Like, in any other sitcom or dramedy, that would be a joke about the character's weight, or the loneliness of their pathetic existence or whatever. Liz Lemon, as far as I understand her, would take the potentiality of scorn and highlight why those impulses are destructive. Mindy Lahiri (Mindy Kaling's character) is matter-of-fact and joyful, because look what she can do instead!
The Mindy Project is a really, really imperfect sitcom. As many critics, including Todd VanDerWerff of The A.V. Club, have noted, it's super-unfocused. Most of its supporting characters are crazy broad and wacky, useful for side commentary but often better ignored. And while I love the idea of a workplace sitcom, the whole "doctor" aspect of the show is only interesting when the ob-gyns reveal their utter scorn for the holistic midwives in the practice upstairs. Or, memorably, that one time Mindy snapped and told a high school volleyball team to stop worrying about romance and start worrying about herpes.
The first season of the show was spun on romantic comedies gone awry, but that only worked so far. While some romantic pairings worked better than others, we're clearly supposed to feel like Mindy/Danny is the endgame romance. They've got crackly chemistry, they are weirdly attached to each other (they sent letters to each other while she was in Haiti! who does that), and they fight a lot. If there's anything we've learned from fiction, it's that endless bickering is a sign of TRUE LOVE FOREVER. *eyeroll*
SECRETLY IN LOVE.
I'm not sold on them as a romantic pairing, but it's for the same reason I buy them as romantically entangled: they are so mean to each other. Just, they have paid attention to each other enough that they know how to hit where it hurts, every single time, and they don't hesitate to do that. I don't remember what episode it was, but in the first season, Mindy carelessly (it's always careless, exasperated, or at most, in a fit of pique) comments on Danny's still-painful, relatively-recent divorce. And Chris Messina is a good actor, and you can see the nano-second recoil before he lashes back. And it took the form, unfortunately, of telling her to lose fifteen pounds if she wanted to keep her boyfriend interested. Because he's an asshole.
Maybe that's the thing that makes this show feel weird. The main premise of the show, the thing that works, is that this is a romantic comedy, but the protagonists aren't the lovable goofs we've been trained to expect. They're not bad people, really, but they're self-centered and selfish. They're unkind to each other, even as they're relentlessly generous. It's a super-weird dynamic, but it's fascinating.
It's possible I'm not so much recommending this show as talking myself out of it. I guess we'll see?
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