How I Met Your Mother

[GinFizz]

Apr 2, 2014 0:55:41 GMT -4 cabbagekid said:

The difference being, Joey/Rachel's relationship was dealt with early on in the final season which paved the way for the inevitable ending of Ross/Rachel so by the time that Ross/Rachel ending happened, viewers already had time to get over Joey/Rachel.

Yeah, DC did the same thing in its final season. (Although, apparently the final ep was meant to end with Joey/Dawson together, but the writers explained to Kevin Williamson that since his departure the characters had developed in such a way that it made more sense to go in the other direction.)

I wonder if we'll ever get any idea from the writers on why they ended things the way they did? I would hazard a guess that out of the viewers that had held on to the bitter end of this show, a significant section would have been Barney/Robin fans. (At least if one judges by sites like TWOP, fanforum etc.) Ted/Robin fans probably gave up a few seasons back (cf. random survey of my family) and the rest of the audience didn't care who ended up with whom.

I think the show also probably went on a lot longer than anyone thought it would, which gave many viewers Ted/Robin fatigue, and caused the Barney/Robin relationship to be more extended than it would otherwise have been (if it had happened at all).

[aibohphobia]

Apr 2, 2014 0:55:41 GMT -4 cabbagekid said:

I wasn't an avid viewer of HIMYM, I binge-watched the first 3 seasons on Netflix, then kind of got tired of the Ted/Robin relationship, but I always figured, they'd somehow end up together at the very end. The only issue I had with the finale was the fact that Robin/Barney's relationship literally ended in the same episode as Ted/Robin getting back together. I get it, Ted/Robin didn't get back together until MANY years later, but the change in years was told to us. The reunion of Ted/Robin was about ten (?) years after Robin/Barney's relationship ended, this was "show reality," but in viewers reality, this was actually a matter of minutes.

Yes, I wouldn't have minded the last episode or really the whole season if they hadn't wasted so much time on the Barney/Robin relationship and showed so many times over the last few seasons why Ted and Robin didn't work out. If the last season had focused more on Ted's relationship with the mother, and showed more about why Barney and Robin weren't able to work things out, then I think the ending could have worked. Instead they focused on the stupid wedding storyline the whole season. The ending just felt way too rushed. It also felt too jarring because they didn't allow enough time for the audience and Ted and his kids to get over the mother's death without pairing Ted right away with Robin.

[Trixie]

No, Show.

I loathed the finale, but am not giving those morons $ to try again.

[cabbagekid]

Apr 7, 2014 14:44:29 GMT -4 Trixie said:

No, Show.

I loathed the finale, but am not giving those morons $ to try again.

So are they trying to pull off a "choose your own adventure book" but instead doing it with a DVD. I don't even know if I want to finish watching the series on Netflix. I've only watched through season 3, but the ending was so horribly executed, I don't know if its worth it to watch.

[jynni]

Sounds like someone needed a way to salvage DVD sales...

The series starts to go downhill after season 3 so if you're on the fence, I wouldn't put too much effort into it.

[Binky]

The alternate ending is probably just the scene where Ted says the stuff about the mom getting sick omitted, and edited so the kids are saying "go get her" about the mother, if that. I doubt the Barney/Robin divorce can be omitted, as they only shot one script, they literally don't have the scenes for the 'happy ending' they're claiming.

[Deleted]

There is actually a fan made video that did exactly that, omitted the stuff about the mother getting sick and dying and basically ending with them on the train platform. It doesn't fix all the problems of the finale, namely what they did with Barney and Robin. Plus it doesn't explain why Ted is telling the story. But it is sweet and I much prefer it to the real ending. Plus the kids reaction is pretty funny. I doubt the creators will come up with anything better than that.

I read somewhere that Cristin Milioti auditioned for the part of the mother with that scene on the platform with Ted. So the writers had that scene written at least a year in advance. I don't know how they could watch that scene with those two actors and not see how great their chemistry is and not realize they need to build the final season towards that scene. And if they really wanted to end with Ted and Robin why did they spend an entire season on Robin and Barney's wedding and how they really do love each other despite everything and Ted learning to let go of Robin, remember when she floated away like a balloon? And arrgh, I don't even know why I'm complaining.

In regards to whether you should catch up on the whole series, HIMYM was never one of my favorite shows but I really did enjoy the early seasons. I lost interest in the last couple of years when I realized I hated every single character and stopped watching almost entirely. I started watching again this season out of curiosity when they said the mother was going to be a regular and ended up watching every week because I really liked her. So while I really did not care for the finale I am mostly angry at myself for getting caught up in it again when I knew it was going to disappoint me.

edited to add- there is a conspiracy theory going around that How I Met Your Dad is going to be about 31, aka Barney's baby's mama. I seriously doubt that will happen but that would be so hilariously terrible if it is true. Because what is a less romantic story then a widower telling his kids about how he was always really in love with their aunt? How about a story about a mom telling her kid how she got knocked up from a one stand when she was the 31st woman in a row to have sex with the dad?

[carrier76]

Finally got around to watching this finale. I didn't watch from the beginning, but mr. carrier76 watched it when I met him, so I started watching it with him, and boy oh boy the last couple of seasons were hard to get through. This one was particularly annoying, but over the course of the season they made us care about the mother, and thusly, I cared about and bought into her being with Ted. Robin has ended up being my least favorite characters. Whiny and negative, especially throughout the finale. The fact that they killed off the mother so that Ted could be with ROBIN really felt like a slap in the face. She's just a shitty person.

[prada]

I think Robin's character was ruined when they put her together with Barney and when the show shifted its focus on him. Truthfully, we all change over the course of 9 years but the way Robin did was just bad. I wasn't surprised Tracy died, they had been laying the groundwork for it for a while. It was still sad as she was the best part of the last season. But I do understand why the show ended how it did. The story was always mostly about Robin so in that sense it wasn't all that shocking to me.