Let me start off by saying
that as I’ve reflected on this episode in preparation for writing this review,
I had a really hard time deciding exactly how I feel about it, which is one of
the reasons why I’m several days late on posting this review. Don’t get me
wrong, I loved this episode as I was watching it; it’s just that the way this
episode ended was a major let down to a certain extent, and I also have several
other issues with this episode that I’ll address later in this review.
While the writers took a
break from focusing heavily on the post-kiss drama between Jess and Nick in the
previous episode, they went back to focusing very heavily on the aftermath of
their kiss in this episode, especially when it comes to the awkwardness that
their first kiss as well as their subsequent make out sessions has created
between them.
Personally, I found the
whole thing with Nick randomly putting his hand on Jess’ breasts at several
different points throughout the episode rather funny. It reminded me a lot of
the character Dr. Fitch Cooper on Nurse Jackie and the whole thing with his
sexual Tourette’s where he will randomly grab women’s breasts. For the record,
Cooper is one of my favorite characters on Nurse Jackie, which is a part of why
I thought Nick doing that in this episode was so funny, but I digress.
The more that I think about
this episode, the more I realize just how mixed my thoughts on this episode
are. On the one hand, this episode had a lot of funny moments throughout it,
especially between Jess and Nick. However, at the same time the way things
ended between Jess and Nick at the end of this episode is the main thing that
makes my reaction to the episode so mixed. One thing that I find myself
thinking about a lot is how poorly the ending of this episode was handled
compared to the endings of the episodes “Cooler”, “Marriage” and “Quick
Hardening Caulk” and how great the buildup to the end of the Jess and Nick’s
storylines in those storylines were handled. With this episode, it kind of felt
like the writers were trying to build up to some big moment, but once Russell
looked at what Jess and Nick had written on the cards when he asked them what
they thought their relationship was, I feel like this episode really collapsed.
Another issue that I have
with this episode is that I don’t think the episode had a very good flow to it.
If there’s one thing that I think really hurt the flow of this episode aside
from the way the episode ended, I think it would be the whole thing about Jess
and Nick repeatedly flip-flopping about whether or not they were on a date.
Towards the start of the episode, Nick pretty much decided that he was going to
ask Jess out on a date when he was talking to Tran (The silent old Asian man
from the episode “Menzies”) in the park and he even practiced asking Jess out
with him, and what he was planning to say to Jess was actually pretty sweet,
especially for Nick. However, the writers immediately followed up the scene
between Nick and Tran with Nick going to ask Jess out on a date, only to end up
coming across as a total idiot, making Jess think that he was only asking her
if she wanted to hang out as friends.
Things continued to get
increasingly complicated when their date started and Nick insisted that it
wasn’t a date when Jess asked him what he thought the evening was. As if that
wasn’t enough to make the whole situation even more awkward than it already was,
they ran into Jess’ ex-boyfriend, Russell, from last season who instantly
assumed that they were on a date. They quickly became obsessed with Russell’s
reaction to seeing them together, which is what prompted them to start
flip-flopping back and forth on whether or not they thought they were on a date
or just hanging out together. Personally, I thought their indecisiveness
regarding the situation was kind of funny, but it also came across as being
rather bizarre, which definitely contributed to the ending of the episode
falling flat on its face in my opinion.
One person on IMDB suggested
that the whole thing with Nick meeting a guy at the bar where he works who
claimed to be him from the future and told him that he was going to do something
to hurt Jess in the future back in the episode “Katie” is going to end up being
connected to the whole thing with the cards in this episode. Personally, I
would really like it if that were the case, and if it is, that might make me change
my mind regarding my thoughts on this episode. If I had to guess, Nick wrote
something about this whole situation with Jess being just about sex or some
kind of casual fling. Personally, I think that Jess is more into Nick at the
moment, while Nick isn’t quite sure what he wants when it comes to Jess.
However, I suppose that I could be wrong and that Nick wrote something more
profound such as a relationship or as one person on IMDB suggested, “The One”,
while Jess was the who wrote something indicating that she’s not looking at
what’s going on between them as being too serious, especially since Jess has
repeatedly pointed out things that bug her about Nick and his tendency to be
very immature and irresponsible at times.
If that’s the case, I don’t
think that Jess would necessarily not actually be into Nick, but perhaps she
only wrote something about things not being very serious between them in order
to protect herself emotionally. That might also be why she dressed up very
casually for their date while Nick really wanted to look nice for it. The other
reason why I think Jess either doesn’t view things between her and Nick being
very serious, or simply doesn’t want to think of them as being very serious,
which is possibly why she decided that she wanted institute “middle school
dance rules” between them. Regardless, it will definitely be interesting to see
if the whole thing with what they wrote on the cards will be revisited in the
future, and I’m guessing that it will be.
One of the best things about
this episode for me personally is all of the recurring jokes that they made
references to, such as Nick’s relationship with Tran and how he has one-sided
conversations with him. I love that it was a one-sided conversation with Tran
that prompted him to ask Jess out on a date. The writers also referenced the
whole thing with Nick not liking fish and Nick’s infatuation with Russell, as
well as the whole thing with Winston not being good at playing pranks on people
due to the fact that his ideas for pranks are either too over-the-top or they
are really stupid and insignificant.
I really enjoyed the whole
subplot with Winston and Schmidt trying to sabotage Jess and Nick’s date,
because they were worried what would happen if Jess and Nick became a couple,
and in their minds Nick is apparently the glue that holds the dynamic in the
loft together. However, there were also quite a few rather awkward moments throughout
their storyline that were simply beyond bizarre and not one bit funny, in my
opinion. Winston and Schmidt had trouble coming up with ideas for how to ruin
Jess and Nick’s date, mainly because Winston is terrible at playing pranks on
people. They finally came up with an idea for a way to ruin Jess and Nick’s
date by getting Outside Dave to sing Sir George Michael’s song “Father Figure”
to Jess and Nick while they were on their date, because that apparently
happened to Winston once when he was on a date with a girl.
They even showed a flashback
of the incident where an overweight African American man was singing that song
to Winston and the girl he was on a date with. There was also another flashback
of the guy singing another song to them during the end credits. I have to say those
flashbacks were just bizarre to watch, and I didn’t find them the least bit
funny. Usually, I love the flashbacks/cutaways that they have a New Girl, but I
absolutely hated those. They reminded me a lot of a lot of the cutaways that
Family Guy has done involving Peter. Most of the time I love the cutaways they
do on Family Guy, but I pretty much always hate Peter centric cutaways, because
they usually drag on way too long for my taste, which was definitely the case
with the flashbacks of Winston on a date with a girl, but I digress.
Unfortunately, their plan
got derailed after Outside Dave locked himself in their bathroom. One thing led
to another and Schmidt decided to break into the bathroom by going through a
window on the roof. However, he ended up dangling from the rooftop window and
Outside Dave started shaving Schmidt’s legs, which is just…beyond bizarre.
Anyway, Winston broke into the bathroom through the door after Schmidt started screaming
in terror and the whole experience helped Winston and Schmidt realize that
their friendship would be just fine with or without Nick. While I found most of
the Winston and Schmidt storyline beyond bizarre instead of being funny, I still
got some enjoyment out of it, especially when it comes to the conversation that
they had after Winston rescued Schmidt from Outside Dave.
All in all, my thoughts on
this episode are very mixed at the moment, but based on some of the spoilers
that I’ve read for upcoming episodes, I’m thinking that my thoughts on this
episode may change once I see how the rest of the season plays out. I say this
because I kind of got the feeling that this episode is meant to serve as the
setup for some potential drama between Jess and Nick in the future. The more
that I think about this episode, the more I would describe what I thought of
this episode as bizarre if I had to describe in the episode in just one word. While
my thoughts on this episode are rather mixed, especially when it comes to
Winston and Schmidt’s storyline, it still had quite a few great moments, both
in the comedic sense and in a more sentimental sense, which I found very
enjoyable.
That being said, I give this
episode a rating of B-.
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