The second season of “The Mindy Project” is currently on air, and it released before we anticipated it to be on air. What sucks is that we weren’t prepared, you know, in that special way when you read up and recap the season finale in your head, before getting down to pirate it and make a night of it. So it’s only fair that we fulfill the tradition before another episode is released and we’re still wondering why she’s sporting that cute-ghastly pixie cut.
Anyone who has watched “The Office” will have loved to hate Kelly Kapoor. She did slap Michael Scott (Steve Carrel) when he made “googly” eyes at her and pretended to be pregnant so her real life on-again-off-again beau Ryan (BJ Novak) would get back with her. Mindy Kaling, the comedian who also wrote, executive produced and directed several episodes, has her own sitcom “The Mindy Project” now. Here are 10 of the show’s best moments that made us sit up and go whoa!
- When Mindy cycled home drunk
So she’s a 31-year-old Ob-Gyn, she’s single, has terrible luck with men and is a ditz. Why would we want to watch the show beyond this tried, tested and failed concept of a show? Because Kaling created a character who revels in her flaws, she’s overweight, she’s into rom-coms and she gets into embarrassing situations with the flair of professionals, whilst being supremely confident about her abilities. She slurs, “I’m Sandra Bullock!” while cycling home drunk from an ex’s wedding, hoping she’ll find her own Hugh Grant and Ryan Gosling. Right then we know she’s a whack-job, and we were hooked. But the icing on the cake is a bit later when Mindy hallucinates that a Barbie shames her for being single.
- When the whole staff cheered up Mindy on Christmas
In that cringe-worthy moment when Mindy gets beaten up by the woman whose couple-dom she’s wrecking, we can just try to stifle our giggles. She’s down in the dumps and we’re wondering, how on earth, could she put herself in these situations. But downstairs, her colleagues are rallying the troops to cheer her up. She’s a mess, but she’s their mess. Don’t we all want a pick-me-up at the end of a rough day?
- When Mindy’s prostitute sang at a party
Mindy ends up picking up a prostitute at a bar by knocking over a woman to make space for him and getting wasabi in her eyes. Aptly titled, “Pretty Man,” this episode sees Mindy’s undying need to meddle when she decides to uplift Adam (Josh Meyers) the prostitute’s life. During Danny’s party everyone is enthralled with the male hooker’s piano abilities, but then things go downhill when he sings an original about 9/11 and proudly declares, “I really like being a prostitute.”
- When Morgan become’s Danny’s brother
Our favourite supporting character, the kook male nurse, Morgan (who wanted to be referred to as Ransom) has left the doctors and shacked up with the midwives, the Deslaurier brothers (Mark and Jay Duplass). Despite Danny Castellano (Chris Messina) and Jeremy Reed (Ed Weeks) making him an offer, “Would you mind writing it on a small piece of paper and passing it to me like we’re in an 1980s business movie?” Morgan only wanted to be treated better. And what really sealed the deal was when the doctors included Morgan in their family, called him their brother and gave him a puppy (who was later named Bones).
- When Mindy supported her brother
Rishi Lahiri (Utkarsh Ambudkar ) tells his sister he wants to quit college and focus on his rap career. Imagine his sister’s disappointment and rage at having an ungrateful sibling. But hey we’ve all been there. So when she decides to spot her brother some love and help him during a rap battle, all’s well that ends well. It also helps that the younger Lahiri doesn’t suck and while Mindy can’t really sing back-up, we liked how she was a prude to the naughty lyrics “That’s too vivid. Hugging and kissing is fine, too. You’re all young” when she has one sexcapade after the other. Classic Indian double standards.
- When Morgan carried Danny over the finish line
Like a knight in shining armour, Morgan saved the day and also Danny from succumbing to a cramp when he lifted him over the NYC marathon’s finish line. And they say chivalry is dead. This despite, Danny firing Morgan. Poor Danny had to take Mindy’s place when her stress-induced projectile vomiting stood in the way. Thank God they share the same shoe size. What a heartwarming moment, especially since Morgan had cosied up with the midwives brothers just earlier.
- When Seth Rogen got “arm” tattooed on his arm
Little Sam Klienfield met little Indian Mindy at Jewish camp, because “If I was going to be away from home for several weeks, my parents only trusted me in the gentle hands of the Jews of the Berkshires.” And love blossomed to the background score of Michael Jackson’s Black Or White. So when Mindy, despite the fact that Sam won’t be staying long, decides to be with him, it made us lean towards the mush. In a romantic gesture Sam interrupts his ARMY tattoo to walk out with Mindy in a happily-one-day-after scenario.
- When Mindy tries to hook up with a midwife
Mindy’s gotta get some and she looks no farther than the floor above occupied by the midwives. She’s got her eye on Brenden and despite loads of insults flying back and forth, he did look dapper in his (hemp?) sweater and drawstrings as he nonchalantly played Landslide on his guitar. The whole thing of course, turns out to be a fiasco when Mindy is physically assaulted by the midwives’ shower (with its automatic sliding glass doors). It ends with Mindy saying the next day, “There is a small knife at your house. I brought it with me to stab you with it in case you tried to attack me.”
- When Moby performed in a church
This is a fleeting moment, but one that really proves how cool Kaling is. At this point in the show Mindy has met the cool pastor Casey (Anders Holm), they bonded over how both their apartment buildings used to be tuberculosis hospitals. She’s totally trying to please him by attending his service and that’s when it happens. This is not some square church, it’s a Lutheran hip Jesus-loving party where Moby spins music instead of a choir. When can we convert? Sidenote: Cool Casey prays to G about “Game Of Thrones” not being available on DVR and sings Bruno Mars songs. Sigh.
- When Mindy cuts her hair
In the season finale, we saw how the show smoothened out its kinks and built nice little cosy half-hour segments that impressed us week after week. Mindy thinks she can move to Haiti to be with her cool Christian boyfriend Casey, but chickens out at the last minute when he proves to be too committed to her. When she flip flops and changes her mind, in a last ditch effort to get back together, Mindy lies about being pregnant (maybe that’s a thing with Kaling). But the clear ringer is when she finally pulls down her hoodie to reveal a pixie cut. It’s her version of showing commitment, because what better way to say “I’m sticking with you” than by forgoing the most important thing, vanity. But hey, we loved it. This is as close as we can get to John Cusack with his boombox in Say Anything.
