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The Paper Season 1 first reviews point to a promising but uneven workplace comedy: the 10-episode Peacock series is warmer and more journalism-focused than The Office, yet it is not a direct replacement. Critics praised its newsroom premise and civic-media subject while faulting familiar jokes, inconsistent pacing, and franchise dependence.
Created by Greg Daniels and Michael Koman, The Paper follows the Toledo Truth Teller, a historic newspaper trying to survive inside a company that also owns a toilet-paper brand. Domhnall Gleeson plays earnest editor-in-chief Ned Sampson, while Oscar Nuñez returns as Oscar Martinez.
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Key takeaways
- The Paper Season 1 has 10 episodes, all released on Peacock on September 4, 2025.
- The series follows the struggling Toledo Truth Teller, where an earnest new editor tries to turn inexperienced employees into reporters.
- The Paper is connected to The Office through the same fictional documentary crew and Oscar Martinez, but it is not a continuation of the Dunder Mifflin story.
- According to Rotten Tomatoes in 2025, Season 1 held an 85% critic score from 106 reviews and a 70% audience score from more than 500 ratings.
- Early reviews generally approve of the journalism setting and the show’s warmth, while criticizing its uneven pacing, familiar mockumentary habits, and dependence on comparison with The Office.
- Peacock renewed The Paper for Season 2 in September 2025; Peacock’s official show hub linked to a Season 2 trailer on August 12, 2026.
What is The Paper about?
The Paper is a 10-episode workplace mockumentary about the Toledo Truth Teller, a historic Midwestern newspaper struggling to survive in a digital, click-driven media economy. Ned Sampson, a newly appointed editor-in-chief played by Domhnall Gleeson, tries to revive the paper with a staff drawn from advertising, circulation, accounting, and a toilet-paper division.
The premise places civic journalism beside a commercially successful corporate paper-products business. Enervate owns the Toledo Truth Teller as well as Softees, a toilet-paper brand, creating an intentionally absurd question: can a newspaper dedicated to public information compete inside a company whose more profitable products are literally made from paper? TIME’s review summarizes the fictional corporate logic as, “Enervate sells products made out of paper.”
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The newsroom’s stories involve local reporting, clickbait, advertorials, online competition, workplace rivalries, and the economics of keeping journalism alive. Episode storylines include a blogger with more readers than the paper, a dating-app scammer, product testing, conflict with the corporate owner, and the Ohio Journalism Awards. Rotten Tomatoes’ episode guide provides the season’s episode-level outline.
Is The Paper a sequel or a spin-off of The Office?
The Paper is a spin-off set in The Office universe, not a direct continuation of the Dunder Mifflin storyline. The same fictional documentary crew moves from Scranton to Toledo and begins filming a newspaper, while Oscar Martinez is the principal returning character. The new series has its own workplace, ensemble, conflicts, and central story.
The connection is therefore meaningful but limited. Viewers get familiar documentary conventions and one established character rather than a reunion of the original Office cast. Peacock’s release announcement describes the series as a new show set in The Office universe.
How is The Paper different from The Office?
The Paper changes the workplace and the comic target while retaining the mockumentary grammar. The most important difference is that the new show is about journalism’s public purpose and financial crisis, not paper sales, office hierarchy, and the interpersonal dysfunction of Dunder Mifflin.
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One free scan finds every outdated or missing driver and matches the right update for your exact hardware.Free scan · exact hardware match| Comparison | The Paper | The Office |
|---|---|---|
| Workplace | The struggling Toledo Truth Teller newspaper | The Scranton branch of Dunder Mifflin |
| Central manager | Ned Sampson, an earnest and inexperienced reformer | Michael Scott, an often inappropriate and self-involved manager |
| Main comic subject | Local journalism, clickbait, shrinking resources, and civic responsibility | Office hierarchy, workplace relationships, and everyday dysfunction |
| Corporate complication | The newspaper shares an owner with Softees toilet paper | The branch operates within a paper-sales company |
| Mockumentary style | Reaction shots and awkward pauses, plus title cards and archival-style material | Reaction shots, awkward pauses, direct-to-camera interviews, and documentary observation |
| Emotional tone | Warmer, kinder, and more openly hopeful | Often more uncomfortable and consistently driven by interpersonal cringe |
| Franchise link | Oscar Martinez and the returning documentary crew | The original Dunder Mifflin ensemble and its Scranton setting |
Ned is not simply a replacement Michael. Ned is socially awkward and overly enthusiastic, but his defining problem is inexperience and forceful idealism rather than deliberate self-centeredness. His efforts to make reluctant employees into journalists create the season’s central comic and emotional tension.
Greg Daniels, co-creator and executive producer, described the premise to Peacock this way: “It’s inspired amateurs trying to be reporters and making all the newbie mistakes that cub reporters make.” That idea gives The Paper a more specific engine than a generic office comedy.
Does The Paper have a strong cast?
The ensemble works because the staff members approach the failing newspaper from sharply different professional backgrounds. Ned’s reform campaign is not led by a room full of experienced reporters; it is assembled from employees who understand advertising, circulation, accounting, or corporate operations better than journalism.
| Actor | Character | Role in the newsroom |
|---|---|---|
| Domhnall Gleeson | Ned Sampson | The optimistic new editor-in-chief trying to revive the paper |
| Sabrina Impacciatore | Esmeralda Grand | The glamorous managing editor and Ned’s principal internal rival |
| Chelsea Frei | Mare Pritti | A former Stars and Stripes writer reduced to copying and pasting website stories |
| Melvin Gregg | Detrick Moore | An advertising employee pulled into volunteer reporting and workplace complications |
| Ramona Young | Nicole Lee | A circulation employee recruited as a volunteer reporter |
| Gbemisola Ikumelo | Adelola Olofin | An accountant and burnout figure gradually energized by Ned’s arrival |
| Alex Edelman | Adam Cooper | An enthusiastic, emotionally perceptive accountant |
| Tim Key | Ken | A corporate figure tied to Enervate and Softees |
| Oscar Nuñez | Oscar Martinez | The returning Office character, associated with accounting and the arts-and-leisure beat |
Mare provides one of the clearest emotional links to the profession. Her previous reporting career has been reduced to mechanical web production, and Ned’s arrival rekindles her interest in journalism. Adelola represents a different form of professional exhaustion, while Nicole and Detrick show how people without newsroom backgrounds can become useful—or dangerously overconfident—when asked to report.
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Oscar remains skeptical of the documentary crew, preserving one of the most recognizable links to The Office. Some critics find Oscar’s presence smart and organically funny; others see him as a franchise bridge inserted to reassure existing fans rather than a necessary part of the newspaper story.
What did the first reviews praise?
The strongest critical response concerns the decision to make journalism the subject. The Toledo Truth Teller gives the mockumentary format a timely workplace: reporters have to defend public-service work while management demands traffic, commercial partnerships, and financial results.
The Los Angeles Times review called the series “spot-on commentary about the state of journalism” and described the opening episodes as “clever, funny and charmingly clumsy.” The same review’s critic, Lorraine Ali, wrote, “The industry is collapsing like an old smoker’s lung.” The line is vivid, but the underlying point is serious: the show’s best material comes from treating newsroom decline as both a professional crisis and a source of comedy.
Rotten Tomatoes’ first-review roundup identified The Paper as both a spiritual cousin to The Office and a reinvention of the workplace-sitcom formula. The series is most effective when its familiar ensemble rhythms support a distinctly newspaper-centered conflict.
The documentary device also receives a modest update. Title cards, archival-style material, and commentary from the filming process can confirm or undermine what a character says. These additions do not reinvent the mockumentary, but they make the camera crew feel somewhat more involved than a silent observer.
Warmth is another recurring strength. The characters are flawed, but the comedy is usually interested in people who want their work to matter. That emphasis on kindness, hope, and professional purpose separates The Paper from the harshest forms of workplace cringe.
What did the first reviews criticize?
The largest problem is comparison pressure. The Paper inherits the documentary crew, the workplace-comedy lineage, and Oscar Martinez, so reviewers naturally measure its jokes and characters against a much more established show.
TIME characterized the series as comforting but familiar and called it a 2000s throwback. The Guardian criticized one-note dialogue and a lack of hilarity. The Daily Beast described the show as a likeable but disappointing copycat that had not yet found its own voice.
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The season is also uneven. More favorable reviews suggest that the characters and premise settle into place over time, with the later episodes and finale showing greater confidence. Less favorable reviews interpret the uneven pacing as evidence that the writing never fully resolves the conflict between familiar Office-style behavior and the new journalism setting.
The disagreement makes “does The Paper get better?” a matter of critical tendency rather than an objective guarantee. Several reviewers thought the series improved as it progressed, but the consensus does not say that every weak early episode becomes outstanding.
How funny is The Paper?
The Paper is funny in bursts, especially when newsroom ideals collide with digital metrics, corporate absurdity, and the confident mistakes of inexperienced reporters. The season is less consistently explosive than The Office, and viewers expecting a replacement for Michael Scott’s particular brand of chaos may find the comedy restrained or familiar.
The humor improves when the show focuses on its own subject matter: a blogger outperforming the newspaper, a commercial assignment masquerading as reporting, or employees trying to understand what readers actually need. The comedy is weaker when characters appear to be repeating recognizable mockumentary types without a fresh newspaper-specific complication.
Variety critic Aramide Tinubu, quoted in Rotten Tomatoes’ first-review roundup, offered the more optimistic assessment: “The series takes a moment to work out its kinks, but by the season finale, it has all the makings of being as witty and iconic as its predecessor.” That is a useful description of the upside, not a claim that Season 1 already reaches The Office at its peak.
What are the review scores for The Paper Season 1?
The early aggregate scores point to qualified approval rather than universal enthusiasm. According to Rotten Tomatoes in 2025, The Paper Season 1 had an 85% critic score based on 106 reviews and a 70% audience score based on more than 500 ratings. According to Metacritic in 2025, the season had a 66 Metascore based on 39 critic reviews and a 5.7 user score based on 52 user ratings.
| Aggregator | Critic result | Audience or user result | Basis and date |
|---|---|---|---|
| Rotten Tomatoes | 85% | 70% | 106 critic reviews; more than 500 audience ratings; 2025 |
| Metacritic | 66 | 5.7 | 39 critic reviews and 52 user ratings; 2025 |
Review-aggregator scores can change as additional reviews and ratings are added. The figures above describe the researched 2025 snapshot and should be rechecked before publication if they are displayed as current scores.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Where can you watch The Paper Season 1?
As of August 13, 2026, Peacock is the official streaming destination identified in the researched materials for The Paper Season 1. Peacock released all 10 episodes together on September 4, 2025, so viewers do not need to wait for a weekly Season 1 schedule. Peacock’s release announcement confirms the release date and platform.
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Stream The Paper on Peacock if you want to watch the complete first season through the show’s official streaming home. Subscription pricing, regional availability, and any current promotional terms can change, so check Peacock’s current service page before subscribing.
Will there be a second season?
Yes. Peacock renewed The Paper for Season 2 on September 3, 2025. Peacock’s official show hub also linked to an official Season 2 trailer on August 12, 2026. The available research confirms the renewal and trailer listing, but it does not establish a Season 2 episode count, release date, or story details. Peacock’s renewal announcement is the primary source for the renewal.
Is The Paper worth watching if you loved The Office?
The Paper is worth watching for The Office fans who want a warmer, more journalism-focused workplace comedy and can accept a show that is still developing its identity. It is not the best choice for viewers seeking a direct replacement for The Office or the same level of consistently explosive comedy.
The best reason to watch is the newsroom premise. The show asks whether local reporting can remain valuable when clicks, advertorials, corporate ownership, and shrinking resources determine what gets made. That subject gives the series its most distinctive stories and its strongest emotional stakes.
The fairest verdict from the first reviews is that Season 1 is a promising evolution of the workplace mockumentary: funny and charming in places, increasingly assured for some critics, but uneven and too dependent on its predecessor for others. The Paper works best when it stops trying to be the next The Office and becomes a comedy about people attempting to save a local newspaper.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is The Paper a sequel to The Office?
The Paper is a spin-off set in The Office universe, not a direct continuation of the Dunder Mifflin story. The series follows a new Toledo newspaper staff and brings back Oscar Martinez and the fictional documentary crew.
Does Oscar from The Office appear in The Paper?
Oscar Nuñez returns as Oscar Martinez in The Paper. Oscar is associated with accounting and the arts-and-leisure beat, and his skepticism toward the documentary crew remains part of his characterization.
Where can I watch The Paper Season 1?
Yes. All 10 episodes of The Paper Season 1 were released together on Peacock on September 4, 2025. Availability and subscription terms can vary by region and may change.
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Several reviewers thought The Paper became more confident as Season 1 progressed, especially toward the finale, but the improvement is not a universal critical verdict. The season remains uneven for some viewers.
The Bottom Line
Bottom line: The Paper Season 1 is a warm, journalism-centered workplace mockumentary with a promising premise and qualified critical approval. Watch it on Peacock if you want a connected but independent companion to The Office; do not expect a direct replacement or equally consistent comedy.
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