I've watched "How I Met Your Mother" semi-regularly since its debut nine years ago, a show that brought manic energetic comedy with occasional moments of reality and drama. The writers bestowed us catchphrases, flashbacks, the romanticism and know-it-all-isms of Ted Moseby an the legen - wait for it! -dary Barney Stinson.
The show has no direct Atlanta ties, save for Alyson Hannigan's brief time growing up as a pre-teen in the city. So I have more or less ignored it on this blog.
But it all came to a glorious end tonight. So I want to acknowledge its departure, which provides loyal fans proper closure through a series of flashbacks from 2014 moving forward.
And the predictions many fans made were largely right: Tracy (that's the name of The Mother) did die. We don't know of what but she passed in 2024. Ted tells this loooong story to his teen kids in 2030. The surprise: the kids realize this long story has very little to do with their mom.
It has to do with Robin and the fact he was destined to be hers. They encourage him to date her.
(Sidenote: the producers smartly taped the scenes with the kids in 2007 or so before they got too old, which is why Josh Radnor had to do his scene separately in 2014.)
The final scene: Ted going to Robin's apartment, holding that blue French Horn, which Ted stole from a restaurant in the pilot episode for Robin. While the death of the Mother is sad, we didn't take this journey with her. She was a byway to what viewers really wanted and expected: a reunion between Ted and Robin - happily ever after.
Most of the hour chronicles the big moments over the next six years or so for the gang.
Lily wants them to be together forever but inevitably, they can't. The fact they held on for nine years is a miracle courtesy of TV sitcom writers and loyal viewers.
Wedding night for Ted and Robin, 2013: Ted finally sees the one, the bass player. But he has to take a train from fictional Farhampton into the city to go to Chicago. Good news for him: The LIRR is late, very late. Fortunately, the mother is also there waiting for a train holding Ted's yellow umbrella. So he meets her cute (they argue over the umbrella in the rain). He ditches Chicago, decides to stay in New York and the rest is destiny.
2016: The D-word! Unfortunately, Barney and Robin split up after three years. Her career takes precedence over their relationship. At a party where Lily and Marshall say goodbye to their NYC apartment because of a pending third child, Robin shows up and sees them moving on, her ex husband hitting on slutty cops and the man she thinks she probably should have stayed with happily married and about to have a child with The Mother. She doesn't feel like hanging around. While their friendships will live on, the act of "the five of us hanging out at McLaren's young and stupid is not one of those things," Robin says to Lily. "It's over."
2018: Marshall gets his judgeship. Barney explains why he remains single, post divorce: "If it wasn't going to happen with Robin, it's not going to happen."
2019: Ted and the Mother have not married yet - interrupted years earlier by a pregnancy. Barney is working a new playbook and had 31 women in 31 days, beating his 7 in 7 in 2010. But the 31th got pregnant. (His boys can swim!)
2020: Ted sees Robin on the sidewalk. She's become Anderson Cooper. It was brief reunion. At a hospital, Lily and Marshall are complaining about Robin's absence. Barney meets his love child Ellie. He falls in love. (We never see that mom because it doesn't matter, does it?)
2020: Ted and the Mother finally get married after seven years and two kids. Marshall, Lily and Ted meet at McLaren's with Barney, who is exhausted thanks to the infant. And instead of hitting on two young women, he tells them to go home. Then Robin steps in. She says at first she didn't want to go to the wedding but the Mother changed her mind. The Mother, in a wedding dress, arrives at McLaren's and takes a picture of the "gang."
From there, we learn that eventually, the Mother gets sick and dies. But they had a great relationship while she was alive, a relationship Ted always yearned for.
And as mentioned before, we finally get to "present day" 2030, where phones look really really strange.
If you're feeling teary eyed and wistful, here's a lovely summary of musical moments from the show, courtesy of People magazine. Robin Sparkles, we hardly knew ya!
About the Author
