While many of The Office’s popular characters went through job, life, and personality changes throughout the sitcom, no character evolved quite as dramatically as Jan Levinson.
When Jan is first introduced, she is a composed and professional businesswoman who acts as the Vice President of Northeast Sales for Dunder Mifflin. By the end of the series, however, she is an erratic, wild-spirited executive with a mind set on revenge. How did she get there? It’s time to find out.
Here is how Jan’s character developed and changed throughout The Office.
Though Jan claims she’s not ready for a new relationship after her difficult divorce, she ends up pursuing a relationship with Michael Scott even though she is his superior.
Jan has a difficult time admitting that she wants to be with Michael due to his eccentric nature and her high position in the company, but she nonetheless, if not a bit reluctantly, takes a shot. Unfortunately, the dynamic between the two goes downhill quickly.
Soon after Michael and Jan begin dating, she starts to take unhealthy control of him, valuing his presence more than his person.
Michael loves Jan in a romantic way, but she becomes obsessed with him in a sexual way, frequently pressuring him to do things he’s uncomfortable with. While at David Wallace’s house for a party in “Cocktails," Jan drags Michael into the bathroom for a steamy make-out sesh. This confuses him as to the nature of their relationship.
As Jan’s personality starts to derail, so do her clothing choices.
When viewers first meet Jan, she wears professional suits. Her makeup is tasteful and her hair is perfectly curled around her shoulders. However, right as Michael is pondering leaving her in Season 3, she shows up with breast implants that convince him to stay with her.
From this moment on, Jan continues to wear more revealing outfits. Even in Season 9 when she’s regained an executive position, her white dress shirt features a noticeably plunging neckline.
Dunder Mifflin finds out that Jan is abusing corporate policies, so they fire her. This causes her to move into Michael’s condo and drain him both emotionally and financially in Season 4.
Jan doesn’t do much and spends her free time working on her scented candle business. However, she’s not good at putting her plans into action and treats candle-making like a hobby more than a serious business venture.
The only thing worse than a lazy Jan is a Jan who actually tries. This is because her entire personality (not just her romantic life) starts to unhinge after her divorce.
Jan has no problem making her Season 4 "Dinner Party" guests uncomfortable as tension grows between her and Michael. She also freely releases Michael's private diaries to Dunder Mifflin and claims the company let her go due to her breast augmentation. Even later in the series when she gains a little more footing, she retains the self-centered, side of her personality, caring little about those around her.
Michael isn’t the only lover Jan takes on throughout the course of the series. In addition to liking men less powerful than her, Jan develops a thing for guys who are several years younger than her.
It is implied that Jan had a fling with her assistant, Hunter. Hunter is sad to see Jan get fired, and in "Dinner Party,” she plays a song recorded by his band that suggests they were once together.
One of the reasons Jan originally split up with her ex-husband was because she wanted to have children but he didn’t. She gets her wish in Season 4 after using a sperm donor to become pregnant.
Jan gives birth to a daughter she names Astrid. Though Michael anticipates Astrid as if she were his own child, he eventually realizes that he has no connection to her.
Though Jan is absent during Season 6, she reappears in Season 7 as a hospital administrator. After all, she has to support her daughter somehow.
Jan looks to be successful in her position. Though she remains coarse and domineering, she seems to fit into her work environment just fine by expressing her inner feelings through creative outlets.
Though not the largest part of her character, it is frequently implied that Jan is interested in music, which is first revealed when Jan wishes Hunter good luck with his band. It's later confirmed in Season 5 when Jan sings at her baby shower and in Season 7 when she records a Doris Day cover album and shows off her talent to Michael when he visits her new workplace.
Even later, Jan appears in Michael's movie Threat Level Midnight by taking on the role of a diva jazz singer.
While Jan never regains her status at Dunder Mifflin, she does manage to make a name for herself at the White Pages phone book company.
In the Season 9 episode “The Whale,” Jan prepares to reject David Wallace's business partnership as retaliation for firing her from Dunder Mifflin years earlier. However, her plans get put on the back burner after Dwight and Pam show up instead of David.
Dwight successfully scores Jan’s business by suggesting Clark as her personal liaison. Jan can’t resist.
