How I Met Your Mother

For awesome moments from the show, you can't go wrong with the ending to "Three Days of Snow", or the debut appearance of Robin Sparkles.

My only issue with Robin Sparkles' first appearance is that was the start of the slap bet, which definitely wore out its welcome.

... not to mention it was comically unfair. It's almost like having your wife be the slap bet commissioner is an advantage.

Lily being Slap Bet Commissioner was Barney's idea, though.

In hindsight, a HUGE mistake.

I love the Slap Bet though, because Barney kind of deserved the karma after the first few seasons of being an utter prick. Also it made for a GREAT series of episodes.

I loved it for a while, but by "Ducky Tie" I was super sick of it.

In a related note, I found the choice of holiday episodes odd. There were what, five Thanksgiving Episodes? And only one-and-a-half Christmas episodes? Just an odd proportion.

My favorite slap from the slap bet was the one at the end of Barney's awful play. Almost all of the others (or possibly all of them, I don't remember) had build up; that one was funny because it came out of left field at the right time.

I wish they'd used them more that way.

Agreed.

Ironically, I think that's the slap that got people most excited about the Slap Bet... and it was the gross outlier.

"Slapsgiving" was passable for being the first "event slap" and it was mostly a subplot to the actual story about Ted and Robin backsliding and figuring out their new friendship. "Slapsgiving II: Revenge of the Slap" was pretty much entirely about the slap itself, while "Disaster Averted" worked for the surprise double-slap. But I agree, the surprise slap during Barney's one-man-play in "Stuff" was the funniest, not just for being unexpected but Barney is also completely laid out by the slap in the robot costume.

And not to go too much on the finale, but I think the main reason there was such backlash is because Cristin Milioti was a surprise success in charming the audience with her performance as The Mother. If the Mother remained a minor character only revealed in the last episode, or last couple of episodes, the backlash would have been minor. But no, we had to get "How Your Mother Met Me" and we are crying with this girl and can't wait for her to find Ted too.

You know, credit where credit's due.

I don't think anyone thought that the mother herself could possibly live up to expectations. And damned if she didn't.

So I'm rewatching the series and while I like Alyson Hannigan as an actress, I despise Lily as a character and think the show would have been way better if she got called out on her flaws, in particular being nosy and trying to meddle in her friend's lives.

She was called out at least once but it changed absolutely nothing.

That was the worst part of the show in my opinion, she faced no consequences for her less likable moments beyond that one moment. Ted and Barney face consequences for their actions even if Barney's are more comedic then Ted's and Robin sometimes faces consequences for her's.

She ended up saddled with a huge mortgage on an apartment that was both crooked and downwind of a sewage treatment plant. I'd say that counts as a consequence.

Lily tended to be the hardest on herself more than anyone else. She did probably the biggest mistake of any character in the series in running off to the art program in San Francisco, which took half a season to recover from. She spent a long time panicking over her credit card debt only for Marshall to forgive her. She stood by Marshall even though him quitting his job and doing volunteer work was driving her crazy. She also confessed how much it pained her to be having second thoughts about being a mom. Ted was also very quick to chastise her over peripherally breaking him up with past girlfriends, even though he later admitted she was Right for the Wrong Reasons (because she was orchestrating the break-ups, Ted never understood why those girls were bad for him). Ted also put her through the ringer for her aggressively staged group pictures that didn't actually show the truth of the moment.

edited 21st May '16 11:32:04 AM by KJMackley

She still faced very few visible onscreen consequences and didn't really develop much as a character from it. She didn't stop being super manipulative, the show made it so she still got everything she wanted in the end without really earning it. The show gives us reasons to pity her, but it doesn't give us reasons to support her and often shows off how bad a person she is more then how good a person she is.

I think that may be the writer's fault for focusing more on Robin and Barney then on Lily in the midseasons but either way I still feel Lily was the least likable character of the main five.

edited 21st May '16 5:27:25 PM by DamascaRamza

No, I think that was totally intentional. If you pay attention to the future segments and realize she's pretty much a politician, they had every intention of her being a manipulative monstrous bitch because it would get her places. At the very least she dresses like a politician and she's married to a judge.

I don't know, "visible, onscreen consequences" feels like an extremely narrow definition when it comes to talking about the character having flaws and making mistakes. Like I said she made the absolute biggest screw-up of any character in the series by running off to San Francisco, essentially Breaking the Fellowship for half of season two.

I think it may be more that early on Ted treats her as being the voice of reason (although she is also Not So Above It All too), as such throughout the series she is the one offering advice because that is literally supposed to be her character. In addition to the fact all her stories directly involved another member of the group, especially her marriage to Marshall. At least Marshall was able to have problems and make mistakes regarding his job. By the time Lily saw actual career growth it is easy see that Marshall has fought tooth and nail to become a judge, while Lily fell backwards into being the art assessor.

Consider that her comeuppance, I think. If they'd been wanting her to be a Karma Houdini they would have pointed out that rich dog owners are absolutely nuts about their dogs and probably would have been a great market for her dog art.

Instead, they make her an assessor who doesn't seem to make her own stuff anymore.

That was certainly part of Lily and Marshall's big fight in the last season. Marshall was fine taking some time off because his career had stalled for the time being and was happy Lily had something going for herself, but when looking at the big picture his career was far more stable (especially as a judge, and not subject to the whims of The Captain) while her career had not been much more than just a hobby. That doesn't mean she should have been happy to give it up, but that situation had no easy answer. In the finale it was pretty obvious that Lily was feeling guilty over how depressed Marshall was after passing on being a judge. It all worked out okay in the end, but that still meant a few years of struggling.

Yeah, I legitimately did not like Lily. I think my favorite term for her is "Fridge Bitch" because she doesn't seem so bad at first, but then you think about what she's done and how the narrative treats her and it's actually pretty bad.

If "being saddled with a bad apartment" is supposed to be her karmic comeuppance, then that's messed up because Marshall gets hit with the exact same thing, and she's literally given a house a year later. Then when she decides she doesn't want that, she's given an apartment.

It's just really weird because you can compare what she does to another character doing the exact same thing and for some reason she comes out of it smelling like a rose. Take the episode where Robin is taking her breakup with Barney really hard, but hiding it from the guys. The guys are shown to be giant jackasses for being insensitive. They're beating themselves up over it for the rest of the episode. But Lily knew and didn't tell them or do anything to make them stop. Why? Because the "bang" song was catchy. And she isn't portrayed as being in the wrong at all. That's messed up.

But I think the worst was the whole "breaking Ted up with his girlfriends because they don't fit her own vision for her future" thing is messed up. And by the end of the episode Ted not only absolves her but basically joins her side. It's like she has an Omniscient Morality License but without the omniscience.

edited 23rd May '16 8:09:25 AM by Larkmarn

Indeed. First: It's likely all these women would have found legitimate (to them at least) reasons to break up with Ted on their own loooong before that porch test needed to come up. Or vice versa. Second: There's nothing saying that knowing Ted couldn't have made the bitches see their own flaws and dampen them down a little.

My question now is: Was it the writers clinging on to an outdated ending, or were the producers all like "We spent money on this ending almost a decade ago. We're not wasting it. Find a way to make this work or we're black listing you?"

Thinking about the Castle ending has me wondering this because I KNOW those writers never wanted to use the ending we got. They were forced into it.

Well, your second point ("There's nothing saying that knowing Ted couldn't have made the bitches see their own flaws and dampen them down a little") does run contrary to one of the weirder themes of the show, that love is supposed to be easy and changing yourself for your lover is wrong. Seriously, it keeps coming up again and again and again that any relationship that requires work or changing is an unhealthy one. If your paramour doesn't instantly and automatically love you for all your flaws and everything from the word go, it's doomed.

It's why Barney and Robin's marriage was doomed. Barney had to grow at least somewhat to be a good husband, and in the HIMYM world, that's a flaw in a relationship.

Christ, I forgot about the episode "Milk." You know, the one where Lily went off for her art program interview. Now, you'd think I'm going to rail on her for going to the interview behind Marshall's back. But nope. I'm going to rail on her for, when Ted comes to get her in Marshall's Fiero, she not only goes to the interview (which she promised she wouldn't do) but she abandons Ted. Knowing that he has a hugely important date that night. I always thought that girl (the one that was supposedly perfect, set up through the online dating service) would show up later, but nope. That was it. And at the end of the episode, Ted and Lily have a knowing smile and Ted is basically thanking her for abandoning him.

... oh my god I just realized I could rant about Lily being awful for posts and posts.

edited 23rd May '16 8:52:25 AM by Larkmarn

At that point he was not ready to give up on Robin. So yeah, he was thanking her. And that theme is a horrible one. Seriously, the only reason Lily and Marshall work together is because Marshall is a pushover who is willing to forgive just about anything. If he were a normal guy who didn't need pushed off a cliff to stand up for himself, Lilly would be out on her own failing at her art and drowning in credit card debt.

I was considering rewatching this show at some point, but the more I think about it, the more it falls into the unhealthy side of the Sitcom spectrum. I'm never turning to it again.

But that's exactly what I'm talking about. She has an inexplicably Omniscient Morality License that lets her get away with anything.

Including, and I still can't stress this enough, stranding your friend on the side of a highway and breaking your promise to not go to the interview.

So, does anyone have any idea if the "How I Met Your Father" spin-off is still getting made?

Also, to revive this thread, I was just thinking about the finale and how much I hated it. Loved every single episode, until the 9th season, which was pretty... divisive. But particularly so the finale.

I was thinking about how they pretty much threw all of the characters development in order to acomodate for their dumbass design of the finale. But, in reality, all of the ideas they had were actually pretty good; they just did them in the wrong way, or gave the plot points to the wrong characters. Especially, about Barney, Robin, Ted and Tracy.

So what happened to all of them? Well, Barney got married to Robin (which took an entire season and part of the eight) and then divorced her (which took... like 5 minutes? Are you serious?) to later become a womanizer again (and negating his complex character development... ugh) and only stop when he becomes a father (again, this is covered in the same damn episode). Robin got her freedom back and took like 15 years to be ready to date Ted again (again... what?). Ted met Tracy (and that took 9 seasons), we saw their time together (bits here and there through the second half of season 9 and about 15 minutes of the last episode) and then lost her to an undisclosed disease (they never said what happened to her, right?). Tracy, well, we only had one episode to cover the last 8 years and then, again, she died.

Thinking about it, here's how I would fix this stupid finale.

First of all, I would have Barney would have never marry Robin (and I'll explain this in a bit). His character, while having grown and matured, still didn't feel like he belonged in a marriage. So, he proposes to Robin, only to be turned down/Robin runs off from the wedding. Then, out of grief, he becomes a womanizer again for a good portion of the first half of season 9. This is when he gets that nameless chick pregnant, and mets his daughter. Only here is when he realizes his life has been one of selfishness and stupidity, and truly changes his ways. This way, he never promises to be forever with Robin to only turn again into the idiot he was the second he's alone again.

Now, Robin. It might be complicated, but I'd have switched an important plot point between her and Tracy. Now, do you remember she never wanted to be in a relationship, always enjoying the moment and never caring about the future? This is because, instead of Tracy dying, it would be Robin who has the mortal disease and was dying. This way it explains why she never wanted to get married, because she knows it'd mean that whoever she ends up with would end up losing her to her disease. She was shutting every love interest out, because of some weird mix of selfishness and selflessness, never telling anyone (but maybe Lily). Thus, she'd fall for Barney, but turned him down/runs off because she didn't want Barney to lose her. Ergo, she'd never end up with Ted either, because she'd die a while after he meets Tracy. And the best part is that it'd fit with her whole characterization. Then, of course, she dies, and sad times are had by all.

Ted gets to be with the mother, but griefs about Robin (his first true love). But, he learns to accept and let go of her, ensuring him a happy ending with his true love, Tracy.

And then, Tracy. Ted would met her in the aftermath of the disastrous wedding/another wedding, about the fourth episode. Then, we get a good five or so episodes that cover Tracy's perspective of the last eight years, then, the remaining episodes we get her life with Ted, her interactions with the gang, maybe even some Robin/Tracy moments to solidify a relationship with her out of their love of Ted, get everything more fleshed out.

Anyway, that's how I'd fix this mess of a finale. Any thoughts?

edited 28th Jan '17 4:28:48 PM by ExplosiveLion