Complete and Utter OT: HIMYM Series Finale

Submitted by Mr. Elbel on

This is probably way too OT to be posted, but that Walking Dead thread stayed up so...

Am I the only one who doesn't think that the series finale to How I Met Your Mother was the worst ending to any show in the history of history? I loved the ending, but I feel like I am the only one on earth to love it.

JohnnyV123

April 1st, 2014 at 2:55 AM ^

The worst ending to any show in the history of history belongs to Dexter. How I Met Your Mother finale crappiness didn't come close to topping that, but it was still bad IMO.

Gucci Mane

April 1st, 2014 at 3:18 AM ^

How I met your mother is a terrible show, I have to imagine the viewers have a below average IQ.

Texagander

April 1st, 2014 at 4:27 AM ^

This show was not a sophisticated show that needed an over the top ending and failed miserably (I'm looking at you LOST). It gave the viewer what they wanted all along.

Gulogulo37

April 1st, 2014 at 10:39 AM ^

Exactly. I've never seen HIMYM, but it's just a sitcom. You watch it for some great lines, not because of the story arc. Same with Seinfeld. Was it a great ending? Well no, but how was it supposed to end? There's little continuity from episode to episode.

MGoMarc

April 1st, 2014 at 5:07 AM ^

I didn't like it, but I can kind of understand why some people did.

I can actually summarize my thoughts with a football analogy. Every September we seem to hear, "If you have two quarterbacks, you have no quarterback." Ted ending up with both of them just felt too messy and it cheapened both relationships to me.

michgoblue

April 1st, 2014 at 7:13 AM ^

I have to admit that I love this show. My wife and I were really bummed that it was going off. That said, I also kind of liked the ending. It gave the viewers the rest of the story for all of the characters, and then teased the ending that many fans wanted all along - ted and Robyn ending up together. I, for one, like when shows that I watch are wrapped up neatly and in the way that the fans wanted.

slaunius

April 1st, 2014 at 8:25 AM ^

I remember not loving the Seinfeld finale at the time, but in retrospect it seems pretty appropriate. They didn't really care about giving people what they wanted.



It also feels incredibly like Curb-era Larry David, which people hadn't really gotten used to yet. But if you look at that episode as a sort of conceptual setup for Curb, it's totally worth the payoff.



PS - Now LOST on the other hand...never did I think a show could make me so regret investing myself. So so so stupid.

Brags123

April 1st, 2014 at 7:17 AM ^

Honestly, "How I Met Your Mother" was a great series. It had good writers will good jokes and yet also was able to mix in some serious moments. That finale yesterday was something i would of expected from any other average show and didn't do the whole 9-10 year run jusitice. I felt that the point of the show was to meet the mother not meet her and then kill her off instantly. Just my opinion. 

FieldingBLUE

April 1st, 2014 at 7:52 AM ^

It's not your standard sitcom, in that it has a pantheon of stories and characters that interconnect in a way that's more like a sci-fi type of series. I've never seen a show with so many obscure callbacks and lots of its references tip off that the writers and showrunners are my age (late 30s).

I really enjoyed the finale...it did exactly what it needed to do...let us see this hopeless romantic finally meet his destiny (the Mother) and then realize his destiny (Robin).

This also fully explains the reason for Ted to be TELLING his kids about meeting their mother. If she's in the other room, it's kind of a lame story that they should be telling together (or at least interrupting at some point). Because she's been gone for 6 years, it makes much more sense.

Side note: It's wild that the actors playing the kids have known the ending for years. (They filmed that scene years ago before they aged out of the roles.)

Maybe I'm biased because my mother died when I was in high school and I would have LOVED for my father to tell me their story. 

bluesalt

April 1st, 2014 at 8:00 AM ^

And by that I mean the final scene-plus of the episode. They filmed that years ago and it made sense with where the rest of the series had gone over the prior 9 seasons (understanding that it was at times an absurd show that wasn't supposed to make sense). But the rest of the episode was lacking. The jokes were lacking (I literally laughed once the entire hour). I don't even mind that they killed her off, but because we just met her, there was no emotional attachment to the mother. They showed Ted and the mother's 7+ year relationship in about 15 minutes of television, and didn't create the emotions required for the catharsis of her death. You can do it (see the opening 10 minute montage of Up for instance), but they failed.



The series wasn't the greatest thing ever, but the writer's did a very good job of keeping their characters and plots internally consistent compared to most sit-coms. They also never introduced an additional permanent cast member, which often happens when a show continues too long. A lot of their jokes missed the mark for me, but I did like the writers' ability to create running gags that might pop up once or twice a season. I know when I'm with my group of friends who've hung out for a little over a decade, a lot our jokes together really reference some other joke that we might have made several months ago, and some cycle through for years. In a way, the show felt like that, and the more you watched it the better it got. I didn't really like the first few episodes I saw, but once it was everywhere in syndication, I couldn't help but see it more frequently, and it grew on me very quickly. But I can see how some wouldn't like it.



The one thing I will completely defend this show about is that the cast had incredible chemistry. You could tell they had a lot of fun together making that show.

WMUgoblue

April 1st, 2014 at 8:14 AM ^

I didn't really dislike the ending, I guess I just have a fundamental flaw with the final season itself. Why have the entire season located at Barney and Robyn's wedding and have such a build up for it, only to have then announce their divorce 20 minutes into the episode? It truly was just a waste of time and potential development between Ted and the Mother.

Lionsfan

April 1st, 2014 at 9:52 AM ^

I had the same issue. I don't care about whether or not some random coworker gets an invite to the Wedding, or about the "Slapping Sensei's", or that Barney was super hungover on his wedding day.

If they were gonna show those future moments, I would rather have had a full season of them. Not just 5 minutes per skit

JediLow

April 1st, 2014 at 8:34 AM ^

I personally thought the ending was good (not great; it needed a lot more time for the stuff that happened at the end) - instead of every marching off into their fairy tale lives the ending had a huge dose of reality (that and it all really fit who the characters were). The ending also did cap off the show - it's not a story about how Ted met the mother and their life together (which his kids would have never wanted to hear since they experienced it), it really was a story about how he met the mother, and the story between him and Robin that has gone on throughout the entire series.

 

The amount of gags/plot lines that went throughout the entire run of the show was amazing (in the last episode - Marshall hands Lily cash when Ted gets married because of the bet they made at the beginning of the series, the mother's name is Tracy which was an obscure reference where Ted made his kids think that she was a stripper, etc)

Mocha Cub

April 1st, 2014 at 9:33 AM ^

I was wondering if anyone else caught the quick monetary exchange between Marshall & Lilly and if they would know what the significance was. Most of the reviews of the finale didn't really touch on it. I thought the finale was ok. I liked that we got to see how the lives of the characters played out after the wedding. The part I didn't like was it was just a long story/excuse for Ted to call Robin to ask her on a date again. I thought that part was kind of lame because the mother was actually much more perfect for Ted than Robin ever was and then to kill her off sucked. In a show of running jokes, it was fitting that it ended how it began, with Ted bringing Robin the blue french horn.

Simps

April 1st, 2014 at 8:32 AM ^

I stopped watching HIMYM awhile back, and thank goodness I did. I caught a couple of episodes this season after not watching the last couple, and it seemed to me that every episode was a bottle episode this season. 

I still think the worst ending in TV history has to be Lost. The best ending has to go to M.A.S.H or The Sopranos.