“How I Met Your Mother” — How I Met Everyone Else
The Vicky Mendoza Diagonal
I’ve been complaining that the show this season has kind of lost its feel (actually I seem to be complaining about that for every show these days). Well, if there were ever an episode that felt like vintage HIMYM, it would have to have been this one. You got your flashbacks, you got your Barneyisms, you got your light romantic drama between characters, you have your sandwiches — all in all a perfect storm of awesomeness. More after the jump…
As far as the random women dated by Ted, Blah Blah Blah has to be the best, and of course by best I mean craziest. The way should would continually snap at Robin started as mildly amusing and quickly ascended the ranks to funny before ultimately capping out at hilarious. Not only was she great at freaking out, but her presence finally allowed Robin and Ted to both be in the same room. Sure, it was a plot contrivance and ultimately has no impact on next week, but for now it just made me happy that the characters could interact a little.
The flashbacks were fun if not all that laugh packed. The period details, however, make the jumps well worth the price of admission. College Ted looks like Sixteen Candles era John Cusack but with alt-rock t-shirts and god-awful wire frame glasses, whereas Marshall looks like a flannel-wearing version of Segal’s character from Freaks and Geeks. It isn’t a well that should be dipped into all that often, but every now and then it’s a great tool for storytelling.
And of course there are the sandwiches. Delicious, fat, smoked sandwiches. Future Ted’s frequent desire to shield his kids from his more elicit behaviors has proved to be a good move in terms of storytelling. From the tricycle a couple weeks ago to this week’s sandwiches and Blah Blah Blah the series has thrived on letting us know more than those kids… who frankly, are probably going quite tired of ol’ dad’s story.
