What New Girl Replacement For Zooey Deschanel Would Be Less Jarring Than Megan Fox?

With Zooey Deschanel needing to exit New Girl for a while -- while she is pregnant, Jessica Day is not -- the show's decided not to try becoming Three Guys In A Loft. Instead, while Jess is "sequestered on jury duty" for several episodes starting in January, her room's going to be rented by a pharmaceutical rep played by Megan Fox. ...Mmmmkay.

Leaving aside the factual accuracy of series creator Liz Meriwether's remarks on the subject -- of Fox, she reportedly said, "It's insane to me that such a gorgeous person can be so funny" -- this is weird, right? Other than that they are both dark-haired white women, Deschanel and Fox could not be less alike. The former is basically Bambi reincarnated as a lady, while the latter is like a 3D-printed composite of the results of a Maxim readers' focus group. I mean, fine -- I do appreciate that they're not just making Deschanel hide her pregnancy by having Jess carry around big purses or mattresses à la Grace Adler and Elaine Benes. And obviously by casting the exact opposite woman from Deschanel means they're thinking of trying out storylines a different kind of woman would feature in (though I bet they end up having a lot in common with those involving Joey Tribbiani and his hot dancer roommate!). But if anyone at the production had come to us for ideas on how to replace Zooey Deschanel in a way that would be less of a shock to the viewer's system, we would have been extremely helpful. Here are just a few suggestions.

• Alison Pill as Maggie from The Newsroom
• Bryce Dallas Howard as Claire from Jurassic World
• Mageina Tovah
• Charlyne Yi
• a life-size Raggedy Ann doll
• Jane Levy
• a bowl of sponge curlers
• Kristen Bell
• Busy Philipps
• Jenny Slate
• sun tea
• Mila Kunis
• a beagle puppy (preferably a runt)
• Sami Gayle
• a rag rug made of upcycled burlesque costumes
• Tatiana Maslany as Krystal from Orphan Black
• a heart-shaped waffle
• the Warby Parker catalogue
• an Adirondack chair made of reclaimed barn wood
• roasted chestnuts
• a chestnut pony
• Taylor Swift
• the original Broadway cast album of The Sound Of Music
• a pair of vintage lace tap pants, baby blue
• the voice-over from a Love's Baby Soft commercial from the '70s
• a Judy Garland hologram
• three raspberries in a Mason jar
• Zoe Kazan