How I Sat Real Close To Your Mother At A Train Station

Last night was -HOPEFULLY- the last season premiere How I Met Your Mother will ever have, and I write that with utmost affection. We picked back up at this neverending Barney wedding and ended the episode at the Farhampton train station, where a woman braves the rain with a familiar yellow umbrella. Looks like Ted's about to meet somebody's mother...and it's not Marvin's!!! Ha ha ha ha ha ha!

Marvin is the name of Lily and Marshall's baby. Speaking of the Eriksens, Lily and Marshall are zombies now because they're the sleepless parents of a newborn and they refuse to sleep when they get a chance. Sleep when the baby sleeps, that's what comic strips always told me. But I can see how that might not make for great television. What makes for great television? Having Lily and Marshall look at their friends through aquarium glasses to illustrate their exhaustion, I guess. Or at least that makes for heartily OK c-story television.

Barney TED (jeez Beck) ran off with Victoria at the end of last season and I'd completely forgotten. I honestly thought Victoria was just one in the long line of "Remember her from season 1? She's still not the mother" girls they brought in last year. Look, she was cool and everything, it's great she makes cupcakes, and clearly she's a complete nerdlington match for Ted. But is she worth spending more time with? Do they ever give her any jokes to deliver? Who is she really, and why am I even asking? The best thing about her is her 2-second mention during Barney's 1-minute recap of the entire series. She isn't even the first girl Ted wimps out on kissing. YIKES, TORI.

Meanwhile Barney and Quinn (also still around) are having relations in Marshall and Lily's doorless half-kitchen. A long time ago, when the writers put Barney and Robin together, they quickly broke them up because "None of us wanted to see Barney wearing a sweater-vest and going to bed-and-breakfasts," according to Carter Bays. Considering where our chess pieces are now poised, this statement must've come out as soon as the writers decided to have Barney and Robin (Swarkles) end up together. Since all great romantic comedies show that Guy Loses Girl must come before Guy Gets Girl Back, an immediate Swarkles Breakup was the only natural choice to get there. EXCEPT IT WASN'T!

I've had qualms with the Swarkles Breakup for a while now (clearly), and I think those qualms funnel straight into the discomfort I'm having with the Future Swarkles Wedding. The fun thing about Barney and Robin - as we learned in season ONE - is how compatible they are. They love scotch and cigars and haberdashery! They love independence and self-reliance and unabashedness! It's a match made in gentlemen's club heaven, but somehow it doesn't look that way when they're together. For the two seconds that Swarkles existed onscreen, they were forced into unhappiness. They dodged the sweater vests, but they completely abandoned the camaraderie. I don't think it had to be this way. I think we could've watched a totally different relationship unfold, and I think it still would've provided the dramatic plotlines the showrunners needed. It's like what I'm learning in improv: don't say no to a perfectly good situation. Be there and do it and see what it leads to. Otherwise, the audience will sit around asking why they wasted so much time watching a scene that ended up going nowhere. Ted and Barney's friendship went through the wringer to let Swarkles happen, and then it all went down the toilet in a grand, pointless ghost flush.

And so we're left with the final storyline of the season opener: Robin's continued unspoken adoration of Barney. Which was what all of last season was. And the episode ends with Barney giving her a key to a storage facility, where it turns out he's keeping all his Swarkles Merch. Guys? We know already. We know Robin wants to marry Barney or whatever. From their relationship, it's unclear WHY she does - perhaps a more tangible breakup would've given this arc more weight* - but she's stuck on him just the same (even though apparently she's dating some chump right now?). 
*Right now all I can remember from their breakup is that they were going through their first rough patch and just said screw it.

Here is my dream of where this season goes from here:

-Barney and Quinn break up AS SOON AS POSSIBLE in order to make room for more ACTUAL GROWTH between Swarkles. It wouldn't make sense for two can't-tie-me-downers to jump into a quickie wedding, even if it's for some cute sitcom reason of "if we don't do it now, we never will!!!" I want to see how they finally really do finagle their wants and needs into a workable relationship. I HAVE SPENT SEVEN YEARS ON THESE CHARACTERS. DON'T SEND ME OUT ON "OH, WHAT THE HECK, LET'S GET HITCHED"

-Ted putters around as harmlessly as possible for as long as it takes to get him to that stupid Farhampton train station. Have him take Marvin out to the playground and pick up a one-episode girlfriend while pretending to be a single father. Have him accidentally kill The Captain. Have him find Bryan Cranston's character and slap his face. Have him stumble into a roomful of women he's dated and make him sit them down one by one to explain why they weren't The One. Build a cupcake bakery for Victoria but don't waste any more time dating her for God's sake.

-Marshall and Lily can't stray too far into the Exploring Parenthood sphere because How I Met Your Mother is solidly in the Exploring Adulthood sphere. Maybe they try to rig something where they can enjoy themselves like childless people where there are lots of pulleys and axles and the crib lifts up and down? I don't know. I'm still working out ideas.


I say all of this and spend my time thinking about this because I truly adore this show. As soon as I started watching, I fell in love with its intricacy and playfulness. It felt like each callback was just for me. I respected the characters' wants and needs because they all made sense in a genuinely satisfying way. I just want to feel that way again forever. Can-do's-ville, babydoll?


All photos courtesy CBS.com