#TheXFilesRewatch 1x01 "Pilot" (Sorry, Nobody Down Here But the FBI's Most Unwanted) [Contributor: Lizzie]

"Pilot"

Original Airdate: September 10, 1993

How can I start anywhere in a re-watch of The X-Files but with the pilot? And I say this with the requisite amount of irony, because I, like many other fans didn’t really watch the pilot until Mulder and Scully were already so ingrained that watching these naïve and relatively untouched versions of our favorite characters makes us want to scream things like: "YOU HAVE TO TRUST EACH OTHER and JUST EACH OTHER, NO ONE ELSE, please, please pleaaaase, NO ONE ELSE."

But that’s a story for later. Much later. For now, let’s talk about how this series started.

(Side note: I’ve never been this excited to press play on something. Or to see the terribly old-fashioned block letters on the screen.)

The pilot begins, like most episodes of TV these days, not with our main characters, but with the crime/case of the week. This one seems to involve aliens, which is strange, because I didn’t think we were going to get the alien stuff in the first episode. Which just goes to show my memory cannot be trusted.

And this is a weird one, for sure, because if you see a light and a crazy dude coming at you in the middle of the woods, wouldn’t you like… I don’t know, scream? Try to run away? I know scary movies have shown that neither of those things actually work, but it’s still better than doing nothing. Isn’t it? Our victim does neither, and next thing we know, she’s dead. (This was to be expected, the show IS called The X-Files, yes, but you still need a body to investigate a crime, even in a show about the paranormal. The only thing to note about this particular death is that the actress looks remarkably like Scully, which I guess could be a coincidence, but, knowing Chris Carter, it probably wasn’t.)

The last words before the black screen and our first glimpse of the logo are: “It’s happening again, isn’t it?” and if that doesn’t just describe the whole premise of the show, I don’t know what does.

As I said before, we get our first X-Files logo, but not the music yet, and I never thought I’d miss music so much. It’s like The X-Files is not The X-Files without the song.

We meet Scully first, and I’m really glad she just walks around for ten seconds or so, because is her outfit throwing me off. I know fashion has changed A LOT in the past twenty years, but WHY would she wear that? It’s like three sizes too big for her, and I’m not even sure it was fashionable in 1993. Sinister Dude Number 1 (Blevins, I think), makes me forget all about fashion. And there’s Cancer Man in the corner, wow. I’d forgotten he was there from the beginning. Sinister Dude Number 2 (No idea about HIS name) gets straight to the point. We want you to spy on this Mulder guy. Of course, he uses other words, but I’m here to translate for you. They want her to use science to prove that Mulder is just a crazy dude chasing ghosts.

Scully shows a little personality, but just as we probably would in her position, she seems to agree. She makes a little joke, tries to please the bosses. It’s kind of cute, really, especially knowing what we know. In fact, the only thing this conversation doesn’t make clear is why exactly, if they’re going to all the trouble of assigning Mulder a partner, don’t they just… shut down the X-Files and reassign Mulder. Are they worried he won’t let it go? Are they using him for something? Why exactly do they want him there and, at the same time, don’t want him to be able to do his job? We won’t get an answer anytime soon, but it’s a good subplot and a nice introduction to the idea that something much bigger is going on here. And we’re only like, five minutes into the show.

Scully heads for Mulder’s office, and she looks thrilled with her assignment. Really, truly happy.

NOT.

And Mulder’s office, in case you didn’t know, is in the basement. We don’t know why. We also have no idea why someone is walking around casually as if this wasn’t, you know, the BASEMENT. Scully walks in and there’s sass from Mulder, a look of “What the hell did I get into?” from Scully and the POSTER, THE POSTER, but I can’t process because I’m drowning in feels. He’s being awfully flirty, and she looks very nice in this scene. I remember thinking, many years later, that I could have been imagining all the sexual tension, but oh, no, first scene, and it’s obvious that these actors have too much chemistry; these characters will never be just friends.

I also find it hilarious that, even before they knew they’d be assigned together, they both knew about the other. Although, either Mulder was a stalker, or he did know he was getting a partner, because, reading her thesis… a bit much, Mulder. A BIT MUCH.

Mulder is quick to explain the case in the craziest way possible. Scully tries to counteract with some common sense. It doesn’t work. (It never, ever works). They’re going to have to check it out in person.

And I wouldn’t even bring up the airplane scene while they head to the middle of nowhere, except for this. WHAT THE HELL IS THE UPHOLSTERY ON THOSE AIRPLANE SEATS?
My eyes will never recover.

Also, Scully’s clothing choices are becoming more and more suspect.

But seeing these two together makes my heart soar. I’ve missed them more than I can explain. I want to bang their heads together and make them, well, bang. NOW. Not in like, seven years or so. Sadly, I don’t have that power. I’m here to enjoy the ride. And the ride takes us to Bellefleur, Oregon, where, before the case is even mentioned, we’ve already experienced a funky radio and a car that mysteriously stops and then re-starts again without anyone kicking it or even attempting to pop the hood.

Don’t ever say The X-Files holds anything back.

Mulder responds, in typical Mulder fashion, by getting out the can of red spray paint that an always prepared FBI agent keeps in the trunk and marking the spot. He doesn’t offer much of an explanation to his way of thinking, and it’s weird, but Scully doesn’t say much, so we ignore it too. Weird show about weird things, so he gets a free pass, right? On with the case. First order of business: let’s exhume some people! Oh, and let’s use some clearly inept crews so they drop the casket and we are forced to run after it. The body inside looks like an alien, which, of course, considering this is only the first episode probably means it’s not.

Or maybe I’m wrong. I can’t remember Scully examining the body, though this is what she always does. I have a vague recollection of her finding an implant, but that’s about it. It’s like I’m watching this episode for the very first time!

Other things I don’t remember: The fact that this all seems to lead back to the Class of '89, the fact that guy whose body they exhumed confessed to the two other murders, the fact that he was in a psychiatric hospital or the fact that there are two more of his classmates in that hospital. Not that it really matters much in the grand scheme of things, Peggy O’Dell is in a wheelchair and Billy Miles is comatose, so it’s not like they have anything to do with what’s going on, right?

This is a very good pilot, and I’ll tell you why: it’s a good example of everything the show would end up developing. There’s Mulder/Scully banter, even a little bit of sexual tension, there’s tons of things we cannot explain, there’s shadowy government figures, and there are aliens! There’s also our favorite agents running into danger, because, of course, who needs common sense in a show like this?

Despite the fact that I know this is just the first episode, and our main characters are not about to get killed right away, I feel the sudden need to inform my TV screen that this is how scary movies usually start, with people running into dark forests. Not that they find much other than some strange ash on the ground, and creepy detective dude with a gun. Why is it that small town detectives are always painted as creepy?

When they’re driving away, a flash of very bad special effects light envelops them RIGHT on the spot the car malfunctioned earlier. When they open their eyes, nine minutes have disappeared, a fact that Mulder says, it’s commonly reported by aby alien abductees.

Cue disbelief.

Back in the motel, Scully examines the evidence, Mulder goes for a run, and then, well… it’s time for our gratuitous shot of the female lead half naked! Scully is, apparently, one of those people who has to take a shower before bed. (Like me!). Except, unlike me, she has to walk very slowly to the bathroom, drop her robe and stand in front of the mirror in her underwear, because … well, because.

Despite the fact that I said this episode was a very good example of what this show would turn out to be, it does tend to focus on Gillian Anderson’s beauty a little more than subsequent episodes will. I don’t remember many instances of our leading lady in underwear, and our leading lady in underwear running into Mulder’s room because she’s scared the two marks on her back are the same as the marks found in the victims is a one-off thing. (Although, to be honest, I would have been freaked out too. The marks are IDENTICAL. I have no idea how Mulder can just look at them and dismiss them as mosquito bites.) He does take his sweet time looking, though. The sexual tension is alive and well.

The scene afterwards is the scene that made us, well, shippers. It’s the reason why people write fanfic. In fact, if it weren’t for the fact that fanfic wasn’t as popular back in the day, I would have said this was Chris Carter’s evil plan all along.

Scully hugs Mulder after he reassures her that the marks on her backs are simply mosquito bites, and then, there’s a pause, and next thing we know, Scully is laying down in Mulder’s bed, covered up in a blanket as he sits on the floor and tells her about his sister.

Even I wrote a fanfic about what happens in between.

(I think.)

They get interrupted (OF COURSE) by a strange call (OF COURSE) and they rush out to find that Peggy O’Dell, previously wheel-chair bound Peggy O’Dell, mind you, has been killed by a car while WALKING AROUND. Which, a) Don’t walk around deserted roads at night, and b) DON’T WALK AROUND DESERTED ROADS AT NIGHT. Especially when you’re not even supposed to be able to walk.

Afterwards, they come back to the motel to find the whole thing is on fire and their evidence has been destroyed. Which, of course. Like I said, this is THE WHOLE SERIES IN A NUTSHELL. Good God. How did I watch nine years of them getting so close to proving something only to have all their evidence stolen?

Oh, yes, because of Mulder and Scully.

Moving on: Teresa, the daughter of the medical examiner who did the autopsies for the original victims wants to talk to them, and imagine that, she’s also from the Class of '89! She tells them she’s awoken in the middle of the woods several times, and that she needs their help, only for her father and creepy detective to show up and take her away.

With nothing left to do, Mulder and Scully decided to return to the cemetery, to, I presume, pick up a shovel and try to exhume the other bodies by themselves. Someone got there first, however. And it’s raining. Hard. Because that just makes the whole conversation more romantic, or something. Mulder has it all figured out -- it was Billy Miles! Scully laughs, but hey, at this point, what other option is there? Scully wants an explanation as much as Mulder does; she just needs proof. Her problem never is that she doesn’t want to believe, it’s that she isn’t as predisposed to believing everything as Mulder is.

They go back to the hospital to try to find their proof, and it’s there, in the form of sediment in Billy Miles’s feet, which... hard to get your feet dirty if you’re in a coma, and all. Scully takes a sample of the dirt and wants to go back to the forest to take another sample to compare it to, because, lost evidence and all.

Back in the woods, creepy detective Miles, who, by the way, is Billy’s father’s, finds his son offering up Teresa as a sacrifice to the alien gods or something, and there’s a bright light, and the alien gods must reject the sacrifice or something, because Teresa is unharmed, Billy comes back to himself and the weird marks in his back disappear. Mulder is there to witness it all. Scully is obviously not. That would be too easy.

Later, we watch Billy Miles explaining it all, under hypnosis. The aliens abducted them as punishment for partying in the forest (or because they were there, and it was easy, who knows?) and killed them when the tests they were performing failed. But, no proof, no dice, as Sinister Dude Number 1 informs Scully. Except Scully HAS proof. She had the implant on her pocket all along!

Of course, once she TURNS in the evidence, it’s lost forever. They even have a big evidence room for all their super-secret things, which seems like a really bad idea if you ask me, why keep ALL YOUR EVIDENCE in one place? But this is just the pilot, so they get a break. Especially when you consider what a good episode this is.

We even get a few things that will become standard X-Files trivia questions later on to close out the episode: Mulder calling Scully at 11:21 and the standard “Scully? It’s me” that’ll be used by both of them so much in the series that I even had it as a ringtone at one point.

And, that’s the end of this week’s journey into memory lane. It’s a brilliant pilot that touches upon all the elements that’ll become iconic in later years, and, even on re-watch, it’s an entertaining hour of television.

Quote of the episode:

Scully: Wait a minute, you're saying that time disappeared. Time can't just disappear. It's a universal invariant! 

Mulder: Not in this zip code.

Scary moment of the episode:
There are scarier episodes, of course, but the moment when Scully finds the marks on her back wins it for me this week. Later on we’ll get to be scared about what happens on this show, this time, we’re scared for Scully.

Mulder/Scully moment of the episode: 
There’s many, many to choose from, but I’ll go with semi-naked Scully throwing herself in Mulder’s arms. It’s a scary situation, and though they’ve only just met, this sows the seeds of trust that’ll remain.

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#SummerRewatch The Flash 1x03 "Things You Can't Outrun" (Catching Up To You) [Contributor: Deborah MacArthur]

"Things You Can't Outrun"

Original Airdate: October 21, 2014

The Flash opens up the episode by giving me the theme right away: everyone is running. Barry voiceovers for me and other viewers that, "Being alive means running. Running from something, running to something – or someone. And no matter how fast you are, there's some things you can't outrun. Some things always manage to catch up to you." How fitting is that for this show about the fastest man alive, huh?

The theme of running and “things catching up to you” does stick around throughout the episode, which I’m glad about. A lot of shows try to stick on a theme and then don’t follow through with it later on, but The Flash is more thorough with their ideas. For our main characters, we have Caitlin – who is running from her memories of Ronnie and his death and the negative associations she has with the particle accelerator – and Iris, who is running from facing her dad regarding her relationship with Eddie. Cisco might be running from his guilt over Ronnie’s death. Joe is running from his guilt over not believing Henry Allen to be innocent.

Then there is the episode-specific story involving the Metahuman of the Week, who doubtlessly believes himself to be the “thing” catching up to the people he thinks wronged him. I’m sure the fact that he turns into evil gas is symbolic of something. It’s hard to outrun like, air, or whatever. Notice the shift in roles – the good people in these stories are doing the running, while the villain is doing the catching up.

For each of the main characters, there’s a fear or a negative feeling that they’re trying to avoid. Barry, however, is running to something: saving his father and finding the thing that actually killed his mother. We even get that outlined in the episode itself, when Henry Allen tells Barry about when Barry took his first steps. Barry didn’t just walk – he ran, to his mother. “You ran to your mom, Barry. Right into her arms.”

It’s interesting to me how the writers set up a lot of plot and character in this seemingly generic villain-of-the-week early episode. There are some bigger things under the surface of this episode’s story. You know, “The Mist” (™ Cisco) is killing a bunch of people and then he gets stopped by The Flash and the team, gets thrown into the metahuman prison as its first resident, etcetera. If you just take that little synopsis of the episode, it’s a bland episode. But The Flash writers manage to hide some deeper ideas, not the least of which is the theme of “running,” which sticks through all twenty-three episodes of the show’s first season. Barry is running to that combined goal of finding out the truth about his mother’s death all the way up until the finale, while other characters vary between running to things and away from things, but none of them ever seem to stop.

I guess that’s why I’m so impressed with the first season of The Flash. It’s a great, action-packed season of television, to the point where I often mentioned how I couldn’t believe it’d only been one season. They manage to stuff a lot of story into a show that looks like it should be a fairly simple. Disregarding the weekly metahumans, even the arcing plot seems a bit cliché – you know, hero wants to solve the murder of a loved one, grows as a person and a hero as they do so. The usual.

But The Flash manages to work in some twists and turns and mysteries, not to mention the interesting subplots and character stories that can be fun and interesting. Having seen what they can do with a season of television – and being reminded of it with these rewatches – I can't help wondering what season two is going to have for us.

Bulletpoint Commentary:

• Barry mentions the Ophiocordyceps unilateralis fungus, which is probably my favorite horrifying nature thing to tell people about other than "hummingbirds stab each other in the throats during mating season."
• I love the weird little shrug Barry does when Iris questions all the food he's eaten on their outing.
• It took the jury 52 minutes to say Barry’s dad was guilty HOW? Were they paid off? All the evidence was from time travel!
• “All I can think of to say is, I feel like I’ve waited for this day for centuries.” FORESHADOWING!
• I remember laughing at Barry handing a lady getting mugged a knife when I first watched the episode, and it's still hilarious to me.
• “It’s a small needle, you probably won’t even feel it.” “You’re definitely going to feel it.”
• “My chest feels like that one time I had a cigarette… Yeah, teen me lived for danger.”
• “I didn’t want him to be a hero. I wanted him to be my husband.” Still heartbreaking.
• I’ve always kind of had the impression that Barry’s dad trusted Joe, but this episode shows he had a bit of a grudge against him so… how did Barry end up with the Wests, exactly?
• “Rescuing you is exhausting.” “I really miss the ability to be able to ground you.”
• “I should let you two talk, and I’ll just be outside… looking into the witness protection program.” Eddie. I’m sad about your future.
• “So… We’re just supposed to get used to working above a makeshift prison, housing evil people… with superpowers.” Hee.

Thanks be to Deborah who so graciously has helped me out the past few weeks with our reviews of The Flash while I've been busy moving and packing and unpacking. Lucky for you, you won't even get a new #SummerRewatch review next week, since we'll be re-watching "Going Rogue" and... well, I've already reviewed that one! See you in a few weeks, lovely readers, and be sure to re-watch next week's episode and then read the review. :)

(And tell Deb how awesome she is for doing these for me, would you?)

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#SummerRewatch: The Flash 1x01 "Pilot" (Run, Barry, Run)

"Pilot"

Original Airdate: October 7. 2014

I don’t know what kind of hero I am but I suspect that I’m more like Barry Allen than any other fictional hero. Barry is optimistic. He’s driven. He’s fun, lighthearted, cares about his friends and family deeply. He wants to protect others and he hasn’t been jaded by the world as much as some people have. He didn’t have to be forged in fire or life experience. He literally woke up one day with a superpower. He didn’t ASK to be a hero; he was CHOSEN to be one. In the pilot episode of The Flash, we see and hear this quite clearly: when the particle accelerator at S.T.A.R. Labs explodes, it hits the crime laboratory where Barry is working. A bolt of lightning hits him, sends him into a coma, and when he awakes – nine months later – he’s the fastest man alive and, as he soon discovers, not the only one of his kind.

But before we dive into a discussion of Barry in the pilot, let’s talk briefly about what makes The Flash so different from Arrow and what makes Barry and Oliver Queen such different kinds of heroes. I love Barry Allen because he’s got a good heart. He’s always concerned about other people and that is always his first instinct. His first instinct is not self-preservation. That’s always Oliver’s first response and it’s natural, given the amount of time he spent on the island and in Hong Kong, forced to do whatever it took to survive. Oliver was forced into becoming a hero, his soul blackened and body bruised and soul scarred because that was the only way. Before the island, Oliver was… well, making some morally questionable decisions. Barry, though not a saint, seems to generally make the right decision – he’s the do-gooder. The Flash is constantly a show about optimism and hope; Arrow is a show that is often very gritty in its realism. There are no characters who laugh as they name and label “metahumans.” In Arrow, everything is always dark and dire (with some exceptions). Even the humor on the show is often more biting and sarcastic than the goofy humor on The Flash. It doesn’t mean that one show is better than the other and it certainly doesn’t mean that one hero is somehow better than the other.

If we learned anything from The Flash/Arrow crossing over this year it’s that Barry can learn a lot from Oliver and needs to continue to allow himself the humility to learn from others. But Oliver can learn a lot from Barry, too. Barry still looks at the world and sees it as full of mostly good people… including Oliver. And Oliver? Well, he wishes he could be the kind of hero that Barry can be – the kind who didn’t have to suffer, who was chosen instead of forced to become “something else” (I couldn’t resist). Both heroes need each other for support, as the pilot of The Flash displays quite clearly. Who is the first person that Barry leans on for support when it comes to being a hero? Oliver. Remember of course, if you also watch Arrow, that this rooftop conversation takes place directly after the events at the hospital in “The Calm.” So Oliver is still fresh from his sort-of-breakup with Felicity. And yet, he manages to offer Barry words of advice: he tells him that he was chosen to become a hero and that Barry can impact Central City in a way that Oliver cannot – acting as a guardian angel, essentially. Where Oliver is a vigilante, roaming the streets during the nighttime to put away criminals, the implication here is that while Barry may want to invest in a mask, he’s going to be the kind of hero who watches over others and comforts them, protecting them, helping them.

But before Barry Allen is struck by that fateful bolt of lightning, he’s a relatively normal young man. There’s one notable exception: his father is in prison for the murder of Nora Allen – Barry’s mother and Henry’s wife. Because Henry is serving time in prison for a crime Barry is convinced he did not commit, Barry was raised by Joe West – the father of Barry’s childhood best friend, Iris. Barry and Iris are still best friends (more on them throughout this #SummerRewatch series) and rely on one another for support and encouragement and comradery. They’re yore than friends, actually: Iris is Barry’s family. And Joe is Barry’s family, too. Knowing what I know now, re-watching The Flash’s pilot was illuminating in terms of the relationship between Joe and Barry. There was a moment where Joe actually yelled at Barry and it was kind of jarring because I don’t recall too many moments later in the season where Joe acts this aggressively toward the young man. But despite their differences and disagreements, Joe and Barry love one another. Joe constantly supports Barry and treats him just like he does Iris – his own child. Joe may not be Barry’s biological father, but he’s still his parent: the one who keeps a watchful eye, the one who doles out advice and occasionally harsh truths. The one who supports and loves at the end of the day. That’s the kind of relationship that Joe fosters with Barry and it’s absolutely wonderful. I have no doubt that the combination of how Barry was raised up until his mother died and how he was raised under Joe’s roof allowed him to become the heroic young man that we meet in the pilot episode. Because even before Barry puts on a suit and a mask, he’s a hero. He’s doing what he can as a forensic scientist to help the world and make it better. He wants to solve his mother’s murder and prove his father’s innocence. He believes in happy stories. It’s why he and Felicity Smoak get along so well together.

But once Barry is hit by that bolt of lightning, he changes. He becomes The Flash: a young man with superhuman speed. And because of the coma that the lightning put him into, he’s monitored until – and after – he wakes up by a trio of S.T.A.R. Labs employees named Dr. Harrison Wells, Cisco Ramon, and Dr. Caitlin Snow. Do you ever go back and re-watch pilot episodes of your favorite shows? With Friends now readily available on Netflix, I did that recently and it struck me how young and how different everyone was. The same holds true in the case of The Flash, to an extent, even though the series is only a season old. Caitlin is much colder (pun intended for those who know what I mean) than she is during the later episodes and with good reason: at this point in the story of the show, it’s only been nine months since she lost Ronnie and since her career and boss deteriorated. Harrison is a lot harsher than I remember him, too, and a far cry from the man we meet early in the episode pre-particle accelerator explosion. That man was charismatic and charming. The man we meet in the wheelchair? He’s… curious. But he makes it clear that Barry is not a hero. Cisco is the character who changes the least in some ways: he’s still extremely energetic, fun, and doesn’t take anything seriously. At the end of The Flash’s first season, we still see that part of Cisco, but we also see a very serious, very determined, very intentional young man in the season finale. Cisco is brilliant, that much is certain, and he doesn’t take life seriously at all in the pilot which is – I think – his way of coping with all that happened. His boundless energy and enthusiasm is what keeps him going from day to day.

Unbeknownst to Barry upon meeting them, these people will change his life in ways he cannot even comprehend. And it’s fun to see little hints of that sprinkled throughout the pilot. Pilot!Barry and finale!Barry are similar in a lot of ways: both are desperate to save the people they love, both still believe in hope and goodness, and both fight for humanity and for themselves. That hope is what carries Barry throughout the entire season. It’s what causes him to realize that he has a purpose. It’s what gives him strength. And the support of Dr. Wells, Cisco, and Caitlin allow Barry to begin on the path that will lead him to growing and changing in the best possible ways.

The Flash’s pilot is important because it lays the foundation for the rest of this show: optimistic, fun, engaging, inspiring, and ambitious. What a way to begin a series.

Additional notes:

• I love Barry's voiceovers. They're just so energetic.
• “My dad gave me that pen. He fought and died.”
• “The future will be here faster than you think.” HAAAAAAAA. *hums “I Know Things Now” from Into the Woods* Also: isn't it great to go back and rewatch earlier episodes of this show, knowing what you know by the end of the season?
• “Lightning gave me abs?”
• “I need you to urinate in this.”
• “That was quite the nap you took there, baby face. And you still look twelve.”
• “You’re not a hero. You’re just a young man who was struck by lightning.”
• “You can inspire people in a way I never could.”
• “Now run, Barry. Run.”
• Barry/Henry scenes are some of the best and most emotional in the entire series and the one in this episode at the end was no exception.
• DUN-DUN-DUN. Sketchy Dr. Wells is being sketchy in the end tag!

Did you all enjoy rewatching the pilot of The Flash? Do you remember what your first impressions were of it? Hit up the comments below and let me know your thoughts. Until then. :)

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New Girl 1x02 "Kryptonite" (Learning to Let Go)

"Kryptonite"

Original Airdate: September 27, 2011

Who or what is your kryptonite? Last weekend, friends of mine went to see the new Superman movie Man of Steel (don’t worry – this story has a purpose). My friend Kate was mulling over the fact that kryptonite, as a destructive element, is so ironic. Wasn’t it kind of absurd, she explained, that the very thing that was Superman’s ONE true weakness was found on his home planet? That the very thing that could undo him was so close to him every single day of his life? I didn’t think much of Kate’s statement until I finished my re-watch of New Girl’s “Kryptonite.” And then, that conversation replayed in my mind. Isn’t it intriguing that Jess’ weakness – her kryptonite – is the very thing that had been closest to her for six years – Spencer? Maybe it’s not ironic at all; maybe it actually makes complete sense. But I often think about weaknesses, about our external enemies, as things or people we keep at arms’ length from our lives. A vice isn’t something we want to keep close to us, after all. It’s something that we KNOW is terrible for us (be it junk food or an ex-boyfriend or Keeping Up With the Kardashians) and try to rid ourselves of. But kryptonite is different – kryptonite is something you are close to, something you surround yourself with, and something that could – if used as a weapon – destroy your very existence. Spencer isn’t a terrible person, necessarily. Yes – he cheated on Jess which was terrible and gut-wrenching. But there was never any evidence to suggest that Spencer mistreated Jess in their relationship. He seemed aloof and lazy, but not malicious or violent. We wonder, just as the loft guys do, exactly WHY Jess is so completely undone by Spencer until Nick explains the concept I noted above: Spencer is Jess’ kryptonite. He’s toxic because of how close Jess allows him to be in her life, still, in spite of their catastrophe of a break-up. And really, that’s what “Kryptonite” is all about, at its core – the idea that relationships can be toxic and disastrous… only if we ALLOW them to be. They can also be gratifying and loving (Jess/the loft/Cece) or full of respect-ish things (Schmidt/Winston).

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New Girl 1x01 "Pilot" (What It Means to Be Adorkable)

"Pilot"

Original Airdate: September 20, 2011

I’ve always really adored Zooey Deschanel. Even when I only knew her as “that girl from Elf” or “that actress in (500) Days of Summer” or “the one who sings,” I thought she was endearing. Zooey Deschanel is the type of person who is unique and could care less how others perceive her. She’s confident with enough humility to leave her grounded, but bold enough to not second-guess her decisions. And even though I don’t know her, personally, I can deduce these things because of what I have seen and heard. The combination of these characteristics (or portions of them) is transferred onto Jessica Day, a young woman we meet in the pilot episode of the partially Deschanel-produced series New Girl.

When I learned that Zooey would be getting her own television series, I was excited. And when the promos for the pilot episode began surfacing, I was even more excited. The show had promise, I decided. Three men living in an apartment with a quirky young woman who was just broken up with rather terribly? Well, it had potential. I’ve talked a lot about pilot episodes on this blog before, but I’ll reiterate this – most people, when asked, will not pinpoint the pilot episode of a television series to be their favorite. Pilots aren’t necessarily meant for us to covet as favorites; their purpose is to introduce us to characters and situations that engage us just enough so that we will become invested in them and learn to form a relationship with them. Friendships and relationships in our lives are built upon the foundation of an initial meeting, but only truly develop when we make the continual effort to connect with that individual. The same logic applies to a television series. That’s why it’s such a struggle for television pilots to succeed – viewers (those of us with short attention spans, at least) want instant connections to characters and jokes or drama and… that doesn’t often happen. Community’s pilot was a bit rocky, in terms of comedy. The series grew though and found its footing. Doctor Who’s 2005 reboot, similarly, was a bit on the rocky side until it, too, found its stride.

Both of those shows noted above are now my favorite, and yet they weren’t always that way. In order for a pilot to engage me – or for me to want to set aside time throughout the week to sit down and watch it – there needs to be some sort of emotional connection between the audience (me) and the characters. I’m a sucker for sap and sentiment, but not without the promise of growth. I’m a sucker for jokes, but not without a solid foundation to anchor them on. I was a fan of New Girl from the pilot episode because I saw that this series had the potential to develop its characters into something special. It, like many pilots, was a bit rocky, but it knew where it was headed. One of the things that my friend Jaime and I have discussed before in regards to this series is that it never had Coach (and Winston), Nick, and Schmidt learn to like and care about Jess as a person – they just DID. And I’ll discuss this more throughout the review, but this element is something pretty beautiful. These are three characters who didn’t have to struggle against their prejudices or dislikes in order to learn to love Jess. A lot of series DO follow this format (Community is an example) and that worked for the show and made sense for the character of Jeff Winger – here’s a jaded ex-lawyer who has probably never had much of a family, learning to love these study group strangers. The loft boys may have rolled their eyes at Jess’ antics. They may have thought it was a bad idea to let her move in. They don’t always understand her. But they immediately – without having to learn this – care about her and make sacrifices for her. That’s always been a theme of New Girl, and it’s something that really drew me to the series. And I think I recall reading an interview with Liz Meriwether where she essentially said that this isn’t a series about a weird girl and three normal guys who learn to deal with her weirdness. It’s about four people, all who are a little weird, who learn how to live together and support each other. THAT is what New Girl is truly all about.

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