Here are all the stories behind the different personas used by Michael Scott from The Office. Michael (Steve Carell) served as the Regional Manager at Dunder Mifflin's Scranton branch throughout most of the series. Michael notably left the series in season 7 but The Office continued through season 9.
Michael had a unique sense of humor that some could describe as being juvenile at times. He also had very unconventional management methods. Michael's wild creativity often got the best of him as he had a tendency to develop alter egos as a way to get through to his employees. Some of these characters were created due to experiences in his personal life. Michael's love of stand-up comedy and notable figures in movies influenced many of the personas.
At times, it was very difficult to keep his Dunder Mifflin employees enthusiastic while working in the paper industry. In order to keep the employees entertained while at work, Michael created a number of notable aliases to obtain laughs. Some of the characters were better thought out than others but they were meant to get attention and to teach lessons even though some were highly offensive. Let's take a look back at all of Michael's various alter egos during The Office.
Agent Michael Scarn
The most prominent alter ego of Michael came in the form of Agent Michael Scarn, the hero of Michael's homemade movie, Threat Level Midnight. The script for the film was found by Michael's employees and later turned into a filmed project which was shown in a later episode of The Office. Michael portrayed the character he created, who was described as "part Bruce Wayne, part Bruce Willis, and part Bruce Vilanch." Agent Scarn was the best secret agent in the business.
Threat Level Midnight followed Michael Scarn after his wife, Catherine Zeta-Jone Scarn, was killed at the WNBA All-Star Game by Goldenface. The President enlisted Agent Scarn to go on a mission to find the bomb at the local NHL All-Star game. After training from Cherokee Jack, Agent Scarn learned how to defeat the villain, Goldenface. Scarn managed to hit the puck bomb out of the stadium and save all in attendance, once again becoming the hero. Agent Michael Scarn should not be confused with Michael's other persona, Detective Scarn, a character he used in his improv class.
Michael Scott’s Other “Michael” Personalities
Over the course of Michael Scott's arc in The Office, he used a number of other alter-egos that held on to his first name or a version "Michael." This could be due to Michael's lack of creativity at times when attempting to be funny or just the fact that he couldn't act quickly on his feet when creating new personalities. Here are his "Michael" inspired personalities:
- Prison Mike - In The Office season 3, Michael held a meeting to prove that prison wasn't more fun than Dunder Mifflin. To emphasize his point, Michael transformed into the purple bandana-wearing, Prison Mike. He tried to recount his time in prison as if he was in the Scared Straight! documentary. Prison Mike stated that the worst part about prison was the Dementors.
- Michael the Magic - During a cold open, Michael tried to magically escape a straight jacket to impress the office. The key he was hiding slipped out of his hand and was covered by Jim so it couldn't be found. After rolling around the floor, Michael the Magic got trapped in the straight jacket.
- Michael Klump - To prove that overweight people are people too, Michael wore an inflated sumo suit under a business suit for a weight-themed meeting.
- Michael Scotch - After Charles Miner cancelled Michael's anniversary party, Michael called David Wallace to complain. He couldn't get in touch with David so Michael became aggressive and transformed into Michael Scotch, claiming he kidnapped David's kid.
- Date Mike - Whereas normal Michael could be charming with women, Date Mike was his overly confident personality. While on a double date with Jim and Pam, Michael scared off his date but impressed another woman so he claimed the personality paid off.
- Mike Leno - As a fan of comedic legends, Michael did a parody of Jay Leno and referred to himself as Mike Leno.
- Mykonos - The alter ego of Mykonos was created with the help of Holly. The Greek character was used as a potential buys for Andy's new product.
- Michael Wonka - Michael dressed in a Willy Wonka-inspired suit when he developed a Golden Ticket promotion for Dunder Mifflin's clients.
- Michael Scarn - Based on his character from Threat Level Midnight, Michael Scarn was the fake lawyer he pretended to be in order to drive Prince Family Paper out of business in The Office season 5.
The Rest Of Michael Scott’s Alter-Egos
In addition to the "Michael" personalities, Michael introduced a number of other alter-egos during his time at the Dunder Mifflin Regional Manager. Many of the alter-egos only made one appearance but others returned multiple times such as Ping. Here are the rest of personalties used by The Office's Michael Scott.
- Ping - Probably the most offensive of Michael's alter-egos would be Ping, the Asian caricature that was based on Michael's Chinese food delivery man. Ping was introduced in the Dundies episode and made a few other appearances including the episode that focused on Michael leaving Scranton.
- Carnac - The character's name was never revealed but during the Dundies, Michael wore a jeweled turban during the awards show and said he based it on Johnny Carson's Carnac the Magnificent.
- Santa Bond - Also known as "Classy Santa," Santa Bond was Michael's version of the jolly figure during one of Dunder Mifflin's Christmas parties. He wanted to impress Holly so Michael wore a Kangaroo-style Santa hat, a dress shirt, a red jacket, and smoked a pipe.
- Orville Tootenbacher - The briefly mentioned character was a millionaire that farted popcorn.
- Reginald Poofta - There was not much known about the persona Reginald Poofta but he claimed to be developing the character when he ran into David Brent.
- Caleb Crawdad - Caleb was the persona that Michael used for the Southern murder mystery game that he played in The Office season 6.
- Blind Guy McSqueezy - The persona was created by Michael during his improv class so that he could feel up women.
- Lord Rupert Everton - The alter ego was a part of Michael's dream for if he ever needed to be in the United States Federal Witness Protection Program.
- Scranton Strangler - Michael pretended to be the Scranton Strangler in the same episode that he introduced Date Mike. The scene was cut from the episode but it could be found in The Office season 6 blooper reel.