Comedy Corner: Up All Night, The Big Bang Theory, The Mindy Project, The Office – Week 3 Review

Reviews

This week:

  • How I Met Your Mother
  • Raising Hope
  • New Girl
  • The Mindy Project
  • Two episodes of Modern Family
  • The Big Bang Theory
  • Up All Night

No episode of Parks and Recreation this week thanks to the vice-presidential debate – bummer! But you know Leslie Knope would be watching.

 

How I Met Your Mother – “Nannies”

Sigh. The problem with all the teasers on How I Met Your Mother telling us exactly what’s going to happen like, say, that Ted and Victoria and Robin and Nick would break up, is that then you’re not invested in the storylines. In trying to one-up each other about how much they were “clicking” with their respective partners, we didn’t actually get to see Ted or Robin really interact with those partners. They’ll break up, and we’ll never know if we should be happy or sad. The rest of the episode was also a bit of a letdown. Barney’s post-breakup antics felt like a tired joke, and it was so obvious that Lily’s dad would end up babysitting Marvin that I couldn’t fully appreciate that storyline either.
Best Moment: Barney spending seven grand on “merch”.

Raising Hope – “Throw Maw Maw From The House (Part One)”

I wasn’t that into Raising Hope last week, but I liked this episode a lot. A visit from social services would be the Chance’s worst nightmare, and I had to laugh when it turned out that the complaint was from twenty years prior, when someone saw toddler Jimmy crowd-surfing at a concert. But while the social worker was there, she was concerned about how the family was treating Maw Maw. The episode was part one of two, so it ended with a cliffhanger. I look forward to seeing how the family breaks Maw Maw out of that home!
Best Moment: “Maw Maw and Hope are a lot alike. I hope I have a baby rival when I’m her age.”

New Girl – “Neighbors”

New Girl has always been about figuring out adulthood, I think, so having some young hipsters move in next door was a good way to highlight how different it is to be approaching thirty. Especially at this point, when Jess has lost her adult job and is at the same kind of place as a lot of 23 year olds. This wasn’t my favorite episode, but it was decent.
Best moment: “Jess, we don’t care if you stole your catchphrase from some low-budget web series. We still want to hang out with you.”
Runners up: Winston calling himself “Prank Sinatra” and young Nick acting like an old man on his front stoop.
Schmidtism of the Week: “Who’s ready to set an arcade fire?”

The Mindy Project – “In the Club”

I’ve been hearing a lot of concerns from readers and critics that they can’t get into The Mindy Project because the Mindy character is too unlikable. Maybe I’m also unlikable, because I love her. All the stuff that people think goes too far cracks me up. But this week Mindy gave up a sweet after party so she wouldn’t bail on her friends, so hopefully that helps endear her to some viewers.

I could relate with the premise of this episode. I have long been the girl who was kind of jealous of everyone else’s crazy club stories. Even though I’m not a doctor and I’m still in my twenties. Taking the whole gang out of the office and into the club was a great idea. The episode didn’t reach Parks and Rec levels of greatness, but I thought it was a great third installment.
Best moment: “I fell asleep watching the movie Amelie, and when I woke up I had spilled so much red wine on myself I thought I’d been shot.”
Runner up: “I can’t do clubs anymore. They make me feel judged and rejected by people that I would normally judge and reject.”

Modern Family – “Schooled”

I accidentally watched these Modern Family episodes backwards, so take from that what you will. I liked pretty much everything about the episode – Phil in all his awkward, bumbling glory at Haley’s new college, Mitch and Cam trying to get along with Haley’s classmate’s lesbian moms, and Jay and Gloria getting kicked out of the parenting class. Solid material all around – especially everything that came from “Phil’s-osophy”.
Best moment: All of Cam’s interactions with the lesbian moms, with this exchange as runner up…
Haley: Seriously, don’t study too hard.
Alex: “I’ll have fun. I’m Iceland in the mock UN.”
Haley (to Claire): “We’re losing her.”

Modern Family – “Snip”

It’s a time of change on Modern Family. Jay’s having a baby at age 65, which inspired Phil to get a vasectomy, and Cam is experiencing his own empty nest with Lily in kindergarten. The Cam and Mitch storyline, where Mitch tried to convince Cam to go back to work, was funny. However, it kept them in their typical roles – Mitch as the nagging practical one, Cam as the oversensitive free spirit – which I think the show needs to get away from. You had to laugh when Cam started to cry because his “master project” was a mermaid costume for the cat. Phil freaking out about his vasectomy felt a bit predictable, but I liked the moment with him and Jay that resulted. The Phil Dunphy “not a real man” bus bench ad was hilarious.
Best moment: “You’re a very talented boy. You’re going to find plenty of music teachers to put butter on.”

The Big Bang Theory – “The Higgs Boson Observation”

I don’t know if it’s me or the show, but I had a hard time focusing on The Big Bang Theory this week. I kept getting distracted. I’m getting a little bored of Howard in space, so maybe that was it. Amy’s jealousy about Sheldon’s new assistant was funny, especially when she then convinced Penny that the new assistant was actually hitting on Leonard. But at this point, I just want Penny to make up her damn mind about Leonard. We’ve been through this before! I’m tired of watching Penny feel unsure about whether she wants to be with him.
Best moment: Sheldon telling Leonard that his assistant should eat separately based on what he’s seen from Downton Abbey.

Up All Night – “Jerry Duty”

Oh man, guys. I don’t know. Last year, I was excited about the potential I saw in Up All Night. I loved the chemistry Chris and Reagan had, and Maya Rudolph is hilarious no matter what. But the show was inconsistent, and this season has just been blah. I thought dumping the Ava Show and focusing on Chris and Reagan’s relationship would help stabilize the show, but these first few episodes just haven’t been working. Considering the news that the return of Community has been delayed, I’m now on board with the idea of putting Community back on Thursdays (rather than Fridays, where it was supposed to be this year) and either moving Up All Night to Fridays, or just letting go of it altogether.

You can follow Jill at her blog, couchtimewithjill.com, or on Twitter @jillemader Jill has been an avid fan of TV since the age of two, when she was so obsessed with Zoobilee Zoo that her mother lied and told her it had been canceled. Despite that setback, she grew up to be a television aficionado and pop culture addict.