Mindy's Rowlf Wasn't That Bad

The Mindy Project, S01E15

Mindy's pitiful taxi video about women's health brought her enough ridicule and infamy that the local news wanted her to do a segment on their show.  Danny coached her on how to successfully present facts without being a joke, but Mindy had to bail on the show at the last minute to look after a patient.  Danny reluctantly took her place.  Beverly also got rehired to the practice as part of the administrative staff, but she had trouble using computers.

I didn't think that Mindy's little video was so bad.  It was definitely dorky, but not so bad that I think that the cab driver needed to express a wish to kill himself the longer he heard her voice.  It was strange that when I saw her open her mouth super-wide, it reminded me of The Muppets, but I still didn't get why she was dressed up as a dog.  It wasn't until later when Mindy said that she was trying to be Rowlf that I got it.  I felt like an idiot, but I felt like it made me like her video even more.  Only Mindy would dress like him to teach tips about women's health.  She is so random that it ends up being a little adorable.

I had mixed feelings about her being on the news, though.  On one hand, it was a chance for her to redeem herself and show that she's not just some goofball playing with puppets, pretending to be a doctor.  On the other hand, they only wanted her because her rating for pity was so high.  Damn. She wasn't that bad.  I don't think her taxi video was the best thing to bring in customers, but I don't think it was something that should have been on Tosh.0 as one of his "Fat Losers of the Week."  People's reaction to her video were way over the top.  She was being silly about reporting health.  It wasn't like she was sobbing over a cheeseburger on the floor or something.

I thought Mindy was going to make herself look even more like an idiot until she picked job duty over PR repair.  Her choice was the right one, I think.  We got to see Danny mess up on all the things that he assumed Mindy would do, proving once again that he (and Jeremy) shouldn't act like she's the only one capable of making their business look bad.  I'm pretty sure that Mindy would have been able to keep it together a little better than Danny.  He fell apart so quickly.  The best thing about him doing the news segment, though, might have been that his screw-up probably distracted the town from her dog-doctor video.

The absolute greatest thing that happened in the episode was one of my favorite scenes so far.  Danny and Mindy were in the elevator when Brendon came in.  I was not ready to see his smug face so soon, nor did I want to see Mindy being lured into his trap again.  Thankfully, Mindy did not want to give him the time of day:

[Brendon] Mindy, why aren't you answering my texts?

[Mindy] Because you're a dick.

I wanted to leap out of my chair and cheer when I heard that.  Finally!  It took her long enough to cut the bastard off.  I couldn't have possibly handled her being fooled by that piece of trash one more time.  Way to go, Mindy.

I didn't care too much about Beverly coming back to the practice.  So far she doesn't bring much besides a knack for racist quips.  Maybe that'll grow on me with time, but for now I wasn't impressed by the story about how she didn't even know how to use a mouse.  Who hasn't seen an elderly person struggle with technology?  This was nothing new, nor made me glad to see Beverly employed there again.

This episode was okay.  It had an incredible moment where Mindy basically told Brendon to shove it, but that didn't really make up for the entire story.  I like seeing Mindy putting her patients above her own reputation, but I'm a little tired of her being made a fool of for little reason.  Beverly, known for punching Mindy square in the nose, has returned to the show, but I don't see her value quite yet.  We'll see if she's able to make herself as indispensable as Morgan or Betsy.

Tina's Poop Scoop

Bob's Burgers, S03E12

Tina started reporting about a serial pooper at school in her own newscast when the school news channel pushed her to the background as just a juice server.  Gene also started dressing and acting like Bob when he saw that Bob once looked like Gene at his age.

I was reminded in this episode how much I hate Tammy. Not only is she dressing a little too flashy for her age, but she's the type of girl who doesn't want anyone to shine except herself.  I don't know if the teacher would have given Tina the position of anchor if Tammy hadn't sabotaged her (since Tina isn't naturally filled with energy and celebrity appeal), but she might have been taken seriously instead of being looked upon as a burden.

I admired that Tina went after a real story, even though no one wanted to listen to her at first.  She was genuinely interested in journalism and informing the student body about important events happening in their school. It's just lucky that it turned out to be something so disgusting and grabbing like someone going around the school dropping dukes wherever they felt like.  I was really happy that Tina's reporting was making her popular enough that the news crew who had shunned her was jealous enough to try to frame her.

I don't know if Zeke has always had a thing for Tina or if he's just a nice enough kid to poop in public for her sake.  Either way, it was sweet that someone else was on her side.  Of course, Louise was one of her biggest supporters and even tried to get a little payback on Tammy at the end.  That was one of my favorite parts when Louise pushed Tammy toward the poop.  That would have been a really awesome ending, but unfortunately Louise hadn't pushed her quite enough.  Damn.  Still, I loved that Louise tried.

It was also sort of sad and cute that Tina had such a repertoire with the school janitor.  Like, she is by no means overflowing with friends, so it's not that surprising that she would befriend a staff member.  Still, I wish that she had someone around her age that would laugh at one of her jokes even if that person didn't understand it.  Tina has a lot to offer as a friend, and it would be nice if more people noticed that.

As far as Gene was concerned, he was being his typical pain-in-the-butt self.  I felt like I could feel Bob's anger with Gene imitating him in a way that wasn't cute at all.  Of course, the rest of the family indulged him and made the whole thing much worse than it had to be.  All Gene was doing, really, was insulting his father 24-7, and he looked sort of like an asshole doing that.  At one point Gene said that the family was terrible, but he still loved them in what he assumed was a Bob-like fashion.  Although Bob was mad he said that, I gotta agree that the family is terrible, but Bob does still love them all the same.  I mean, he'd be terrible himself if he didn't love his own family (since it's not like they are murderers or spitting in his face), but I often think that Bob would be so better off if he ran off one day (not unlike Archer in that episode--the real Bob himself could use a spa day).  Bob's just lucky that Gene doesn't stick to one annoying thing forever and can be distracted enough by poop to stop playing his father like a fool.  And I'm lucky, too, because I couldn't stand to watch it much longer.

This episode wasn't bad.  It made me like Tina a lot more and remind me of the many characters on this show who I wish would fall into a hole in the center of the Earth.  Really, the writers are geniuses at creating characters who are so irritating.  However, even though I generally like the shenanigans that the kids get into, I have to say that they can be pretty irritating themselves.  This is particularly true of Gene, who takes his jokes on further than is necessary or funny.  I'd love to see an episode once where him constantly making fun of his father brings him more unpleasant consequences.  Sometimes someone needs to slap some sense into that boy.