In lieu of movie post this week, I’m doing a TV show post.
No matter how you end a beloved series, someone is going to complain, probably a lot of someones. I watched the How I Met Your Mother finale on Monday and I’ve read many complaints.
I actually liked the finale just fine. It made sense to me. Maybe I’m the only one? I don’t know.
There’s a saying that applies to writing: the end is the beginning or maybe it’s the beginning is the end. I can’t remember for sure. Basically, the idea is that stories should come full circle. That is what the show did, pretty much. I mean, look at this synopsis from season 1, episode 2.
“After telling Robin that “He loves her”, things fall apart for she and Ted and he figures that it’s all over for the two of them, but not for long as Ted finds out from Lily after she met Robin that she (Robin) likes him and Ted tries once again…” It goes on.
So, yes. The series really was more about Ted and Robin than it was about Ted and Tracy.
I did have a couple of complaints about the finale. I thought Barney’s character did a 180 that didn’t make all that much sense. He had grown as a person. All the romantic sincerity he’d picked up just flew out the window.
They tried to redeem him at the very end, but it was too little, too late. He should’ve at least ended up becoming a more sophisticated version of his previous self or something. The devolution felt cheap and forced.
I also didn’t really like the cliché that Robin became toward the end. Lonely spinster with too many dogs? Girl, please. How boring is that? How one-dimensional? It sucked every bit of her cool out of the room.
As for the rest of the story, I was okay with it. Marshall and Lily – good, Ted – fine. The kids were funny. Fast-forwarding through everyone’s lives was a little jarring, especially when the mother died. That was sad. Apparently there was some foreshadowing to this but I totally missed it.
Those are my thoughts. Did you watch it? What did you think?
Professional Stringer of Words 