Friday, September 27, 2013

What I’m Watching: New Girl


New Girl: Season 3, Episode 2 “Nerd” (B+)

There are times at which this show’s plotlines aren’t entirely creative or logical, but it manages to be terrific and hilarious anyway. Jess not fitting in with her fellow teachers at a new school made sense, and I liked the casting of two familiar comedy faces in new and different roles. Seeing Angela Kinsey from “The Office” as an adult mean girl rather than a stuck-up strange woman was fun, and the same was true of Dreama Walker, transplanted from “Apartment 23” overexuberance to a more controlled and cruel bullying teacher. The fact that Nick invited them to his bar to help Jess become popular was great, as was his later action of breaking into the principal’s backyard with Jess so that he could be her partner in crime. They’re a sweet couple, even dorkier together than they are individually. Schmidt’s continuing two-girl crisis doesn’t seem to be approaching its end anytime soon, but this episode did deal with it in a fun way that gave us the opportunity to see Eva Amurri again as Schmidt’s workplace nemesis who is very much aware of the fact that he’s simultaneously dating two women. His box-size “Mad Men” imitation office was entertaining, and I like how he unintentionally tricked Cece and Elizabeth into thinking the other was there for a perfectly natural reason and that there was no reason to suspect anything else. Winston’s bizarre reactions continue to be terrific, and I love that his first instinct was to murder Daisy’s cat when he realized she didn’t want to be exclusive. It’s rare to see him stand up for himself, and that was a welcome treat.

No comments: