Tag Archives: HIMYM

March 16, 2009 · 9:38 pm

How I Met Your Mother – “The Front Porch”

“The Front Porch”

March 16th, 2009

In bringing in Karen, Ted’s ex-girlfriend from his high school days, How I Met Your Mother has returned to the temporality that often sets it apart from other sitcoms. The show’s basic premise is one of its defining legacies, as the very idea of this being one large story told by Future Ted to his own children has given the past (and memory, and revisionist history) a very important meaning. Even further, episodes on occasion create alternate futures, showing that Ted and the rest of the characters are just as concerned with their own prospective futures as we are about the future we know is inevitable.

“The Front Porch” is ultimately a mediation more on this last idea than the former, the past serving as evidence for the concern for the future. The result is an episode that is less about Karen and more about what Karen could represent, and a more subtle than expected refocusing on the answers to the episode’s central question: how does Ted, exactly, meet this mother? Flanked by some simple but effective little pieces of comedy, the episode avoids sending Ted into a place too annoying, and Lily to a place too mean, in its navigation of what is quite an important issue in the show’s future, and one that could well be heading to a conclusion before the season is over.

Continue reading →

4 Comments

Filed under How I Met Your Mother

Tagged as Backup Wife, Come On Wake Up New York, Creed, Delivering a Baby, Entertainment, Episode 17, Flying, Front Porch Test, Heart Attack, HIMYM, Karen, Kim Jong Il, Laura Prepon, Lily, Man on Fire, Marshall, Morning Show, Nightgown, Nightshirt, Robin Cherbotsky, Sabotage, Scrooge, Season 4, Stella, Suit Pyjamas, Suitjamas, Ted Mosby, Television, The Front Porch, Victoria

March 2, 2009 · 10:50 pm

How I Met Your Mother – “The Stinsons”

himymtitle

“The Stinsons”

March 2nd, 2009

Listen to any fan of How I Met Your Mother talk about why they think other people should watch the show and, chances are, they are likely going to eventually say something along the lines of “this is not a traditional sitcom.” This is something that causes some people some doubts: the show has a multi-camera format and utilizes a laugh track, looking and sounding like any traditional sitcom they’ve ever seen.

Astute fans, though, will point out the show often evolves beyond its sitcom qualities through the use of things like the manipulation of time, copious amounts of flashbacks, and even the general conceit of this all being one big memory told by Future Ted. The show has a lot of tricks up its sleeve that, often, leave it looking nothing like a sitcom at all. There are other times, though, where these elements aren’t as present, and where anyone spotchecking the series for the first time might leave thinking that this is a funny, but not particularly original, sitcom.

“The Stinsons” is an episode that, if I had to put it into one of these categories based on its basic concept, would be in the latter classification. This is the very definition of a situational comedy: after Barney leaves the bar suspiciously, the rest of the gang follow him to the suburbs where they discover a secret about his life that could forever change the course of their lives…or, more accurately, the course of the following twenty minutes.

But what this extremely odd, but extremely entertaining, half hour does is prove that HIMYM isn’t just capable of fundamentally altering the sitcom DNA to make itself standout: in the development of Barney Stinson as a character, and through Bays/Thomas’ great grasp of the sitcom conventions, they are subversive just in delivering this scenario in the most dysfunctional but hilarious fashion. That the episode actually ends up boiling things down, even in its lunacy, to an important point of character realization is testament to the show’s strength: being awesome.

And that’s the Stinson family motto, after all.

Continue reading →

2 Comments

Filed under How I Met Your Mother

Tagged as Actors, Barney's Mom, Betty, CBS, Die Hard, Entertainment, Episode 15, Fake Family, Frances Conroy, Grant, HIMYM, Lily, Loretta, Marshall, Mrs. Stinson, Neil Patrick Harris, Pregnancy, Robin Cherbotsky, Season 4, Ted Mosby, Television, Terminator, The Breakfast Club, The Karate Kid, The Stinsons, Tyler, Tyler No Likey

January 19, 2009 · 11:07 pm

How I Met Your Mother – “Three Days of Snow”

himymtitle

“Three Days of Snow”

January 19th, 2009

There comes a time in the life of every sitcom that tries to be something different than your traditional sitcom that you stop thinking of its unique qualities as unique and start to view them as cliches, crutches the show uses to pretend that its storylines are something more than they really are. And considering that this is the umpteenth time that I will talk about how charming the show’s use of time in order to disrupt storylines, perhaps this is the time for How I Met Your Mother.

Now is not the time.

What makes “Three Days of Snow” such a strong episode is that the time-twisting trait of sorts was intertwined with the characters who hold this show together, returned to their simplest forms. Lily and Marshall use this three-day storm of the century to re-engage with the innocence of their married days, Ted and Barney try to pick up co-eds and investigate the futility of male fantasies, and Robin is forced to confront her robotic tendencies and perhaps open herself up to some sense of emotional connectivity in the future.

The result is, yes, the very definition of a sitcom episode: characters we know and love put in situations where they get to demonstrate why we love them. But HIMYM continues to shine when it uses these scenarios as a display for a unique comic voice and a unique sitcom structure that’s time is not up by a long shot.

Continue reading →

5 Comments

Filed under How I Met Your Mother

Tagged as Arizona Tech, Auld Lang Syne, Barney, Entertainment, HIMYM, Kokomo, Last Call, Lily, Marching Band, Marshall, Puzzles, Robin, Storm of the Century, Ted, Television, Three Days of Snow

December 9, 2008 · 3:41 am

How I Met Your Mother – “The Fight”

“The Fight”

December 8th, 2008

After a season that got off to a bit of a slow start figuring out how to balance the arrival of Stella, and that has been much better in the aftermath of the broken off wedding than leading up to it, “The Fight” continues to demonstrate that the show is back in its sweet spot. Like “The Naked Man” before it, this week’s episode was democractic and monumental: this felt like one of those memories that the group would keep, it involved all of our major characters in some capacity, and it really hit some intriguing comic notes throughout.

The show is still content to play lip service to recurring storylines as opposed to really digging into them, but this feels like the right note for a show reaching its midseason break and heading into the second round metaphorically floating like a butterfly.

Continue reading →

How I Met Your Mother – “The Naked Man”

himymtitle

“The Naked Man”

November 24th, 2008

[UPDATE: For those who want a better look at Lily’s list of 50 reasons to have sex, Mo Ryan at the Chicago Tribune has the enormous napkin list. I think my favourite is #39 because of its history between Marshall and Lily and the early Season Two period.]

When adding terms to the HIMYM Lexicon, it is usually Barney who takes the mantle, but “The Naked Man” takes a slightly different approach. For once, it places all of our characters on the same page: they are all students to Mitch The Naked Man’s teacher, and the result is that all of them test out his unorthodox method for their own purposes.

What could have been, as a result, a highly unorganized episode smartly lays low in regards to the show’s central dramas. With Barney and Robin’s love, and Ted’s recent breakup with Stella, payed homage to without dominating the episode, you have a chance for each character to play their comic beat while not becoming overloaded in drama. Yes, ultimately this episode feels quite inconsequential, but it was indulgent in a way HIMYM hasn’t been all season with the cloud of Stella or Major Life Changes hanging in the air.

And in many ways, this episode is the transition point: from this point forward, Ted’s in a new place in his life and perhaps we can find a new turn around the horizon…just as long as Mitch isn’t there when we turn the corner.

Continue reading →

2 Comments

Filed under How I Met Your Mother

Tagged as Barney, Entertainment, Episode Nine, HIMYM, Josh Radnor, Lily, Marshall, May 2009, Mitch the Naked Man, Naked Man, Neil Patrick Harris, Robin, Season Four, Ted, Television, The Goat, The Naked Man

November 18, 2008 · 7:33 pm

How I Met Your Mother – “Woooo!”

himymtitle

“Woooo!”

November 17th, 2008

Scoring its highest ratings since the season premiere, which were close to its series high levels, How I Met Your Mother has grown from a niche success to a bona fide comedy hit, scoring extremely impressive numbers in key demographics in particular. Whether it is the result of the recent stuntcasting trends, or just based on the show’s undeniable quality, How I Met Your Mother has in the span of only a year gone from a show fighting for its life to a show that CBS will be keeping around as long as possible to allow it to expand into syndication.

When that happens, I don’t really know if “Woooo!” is going to resonate very well as an episode of the series in terms of its broad strokes. While the titular expressions of happiness are, as the episode cleverly shows, veiled cries for help amidst a pool of self-pity, this episode lacks a certain level of depth that could help elevate it. The episode returns to the Barney and Marshall battle for Ted’s best friendship, but after last week delved into the question of parenthood this week we see very little on that level of character building.

Instead, what we get is an office in the head of a Tyrannosaurus Rex and a Strip Club in the Letter “N,” and let’s be clear: on that level, this was a very sharp and (when it repeats in syndication) thoroughly entertaining half hour.

Continue reading →

How I Met Your Mother – “Not a Father’s Day”

himymtitle

“Not a Father’s Day”

November 10th, 2008

If there was a checklist of HIMYM tropes, this episode tried to tick off every single one of them. You had a new Barney-ism (“The Cheerleader Effect”), a new egotistical celebration of bachelorhood from Barney (the titular “Not a Father’s Day”), Ted and Robin clashing over the value of having children, and our characters facing more realities of being 30+.

It isn’t breaking any new ground, no, but it’s a solid piece of comedy that feels distinctly HIMYM, instead of feeling distinctly like a traditional sitcom as it can sometimes do. There’s a certain pace that “Not a Father’s Day” keeps, helped mostly by Alyson Hannigan’s ability to play drunk with such wonderful abandon and Cobie Smulders being let loose as Robin to a degree that was almost too over the top, which really keeps things moving here: even though this was really a setup episode for two major plot shifts (one involving the living situation at the apartment, the other a life-changing decision for Marshall and Lily), it was a mighty fine concoction while it went down.

Continue reading →