some in fact wear a suit and tie and quite literally push paper for a living. Stanley was never a man to apologize, unless he thought we was wrong. If you did not believe his apology was sincere, then you can shove it up your butt!
His never-ending quest to be on jury duty every year since his 18th birthday was the American Dream we never realized was a thing. Sure, it would have paid him less than a day at the office, but to be in a room with other people and be paid to judge someone with consequences. Oh, that was so up Stanley’s alley. He was the spokesman for how great jury duty is!
While there were other characters on The Office who had more meaningful screen time than him, we could always count on Stanley to make us laugh, with one heat-check performance after another.
The guy did not even have to say a word to get his point across in most instances. His facial expressions of never being thoroughly amused by perpetual nonsense spoke volumes every single time. Those may have been the most relatable moments of the entire show. He was the Mozart of rolling one’s eyes, a freaking prodigy!
Stanley was a man of a different generation, one who was not corrupted by participation trophies or gold stars. Nobody under the age of 40 these days conducts business this abruptly because we all want to be friends with everybody, even though we not-so-secretly hate each other. Stanley did not care, so long as the checks cleared and got that pretzel once a year.
We vicariously lived through Stanley’s bluntness and we will always be grateful for that.
Watch Stanley one last time on Netflix.