Marvel and DC don’t have a monopoly on the concept of shared universes. Seinfeld and Mad About You, son. Golden Girls and Empty Nest, homey. Perfect Strangers and Family Matters, dude. These shared worlds exist and there are many others in the sitcom world. Still, it’s an increasingly (and unfortunately) rare thing nowadays. But in Tuesday’s episode of The Mindy Project, something burst into existence by way of an Easter Egg.
In the episode, Mindy goes down to Texas to visit Peter (Adam Pally) and to try to boy browse and carouse a bit. While there, Mindy has to walk to the store and she bumps into Peter. The store? Cloud 9 — the superstore from Superstore. Same logo, same blue smocks.
Being that the episode takes place in Texas, none of the Superstore cast is involved. No America Ferrera or Colton Dunn or Ben Feldman (who appeared in two episodes of The Mindy Project in 2013 as Jason Richman because this universe clearly has doppelgangers). But it is most definitely the same store, which means that, in a super small way, The Mindy Project and Superstore exist in the same creative space, which is fun and mostly meaningless.
Here’s the thing, though: why did The Mindy Project use Cloud 9 and drag the freshman NBC show into its realm? There are a few obvious possibilities like the fact that both The Mindy Project and Superstore are produced by NBC Universal or the likelihood that it was easier to shoot on the Superstore set due to what the scene required. It’s also possible that Mindy Project creator Mindy Kaling and Superstore creator Justin Spitzer, who worked together on The Office, decided to have a little fun for the sake of their fans. Which is the best reason to bury something like this in an episode.
