Today, it was confirmed that Season 9 of HIMYM is going to break with the sitcom's conventions and dedicate the entire season to one significant three-day-long event. Already, fans and not-so-fans of the series are torn on this development, with many already decrying it to be a terrible idea. I, however, do not believe in terrible ideas, only poor executions of said ideas. And this idea, if done well, could be, for lack of a better term, LEGENDARY!
How I Met How I Met Your Mother
I am a relatively new HIMYM fan. As in, brand new. If my relationship with this show were a human being, it would just now be learning to sit up by himself. That means I probably don't have as much authority to make any claims about the show over an avid fan who has been with the series since 2005. Oh, I was aware of the show's existence since the beginning, but I had absolutely no desire to watch it at first.
I tend to stay away from conventional multi-camera sitcoms (i.e. the ones with a live/canned laugh track). The format constantly reminds me that I am watching a show which takes me right out of the story. A lot of these shows also rely on more basic humor and stagnant stereotypes to appeal to a larger audience and the pacing of the audience laughter means that smart, quick comedy has little chance of making it into an episode. The first (and only) sitcom that I regularly watched was Friends, which I sought out after a friend recommended a particularly funny bit of physical comedy in one episode. I enjoyed it, sought out some of the "Best of" collections, and eventually worked my way through the series. By becoming familiar with these characters, I was able to forget about the laugh track and just focus on their interactions.
When Friends finally ended, many new shows attempted to fill the void it left behind. These pilots were so glaringly obvious in their attempts to copy the former, that they neglected to pick up on the fact that what made Friends work so well was the genuine bonds and dynamics that the six characters shared. I figured that Friends was a fluke, so I stayed away from anything resembling it, including HIMYM, because it would surely not last as long as 10 years.
But I was mistaken. After a couple of years, HIMYM was still going strong. And, unlike one of it's fellow long-running CBS sitcoms, Two and a Half Men, I was actually hearing good things about the show. Things that made me want to check it out, like "Slapsgiving." However, I hesitated to start late to the game. For one thing, I was surprised that the main character hadn't met the mother yet, and probably wouldn't anytime soon. At the time, I was deep into another mysterious show, LOST, and I just didn't want to make a commitment to a story that was already going on without me.
It wasn't until this past year that I learned that HIMYM was finally getting an enddate. So, with some free time and the glorious Netflix Instant Watch, I decided that now was a time as good as any to pick up the show. And from the pilot episode, I was hooked.
Perhaps knowing how long I had allowed me to appreciate each season for what it was. I didn't feel as if I was being jerked around and I did not have to endure long summer hiatuses to resolve uneventful cliffhangers. The entire story was clearly mapped out, and I didn't have to worry about getting too attached to new female love interests like Stella or Zoey. And I now have a clearer perspective on what kind of show HIMYM truly is: an epic.
Every New Beginning Comes From Some Other Beginning's End
The pilot episode of HIMYM was quite bold for what it attempted to do. Not only was it a sitcom with a narrator. It was a sitcom with an unreliable narrator and a clearly telegraphed setup for eventual disappointment. Our hero, Ted Mosby, is built up do be a hopeless romantic. At first glance, he is a typical romantic comedy lead. After spending more and more time with him, his flaws begin to crop up, creating a sometimes unbearable character. But, because we are always being told things from his perspective, we are forced to envision him as the most deserving and noble individual on planet Earth.
The first episode is a mini rom-com in itself, and by the end of 30 minutes, the audience has prematurely fallen in love with Robin, just as Ted has. Television shows and movies are skilled at eliciting these emotions which, in real life, are probably best reserved for longer periods of time. The episode takes things an extra step by telling us that Robin is absolutely NOT the mother. Without the framing premise of the show, the audience would be fully expected to root for Ted and Robin throughout the entire run, just like the many Ross-Rachel relationships of television's past. In fact, Future Ted tells his story so well that many people still are rooting for Ted and Robin, despite being explicitly told it won't happen. Heck, the finale finds Ted preparing to make at least one more grand romantic gesture to win Robin back! For a show all about falling in love with another woman, Ted spends an inordinate amount of time on his ex-girlfriend.
In the earlier years of the show, Future Ted would joke and tease his audience about how he knows he's taking "what feels like years" to get to the point, but the great classic stories are not about the destination, but the journey. In ancient mythologies, storytellers would sing tales for days about their heroes, telling their legends in episodic format. Each of these stories ended with the hero's death, and no one was clamoring to find out how the heroes died. In this show, meeting the mother is Single Ted's death. Not in a morbid sense, but in a transitional sense. Pre-Mother Ted and Post-Mother Ted are leading two very separate lives, and we are basically know how the Post-Mother Ted story goes.
Sure, the story of meeting the mother could probably do without the time Marshall had trouble pooping in his office bathroom or the time Barney hired a bunch of actors to be his fake family, but the bigger story elements need to be there. We need to learn about Robin's relationship with Ted from beginning to end, in order to understand the place he is in when he finally does meet the mother. And now that we know that it's coming in 3 in-universe days, we need to slow down for a bit.
The Show That Replaced...LOST?
As I said earlier, the pilot had me hooked. And it wasn't due to the story. It was due to the way the story was being told. This isn't a show about a relationship. This is a show about how we tell stories.
Various times throughout the series, it is made explicitly clear that what we are seeing is not the truth. In an early episode, Future Ted uses the euphemism "sandwiches" in place of "pot," and from that point onward, a scene involving a person "eating a snadwich" would mask what was really happening. Other episodes employed the Rashamon-style of storytelling, having Ted's friends retell stories from their perspective, highlighting new details and different accounts of a single event. And, most similarly to LOST, flashbacks and flashfowards would be used to emphasize important plot points and make for bigger reveals.
This non-linear form of storytelling made Ted as narrator seem all the more human. He would forget things only to bring them up later or alter story lines to make himself look better. Any over-the-top instance that I would normally find inexcusable on another sitcom, I enjoy because I know that Ted is just trying to tell the best story he can.
There are two episodes where this manipulation of storytelling comes into play. The first is Episode 610 "Blitzgiving." While not a particularly major episode, it does shed a light onto how Ted is telling his epic yarn. We meet a new character named Steve Henry, played by Jorge Garcia (Hurley from LOST, in an intentional bit of casting). Steve is known as the "Blitz," named after a "cursed" individual who always had the misfortune of missing out on totally awesome situations. It is implied that Steve has always been among this core group of friends, it's just that he was never around for any of the interesting stories. He is only included in this episode because this was the one time he was present for a cool moment, having passed his "curse" onto someone else. A similar reveal happened in the episode that taught us about the secret smoking habits of all the main characters. Future Ted is altering history, literally eliminating one of his best friends from existence, save for the one time he did something important.
The second most-telling moment was Episode 820 "The Time Travelers." The episode seems pretty standard and pointless, with Ted and Barney debating over attending a robot-wrestling match and Marshall, Lily, and Robin arguing over who invented their own cocktail. Then Ted and Barney start interacting with their future selves and Ted begins imagining alternate possibilities and missed chances. But the most poignant moment comes right at the end, when it is revealed that none of the events of the episode happened the way Ted told it, even the normal non-sci-fi elements. The Marshall-Robin fight happened months earlier and Ted was the only one with tickets to the event. He had just found himself at a point in his life in which nothing interesting was happening because his friends were occupied with a new baby and wedding plan.
This is the first time Ted is at a loss for a story, so he must piece one together out of past and future events. He then tries to rush to the ending, stating that, had he known that in 45 days he would meet the mother, he would just meet her right then and spare himself the pain of not knowing what his future will hold.
During it's last 3 seasons, LOST used its scheduled ending to experiment with time and was able to space out the overall story much better. Some were disappointed with the radical shift that the final season offered and, as we see with HIMYM, fans are already starting to grumble. But they should not fear, because this new format is the only logical way for Ted to end his story.
They Say When You Meet the Love of Your Life, Time Stops
Around the halfway mark of HIMYM's run, the show started dealing out hints as to when Ted would actually meet the mother. As more pieces were filled in, we learned that Barney and Robin were going to have a wedding, and it was at this wedding that the mother would be part of the wedding band. The very last scene of Season 8's finale told us that we have 56 hours before the wedding. And now we know that the next season will cover just that, slowing the story down and drawing out the meeting for as long as possible.
This is perfect.
A lot can happen in two and a half days. And Ted still has a lot to go through with Robin before he can just meet the mother and have everyone live happily ever after. The show is called "How I Met Your Mother." It seems necessary and fair to the mother to spend a significant portion of time on the actual meeting. Taking the chance to learn all about her as she interacts with others, we don't have to worry about her being some blank slate with a pretty face that is included just to fulfill a plot point. We actually get to meet her as well. But even if that weren't the case, remember, this is all from Ted's perspective.
For him, this is the most important moment of his life. The reason it feels as if time stops when shocking moments occur is because your brain kicks in to memory overdrive, making sure that your body will be later prepared for similar moments in the future. Studies have even shown that intense, unexpected moments vastly improve one's memory of the event. So, it goes without saying that Ted is going to remember as much as he possibly can about this wedding.
And, if that weren't enough, let's go back to the pilot episode. HIMYM was a sitcom that took risks. That was the reason it outlasted the Friends clones, that was the reason critics praised it, and that was the reason I ultimately decided to check it out. Had I not watched the series at all and only heard that the show would to a "real-time" 9th season, you could bet that I'd be spending this summer watching the whole series as quick as possible. Much like the controversial Sopranos ending, it is these kind of bold movies that make people stop and talk about a television show as more than just a television show.
LOST decided to spend it's final season in a supposedly alternate timeline and, no matter how it was pulled off, that was intriguing enough for me to watch it to the end. A sitcom shot in real-time for one episode is nothing new (although often yields great results), but sustaining it for a whole season? Even if it fails, I'd be remiss not to watch.
As the network television landscape slowly becomes more crowded with basic, formulaic sitcoms and dramas, I have to commend HIMYM for using it's longevity to try something new and bold. To challenge its audience to into partaking in a completely different style of television. How could this be anything other than legendary?
Well said! I started watching very early in the show's lifespan, but have always felt that the journey was more important. I knew the day would arrive when Mrs. Ted Mosby would arrive, so I always submitted to enjoying the ride, rather than speculating. I'm excited for season 9. It'll be worth it.
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