Well, he does, spoiler alert. The unidentified person who finds Furguson is Bertie (Jessica Chaffin), an amorous and frisky bus driver with a habit of talking straight and a distaste for the dating scene herself. Immediately taking a liking to Winston, it takes him a little while to catch on, and once he does Nick finds himself an unwilling third layer to their love sandwich. Winston and Bertie are a really nice match, and by casting a “name,” it suggests that Bertie will be a part of Winston’s life for at least the next few episodes.
His “thing” has been “owning a cat” for far too long now, it’s about time he had an interesting character with whom to bounce off. Nick’s role was mainly to act as audience surrogate, acting a little grossed out at the intensity with which Winston and Bertie seem to subconsciously connect. All in all, I’m glad for him (Winston).
While this is going on, Cece and Coach are on a date. This drives Schmidt crazy, necessitating Jess and Nick to stay and look after him as well as Furguson. I really liked how Schmidt, throughout the episode, was fully aware of how he acts when he gets like this and kept advising Jess on what he was about to do, and what she should do to help out. This culminated in possibly a broader way than you’d probably imagine – Jess hitting Schmidt with her car. Yes, what started out as a potential bottle episode ends with an impressive stunt, involving camera angles and stuntmen and everything. It’s not often that New Girl pulls out the big guns, but it really worked.
Is Schmidt right to get so manic? Well, yes. Coach and Cece are a really nice fit, when Coach isn’t acting up. It turns out that ordering seven pretzels at a basketball game, as well as buying most of the merchandise at the stall, isn’t the way to Cece’s heart. She eventually storms off, when he refuses to stop texting, but he chases her out and manages to stop her by revealing he was actually texting his mom. He even has a nickname – “Booboo.” Luckily, Cece’s charmed by this, and they eventually end up kissing under a streetlight near the building. No big deal, right? It’s not like anyone will see them… right? Right?
