When I first started seeing trailers for New Girl, it looked like a typically mundane sitcom replete with wacky characters and annoying one-liners. But after watching the first few episodes, the show slowly started to reveal something very endearing, almost special, at its heart. These unique qualities quickly imploded Season 3 and on, but let's revisit the beginning and talk about what I found so lovely at the start.
- Nick. Jake Johnson shines as the grumpy, caustic, turtle-faced old man at heart. Genuinely makes me laugh as he shouts and complains about...pretty much everything. His facial expressions are gold as he groans and cowers from life's miseries.
- Schmidt and the Douchebag Jar. Schmidt and his driving moccasins. Schmidt and his hair chut-a-ney.
- Jess is not a Manic Pixie Dream Girl. Deschanel admittedly plays this role often, but not here. She's quirky, but everyone is aware of it, and instead of automatically falling in love with her quirkiness, people generally are either annoyed by it or just ignore it completely. Jess gets called out on it constantly, which brings me to...
- The "Jess and Julia" episode. Such an important episode in the ever-widening landscape of what people understand feminism to mean. Being a strong woman does not mean you have to be a tomboy, or physically strong, or mean, or into sports. You can be a strong woman and still like the color pink. It's something I've struggled with, and I'm sure many women out there have too. Here, you've got the pant-suit wearing lawyer Julia, who mocks Jess for making desserts and stopping for birds. And here is Jess's awesome response: "I break for birds. I rock a lot of polka dots. I have touched glitter in the last 24 hours. I spend my entire day talking to children, and I find it fundamentally strange that you're not a dessert person. That's just weird and it freaks me out! And I'm sorry I don't talk like Murphy Brown and I hate your pant suit. I wish it had ribbons on it or something to make it just slightly cuter. And that doesn't mean that I'm not smart and tough and strong!"
- The devolution of Winston. At first, it's a matter of the writers struggling to figure out how Winston fits in with the rest of the group. There are some half-hearted attempts at storylines for him that just don't work hold the viewers interest. Finally, the writers decided, if he can't fit in, he's going to do the opposite. And then Winston just becomes...weird. And becomes a character in his own right because of it.
- It's just such a sincerely sweet show, with this group of friends navigating the unlikely premises of life: Jess being quirky in a world that doesn't want her to be, Schmidt facing the consequences of being a douche, Nick hating everything, Winston not knowing how exactly he fits in so he just becomes as weird as possible, and Cece, well, I hate Cece, so whatever.
- The Fancyman saga, which birthed the enigmatic drinking game, "True American." Play at home at your own risk.
- The episode, "Injured." A sincere and earnest story. Love the moment Jess breaks character and decides to "get real" after Nick rags on her for being too cutesy. The night on the beach where everyone contemplates about what is meaningful to them in life. The sweet scene at the end where this group of friends comes together and implicitly pledges to take care of one another.
- Nick and Jess. I know, I know, the tired, "we hate each other but we secretly love each other" trope. But where it is tiresome and not believable in other sitcoms, it somehow works here. And that is partly because we were able to flesh out the characters and root for them individually before any of the romantic tension started, so when they finally did start hinting at it, we could understand why, and see their inherent compatibility. I feel like, besides the physical chemistry between the two (oh man, that first kiss, am I right?), there is a genuine connection between personalities that makes it so much more than the "Ross and Rachel" of New Girl. It was refreshing to see their romance addressed so soon in the show, and disappointing when they ruined everything good about them in Season 3.
- The monkey cracker video
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