The TV Chick

New Girl is back and all is right in my TV world! There are two new episodes on FOX tonight — one at 8 and one at 9, in its usual time-slot. “Re-Launch” is all about Schmidt’s self-planned re-branding party because his penis is no longer broken. Yeah, seriously. He also definitely shows us what his penis cast looks like and it is not pretty. But not all is right in the loft. Schmidt invites Cece to his re-launch, clearly not over her. But she has this normal boyfriend, who Schmidt deems unworthy of Cece (and lesser than him obviously). And Jess gets laid off from her job and is left with no direction in her life. She becomes a shot girl at Schmidt’s party and let’s just say it doesn’t go as planned. The season premiere had me laughing for the first eight minutes straight, proving there is certainly no sophomore slump for this show.

In the second episode of the night, Jess pretends she is Katie, when new guy Sam (played by the super funny and charming David Walton) comes to the bar looking for his date he set up online. Hilarity ensues when she has to tell Nick, Schmidt and Winston to call her by a different name. To add to Jess’ romantic drama, she had asked Nick to set her up with a guy who works at the bar. Nick thinks Jess was referring to this guy who goes by the name of Bear Claw (played by Josh Gad), and they have a pretty ridiculous first date. Meanwhile, Schmidt tries to seduce Winston’s sister who plays for the WNBA. We find out why Winston’s family hates Schmidt, and there a one-on-one laugh so hard you will cry scene. But I haven’t even gotten to the best part yet. We are introduced to “Old Nick,” who claims to have come from the future. He gives Nick cryptic advice about his life and the whole thing is completely hilarious.

It is an understatement to say I am excited about New Girl’s return. I love seeing Nick and Jess get closer in a fairly platonic way (even though, yes I ‘ship this) and I am interested to see how Jess is going to deal with everything. I recently had the chance to participate in a media Q&A with Zooey Deschanel, and here is what she had to tease about the new season.

On Jess’ unemployment: “You know she’s been looking for a job for a little while and so they’re throwing out different jobs. It definitely affects her life pretty deeply because this is something she’s wanted to do her entire life and considered teaching to be her calling. So, it definitely is a blow to her. But, I like how Jess is sort of open to new things and although she’s upset about it, she throws herself into to trying to find a new job and is pretty positive about things, which is a quality I like in the character.”

On Nick and Jess getting together: “There’s no danger of that happening. They’re not getting together anytime soon. I think that they’re not ready for each other and nobody is going to push them together. So, I think Nick and Jess have a great chemistry and I work really well with Jake Johnson. I think it’s nice the sort of love-hate-but love relationship they have. They’re not going to throw them together or anything soon. They might tease it out.”

Be sure to tune in tonight at 8 PM and 9 PM for a double dose of New Girl on FOX.