Recap / How I Met Your Mother S 4 E 13 Three Days Of Snow

Future Ted recounts three different stories that took place three different days during a big storm in New York.

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This episode provides examples of:

• Anachronic Order: By the last third of the episode, Future!Ted clarifies that the three subplots happened in different days of the snowstorm. Marshall and Robin's trip to the airport happens on Tuesday, Ted and Barney's subplot with the band happens on Wednesday. And Lily arrives on Thursday.
• Artistic License: The image of the storm just prior to the opening theme song is spinning clockwise. In the northern hemisphere, storms spin counterclockwise due to the Coriolis effect. The landmass shown underneath the storm is clearly North America (the Great Lakes can be seen).
• Astronomic Zoom: Used in the opening to show the scale of the incoming storm.
• Brick Joke: The woman Lily pictures Marshall leaving her for if she doesn't bring him a six-pack is a Call-Back to what 15 year-old Marshall's description of his future wife in a letter to his future self, which Marshall will find in the Season 5 episode "The Window".
• Both Sides Have a Point: Robin is wrong about criticizing Marshall and Lily having over the top romantic gestures and rituals in their relationship, but she is right about them not being essential for every couple. Marshall is wrong about judging Robin as emotionless because she isn't the romantic type, but he is also right about traditions are fine as long as both like doing them.
• Continuity Nod: Ted and Barney use Telepathy, which was established that the gang "uses" since Season 1.
• Cut Apart: Marshall and Lily rushing to meet each other at the airport. It is then revealed that each of them came on different days.
• Daddy Issues: Barney calls dibs on the girl who makes known that her dad was a drunk and abandoned her.
• Europeans Are Kinky: The woman Lily pictures Marshall leaving her for is implied to be European, and a statuesque Ms. Fanservice one at that.
• Event Title: The episode refers to the snowstorm that hit New York for three days.
• Everyone Loves Blondes: The woman Lily pictures Marshall leaving her for is a statuesque blonde.
• Female Gaze: The man Marshall pictures Lily leaving him for displays his abs.
• Foreshadowing: How can you tell that the episodes take place over different days of the storm? Because on day 1, Marshall is wearing the exact same shirt he'd been wearing earlier at the bar, while Ted and Barney are dressed in different clothes.
  • Tons for future seasons as well.
    • The five-word phrases people say and will come to regret that Future!Ted mentions include Marshall saying "I can jump that far", which he does in the Season 4 finale, and Ted saying "I'm gonna win her back", which he does in Season 8. Marshall also does this just a season ago in the episode "Dowisetrepla", when he says "We should buy a place".
    • After moving the party from MacLaren's to their apartment, Barney and Ted discuss starting a band. Two seasons later, Barney lies to his father about the gang being a band.
    • Two seasons later, the gang will once again talk about buying a bar, and Ted and Barney will open one called "Puzzles", where they indeed regret doing so. Also, as revealed in the final season episode "How Your Mother Met Me", the Mother's future boyfriend Louis apparently visited MacLaren's while Ted and Barney were running it, thinking it was actually called "Puzzles".
• Geeky Turn-On: Ted calls dibs on the girl who made a Star Wars reference, by comparing the blizzard with Hoth.
• Grand Romantic Gesture: Marshall and Lily's "airport pick-up" tradition, where one waits at the airport while the other brings back a six-pack beer. Despite promising each other that this year they would break tradition, both regret it and end up doing their parts to keep doing it (Marshall goes to the airport twice despite the snowstorm, and Lily buys a keg because there wasn't any six-packs)
• I Didn't Mean to Turn You On: Played for Laughs when Marshall thinks Robin hit on him, which is obviously not the case.
• I Owe You My Life: How the band felt for Ted and the gang.
• Male Gaze: There's a scene at the beginning of the episode where a sweating Robin is only wearing a tank top and very short shorts.
• Sequencing Deception: It's not revealed until the end that each of the three plot lines take place in three different days. That being said, the episode has a Spoiler Title.
• Shout-Out:
  • The image of the storms shown in the cold opening imitate the exact weather conditions of The Perfect Storm of 1991.
  • Barney quotes "Closing Time" by Semisonic after last call at MacLaren's.
  • When coming to the bar during the snowstorm, one of the girls makes a The Empire Strikes Back reference, saying it's snowing like Hoth outside.
  • The marching band on the show is actually a small portion of The Spirit of Troy, also known as the University of Southern California Trojan Marching Band.
  • The bar montage and accompanying Kokomo allude to similar scenes from Roger Donaldson's 1988 film, Cocktail.
  • The flashback where Barney gets the idea to buy a bar, Ted and Barney are playing Monopoly.
  • Barney hitting on a girl in the band's flute section may be an Actor Allusion to Alyson Hannigan's infamous flute scene from American Pie.
  • The song the band played at the end is Auld Lang Syne
• Snow Means Love: Marshall still decided to pick up Lily despite a snowstorm.
• Spoiler Title: Played With. The title alludes to the Sequencing Deception reveal, but is vague enough about it that the audience is still taken aback.
• A Storm Is Coming: The beginning of the episode highlights the incoming snowstorm.
• Stronger Than They Look: Ranjit lifted a keg of beer using one arm.
• Undying Loyalty: Just as Lily runs into Ranjit, who is picking up a client, he notices that Lily and Marshall are not following their tradition, so he leaves his client and rushes with Lily to get Marshall's beer.
• Tempting Fate: According to Future Ted, the "five-word phrases people say and will come to regret".
• Wild Teen Party: Ted and Barney organized one to hook-up with two college-aged girls. Doing so made said college students repay them by helping Marshall on his Grand Romantic Gesture for Lily at the end of the episode.