HIMYM - Season 8

The part that troubled me the most was the coda, where Ted, Victoria and the German nudist (a alumni of The State, the best thing MTV ever did) were watching the German sitcom. Ted said something about it being a slapstick comedy but that you really care about the characters.

Yeah, that's how HIMYM fans are. But it's getting more and more difficult to do that.

 

Cheers is a great comparison. I watched Cheers in its entirety (and mostly for the first time) over the course of three or four months some years back. I was glued to the Diane years, but I quickly found the Rebecca years to lack stakes. They didn't hold up because the end game was so clear for Sam and Diane: They would end up together forever or broken apart, unhappy either way. The Mother hangs over How I Met Your Mother in much the same way Diane hung over the Rebecca years of Cheers. The viewer struggles to give any real stakes to any relationship for Ted or Sam because those relationships are temporary. We know about the Mother. We've met Diane.

But the Rebecca years hold up well in syndication. Most TV stations airing Cheers reruns prefer the Rebecca years. They work out of context, requiring only a basic knowledge of the cast. And they have plenty of humor. And the lack of stakes is a weight off the show's chest. I think How I Met Your Mother is destined to be terrific in syndication. There is so much great comedy of all sorts in this show, but it's burdened by the knowledge of that end game. That wasn't much of a problem in the early going, but it seems that many fans obsess over the Mother and the coming reveal. Every plot twist that's not the plot twist incites more eye rolls than excitement.

I try to watch HIMYM without dwelling on the mystery. And most of the show still works for me. There are bad episodes, notably this past one, which might be the worst the show has done. And their are cop outs and weak spots that you'd find in any sitcom. But mostly, it's still a show about four great characters and Ted growing up and trying to find love and happiness.

 

Do you have an issue with Ted the way so many recappers/bloggers do these days, Vers?

Also, did you see the Cheers oral history that GQ just did? That's a link that deserves its own thread, really.

 

I like Ted, but he pales in comparison to the other four mainstays. Robin is dream-girl worthy. Barney is Ron Swanson's best competition for most awesome, funniest character on TV (episodes like last night's aside). And Lily and Marshall form my favorite married couple on TV.

And I saw the Cheers thing but haven't read it. I think oral histories work best for these types of topics, so I will.

 

I will look up that Cheers oral history right now. Thanks for the tip.

I am looking optimistically that that was a "post padding" episode. They knew they needed Quinn out of there. I hope they are as dismissive of Robin's new boyfriend because that's a nobody-cares storyline too. Ted and Victoria breaking up will be interesting to see, because she is the fan favorite.

I liked the season opener but was completely bored by this one. Hoping it's just an off episode.

 

That was an abridged version of that, right? Because it felt very incomplete.

 

There is a fuller 8-page version on line now. I'll go start a thread about it in a second.

 

Did anyone else have a problem with keeping Klaus around as some sort of comic additive? First, he wasn't funny. But more important, I find it very hard to believe knowing what we know about the Victoria character that she would be thisclose to marrying that guy. Just completely asinine.

 

I liked that Klaus guy in the first season of Reno 911. He keeps showing up in other things and not being funny (to me) in any of them. Including subsequent seasons of Reno 911.

 

I agree. That was a total misstep. They shouldn't have even introduced him. Hopefully, he'll be gone by next week.

 

And I believe that's why that relationship hasn't yet ended.

 

I get why he was part of the season premier, but what was the point of keeping him around for the second ep?