Much like Winston's actual birthday, the "Winston's Birthday" episode was dominated by the aftermath of Jess and Nick sleeping together more so than any sort of birthday party. And while I quibble that Schmidt is too good of a friend not to have birthday alerts set up, and a pancake breakfast scheduled months in advance, I still enjoyed this episode. And it was educational as I learned exactly why you should not fall asleep immediately after getting a Henna tattoo done. If Cece can't rock the bearded lady look, there's no hope for the rest of us.

Tags: new girl, new girl file

In "Virgins," we learned that everyone's first time having sex sucked... well, unless it involved a certain rock icon. It was a fun episode that gave me the giggles (and what a perfectly handled way to address Jess and Nick's first time), though I'm still having a really hard time buying that Stiles from Teen Wolf went to high school with Zooey Deschanel. Dylan O'Brien's got a little baby face (and according to the internet there's more than a decade between them in real life), so I was kind of glad they didn't end up having sex because it just would have seemed inappropriate. Aside from that, and the fact that we're living in terror of The Archduke, we'd say this episode was more successful than a night with Mysteria and Octopussy.

Tags: new girl, new girl file, new girl virgins

This episode was pretty entertaining (we always love some Fat Schmidt), but it seemed a little out of order again, like maybe that funeral episode aired when it wasn't supposed to because we jumped back to Nick playing the dead dad card when he didn't even mention his father in "First Date" at all. But we loved the orange jumpsuit, and Shivrang's Jane Lynch/Sue Sylvester reference, so we'll give it a "dead dad" pass.

Tags: new girl

"Chicago" was such an off episode of this show, partly because it dealt with the death of a character we only met once, but mostly because it wasn't funny. Sitcoms can certainly deal with dead people -- look at the legendary "Chuckles Bites the Dust" episode of The Mary Tyler Moore Show as a prime example -- but this just seemed like it was desperately trying hard to be funny and failed almost entirely (some of the Schmidt mortality stuff was amusing). It's a shame because it had the makings of good stuff, what with Margo Martindale and Nick Kroll cast as Nick's mom and brother. But the thing that gave the whole thing an air of weirdness was the unacknowledged elephant in the room of Nick and Jess (he introduces her to his mom as "my new roommate"). Sure, Nick's brother and his insinuating eyebrows made some comments about them sleeping together, but aside from that, it was hard to tell if this episode even took place after the fish-tank-breaking-make-out session, or if this episode was meant to air earlier. It felt like this death of a con man episode existed in this own little bubble, or alternate reality. Maybe the gang should stay out of Chicago for a while.

Tags: new girl, new girl file

We could sit and recite all of the clever dialogue of "Quick Hardening Caulk", but it would probably just be a copy of the script... and besides, the fans on Tumblr have probably gif'd the entire episode by now. Instead, we'll just break down the highlights:

Tags: new girl

We've been so focused on the Nick/Jess relationship lately that we've forgotten the equally important relationship between Schmidt and Nick. Thankfully, Schmidt rectified that in "Tinfinity" with his celebration of their tenth anniversary of living together and threw one hell of a party. We only wish we'd had a chance to see more of the Paper and Wood parties as well. Our major quibbles with the episode involved the way they made Jax such an annoying weepy mess and the lack of Winston in general (yes, we sound like a broken record... for those people who even remember what records are). They could have done the Jax thing in a less over-the-top way and it would have been fine. And we'd say mazel tov to Cece and Shivrang, but we know that would break Schmidt to pieces.

Tags: new girl, new girl file

While last week's episode took a wrong turn in Chicago, and my Tuesday night was totally thrown off with a rerun, "First Date" more than made up for all of that. It was a charming episode full of romance, bromance, awkwardness, sexual tension and lots of homeless people. Most importantly it marked the return of two of my favorite characters, Russell and Tran. What I'd pay to see a scene with them together, the quiet togetherness of Russell and the unspoken wisdom of Tran, it would be like watching a beautiful silent film. Anyway, here's what worked... and the one thing that sorta didn't but I'm willing to let slide.

Tags: new girl

Fox is feeling generous this year.

Tags: drop dead diva, friends & family, gang related, new girl, raising hope, six feet under, the following, the mindy project, zero hour