Just like “Friends”? Copying “Seinfeld”? Is “How I Met Your Mother” worth the watch?
When something finally sticks in the television world, it seems that everyone gathers to it. Friends sitting around and experiencing life together in a big city caught on with “Seinfeld,” was recreated by “Friends,” got a twist in location with “The Office,” and all inspired “How I Met Your Mother.”
Back in New York City, college best friends Ted Mosby and Marshall Erikson go through the trials and tribulations of life, love, marriage, children, careers and friends in a small apartment. The show features two recurring love interests, a variety of special guests such as Katy Perry, and the sex-addicted playboy Barney Stinson, played ironically by Neil Patrick Harris. Instead of a coffee shop, they spend their time they favorite bar, McLaren’s.
I am going to be honest, when I look back at this show I do not find as many life lessons as with a variety of other shows on television. I am not sure if that is just a symptom of the show;s nature, or if television is slowly shifting from more influential to more experiential.
By that, I mean to wonder if television as a whole cares less about influencing a public as it does about giving you uninterrupted laughter for the better part of a half hour episode.
As the cast goes through break-ups and traumatic experiences, there are little emotional moments in every show, but there is not a ton that you can take from the show as a whole.
The one potential theme that can be dragged out is of the ongoing joke from Harris about his life being “legen-wait-for-it-dary.” This ongoing joke about random things being legendary comes to its most meaningful moment when Harris repeats that whatever you do in life is “not legendary unless your friends are there to see it.”
But that is about it. The show’s most emotional moment comes from that scene because other than that, it really just comes up short.
It comes up so short, apparently, that a short stint by Brittney Spears as a receptionist essentially saved the show from being canceled. Not only that, but the show had planned for a different mother, but the show was canceled too early to write that story line. Victoria, a long time girlfriend for Ted, was supposed to be the mother-stand-in. In fact, the writers outright said as much, but claimed the ending of the show before season 8 killed that storyline.
Now, if you have not finished this show already, this is a heads up that the rest of this article may contain spoilers.
While you can pull a lesson from each individual episode, the series as a whole just does not run as coherent or particularly meaningful.
Of course, many shows tend to reach their inevitable “jump the shark” moment, but “How I Met Your Mother” just seems to never find its purpose.
Why would Barney and Robin get together? What in the world are Marshall and Lily ever doing apart? Seriously, who decided that we should all watch this much of a show only for the mother to be immediately killed off and for the main character to realize what the audience knew all along—he was in love with his best friend?
The whole thing just feels like it was not worth the payoff.
Not to mention, apparently the show nearly botched the reveal when the official Facebook account posted it after the East Coast reveal, not realizing that it had not aired for nearly one-third the country just yet.
The show is not particularly progressive, deals with mostly light-hearted issues and showcases a womanizing man portrayed by a real-life gay actor. Everything is just… off.
It is funny. I will admit that I watched the whole thing. Over 10 million people watched the last season with me. But of those 10 million, plenty were not afraid to sound-off on their distaste for the show’s final season.
With “How I Met Your Father” trying to capitalize on the show’s recognition while making a name for itself, I can only hope they find the line between fan service and staying true to the show.
So, if you are in for a good laugh, watch an episode at random. On the whole, there’s unfortunately more legen-wait-for-it-dary stuff out there.
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