Rainn Wilson announced yesterday via Twitter that NBC has opted not to pick-up The Farm, the spin-off of The Office based around his character Dwight Schrute. A pilot episode was filmed, as a standalone episode of The Office that introduces Dwight’s family, and the episode will still air sometime in early 2013, giving us a glimpse of what the Dwight spin-off would have looked like. This means that Rainn Wilson will be sticking around for the rest of The Office’s final season, instead of leaving for his own show, which’ll make for a more fulfilling finale for fans in May.
The Farm was created by Paul Lieberstein (the former Office showrunner who plays Toby) and centered on Dwight and his family’s beet farm/B&B. Thomas Middleditch (The Campaign) played Dwight’s relaxed, pot-growing younger brother Jeb, Matt Jones (Breaking Bad) played cousin Zeke, Tom Bower (Die Hard 2) played Nazi grandfather Heinrich Manheim, Majandra Delfino (Roswell) played Dwight’s intellectual lefty younger sister Fannie who just got divorced, and an unknown kid actor played her 9-year-old son. Dwight’s cousin Mose wouldn’t have been featured on the new show because the guy that plays him, Parks and Rec co-creator/showrunnner Mike Schur, is busy with that job. We’ll get to meet these Schrute relatives in early 2013 when the Office episode that served as the Farm pilot airs.