Tuesday, May 15, 2012

HOW I MET THE END OF MY ROPE:  I stopped watching HIMYM about halfway through the season, came back for last night's season finale, and feel pretty good about abandoning the show. It's not so much the the artificial twists to delay The Big Reveal -- though that's part of it -- but rather that I can no longer enjoy the hammy, sitcommy stuff like Lily's birth scene or the airport security confrontation in a show that has done the subtle, emotional stuff fairly well when it finally gets down to doing it (like having Robin confront Ted on his fundamental doucheness).

We've now seen Ted allegedly trying to find Your Mother seven seasons and 160 episodes. Enough already. The character is the weak link, and I don't really care who he ends up with because unlike the other four leads, he hasn't really grown up or changed in any meaningful way. So I'll keep the TiVo season pass, and watch an episode if y'all tell me it's great, but otherwise, yeah, done.

15 comments:

  1. Watts9:50 AM

    I'll admit to fast forwarding through almost all of the Barney "Magician's Code" bits in the second half hour.

    Also, "Waitforit" as a middle name is not only completely unrealistic (even by this show's standards) it undercuts the touching tribute to Marshall's dad AND tries to revive/continue a catchphrase that's, what?, 7 seasons old now? Give it up already, show.

    AND I'm a little pissed that they used "The Wind" to manipulate me at the end of the second half hour. That song, man. They didn't earn, via the actual storytelling or characters, the emotional response that song automatically produces in me.  (Related: please don't let Cat Stevens become the new "Hallelujah")<span></span>

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  2. So glad you posted b/c I was hoping the ThingThrowers would have something to say about this.

    I'm torn.  I actually really enjoyed the finale, but at the same time, I'm really disappointed.  Obviously Victoria is not the mother, but the fact that Ted would allow her to leave someone at the alter after having it done to him really pisses me off.  Plus, I always liked Victoria and this made her very unlikeable in my eyes.  Also, I love Barney and Robin together, but I like Quinn and thought she was a good match for Barney.

    This season has been enjoyable (especially after last season's awful awful awful Zoe arc), but I am getting kind of tired of this show and am ready for them to wrap it up.  I wouldn't be disappointed if this next season is the last.

    Lastly, as someone who named her cat Swarley, I think Waitforit MUST be his new middle name.  I thought Waitforit was just so funny and ridiculous that it totally worked for me.

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  3. Eh, I enjoyed it.  I especially like the first half-hour, where it was clear that the entire episode was pretty much made up of crap that the writers had thrown out at bull sessions.

    It's not a great show anymore, but it is one I find tolerably funny and since Chuck's demise it is the only thing on Monday to really watch...so I do.

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  4. Marsha10:27 AM

    I still enjoy it, but it's not appointment TV for me any more. I sort of consider it my hammy sitcom throwback slot - in a world where Community and P&R exist, it's almost impossible to consider HIMYM in the same genre with them.

    HIMYM still makes me laugh, doesn't have to be watched on the night it's on, and provides an enjoyable 22 minutes with some characters I care about. It's sad that this is all I expect of a show that was once brilliant ("Slap Bet" is on my very short list of best TV episodes evir), but with the diminished expectations, I'll be around until the end.

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  5. christy in nyc10:30 AM

    I liked the awkward exchange between Barney and Robin after he announced his engagement.

    Overall, though, I'm not sure why I stick with this show. My TV plate is really full. I probably watch about ten comedies a week and if those were ALL suddenly cancelled, there are another ten comedies that I'd watch instead. Quality-wise, HIMYM is really much closer to my second tier than my first. And yet I watch it every week. I guess it's kind of comfort food, but really, given that I haven't gotten the chance to watch this week's Girls or Veep or Sherlock yet, the fact that I spent an hour watching HIMYM last night is kind of silly.

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  6. Tosy and Cosh10:31 AM

    I'm too susceptible to inertia to drop it, but the plot moments were so very, very forced. I don't even care that we're going to spin wheels with Victoria, since I like the character and the actress (although, and if this makes me a bad person so e it, but whatever agents and advisers convinced her that she needed to lose weight need to be taken behind the barn and shot), but the "it's her wedding day and she is having doubts and runs away with Ted" stuff was melodramatic and unnecessary. We don't need it to be a big dramatic moment. She could have just showed up at the bar and talked about her breakup and we would have been fine. All that said, I did very much like the throwaway stories as a running bit and thought it a very clever way to use up ideas good for a bit but not for an entire story.

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  7. Marsha10:45 AM

    Oh, yes, agree on the throwaway bits. The Breakfast Club bit made me laugh out loud, particularly the barely heard "we share an apartment!" line.

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  8. Tosy and Cosh11:40 AM

    I now want all 3-camera sitcoms to do a it about what's on the camera-side wall.

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  9. I'm happy to find someone else watching Veep. I'm really enjoying that show.

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  10. "You guys are really spinning your wheels, huh?" - The "Lost" writers

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  11. Marsha12:45 PM

    Very much enjoying Veep. It helps that I'm a big fan of pretty much every actor on the show.

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  12. Watts1:21 PM

    I was mostly a fan of the creator, and his similar "The Thick of It" and In the Loop. I'm liking cast members on this better than I have in other places.

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  13. Genevieve2:05 PM

    Think we may drop Starz and get HBO instead so we can get Veep and the Sorkin show.

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  14. So, with "Happy Endings" out there, this isn't even the best "Sitcom Trying to Be Friends" on the air.  And I also really hate the sit-commy-ness of it.  As I said (typed?) to one of our company as I watched last night, the Barney stuff was both utterly unrealistic and totally obvious.  But I still can't fault the show quite as much as Adam.  The annoying draw-it-out-ness of the plot arc is baked into the premise -- if the show is successful, it must draw out the mother-meeting.  (Maybe that's wrong.  Maybe they could have just dealt with the misnomer and had the mother be part of the plot for longer.  Maybe that would have been better.)  But mostly, I think I'd push back on the Ted growth issue, because I think this was the episode where we were supposed to see him grow. 

    So, overall I'm torn.  It's not a great show.  It's an uneven show with a few actors for whom I have enormous goodwill (NPH, AH, JS), plus a few others.  But some of its flaws are such that you could have predicted them seven years ago.

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  15. Joseph Finn5:48 PM

    And I still maintain that the show makes onlly nods to the initial premise and it's barely about that these days; now it's a much more intereting show about people growing up and examining their roles in life.  Even Ted, still a douche, has grow up some (or is at least trying to).  It's a stronger show for it and I think this season has been a nice return to quality from the wanderiog in the wilderness with the Captain's Wife (Sheila?  Tara?  Shelly) from last season.

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