Nick And Jess: Bad Friends

New Girl, S02E05

Jess went out with Cece for her birthday with her model friends and insulted Cece.  Schmidt bought Nick a cookie and was hurt that Nick didn't think about him sometimes.

The two stories where Jess and Nick acted like asses to their best friends wasn't bad, but it wasn't too funny.  I suppose it just interesting to see how little Jess valued Cece as a model and how little Nick valued all the things Schmidt does for him without asking.  I wasn't too surprised that Jess couldn't handle a night out with the models without putting someone down (she's shown us several times that she has ridiculously high standards sometimes), but I was surprised that Schmidt didn't already know that Nick displays emotion as often as a mop does.

With that being said, I didn't like Jess' story as much as Nick's.  I can't even think what would be my favorite part of that story because even when she was struggling to stand on the spinning platform for the model gig, I was just cringing at her awkwardness instead of laughing at it.  I guess I just liked that she finally recognized that Cece isn't just an airhead or shallow because she has befriended her model coworkers.  I don't know how Jess even gets on a high horse at any given time, considering how much of a consistent mess she is.

Now onto the slightly better story with Nick.  Of course, I agree that Schmidt should have spoken out about Nick neglecting him, but I couldn't believe how much he was pouting and bitching about it!  But I wasn't too bothered by him because Winston stepped in to take his side and was doing his own version of pouting as well.  I was just disappointed that Winston didn't take it to Schmidt's level because it would have been funnier than Schmidt doing it.  I mean, Schmidt started crying because Nick takes him for granted.  Really?

But my all time favorite moment of this episode was when Nick tried to repair the damage he had done (over the years, I suppose) by getting Schmidt a cookie.  I had a strange mixture of sympathy and ridicule for him after Schmidt told him that his cookie present was terrible:

All these tears from getting a cookie!  Nick was so adorable!  I never thought he would break down like that.  Way to save this episode, Nick.

Oh, and I did like seeing how Nick and Schmidt met for the first time.  It was so bizarre how they just kinda clicked even though Schmidt was just sitting in his room eating ramen for no reason.  Like their friendship was meant to be--they're both weirdos.

Next time I just hope there is a little less man love being thrown around.  I felt like they were almost acting like teenage girls, it was so emotional (inappropriately so--it was a damn cookie).  I'd rather them being doing something else crazy that doesn't involve their feelings and such.  And as for Jess, I want to get back to see what she's doing for employment.  I'd really like to see her teaching some unpleasant kids again.  That would definitely be good for some laughs.

I'm Worried For Marvin

How I Met Your Mother, S08E04

Lily and Marshall finally got some time to themselves, but decided not to spend much of it with their friends.  The two began getting fearful of their deaths and thought they should pick a guardian for Marvin just in case.  Robin, Ted, and Barney began vying for the title of Marvin's guardian.

I would have never guessed that this episode would have led to Lily and Marshall thinking about how they would die (except I did see a commercial for this episode last week).  Nor did I think that their friends would attempt such stupid tactics to win the responsibility of taking care of Marvin in the worst-case scenario.  I mean, all Robin and Ted did was bring big ol' bears.  They didn't put much effort into their bribery.  Barney, on the other hand, put some effort into making children's songs into bro-themed lyrics, but I couldn't see how that was supposed to impress anyone.  I know it's Barney, but still--what was that?  He has to think somewhere in his head that doing that wouldn't make Lily and Marshall snap their fingers and tell him he's the one.  Out of all of them, he could have used his money to actually buy less stupid gifts than teddy bears to bribe them.  It's puzzling.  And it wasn't too funny.

Later, I was a little excited to see Marshall pull out a huge game wheel because Marshall always has the funniest games.  Plus, it's just ridiculous that anyone would make one of those in the first place.  The time he used to make that could have been spent just talking and hanging out with his friends in the first place, but, hey.  Anyway, the categories weren't especially clever, nor were the "contestants' " answers.  We all knew that Barney wouldn't provide a decent answer for most things, but I do think his approach to helping Marvin heal a broken heart was kind of funny:

I know this hurts little buddy. But you will love again someday because time heals a broken heart. But not that bitches window.

But when you think about it, Barney felt like the better choice when you had Robin, being a little too frank about death, threatening to send Marvin to military school, and shamelessly buttering up Marshall by saying he was a stud when it came to sex and Ted, mostly using a damn puppet to explain things to Marvin and caving into his every whim the moment Marvin looked a little sad.  Although, I would still never choose him.  In short, they all seemed like they would be horrible parents.  At least, if we were thinking about each of them raising Marvin by themselves, I would be really concerned about what would happen to the kid.

So I thought maybe Marshall and Lily would see that they all weren't good guardians, but they surprisingly chose them all.  I didn't know you could do that.  And also, even if they raised Marvin together, he would be a complete mess.  They're good friends, but I don't think they would necessarily teach Marvin good life lessons so he wouldn't grow up to be all the bad parts of Ted, Robin, and Barney (that mishmash would be a monster).  But I guess since Marshall and Lily had no family they could agree upon, that was the best they could do.

I also want to say that I was a little shocked that Marshall told his friends that Marvin wasn't one of the most important things in their life, but was the most important thing.  Perhaps one's child is to many parents, but to say that straight up to your friends would still feel like a slap in the face.  I had to share Ted and company's feelings when they walked out after that.  I don't ever think I've seen Marshall and Lily act like such jerks.  They made up for it, but damn.  It just bothers me when people seem to toss friendships away once they have kids.  Your kids are special, but you're not going to be able to bitch to them about your problems or go drinking with them (not while they're underage anyway) or probably hang out with them much (because they'll think you're too old and uncool).  So it doesn't make sense to me.  Good thing they patched things up some.

I guess this was an okay episode.  It distracted me from wanting to see those other two dumb relationships fall already.  I truly didn't even think about it because I was too focused on how Marshall and Lily were acting.  But next time I would like to see them get back to that and put an end to one or both of them.