New Girl: ‘Virgins’

“Listen Nicky, you don’t have to do anything that you don’t want to do. I just want to make sure you don’t miss out on the things in life that are happening when you’re not thinking. Because believe you me, those are the best things in life.” – Walt Miller.

An easy indicator to judge whether a comedy is hitting, or not, is its ability to create quotable lines that have staying power combined with funny situations that don’t even need dialogue to be funny. What New Girl is able to do far more often than not is have a hilarious one-liner that you think will be the highlight of the episode until something happens a moment later that just topped it. It has been a good while since I laughed as frequently and consistently throughout an episode as I did with 'Virgins'.

It’s fairly easy to write normal moments, as well as completely absurd moments, the challenge lies for shows like New Girl in balancing them enough so that we don’t have to suspend disbelief(*) enough to laugh at the humor. So when fat, college Schmidt gets the impression that he needs a tub of lube for his “first time” we have enough previous knowledge about the character, and it isn’t an so unbelievable that it takes out of an inherently hilarious moment. As ridiculously bad as that fat suit looks on Max Greenfield it will be hard for any show to beat the physical comedy of a stoned Nick trying to help out a lubed-up Schmidt.

(*) The last 3 to 4 seasons of How I Met Your Mother are a prime example of a show that relies on ridiculous, elaborate situations to generate laughs which is why the show has become a complete shell of what it once was.

And while I won’t harp on it too much, there was just the right amount of heart contained within the overload of silly ‘Virgins’ contained. Flashbacks, when used well, are extremely effective for moments such as first meetings or to give us more of a character that no longer exists in present day, in this case Nick’s Dad. Nick obviously remembers the conversation he had with him while reminiscing about Winston’s first time and he was able to take the advice his Dad gave him and applied it to finally taking the plunge with Jess. It was a moment that didn’t seem forced and for that I am thankful. That being said, I can’t wait to see the aftereffects of opening this can of worms.

Since I mentioned earlier how quotable this show is, here’s a bunch of them and some other moments of note:

• “Sometimes I just sit in the stall and listen to you guys.” – Nick popping in on the bathroom conversation.
• “A Tuxedo is different than a suit”… “It is?!” – Schmidt informing Nick to his disappointment and surprise.
• Schmidt’s reaction to finding out Cece lost her virginity to Mick Jagger was perfect. Also, can something kind of sucky happen to Cece that is funny and not sad? (Babies, heartbreak).
• “I told you a million times, my arm was a magnet and the wall was magnetic.” – Nick justifying why he had to stay in the room when Schmidt brought his girlfriend back.
• Winston and Nick’s bizarre teenager voices were so funny. Did they use some sort of voice modifiers or were the actors actually able to sound so weird?
• “We work in the finance markets.” – Winston showing off to the hookers. Soon after he goes to explain what kind of virgin he is: “Aren’t you a virgin too? …. Just my penis baby. Just my penis.”
• “Do you sell cookies?...Not a cookie bar?” –Fat Schmidt.
• “Ugh. I’m sick of firemen always winning.” –Schmidt. I’d love to see the world through his eyes for a couple of minutes.

What did everyone else think? Comments are always welcome.