New Girl - 1x17 - Fancyman Part 1

It's an episode full of surprises. Jess is thrown into a tizzy when she's unexpectedly wooed by a more sophisticated, older man. Meanwhile, Nick comes to a shocking revelation about himself when confronted with the reality of Jess' new suitor. And Winston and Shelby get closer with a little help from Schmidt, which is, unfortunately  oddly enough, not as dirty as it sounds.

All put together, it's one of the more fun episodes in a run of a great ones. It doles out the deep character insights that we've come to expect from a lot of episodes in the second half of this season, but without the bittersweet overtones that have typically pervaded them.

So right off the bat, before we get into the nitty gritty of growth, I wanna just go over some awesome parts of the episode that have nothing to do with anything else.

First of all, Rachael Harris is back as Jess' beleaguered principle. I know I say this about a lot of the recurring guest stars, but I LOVE her. She's a perfect example of a character actor that doesn't show up very often, but when she does, I wonder why the hell she's not showing up very often. She brings back her trademark mixture of misanthropy and Freudian inappropriateness, all barely held together with a fraying layer of restraint and buttery dulcet tones.

Apropos of nothing, someone recently got me into Marc Maron's WTF podcasts, and I'd been randomly running through the back catalog when the Patron Saint of Shuffle slotted in Rachael's interview. It's an excellent listen, and I highly recommend it. Made me love her just a little bit more.

She said she's only into neurotic guys with low self-esteem.
Jackpot.

Speaking of which, this bit:

"I'll get a ragtag group of kids together!
A lost soul,
an orphan,
a jewish kid with a keyboard,
a little slut who can dance,
and one fatso.
And I'll choreograph some dances, make a show!"

"You did that already Jess, it's called the spring musical, and it literally brought in sixty dollars."

...was way funnier than it should have been. Maybe it was because I wasn't expecting the comeback, since it's a great New Girl-esque bit of monolouging/rambling (monorambling? ramblouging?) and those typically just trail off. So, just when you're lulled into a false sense of punchline, Harris comes in for the win.

Also funny, but relating to nothing in particular? Schmidt's judgemental gaze when Winston declines working out.

Yeah. This is part of the site's visual vocabulary now.

So. This episode.

It's about growing up. It makes no bones about it; it beats no bush. The Fancy Man is here to catalyze a burst of maturity for both Jess and Nick, to make them better humans. Kind of like Kwai-Chang Kaine, but with cash money instead of Eastern philosophy.

So what does it say about this show's sexual politics that growing up for Nick means making a conscious decision to put away childish things, while for Jess it just means dating an older man? It's kind of disturbing on the face of it. But maybe it doesn't mean anything. Jess is by most measures already a grown up. She has her quirky costumes and weird accents and curtseys, but she's got a proper career, she's financially secure, and she's way more in touch with who she is and who she wants to be than any of the guys. Nick, on the other hand, lives in the perpetual state of denial and unreasonable anger usually reserved for an adolescent, and is proud of it. So maybe Jess' journey isn't about learning how to let herself be "taken care of" by a Real Man (ugh, Cece, really?), but about recognizing that she's already an adult and accepting other adults as peers instead of enemies.

Though, you know, it just kind of hit me that up until that moment that Jess accepts Fancy's invitation for a date, we don't actually know for sure that she has any kind of attraction to him. I mean he's showering her with favors and kindness, all her friends keep pushing her to go out with him, but not once does she even say she finds him cute, or charming, or would be otherwise interested. There's that bit with Cece where she explains that she only falls for losers, but I was unclear on whether that was a proud explanation of her taste or a self-deprecating statement. Maybe we were just meant to assume Dermot Mulroney's dreamy smile is a scientifically proven cause of swoons.

Yeah, sorry, I don't swing that way, Dermot.

...I'm pretty sure I don't swing that way, Dermot.

Whatever the reason, parts of this episode had this really weird dynamic of everyone trying to pressure a young girl to give herself over to a powerful older man showering her (and her friends) with gifts and favors. Which is even more disconcerting because Fancyman was kind of an asshole in that first meeting. The genuinely sweet, affable guy who only wants to go out of his way to do nice things for Jess is complete 180 from the 1980's Overworked Executive Dad who insulted her teaching skills, showed complete disregard for his daughter's feelings, and was generally a walking snot.

Now, in all fairness, it's possible the man took three seconds to look at Jess' "Alternatives to Intercourse" lesson and assessed her capacity for sound judgement accordingly. I don't know about you, but that blackboard's pretty much a step-by-step account of the conception of at least two of my last three illegitimate children.

As Up All Night taught us, Friday Night Lights is an aphrodisiac.

For that matter, what was the point of that parent teacher conference in the first place? Jess obviously brought him in because she was super disturbed about his kid's creepy art project, and yet we never return to the issue. Wherever this poor daughter is, her cries for help go unheeded because her teacher and parent are too busy hooking up. All in all, I'm not entirely sure what the point of that whole first conversation was, except to get us to a place where Jess instinctively hates him, so she can get over that and lurve him. But if we hate him too, it makes everyone pushing her to go out with him seem like insensitive pricks.

So how weird was it that in the end, it was Nick who finally convinces Jess to go out with Fancyman? Where did this Nick come from? There wasn't any hesitation or begrudging-ness. Once Fancyman impressed him with the wonders of  his  Manhood, Nick actually turned into a straight up platonic friend with no apparent designs on her whatsoever. I mean, there was that one perfect moment where he anxiously spits out "This may complicate things, but I'm in love with...him", but otherwise it was a moment of uncharacteristic, and unreserved, maturity from Nick. I mean it was great and wonderful and I love seeing mature characters stow their own bullshit for the greater good with a minimum of whinging. But this also makes me more certain that we've been seeing episodes out of order. There had to have been an arc showing us how Nick got to this point from all the crazy jealous shit we got as "recently" as The Landlord.

Speaking of Nick, I want to be pissed that when it comes to him, we seem to keep getting the same story over and over again: Wherein poor (and unreasonably proud of it) Nicholas learns he has to grow up, get over himself and live his life. And yet... I like them all. It feels like they each bring a unique perspective to the table. Bells showed Nick that he has to stop blaming others for his fuckups, Injured inspired him to start "doing things", and Fancyman reignites his passion for adulthood.

Specifically, what I liked about this episode was that they subtly drew on Nick's backstory to make what pretty much looks like a manic psychotic break feel like a genuine transformative moment. Nick was almost a lawyer. If he had stuck with it, he would've very likely ended up having a study just like Fancyman's. They never explicitly mentioned it, but that was obviously a big part of Nick's fascination with the entire concept of that room. It obviously reawakened whatever part of him that wanted all of that once upon a time. It was probably the first time he wondered what-could've-been, and it wasn't some horrible dystopia of working-for-the-man.

"Wait, where's the button that releases impotence-AIDS into the drinking water?"

Maybe I'm reading too much into this show and its hypothetical layers, but I like the idea that we can have implicit continuity without having to splash exposition around like so much bidet water.

Along the same vein, a lot of the best scenes in the episode belong to Nick and that whole emotional journey. The opening bit about his horrendously low credit rating didn't quite pack the punch it should have, but his subsequent attempts to go Ghost Protocol were inspired. As in, they inspired an entirely new way for me to annoy my (remaining) friends. I am totally going to write letters to see who wants to hang out this weekend.

"Hey Kev!" is now officially the new "Hereeee's Johnnny!"

But, the show stealers, at least for me, started the second he walks into that aformentioned study and starts  homo-erotically embracing  grappling with the concepts of power and Manhood. I wonder how many of those reactions were written and how many were ad-libbed? "I thought it was a chair sweater" was obviously scripted, but I want to believe, with the same fervor that once brought Santa Clause to life, that "I want to kill you. Becase I respect you. I think I understand hunting now!?" was improvised. I want to believe Jake Johnson has that kind of innate skill.

When we say the 1% have our balls in a vice, we aren't speaking metaphorically.

In another, completely separate corner of this episode, Winston goes through a bit of maturity of his own, as he and Shelby enter an actual proper, adult relationship. With a little help from Schmidt.  Even though Winston was separated from the Big Storyline again, it's a step in the right direction that he wasn't there alone, and that Shelby got moved closer to the rest of the cast. Can I say how excited I was to see Shelby interact with another cast member? Like when Julia showed up for the Stich and Bitch, seeing the significant others come in and interact with the rest of the cast is great to watch and serves to make them more real, make us more invested in them. And how adorable was Schmidt teasing them from the car?

Talk of horrendously racist grandma's has never been so romantic.

And finally, you know what was also great? The return of Winston, the Part Time Babysitter. I've been so disappointed that that thread from The 23rd was apparently dropped, that I audibly WOOT'ed when I saw them together again. Talking with this kid seems to be the only time we can get a peek at the real Winston, without the snark and macho competition that happens so often with Schmidt and Nick. And as easily as it can become trite and annoying, I'm glad they pull off the "wise child who speaks like an adult giving advice" trope. When done well, it's cute.

"And that's why Ron Paul is the only logical choice for President.
Are you listening, Winston?"