[6.0/10] “Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?” That amusing phrase more or less sums up how I feel about “Code of Honor.” It is an episode rife with racism and sexism that, if you could somehow strip away, would leave you with a solid (albeit not overwhelming) dose of the usual Star Trek moral and diplomatic dilemmas.
The story finds our heroes traveling to Ligon II, a less technologically advanced planet that nevertheless possesses a vaccine capable of curing a disease that’s plaguing the Federation. The catch is that the (indistinguishably humanoid) aliens have the titular retrograde “Code of Honor” which forces Captain Picard to balance his dignity, Starfleet protocol, and the safety of his crewman versus the need to obtain a vaccine that could save scores of lives.
That’s not a bad premise! It’s classic meat and potatoes Star Trek to have the crew tiptoeing around local customs they don’t agree with and bristling against Starfleet regulations when there’s some greater moral good involved. If that’s all this episode amounted to, this wouldn’t be the world’s best installment of TNG, but it’d be fine.
The problem is that “Code of Honor” is suffused racist and sexist approaches to exploring this material. What I’d remembered from childhood was the treatment of the Ligon people, which would have been enough to sink this episode on its own. Suffice it to say, taking the most African-coded characters in all of Star Trek and depicting them as duplicitous and backward in their practices and society, and less advanced than their mostly caucasian counterparts for good measure, is a strike that this episode never recovers from.
But what I didn’t remember is how wide-ranging those uncomfortable elements here beyond the depiction of the Ligon. A stray line from Picard seems to suggest that the civilization of the Enterprise’s less-sophisticated guests resembles that of the Chinese. An otherwise amusing character moment where Picard attempts to defend the honor of the French language devolves into condescension (and, I’m betting, misinformation) about the practices of indigineous people.
That’s all before the sexism at play here. Once again in the early going, the show’s treatment of Tasha Yar as a sexual being isn’t great. You can see TNG trying to pat itself on the back, with the Ligon’s surprise that a woman is the chief security officer and the other crew members explaining that this is no big deal in the Federation. But at the same time, we’re back to Khan Noonien Singh-style “Women can’t help but be attracted to these raw, manly dudes, even when they’re terrible, because they’re just such Great Masculine Men” infantilization with Tasha, which is a whole separate shade of problematic.
Beyond that, a lot of the business here is just silly. I try not to slate older shows/episodes for that too harshly. But it’s hard to deny the abject goofiness of Tasha and Yareena theoretically fighting to the death amid their stage-combat theatrics on some glowy rhythmic gymnastics set. There’s some rough line reads and bad dialogue here (Picard and Crusher’s conversation about the costs of the disease they’re trying to cure is rough.) And that doesn’t even count some of the costuming choices here, like Wesley’s giant sweater or Yareena’s metallic garbage bag jumpsuit.
The shame of all of this distasteful/tepid nonsense is that there’s some decent ideas at play here. Stripped of its racial context, there’s some decent interrogation here over how societal “honor” can often be a grift used by those in control to maintain existing power structures and hold down and/or take advantage of those outside of that circle. Framing it as something particular to an African-coded community smacks of baseless cultural condescension, but a greater acknowledgement of it as a self-critique could have paid dividends.
More to the point, the episode sets up some of the usual levers and pulleys that Star Trek captains have to consider when dealing with different civilizations that have something the Federation wants. I particularly enjoy the setup where Picard has to basically play Lutan’s game, sacrificing some of his dignity in the process, in the name of diplomacy so that he can get his crewman back and receive the vaccine that’s so sorely needed. His obvious annoyance at having to play along in the game of the greater good makes for interesting character work.
Speaking of which, the best moments in “Code of Honor” have nothing to do with the plot. They’re just the little moments where the characters relate to one another or reveal a little of who they are. Geordi endures Data’s latest stab at comedy. Picard melts a little and allows Wesley to observe on the bridge. Troi, Data, and the captain himself have to convince Riker to be on board with Picard leading the away mission (addressing this feels almost unprecedented!). Picard pokes fun at himself for speechifying to Data about things everyone already knows. Riker follows the captain’s lead and lets Wesley help out at ops.
These moments are, at most, marginally related to the broader conflict with the Ligon, but they go a long way toward making these characters exist beyond the needs of the plot of the week. They have wants and interactions and personalities that aren’t dependent on which alien culture they’re crossing swords with or strange space anomaly that’s entered the view screen. Especially for a show in its first season, that sort of detail is vital, and it’s not a coincidence that the best stuff here could basically be excised as an out of context clip and not lose much impact.
It doesn’t help that Picard’s solution to the problem seems arbitrary and, at best, lucky. There’s a lot of pontificating about the prime directive here, and how it combined with the Ligon people’s leverage from the vaccine puts Picard in a bind vis-a-vis rescuing Tasha. You can feel the show trying to play the “take a third option” game here, with Picard trying to work within Ligon rules to win the day by allowing Tasha to emerge victorious in the battle to the death, while still ultimately saving Yareena’s life after an emergency beam-up.
But it’s not clear why that would solve the problem of ensuring that the Ligon people turn over the vaccine. There’s also nothing to set up that death dissolve the marriage bonds so Yareena can marry Luton’s second in command and empower him instead. It’s all just solution by fiat, where you can see the framework of what the show’s trying to accomplish, but the details don’t add up.
If that were “Code of Honor”’s only sin, it would merely be one of scores of Star Trek episodes with a solid idea and flawed execution. The solid bones of this installment are still apparent despite its other problems. But since the episode is so wrapped in racist and sexist tropes, it stands out as misguided for so many reasons, not the least of which is how it betrays the inclusive, humanizing spirit that the franchise stands for.
[8.4/10] I have to be real -- about halfway through this episode I was hating it. It seemed like we were headed for the hackiest, wackiest, sitcom-y finale imaginable. Johnny fumbles the ball on his anniversary with Moira only to run into the Schitt’s after brushing them off! Alexis’s ex-fiancee tells her about a party being held by her other ex that she wasn’t invited to, which she crashes, only to run into Mutt’s new girlfriend! David and Stevie compete for the affections of the same guy after needling one another about high school dating prowess! It’s all so broad and dumb that I figured this season, for all the good work it’s done, was headed for a crash landing.
Instead, it soared from that point on. I don’t know if this was some kind of intentional feint, to lure the audience into thinking that the show was up to its old tricks and going for the cheap seats, but instead it pivoted toward something real and even touching in pretty much every storyline as it closes out its second season.
The Stevie/David bit is probably the least of them. David mainly got his major growth moment in the last episode, so it’s fine that his bit here is more of a lark. Frankly, their competing for the same guy, with it not being clear whether/if he was interested in both of them or just David felt more like a setup for season 3 than anything super relevant to the present moment. But it still positions them as friendly but combative after all they’ve been through, so I dug it, even if it wasn’t my favorite part of the episode.
But I did really like where they went with Alexis. I assumed that her meeting Tennessee, Mutt’s new girlfriend, was going to revert her back to (1.) offering her passive-aggressive compli-sults and (2.) compensate by hooking up with Ted again despite the fact that the poor guy’s been through enough. The episode started to head that direction, only to pull back and do something much better.
Instead of this experience being cause for backsliding in Alexis, it becomes another chance for her to grow and, most importantly, to develop her empathy. Instead of just feeling sorry for herself given the impact that seeing Mutt with someone else has on her, she realizes how shitty it must have been for Ted to go through that and asks him how he deals with it. He answers that he wasn’t okay, that he cried a lot and that it took him a long time, but that he eventually just got through it. Aleixs understands and even apologizes, and it’s a really sweet and human moment from someone who could be the show’s most cartoonish character (give or take Roland).
And yet, Roland factors into the episode’s crowning moment. I love the impromptu dinner party scene, where the Roses run into their wealthy former friends who just so happen to be passing through Elmdale. The Roses initially try to puff up their current living situation and laugh along with their old friends trashing Schitt’s Creek. They’re embarrassed at their current station and want to seem like they can still fit in with their former moneyed cohort, something especially tricky once Roland and Jocelyn show up.
The Schitt family are incredibly good sports about the whole thing, even as the rich visitors trash their town and even the restaurant they’re so excited to get to dine at. Eventually though, Johnny has had enough. He excoriates his former pals, declaring that for however much these interlopers think themselves above Schitt’s Creek, they’re shitty friends who left the Roses high and dry. Meanwhile the Schitts may not be terribly refined, but have been beyond generous with our refugees from the world of wealth.
I’m not sure there’s been a more heartening moment in this show than Johnny declaring that Schitt’s Creek is their home. It’s a vindication of the fact that however much the Roses may yearn for their more financially secure and, let’s face it, spoiled life, they’re increasingly realizing how equally hollow and shallow that life, and the people in it, were. While life in Schitt’s Creek is unquestionably harder, it’s also full of more genuine people, who are rough around the edges and have their eccentricities and blind spots as well, but who have done a great deal to welcome the Roses into their homes and lives despite the fact that the Roses themselves haven’t been the most gracious guests in the world.
And yet, they are trying and they have gotten better and they have fully and finally accepted themselves as a part of this place. (At least until the next finale-needed conflict arises.) There’s something incredibly sweet about the closing scene at Mutt’s party, where the Roses and the Schitt’s and their various friends and acquaintances all come and dance together. They affirm their love for one another. They join in the bonds of friendship and celebration and, subtly, the fact that they’ve become better people through all of this. That’s a hell of a way to end given where this one started.
You could say the same for season 2 as a whole. This year of the show started out pretty weak, with a string of rough episodes that made me wonder if the show had missed its mark. But while there were still bumps in the road, the show committed to depicting growth in each of the Roses over the course of these thirteen episodes, and earned this great finish in the process.
(As an aside, I loved the cold open with Johnny trying to cajole the kids into wishing their mom a happy anniversary, citing the neighboring Bloomfield family as a model, only for Alexis and David to suggest that the Bloomfields were a little too cozy. Their faux-sincere congrats for Moira, and her response that the kids were starting to sound like those weird “incestuous Bloomfields” was a hilarious punchline. One place where the show definitely stepped up its game in season 2 was the great cold opens!)
I remember watching this episode in the '90s and being stunned that they actually referenced minor events from previous episodes. At this point I was just used to the Star Trek style of storytelling which was generally very self-contained. But Stargate embraced continuity, and this episode brings back completely unimportant characters from not one but two previous adventures! Just for single, throwaway scenes! Crazy! The fact that the show rewarded you for watching like this was one of the things which made me fall in love with it.
A classic stranded-and-hoping-for-rescue episode, with a nice mystery twist. I love the way this plays out, especially the stuff back at the SGC. The Jack/Sam stuff is fine - and I'm sure it triggered a huge amount of shipping among fans - but can begin to drag in parts. The dialogue is so quiet and slow which gets in the way of some good character stuff. It's the search that's that really interesting part, especially Daniel's efforts.
Probably the best episode of season 1. This has a lot of fun with the concept of an alternate universe and feels like it's on a bigger scale than anything that's come before. It's all genuinely exciting. I particularly like that it's all from Daniel's perspective as I don't think it would have worked quite as well with any of the other core characters. Plus, he gets to express a level of frustration and disbelief that helps the episode along.
Stargate did clipshow episodes, a money-saving measure that was an unfortunate necessity for many American television shows at that time. They are never fun to watch. This franchise did at least try to make the episodes as interesting as it could, though. In fact, the Stargate clipshows could sometimes be some of the more important ones for pushing the overall story forward. 'Politics' definitely falls under that description, making it a necessary watch.
Outside of the clips, the episode is actually fantastic. The introduction of Senator Kinsey gives us a really loathsome villain who is a lot of fun to watch, especially with all the verbal sparring that accompanies him. The SGC become ever more desperate as they attempt to defend the Stargate program to a person who has already made up his mind. It's a one-room episode that works really well, and the introduction of more political elements to the show opens things up for some good future conflicts.
But, I just can't excuse the use of all the clips from previous episodes. They are also taken from a number of the more awkward episodes, making them even less appealing. Well, at least we can be thankful that they didn't use anything from 'Hathor', I guess.
A strong and effective send off for Daniel that does hit the right emotional spots. It's handled with care. Of course, even back in 2002 it was widely reported that Michael Shanks was going to be leaving the show, so there wasn't a surprise factor here. But that didn't diminish how sad it was to watch.
While the episode does remove his character, it has the foresight to not "kill" him off as such, leaving the possibility open for appearances in the future. But even so, this manages to feel final. The farewell between him and Jack is played very nicely, and it was the right choice that Daniel selects him to say goodbye to. Their friendship has been rough along the way (even as recently as a couple of episodes ago with the ending of 'Meridian'), but it's really grown into one of the most solid relationships here. The tears in Michael Shanks eyes feel genuine which is a testament to his acting abilities.
Whether you agree with Daniel's reasons for leaving is another matter. He seems to almost be giving up, despite his protestations that he's not. He claims to feel useless and that he's done all he can; I'm not sure I quite feel the same. The episode attempts to justify his state of mind, but the fact that it's not been built up kind of makes it not ring entirely true for me. He and SG-1 have accomplished a LOT over the past few years.
Other than that, this introduces us to the naquadria element and also Jonas Quinn. I like Jonas and I think this episode helps to establish his morals quite well.
I remember a lot of online discussion back in the day about Carter's goodbye scene with Daniel where she's talking about "why do we always wait to tell people how we really feel?". This was misinterpreted by a lot of people, myself included, as her declaring some romantic feelings towards him. I think it's an easy mistake to make given the words she chooses, but it's definitely not meant that way.
The little suburb intro was funny. And it's nice that it wasn't too long.
New villain starts a little weak. The whole, death is beautiful, it allows new things to grow speech ? Please can we do any more cliche than that ? Then you add the even more cliche where the villain kill his own man beacause he's displeased with his performance. Can we stop doing that please ? Isn't there any other way to say look, this is a bad guy! ? Neal McDonough though, there's some potential there. And despite that there's the You don't know who I am do you ? I'm Damien Darhk moment that is totally badass. So let's just hope that this beginning was just inclusive writing for the part of the audience that is too stupid to acknowledge a villain if it's not written in blood on his face and that we will move past that now that it's done.
It looks like they don't even try anymore to hide what they do. Like Laurel calls John instead of 911 and then gets away ? And then she's in the police hq, during an attack, and nobody questions her presence ? They're also openly discussing their night activities in the police station. Are all the cops in on it ? Oh look, it's Lance's daughter doing her vigilante thing again. And she thinks we don't know, how cute. How about the Green Arrow announcement ? Can anyone not recognize him ?
By the way the conversation between the Lances was surreal. They're explicitly looking for important city events, there's the main train station opening, he even lists it, that's probably the biggest thing to happen for months (years ?), and nobody registers it ? COME ON ! How bad can you be at your jobs.
Also Lance is working with the bad guy. So switching back again between good and bad, being friend/ennemy with Arrow's team. It already happened a dozen times, can we move past it ? Is this really the only thing he can bring to the show ?
Petty complaints at the train action:
1) How would the guy hear him jumping on the train over the noise ? And be stupid enough to open the door ?
2) We can see the length of the train during the first scene, and when they're next to it, there are definitely enough cars passing by to make the whole train, but it never seems to stop
3) How did Dig get on board ?
4) Did he not just blow the last wagons ? Would it be enough to stop the whole train ? Why not shoot the engine ?
5) Was the train empty ?
6) Wasn't the explosion a little weak ?
Flashbacks are back on Lian Yu again, without much surprise. They'll soon be out of time left for that, hope the story's interesting.
And the someone's gonna die preview. That sucks. This is something that will probably be ignored for 10 episodes, it was a really bad choice to put it there, even more because I bet it will turn out to be totally insignificant. Someone who's already dead ? Someone we haven't met yet ? From the Lian Yu flashbacks ? I'm willing to bet not a significant character. Barry's presence suggests Felicity, but I don't buy that. Or not dead for real maybe, just to protect her.
This show has a weird quality that makes us keep coming back doesn't it? I re-watched the last 3 episodes of last season and holy crap how sucky was that? Makes me think why I even bother with this show. But here we are for the new season...maybe it's the completely untapped potential that keeps making us come back. But anyway, some points:
I thought the start was good. Amell seems a bit more relaxed now that he didn't have to play the ultra dark and brooding Arrow from last season. I appreciated the little suburb segment. It was a nice change of pace. I remember an episode from Chuck that did the same, but to greater effect. The truck segment was not so good. After 5 months the 3 of them should've figured it out but it felt sloppy. At least Thea was entertaining.
Neal Mcdonough was instantly better as a villain than the dude that played Ra's was all season. Right amount of cynicism and evil. Great. Having a great villain is a good step in the right direction. Although I didn't quite understand the plot to kill the city council members. It really just felt like they needed an action sequence again. sigh
The team arrow reunion was OK I guess. I specially liked Oliver interrogating Felicity about her activities on the last 5 months. The show could use more stuff like that. BTW, I haven't minded Katie Cassidy as the Canary for a while now, but I think she could turn the intensity down just a notch. Every line seems just so damn urgent all the time.
Then most of the rest of the episode was the same old of tracking down and resolving the current crisis which to me felt like the weakest part, not to mention the various mistakes they made like Diggle driving the car, Oliver jumping on the train and then Diggle magically appearing to help? WTF!? Also how sure was Oliver that only the last 3 wagons of the train were carrying the bomb? Because that's all that he stopped. And if that was it, a train without breaks is still a problem, but hey, who cares? The bomb exploded. And for something that was supposed to be a step down from a nuke, it looked pretty weak.
The final parts were really dumb though. It seems like they thought: "Hey, let's throw a bunch of crazy things here and then we can explore them as the season goes on." Problem is, this being Arrow, some of these plots will change completely by episode 3. The Green Arrow announcement was ultra stupid, Lance siding with Darkh makes little sense and the funeral was just a bad idea. That could've been done to more effect on a different episode I think. Plus who are they going to kill? I guess Felicity is the most obvious choice, but if that's her and that's the reaction from Barry Allen then they f*cked up. My vote would be for Thea, Diggle or Lyla. They can't kill Laurel anyway. The casket seemed short as well, but again, I doubt they'll even remember that when the decision time comes.
Now let's see where they go with all this. I remember the first couple of episodes last season were really good, but then the quality dropped off dramatically. If they want me back on their good graces, that can't happen again.
Final arrows:
So, we are finally coming back to the island on the flashbacks. That's good. Last season was terrible.
I like that Thea will have to deal with the Lazarus Pit effect. Wonder if they'll be consistent and tackle that with Sarah as well when the time comes.
"Felicity Smoak, you've failed this omelet."
"Ra's stabbed her right over there"; "Oh."; "We can get a rug!"
"Dude! Nice reflexes!"
[6.7/10] Alas, another underwhelming start to a new season of Schitt’s Creek. I don’t know what it is about the show that it can’t put its best foot forward in its first shot out of the gate, but three data points is officially a trend! Woe is us!
The show’s not only back and doing love triangles, but it’s back to doing them with everybody now! Not only is Mutt back in the picture, but he’s having trouble in paradise with Tennessee. That’s magnified when he invites Alexis to house-sit while he and Tennessee are out of town, and she naturally brings along Ted so that they can all maximize the drama of what is, more accurately, a love quadrangle. Who needs character growth when you can throw in more relationship drama? (Though I’ll cop to laughing at Ted’s bad puns about Mutt and Tennessee going off to a “pinecone harvest.”)
It also turns out that both David and Stevie are dating Jake, the strapping woodworker from the season 2 finale. It feels like the show is eventually just going to cut to the hypotenuse of this one, but again, I don’t need relationship drama between David and Stevie over some random, seemingly polyamorous guy. (Though again, I’ll admit to getting a big laugh out of the cold open with everyone else in the family walking in on a post-coital David and Jake and making things about as awkward as you’d expect.)
Even without the relationship drama, I didn’t really care for this one. Moira’s first appearance on the council lends her to make big promises that she has to walk back when she realizes there’s no money for what the citizens are demanding. There’s a solid lesson there, about politicians not being able to just give a big speech and wave a magic wand to make good things happen (hello, fellow West Wing fans!), but the realization of it is very broad and not especially funny.
The one story I did really like here was Johnny’s. I like the idea that he feels useless after all the other members of his family are off working or helping lead the town while he’s getting kicked out of his would-be office space by a virus-protection scammer. He’s used to “holding this family together” and feels outclassed and surpassed by everyone else. Moira reassuring him that his contributions are still valuable, even if less visible, is another dose of sweetness between the two, and the only good follow-up to what was hinted at in last season’s finale.
Overall, this is another underwhelming start to the new season, but hopefully this one picks up steam like the past two seasons have.
[7.4/10] I liked all three stories in this one. Some more than others, but they were all entertaining and even connected in neat little ways, mainly through the cafe.
My favorite of them was Johnny’s, for once! I love how him reluctantly helping Twyla with a few dishes given her bum leg turned into a whole day’s worth of waiting tables for the Rose patriarch. The whole “full combo” kerfuffle was a solid laugh, and I like the awkward reactions of the other Roses who patronized the cafe. But my favorite part was the close, where having walked a mile in a waiter’s shoes, Johnny decides he can’t take the portion of tip money that Twyla offered him, treating it as “reparations” for all the times he was a difficult customer himself. It’s a nice moment of self-reflection from Johnny, who’s maybe getting some of that personal growth the rest of the Roses have been pursuing as of late.
I also liked both the comedy and the drama of Moira and Alexis having lunch together. For one thing, it’s funny since Alexis ends up accidentally talking herself into this lunch by tweaking her mom for treating her brother like a favorite. By the same token, the way that Moira and Alexis both have to psyche themselves up for the meal (with Ronnie and Ted respectively) is amusing, and the same goes for their awkward silence and Moira’s list of icebreaker questions.
But then, again, the show pivots toward someplace real. Moira’s insecurity about her daughter not wanting to be seen with her and Alexis’s discomfort over her mom’s public notoriety make for good fodder for a heart-to-heart. The pair of them endeavoring to “make up for lost time” after speaking plainly to one another is very heartening.
The story I liked the least here was the continued saga of David and Stevie playing tug of war over Jake. Even so, there’s some good laughs over the comedy of manners that emerges from each trying to navigate the delicate waters of break-ups and other tangles in this tripartite dating arrangement, particularly David not understanding that Stevie was trying to warn him about a break-up. The whole Jake business has been pretty lame, but hopefully it’s over now, and David and Stevie as snipe-y best friends is still a good mode for them.
Overall, a definite improvement on the season premiere, with particularly good stories for all the Roses except David!
[8.1/10] Another episode where I liked both of the major storyline. We’re not only getting some nice advancement for Johnny Rose as a character after him mostly being aimless comic relief up to this point, but we get the best David/Alexis story the show’s ever done in the same episode.
Let’s start with that. I love Alexis and David teaming up for David’s driving test. There’s a really good contrast between the two of them here, with Alexis trying to get her preternaturally anxious brother to relax by convincing him that “nobody cares” and “no one thinks about you like you do”, at the same time David tries to make his preternaturally calm sister realizes that not everybody “skates through life” and “has everything handed to them” the way that she does. It’s an excellent conflict of temperament that comes from deeply-rooted character traits, and utilizes the performers’ great dynamic with one another.
I particularly enjoy where it ends up. David is his usual anxious self during the driving test at first, until he realizes that his sister was right and the part-time DJ of a driving instructor he’s got gennely doesn’t carea bout this, to where David can realx. But I like the reciprocal side of that, where David reveals that part of his constant anxiety stems from having to be the one who worried about Alexis when she was galavanting about the world and her parents couldn’t be bothered to pay attention. There’s a sense that Alexis is partly so calm because she’s seen it all, but also that she only survived all her scrapes thanks to David’s long distance intervention, and that the constant worry took its toll on him. ALexis acknowledges that, but also smiles at the realization of how much her brother cares.
It’s such a great story, one that plays in the space of complicated sibling dynamics, lands somewhere sweet and real despite the absurdity of the context, and even gets some good laughs in their back and forth. A real winner, to be sure.
Even if it doesn’t hit the same heights, I like the story of Johnny and Moira’s reaction to the prospect of Stevie potentially selling the hotel as well. A lot of it is just silly, like Moira’s failed attempt to persuade the Town Council to initiate a bailout or her evasions with Johnny about it. There’s also some good laughs with Ray’s chipper explication of all the reasons that partnering with Johnny is a bad idea. Even Johnny trying to be supportive of Stevie while not-so-subtly nagging her about the drip in the kids’ faucet is a good laugh.
But I also like this as a mean for Johnny to contribute to this family and self-acutalize a bit. He’s felt left behind by all the other Roses’ successes. This is a chance for him not only to find a purpose -- the support and management of the hotel -- but to help keep his family secure by ensuring a new owner doesn’t come on board and kick them out. The fact that in the end, however comically middling he is as a plumber, Johnny is once again ready to do the dirty work, is another nice bit of personal growth for him.
At the same time, I like this one as a brief moment of vulnerability for Stevie, who’s overwhelmed at the prospect of owning a motel with “one underperforming employee.” Her crying when looking over the paperwork and weepily thanking Johnny for his help is really sweet, and the actress does a nice job at conveying the character’s distress.
Overall this is another strong episode that hits on some real emotions, develops the characters, and gets some good laughs in the process. Season 3 is looking up!
[7.9/10] A very nice, albeit very schmaltzy, ending to the show’s third season. They’re really going for the sap here, but it largely worked on me, so who am I to complain?
That said, I think my favorite moment here was one of the less schmaltzy ones. It was Alexis looking at the resumes for other receptionists and realizing that not only is there someone who could do a better job, but that they could help Ted. It’s a sort of selflessness, empathy, and understanding and concern for others that we don’t normally see from Alexis. It’s a nice way to show her growth continuing; it shows that all that time with Ted has been good for her soul, and hell, it even paves the way for the two of them to date again without the uncomfortable boss/employee dynamic.
The rest of the episode is good too. The scenes involving Alexis’s high school graduation are some of the sappiest, but they still work. I particularly like the scene of Moira and Alexis with the latter in her cap and gown. You forget how good a dramatic actress Catherine O’Hara is given how great a comedic actress she is, but she totally sells the look of sincere pride and joy in Moira’s eyes when she sees her daughter ready to take this big step.
The Jazzagals performance is the icing on the cake at that point. It’s nice that Ted shows up to support Alexis too, cementing their bond even apart from the vet clinic. But it is very sweet, however cheesy, for Moira to put her money where her mouth is (while, admittedly, stealing some focus) to make her daughter a priority in her life. It’s not quite Lorelai locking eyes with Richard and Emily, but it’s still quite nice.
There’s even a victory for Johnny here! Lord knows the last thing we needed was more Roland-related sex schtick, but the fact that he and Stevie managed to sell out the motel is an achievement for him too. It’s nice to see all the Roses having their little victories.
That includes David. His is maybe the lowest key, but I like what they do. For some reason, David’s seemed really hesitant to push things with Patrick. Maybe it’s just the demands of a network sitcom where payoffs have to come at the end of the season. Whatever it is, I like Stevie kicking David in the pants and telling him to treat this “birthday dinner” with Patrick like the date that it clearly is. Their kiss in the car is very sweet, and there’s interesting ground to cover with Patrick still testing the waters of his sexual orientation. They have good chemistry together, and Patrick’s thank you to David for the kiss is really genuine and sweet.
I even liked the tag, with Johnny and Moira bringing in a cake (with the wrong names) to show that they didn’t fully forget their kids’ achievements, while also crediting themselves for their recent successes. It’s the perfect, “We’ve grown, but we’re still adorably flawed” note to go out on, especially the over-the-top singing.
On the whole, this was another strong season, one that may even top the prior one. It’s focused on the growth for each of the Roses and taken them in interesting directions, even if it started a little shaky. Onto season 4.
9.2/10. One of the things that elevates this show above the average sitcom is how it plays with the timeline and form. Telling three stories at the in three different points in time, having them nest and relate to one another pretty perfectly, and centering it around a frame story in the present day that ties into the rest of the season is sharp storytelling.
Plus, despite the fact that each of the stories is working its way through Barney's progression, each manages to have its own distinct flavor on the "not where you eat" principle. Robin's is the traditional story (as often seems to be the case on HIMYM), Marshall and Lily have two twists when it's another couple and a neighbor instead of a coworker, and Barney and Wendy the Waitress has the added stakes of McLaren's plus Barney's general awfulness. It creates interesting parallels that never feel dull or repetitive, and the crackerjack editing keeps everything moving and interesting.
And then at the end, Ted is in the least insufferable and most sympathetic shade of his personality (despite his labor-intensive disheveling of his own hair). He acknowledges that there's a good chance things with Stella won't work out, but that he's putting himself out there and taking risks despite that, and even if it doesn't go perfectly, the risk of failure is worth trying to find love, regardless of what the rules are. If anything, that's the message of the series in a nutshell, and it's one of the more down-to-earth yet optimistic versions of Ted we've seen in the series so far. Big thumbs up.
Despite my rating, I have some mixed feelings about this episode. So let's take the good and the bad.
Good: CBS hyped the heck out of a then-notably crazy Britney Spears appearing on the show. The episode, accordingly, got record ratings, and from that point on How I Met Your Mother turned the corner as a successful show that was no longer in perpetual danger of cancellation and could build toward the future.
Bad: Britney Spears cannot act worth a damn. It's not like her role was so well-written or anything, but she had an awkward delivery and added nothing to the episode itself. It's strange because she acquitted herself well enough on Saturday Night Live back in the day, but maybe she just didn't fit with a sitcom setting.
Good: Sarah Chalke is delightful. As Scrubs fans know, Chalke is a consumate pro, who knows how to be charming and likable and also carry some more emotional material in a comedy environment. There's a brightness and sense of fun to her as Stella, and it boosts the episode tremendously. The way she sells both her reasons for not dating Ted and how much her daughter and her career mean to her is great.
Bad: There's something mildly troubling about the entire "turning a no into a yes" motif. It feels generally fine here because we know that Stella does like Ted, there's just something holding her back. Still, there's the fact that whatever her reasons, she turned Ted down pretty unequivocally (as Robin amusingly points out), and the fact that he keeps pressuring her and trying to woo her despite that is a little uncomfortable, at least in principle, even if it works alright in the heightened reality of a sitcom. Plus he's pretty awful to Abby in the process.
Good: There's so many tremendous jokes with a delayed payoff here and gags that play with the nonlinear storytelling of the show. From Barney being the one who made Abby cry, to Marshall being the one who left the self-help book that prompted Ted to devote himself to it, to Lily rubbing Marshall's injured neck. There's some tightly-constructed humor and it really works.
Great: The 2-minute date. Again, there's something a bit uneasy about the whole idea, but damn if the 2-minute date is not an incredibly romantic gesture and one of the top moments of the show. It's Ted at his sweetest and most creative, and the little joking asides through the whole thing are remarkably endearing. If there's one thing that helps wash the sour taste of the "no becomes a yes" idea of my mouth, it's a payoff this inventive and with a great energy and real emotion to boot. A good finish goes a long way.
5.5/10. Pretty weak. You can definitely feel the comedy getting dumber in this one. The storytelling dichotomy of characters arguing over the right way to do something and then realizing that both of them has a point is getting a little tired, even if the show tries to subvert it a bit here. It's odd that being supportive means not being upfront about your own wants or needs according to this episode, but whatever, I guess I can accept some simplified sitcom relationship platitudes. The problem is that this show used to be above that, or at least used to add more of a twist to them. Lily confessing that being supportive with all that's happened, from Marshall's job, to his dad, to their starting a family, was a solid moment, but the rest of the episode largely devolved into sitcom cliches.
The same goes to Barney's whole abandonment issues-turned-exploding meatball sub bit. There's the hint of a good swerve there, and a touch of the old HIMYM meme-ing with "Graduation Goggles," but the execution is pretty uninspired. It was nice to get a good moment with Robin and Barney, but you got the sense a lot of this episode was stretching for time. Cracks in the foundation are starting to show, especially in terms of the humor, which is a shame coming right on the heels of a pretty great episode.
It happens to almost any sitcom. At some point, as the regular stories about normal human interactions become exhausted, you resort to more and more cartoonish, outlandish bits to keep the momentum going. HIMYM has always had a certain magical realism vibe to it, and that was charming and one of the things that made the show stand out from its staid sitcom brethren, but in episodes like this one you can see that sensibility going off the rails and severing the show's tie to reality in the process.
To wit, the whole "different alcohols magically make you different kinds of drunk" is a cute idea, but one that goes so far into crazyland that it can't sustain any character or narrative within it. It just becomes a series of loosely connected gags that feel entirely rudderless. And the fact that the show lampshaded itself turning subtext into text doesn't make Barney and Marshall just stating their internal motivations any less clumsy. Even Lily and Robin seemed more caricatured and all-around broader than normal.
And the bit with Ted and Zoe in the Arcadia fell flat as well. Zoe's monologue about having grown up there is out of nowhere and feels pretty strained as a means to get Ted over to her side, and the whole "we're turning this car around and spending a night at the old abandoned building to teach you a lesson" is another dumb sitcom cliche type deal. Hell, even the whole cock-a-mouse thing, which was never exactly grounded humor, felt wackier this time around.
That's the problem with a tone like HIMYM's. At its best, the show feels like it takes place in the real world, with a few more out there or absurd elements that give it an accent or character of fun and whimsy. But as the show leans more into that, it just begins to feel like a cartoon world where no rules apply and nobody acts like a human being anymore, let alone the characters we knew. It's a rough go, and a bad sign for the show going forward.
As I often say about the less-than-stellar episodes of the show, there's the germ of a good idea here. For one, using the frame story to comment on the silliness of the show's narrative conceit with Kevin the therapist constantly asking Robin to get to the point while she delves into a mostly-unrelated story about Marshall and Lily is a cute plot, it's just not especially well done. Kal Penn in particular joins the pantheon of people like Jennifer Morrison who are perfectly good at what they do, but don't really fit in with the show.
As for the rest of the episode, the Marshall-Lily-Ted bit about Ted getting too involved in their pregnancy and being a third wheel in general had a few good laughs (especially the photo montage at the end), but it had a weird message about not being skeptical about doctors who just tell you what you want to hear, especially when Lily shuts Marshall down about it. (Ted's obviously goes too far.) And the whole resolution of it is pretty strange.
And here we go with more of the whole Barney-Robin-Nora love triangle as the show goes headlong into super broad comedy and relationship melodrama. Barney's various schemes are even more outlandish than usual, and Robin feels out of character. Gone are the mostly real characters we knew and loved (Robin more than Barney) and in their place are caricatured duplicates whose every romantic trial and tribulation we're supposed to care about despite dull obstacle love interests in their way and their general incompatibility and jerkish behavior to one another. Sign of the times, especially Robin's trying to steal Barney and Barney's obliviousness about the whole thing.
(Oh, and if I'm not mistaken, this is the introduction of both Robin crying under the desk with a bottle of wine, which has been meme-ified to the extreme, and the running bit about Robin being unduly harsh with Patrice, which is probably my least favorite continuing gag on the show.)
6.9/10. Did we really need a payoff to the Pumpkin girl story? Probably not. It's a subtle indication that the show was running out of places to go and had started eating its own tail to compensate. That said, I really like where they went with it. It would have been easy to turn the Pumpkin into another major season-spanning relationship for Ted. Instead, the episode dealt with the idea that you can build something up in your mind based on a brief encounter, and that the fuller experience reveals a lack of a real connection. The twist that for most of the episode, Ted wasn't feeling it and thought Naomi was kind of nuts, only to find out that Naomi wasn't feeling it either, but was equally trying to play up to the moment since she too had built the potential for their relationship up was a nice way to illustrate that.
The rest of the episode didn't quite measure up. Lily having "pregnancy brain," which rendered her dumb had some amusing, if fairly stock humor with her forgetting words and handing out staplers as Halloween candy and whatnot, but the whole premise is super-broad and a symptom of the increased cartoonishness of an already decently cartoony show. Still, the metaphor of pregnany Lily as a drunk girl that Marshall was trying not to take advantage of, while Lily tried to "seduce" him with a house in the suburbs was worthwhile premise, even if the way the show went about it wasn't as sharp as I might have liked.
Robin discovering Barney's Canadian heritage and rubbing it in his face was definitely the lightest of the stories in the episode, but chuckle-worthy enough. Robin ribbing Barney about it as payback was entertaining, and Barney's Rocky IV reference in lieu of donning the Mountie costume was pleasant if, once again, pretty cartoony. The end tag with Barney fighting the Canadian version of himself was a bridge too far though.
Overall, some decent laughs, and a nice main story, but a lot of hit or miss stuff at the margins.
5.7/10. This episode basically has two genuinely good moments. The first is Barney's speech at the beginning, which again, feels like the genuine side of him that the relationship between Barney and Robin was and is mostly missing, but which is problematic for reasons we'll get to a little ways down the road. The second is the tag where Marshall and Lily get revenge on Ted by taking his daughter to do a bunch of her firsts. It's the kind of timeline-jumping gag that this show is pretty unique in being able to pull off.
But the rest of it is a reaaaaallll mixed bag. There's meat to the idea that Robin only wants something when she's told she can't have it. (And it even ties into Barney and Robin's previous deal at the end of S3.) But Robin turns into the broad crush-having-machine so quickly that it doesn't click. Her trying to run plays is a nice change of pace, but in contrast to that speech, it's all a big Road Runner chase, so the lack of a grain of realness into it robs it of its power, comedically or dramatically.
At the same time, Ted's realization that he was making Marvin his "baby" now that the GNB building, his prior "baby" is done is a nice enough emotional beat for the character. (And it led to the other good comedic moment -- Marshall explaining why Ted cannot give his lollypop to a kid at the pool), but the jokes weren't really there and the ramping up to get to that point is a little easy. The C-story with Barney's Bro Bibs is pretty slight, but it's good enough for a larf.
So there it is, the worst thing HIMYM had ever done, or would ever do. "The Robin" was once my breaking point on this show, the point where I stopped harboring any illusions that it might one day return to being the show and I had known and loved and accepted that, instead, it had metamorphasized into a pale imitation of its former self. HIMYM had previously had bad episode, bad characters, and bad storylines, but none of them was so fundamental to the mythos of the series, so bafflingly wrong-headed, and so essential to the show's past and its future, as "The Final Page."
But before we explore the horror, let's take just a minute to chat about the things that are okay, even good about the episode. The comedy subplot about Marshall and Lily having their first day off since Marvin was born gets pretty broad, between their minute-by-minute list of activities, to their cartoonish lullaby, to their immediate separation anxiety, but it's pretty standard HIMYM Season 8 comedy, with a few cute moments, and that's enough to give it a pass.
What's more, Ted's speech to Robin about the virtues of making an ass of yourself is a lovely little scene, that manages to delve into Ted's fairly unrealistic view of what loves means, and yet draws it back to something sweet -- that even his wildest misfires have helped him to find a great friend. I've never really bought into the show's thesis, first presented in Season 7, that what was holding Ted back from finding The One was that he needed to get over Robin. But accepting that premise, his words are heartfelt and the gesture of taking Robin to the WWN building is meaningful.
With that out of the way, let's talk about the event that manages to wreck one of the show's foundational relationships, botch its romantic-arc storytelling over at least the last season and a half, practically ruin two of the show's main characters, and infect nearly everything that came after it: The Robin.
The result is simple -- essentially everything from Barney's profession of love to Robin in "Splitsville" has been part of a play, a scheme on Barney's part prime Robin for his proposal. The drunken kiss, the dating Patrice, the whole kit and kaboodle, were one grand effort at manipulating Robin into loving him.
Let's address the first problem with this whole plan -- it's tremendously implausible. The problem with a lot of works, be they dramatic or comedic, aping the Tyler Durden-esque twist that reshapes everything you've seen previously, is that too often they require all too much convenience in order for these sorts of byzantine plots to work. Too much of "The Robin" requires people to react in just the right way, at just the right time, on just the right schedule, or the whole thing falls apart.
Now HIMYM has always been a show that runs more on emotional logic than on real logic. To some degree, you accept the level of willing suspension of disbelief necessary to enjoy this show, or you pretty much have to give up on the whole thing from the beginning (or chalk it up to Future Ted as an unreliable narrator). I'm generally okay with that idea, and the other contrivances that are necessary for the grand gestures that are the stock and trade of HIMYM to work. But this one stretches the reality of the show too far. Maybe it's just that there's too many moving parts; maybe it's that the plan stacks implausibility on top of implausibility until the whole bit is too unwieldy to pass even the most generous of B.S. detectors, or maybe it's that I don't like what this routine is in service of and that colors my willingness to accept it or not. Whatever the reason, "The Robin" feels like a bridge too far in terms of the coincidences necessary for Barney's ploy to work, and while that's far from this episode's greatest problem, it does sincerely damage the effectiveness of the twist.
So let's get into the greatest problem, which is really two fold: that Barney would do something like this and that Robin would accept it.
The first part is arguably, devastatingly in-character for Barney. There have been several episodes to rehabilitate Barney as not just some sort of Lothario on the prowl, but as an actual human being with real feelings and a desire to love and to be loved. The results have been mixed, and all too often the show falls back into the idea that Barney is basically a sex-minded wizard, conjuring spells on unsuspecting dames at the bar with little moral compunction.
So then it's not crazy that Barney would offer this bizarro version of something Ted might do. Barney too goes in for the big gesture, for making an ass of himself, but he does it in the most deranged, cruel manner imaginable, that plays into the worst qualities of the character. Manipulating someone that you claim to love, knowingly putting them through the pain and humiliation and instability that Robin has been suffering from over the past few episodes, doesn't amount to a grand profession of love; it amounts to the revelation that Barney doesn't really understand what love is.
Because what's striking about "The Robin," and what is supposed to ease the audience into accepting all of these horrible things, is that Barney has no malice in any of this. Barney isn't trying to hurt Robin; he's not trying to trick her into loving him; he's not trying to be an amoral monster about something as sacrosanct as two people pledging the rest of their lives to one another. He just doesn't understand. "The Robin" unintentionally reveals that the Barney's arc from, at a minimum, the end of Season 2, where he slowly develops from a sexual predator into a mature human being, is a failure. It leads to a person who believes he loves another person, and maybe, in his own way, he does, but through his twisted methods, shows he has no concept of what love really is.
Love is not torturing someone so as to catch them off guard with your proposal. (I'm also looking at you, Friends.) Love is not intentionally driving someone "nuts." Love is not toying with people's emotions. Love is not spying on your friends. Love is not pretending to date the object of your heart's desire's worst enemy just to get to them. Love is not an elaborate game where if you lie and cheat and steal enough along the way, you get a human trophy at the end.
These are not the acts of someone who truly cares for another human being. These are the acts of a sociopath. This is the best Barney can do. This is him playacting as a romantic. This is him trying to replicate the rhythms of the Mosbies of the world while having no facility, maybe even no idea, about what truly loving another person means.
And this is the point where Barney crosses the moral event horizon. It is telling that the show's creators patterned Barney's "long con" after a similarly elaborate plot from Breaking Bad's Walter White (occasional HIMYM guest star Bryan Cranston). That moment in Breaking Bad is arguably the point where Walter White goes from being a man with good intentions and bad impulses to being the monster he would become. "The Robin" presents a turning point for Barney as well. This is where he goes from being a character who does some pretty terrible things that you can write off as an exaggerated, nigh-satirical take on "pickup artist," buoyed by the character's accumulated vulnerabilities and affections, to becoming someone who would enact this horrifying, violating scheme and view it as a sincere expression of love.
Maybe it is. Maybe this is the closest Barney can come to expressing the emotions that he believes amount to love. But if so, that's terrible, and speaks volumes about the fissures in the foundation of a relationship HIMYM doesn't just wants us to be on board with, but which has been, and will be, at the core of the series' final three seasons.
But perhaps even more insulting is the idea that Robin accepts it. Robin herself has deteriorated a bit as a character since the beginning, becoming more and more exaggerated herself as the late season dearth of places to take the show's characters became more pronounced. And yet there is little in her history that suggests the cynical, pragmatic, independent woman we have seen over seven-plus years, would not only excuse Barney's deplorable behavior, but accept it as a sign that the two of them should be together.
Robin herself offers the most convincing and powerful rebuke of Barney's inherently messed-up gesture. "Seriously, Barney?" she asks. "Even you, even someone as certifiably insane as you must realize that this is too far. You lied to me, manipulated me for weeks. Do you really think I could ever kiss you after that? Do you really think I could ever trust you after that? This this is proof of why we don't work, why we'll never work. So thank you. You've set me free because how could I be with a man who thinks that this trick, this enormous lie could ever make me want to date him again?"
That should really have been it. Robin should have walked away, resolved never to talk to or let Barney into her life ever again, and recognize him as someone who could not trusted to be honest, to be open, to be a mature human being in an adult relationship. Instead, she realizes that this is all, in fact, leading to a proposal, and convinces her to have a complete change of heart about the whole thing.
And it makes absolutely no sense.
How that sense of betrayal becomes instant acceptance of the offer to marry this cretin is beyond me. The most charitable interpretation is that Robin appreciates this as Barney being all-in as only he can be. But that doesn't erase the horrible things he did to her to get there, or offer any indication that he couldn't or wouldn't twist noble ends into terrible acts once more. The less charitable interpretation is that Robin has been left so off-balance and messed up by Barney's machinations that she's in a bad enough place mentally to be willing to accept this sort of thing. The even less charitable interpretation is that no reasonable human being would ever look at what Barney did as a genuine sign of love, or at least as a sign that someone can be trusted to be a committed, loving partner in life, and the show just fiats Robin's emotional acceptance to get us to an end point it not only hasn't earned, but which is the antithetical result to all that we've seen thus far.
Or maybe there's another explanation.
The version of Robin Scherbatsky we've seen over the last handful of episodes has not been good or decent or likable. She is pointlessly horrible to Patrice. She selfishly tries to sabotage what she thinks is Barney's relationship with Patrice. And she only returns to wanting Barney after his declaration that she cannot have him. This too, is not the foundation of a real, committed relationship, or the kind of person with the maturity to be in one. Robin has always been much more of an adult than Barney, and even within the heightened reality of the show, felt like more of a real person. But the version of her we've seen in the lead up to "The Final Page," presents a discomforting possibility.
Maybe these two people deserve each other. Maybe they both have such a fucked up view of what it is to want and care for and love someone that they are made to visit these types of violations of trust and of conscience upon one another again and again, in a spate of co-dependence rather than legitimate connection. Though Barney's missteps are much greater in magnitude here, both he and Robin act terribly in the lead to this mid-season finale. They mislead, don't consider the genuine happiness or well-being of the other (not to mention innocent bystanders), and above all act with wanton disregard for anyone's interests but their own. Perhaps that level of myopia leaves them unexpectedly well-matched, even if not portends a thoroughly unhealthy relationship to follow.
But that's not what How I Met Your Mother seems to want its audience to take from "The Final Page." It wants us to take this all as the act of genuine devotion rather than of hopeless narcissism, as a moment filled with true love than a reveal of psychopathology, as two people who belong together beautifully and finally joining as one than as an implausible acceptance premised on falsehood and manipulations.
This, more than any prior missteps, more than any previous faults in the characters or the plot, more than even the justifiably polarizing finale, is the moment that broke the show, that proved it had truly and fully lost whatever tenuous grasp it had on its understanding of its characters, their stories, or how love and romance work. It's the point at which we were asked to accept the product of a depraved act of betrayal and manipulation as an enviable celebration of true feeling.
There was no turning back from "The Robin." No retcons could save it, and no amount of attempted rehabilitation could rescue the show in its wake. It is the point at which How I Met Your Mother ceased to be a series that had always had a certain rom-com view of romance but which grounded it in genuine human emotion and moments of real feeling, and instead became one simply playing out the string to its unsatisfying endgame, increasingly fixated on relationships that hadn't and didn't work, and which were founded on so much betrayal -- of character, of love, of common sense -- that it could no longer have even the force that came from the years of good will and myth the series had crafted for so long. "The Final Page" is, without question, the worst thing the show ever did, and true to HIMYM's non-linear bent, its ripples are felt in both the past and the future of the show.
7.2/10. A perfectly fun Kill Bill homage (which is itself a pastiche -- we're through the looking glass here people). I remember some controversy about the gang dressing up in Asian garb for the "training" scenes, but I think it's in the spirit of kung fu movies the show is imitating here. Like I said the last time we did one of these, I'm pretty tired of the slap bet business, and frankly I think it should have been a one hit wonder, or at least something brought out to punctuate an episode like it was with Barney's one-man show than building entire episode around it.
Still, it was a fun entree into seeing Marshall go all Enter the Dragon. There was a lot of physical humor here, between the rapid-fire slaps and the slapping tree and the slow motion (poorly green screened) slaps. There was also a lot of the usual slap-related word play. It was fairly enjoyable, even if it's more of the broad humor and empty calories the show seems to have given into at this point. It was nice to have the angle that Barney had become inoculated against the fear of the slap, and then the kung fu story restored his anxiety, only for them to treat it very matter of factly afterward.
The Boys II Men appearance was pretty superfluous, but there's a bit of a pointless guest star-palooza going on this season anyway. This all makes me sound pretty down on an episode that I mostly enjoyed. It was basically cotton candy -- perfectly nice but pretty empty after the fact.
Set aside the last few minutes of the finale for a moment. That last little reveal changes the shape of the episode, and the series, in significant and meaningful ways that make it easy to let it overshadow the rest of the episode. But stop and think about everything that happens here before the scene where he finally meets The Mother.
Because it is, at best, a mixed bag, long before we see the blue french horn again.
I understand the urge to give the audience some idea of what happens to the gang between 2014 and 2030. The problem is that covering a decade and a half in one big episode makes every story feel rushed and underdeveloped. One of the great things about HIMYM is how it used the past and the future to inform the present. Jumping back and forth between a prior conversation and a current one could be the crux of a joke, as could Future Ted's knowing commentary on some boneheaded mistake or unexpected development that was coming down the pipe. But those time jumps weren't just fodder for comedy, as the show did a great job of creating dramatic irony and emotional stakes by showing what lie ahead or the path that led us here. But by compressing fifteen years worth of life developments into an hour, nothing has time to really breathe or feel like it has the temporal scope the show is shooting for.
After all, there's a great story to be told about the gang drifting apart over the years. Another one of the series's best features is the way it combines the exaggerated goofiness of its comedic sensibilities with real, relatable aspects of being in your twenties and thirties. Well, one of the things that hits you once you start to move past that stage of your life is the way that friends, even good friends, can slowly drift apart, not through neglect or anger or hurt feelings, but just because you're suddenly at different places in your life. That's an idea worth exploring.
The problem is that the rush of years in "Last Forever" makes this process feel like something sudden instead of gradual. Sure, we see the chyron at the bottom of the screen showing that we've jumped ahead a year or two, and there's a boatload of semi-clunky expositional dialogue in the episode to let the viewer know where everyone is in their lives and what they're up to, but when all those developments take place over the course of just a few minutes and just a few scenes, it can't help but seem very fast.
One of the best choices HIMYM's creators made in the final season was to parcel out little scenes of the gang's future throughout, giving us a glimpse of what the future held without trying to pack it all into one big episode like this. Sprinkling those flashforwards in did a nice job at making the group's future feel as well-populated as its present and its past. Obviously there were limitations on how much they could do this in prior episodes given the reveals in store for Barney and Robin and Ted, but the method the show chose to relay the gang's future almost inevitably leaves it feeling too quick, too underdeveloped, and too unsatisfying, even apart from the directions the individual stories go.
Those plot developments, however, are another albatross around the finale's neck. The first and most obvious problem comes from Barney and Robin's divorce. Again, there's a legitimate story to be told of two people who care deeply for one another, but don't work as a couple, but it's a difficult story to tell in five minutes, especially when you've spent huge chunks the past season and a half trying to convince the audience that they make sense together. As someone who's been a Barney and Robin skeptic from the beginning, it's entirely plausible to me that the two of them could mean well and have real feelings for one another, but still end up divorced due to some basic incompatibilities. But the reason for their split feels thin here.
There's nothing we know about Barney that suggests globetrotting would be something he's so against. And while there's hints of bigger issues between the two of them, like not getting to see one another or not being on the same page about their respective plans and projects, we never really get to see these problems develop. We're just told about them, and expected to accept that as enough to break them up one episode removed their wedding. Is that result plausible enough based on what we know about Barney and Robin? Sure, but it's just presented to us, rather than developed before our eyes, and since we don't see their path from pledging to spend the rest of their lives together to getting divorced, that end point feels like it happens by fiat rather than something the show earned.
Barney's reversion afterward is just as unsatisfying. Again, there's a believable story about Barney having worked so hard to become a better person, in part to woo Robin, and reverting to his old tricks as a retreat and defense mechanism when his marriage falls apart. But because of the rapidity with which the finale goes from Point A to Point B, it doesn't feel like the natural result of a difficult event; it feels like throwing nine years of character development down the drain in less than a minute. There's a disparity between how much time the show spent building Barney up as more than just an cartoonish hound dog and how much time it spends showing him reverting to his old persona. That cannot help but feel jarring.
What kills me is that I love where they take Barney in "Last Forever." There's something beautiful about the idea that what really changes him isn't some conquest or accomplishment or even a great romance; it's becoming a father. For Barney, "The One" isn't a woman he'll meet some day; it's his daughter, and Neil Patrick Harris delivers a tremendous performance in the scene where he repeats his Ted-like plea, this time to his baby girl. It's a wonderful scene, but the path the episode takes to get there still comes off as a shortcut that has to ignore seasons of character development in order to make it work.
The finale isn't all bad though. While the story of the gang drifting apart is too quick, the scene where they all reunite for Ted's wedding is legitimately touching and full of the good will and warm feelings that the show's been able to generate during its run. Ted and Tracy (I can use her name now!) continue to be adorable together, and the twist that romantic Ted made it five years and two kids into his relationship before he actually married The Mother is a small but effective way to show how much the substance of finding The One was more important to him than the formality of it (even if he was planning on a European castle). It's one of those lived-in details that speaks to his character.
Beyond that, the actual meeting of The Mother is very well done, and it really had to be. Sure, there's a few meetcute cliches involved, but the easy rapport between Ted and Tracy soars once again and nearly saves the entire finale. After all, this was the moment the "Last Forever" had to nail, and it did. Ted and Tracy's conversation weaves in enough of the yellow umbrella mythos for everything to click, and Joshua Radnor and Cristin Miloti both sell the subtle realization that this is something special. For an episode that had to make good on the promise of its title, that meeting went about as well as any fan of the show might have hoped for.
And if the series had ended there, everyone might have gone home happy. Sure, the other problems with the rushed and shortcut-filled finale might have rankled a bit (particularly the way it undoes the wedding we'd just witnessed), but making that moment feel as big and as meaningful as it needed to after all that build up is no small feat, and that alone would have bought Bays & Thomas a hell of a lot of slack.
Frankly, the series could have still gotten away with Tracy dying shortly thereafter, another controversial choice in the finale. There's something tragic but beautiful about the audience watching Ted seek out the woman of his dreams for nine years and then realizing that he only gets to be with her for the same amount of time, while still cherishing and being thankful for the time the two of them had, for that connection and love that was wonderful and worth it no matter how all too brief it may have been. There's a touching theme about the fragility of things in that story, but also about the joy that comes from finding the person you love, that stays with you even after they're gone. It's sad, but it's sweet, in the best HIMYM way.
And then there's Robin.
The decision to pair up Ted and Robin in the last moments of the finale is as tone-deaf and tin-eared an ending as you're likely to find in a major television program, and the reasons abound. The most obvious is that the show devoted so much time to the idea of Ted getting over Robin, and had any number of episodes (the most recent being the execrable "Sunrise") where Ted seemed to have achieved that, to have moved on in his life. Folks like me may try to handwave it, and the show can call back to the premiere of Season 7 where Ted and Robin can declare that all you need for love is chemistry and timing, but at base, Ted and Robin getting together feels like it contradicts so much about the two characters' relationship with one another over the years. So much of the final third of the show involved going over the same beats between Ted and Robin over and over again, of having each move past the other, and coming back to them in the final, despite how iconic that blue french horn has become for the show, just feels like another poorly-established cheat or retcon that isn't in sync with where the show went since that finale was crafted in Season 2.
What's worse is that that ending transforms the story Ted's been telling from a heartwarming if irreverent yarn about the path that led to him meeting the love of his life, to a smokescreen to gain his kids' approval for dating an old flame after their mother's death. Look, to some degree you have to accept the conceit of the show for what it is and not take it too seriously. In real life, no two kids would sit through such a long story, and no father should tell his children about all the women he slept with before he met their mom. But taken in broad strokes, How I Met Your Mother is a story about how all the events in Ted's life, big and small, good and bad, planned or unexpected, went into making him the person who was ready to find Tracy and capable of being with her.
Future Ted himself put it best in "Right Place, Right Time." He tells his kids "There's a lot of little reasons why the big things in our lives happen." He explains that what seemed like chaos was bringing him inexorably toward the best person and the best thing to ever happen to him, that there were "all these little parts of the machine constantly working, making sure that you end up exactly where you're supposed to be, exactly when you're supposed to be there." And he tells them at the time, he didn't know "where all those little things were leading [him] and how grateful [he]'d be to get there."
That, to my mind, is the theme to take from this great, if tainted show. Sure, it's unrealistic that anyone would go on that many tangents in telling the story of their great romance, but the point is that each of these moments, each of these people, were crucial in who he was and who he became when he met Tracy, and that they were as important as that fateful meeting was. Yes, it's a long story, and it has many many detours, but it's the story of all the twists and turns and bumps in the road that brought Ted into the arms of his soulmate, and that smooths over the rougher edges of the show's premise.
Instead, the twist that it's all supposed to be about Ted having the hots for Robin turns that lovely story into a long-winded attempts by a middle-aged man to convince his kids that he should date their aunt That seems much more crass. There's still meaning to be wrung from it, meaning that finds parallels with Tracy and her dead boyfriend Max and the idea that you can have more than one meaningful relationship in your life. But it doesn't add up with what the show had really done to that point. The past nine seasons were no more about Robin than they were about Barney or Marshall or Lily. They no more feel like a way to suggest that Aunt Robin's good dating material than they do that Ted should spend more time with Uncle Barney. As great as that blue french horn was the first time, it had meaning because it represented something we knew was going to end, but which still had beauty and value despite that. This last time we see it, it's represents the opposite, that something beautiful has ended, and the value it had is cast aside in favor of a relationship the series spent years disclaiming. That is deeply, deeply unsatisfying.
Take away those final few scenes, concocted in a different era of the series, and you have a flawed but still potent finale, that delivers on the show's biggest promise and gives the gang one last "big moment" together. But add them back in, and you have an ending to the series that not only runs counter to so much of what the show developed over the course of its run, its final season in particular, but which, moreover, cheapens the story the audience had been invested in for the past nine years. It's almost impressive how a couple of truly terrible moments can do such retroactive damage to such a longrunning show , but here we are, with a sour taste in our mouth from such an ill-conceived finish.
Future Ted was right, a little moment can have a big impacts, and the one at the end of the series is a doozy in that regard. But maybe, just maybe, when we tell our own stories about How I Met Your Mother, we can do what Ted should have done many times -- just leave that part out. There's something wonderful to be gleaned from the ending to this fun, optimistic, heartfelt, and occasionally very rocky series, but it requires us to do what we always do when looking back on things: focus on the good stuff, make our peace with the bad stuff, and remember it at its best.
You know what REALLY makes this ending just so so so so so fucked up? The fact that Tracy was literally treated as just an incubator for Ted. She literally had no other purpose than to make some children for Ted, and once she was done with that she was killed off so that Ted and Robin could be together like the writers always wanted to.
What was even the point of going through all THAT when it was just going to be Ted and Robin? Why get us invested into this character who is presented as so nice and sweet and the PERFECT girl for Ted, only to then write her off in a half assed 2 minute flashback? And not to mention how BAD it is that they knew since the BEGINNING that it was going to end like this, so everything about Robin not wanting kids and not being able to have them is the absolute worst cherry on top of an already disappointing finale.
Again, Tracy is treated like she's just some girl that can make children for Ted, and Robin is actually his "the one" since the beginning, but wait she can't have children so let's just use this random girl as his incubator.
There's so many fucked up things about how the show ended and the last two episodes, but this. THIS really takes the cake. I would give this -50 out of 10 if i could.
[6.9/10] The punchline here is good. I like the idea of an advanced, immortal species, using our heroes as a means to experience what a taste of mortality would be like. The notion that without time as currency, existence becomes idle play, and the idea of death becomes exotic rather than chilling, is an interesting answer to the “Why?” of this episode.
At the same time, I appreciate the continuity nod of the godlike being responsible for the chicanery being from the species who advanced hundreds of years every week or so in a season 1 episode. It’s the kind of thing I thought the show would gesture toward but then totally forget. So their being the culprit makes for not only a good explanation for the “How?” of this episode, but gives us an organic follow-up to a prior story, which is a big plus.
There’s just one big problem -- a solid 80% of the episode until that point simply isn’t that interesting. The scenarios the godlike beings throw Mercer, Grayson, Malloy, Bortus, and (ostensibly) Keyali into are pretty dull, generic affairs. The gang being trapped in a high school isn’t especially weird or scary, and an attack from a giant troll is more odd than frightening. A plane with no pilot is a stock scenario. The Moclan death chamber looks more goofy than unnerving, and the corpse coming back to life is a standard horror trope. And a raft being attacked by a large sea creature isn’t much to write home about either.
The show wants to go for something of a Twilight Zone vibe with these sequences, where some of the sheer eeriness is supposed to carry the day, but it just doesn't . The direction isn’t interesting enough, and the scenarios aren’t exotic enough to really up the tension or deliver the ominous atmosphere the show’s aiming for. Maybe I’ve just watched too many of these episodes of Star Trek to be impressed by this sort of thing anymore, but I kept waiting for some escalation, some wrinkle, that would make these challenges more exciting or disturbing than the fairly generic spooks we got.
What’s more, the broad outlines of the reveal here were fairly obvious, even if the specifics weren’t. By the time we had both Gordon and Mercer experiencing the weird eye-flash thing at the moment of near-death, it seemed obvious that some alien race was trying to comprehend what that experience was like, something gestured to by the title of the episode.
I will say, I appreciated the fake out that our heroes had seemingly made it off the planet shortly before being attacked by the Kaylon. It’s a neat, plausible explanation for why this was happening -- the robotic Kaylon trying to figure out how to commit psychological warfare against their adversaries. You would totally buy it as an answer for the mystery of who was doing this and why, and setting up with Kiyali’s comments about detecting Kaylon radiation earlier is some clever story construction.
The only problem is that I was able to sniff out that the whole thing was a feint, both because it’d be in keeping with past Trek and Trek-adjacent twists-within-twists (thing TNG’s “Future Imperfect”), and because there seemed to be too much time left in the episode for that to be the real answer. But those aren’t the writers’ fault, so I’m loath to slate them for it.
Plus hey, they did surprise me with the reveal that Kiyali was a plant the whole time! It’s setup nicely with the fake Kiyali returning from vacation early, and the fact that she declares she had the same out of body experience the others did, but unlike the others, we never actually see it in her eyes. It adds up in hindsight, and I appreciate when shows like this play fair with a twist like this one.
That’s the thing. On paper this story works. There’s action, adventure, mystery, an earned twist, and a thought-provoking resolution that connects naturally to past escapades. The big problem is that for most of the episode, the whole action/adventure/mystery part just isn’t very good. The show continues to look kind of cheap in its production design and effects, which breaks immersion and dampens the ability of the episode to chill the spine. And the scenarios the demigods (read: writers) cook up to test the good guys just aren’t that interesting. The big picture ideas behind this one is cool, and the structure is sound, but on a scene-to-scene basis, there’s just not enough there to make it worth your while until the end.
"To the Undiscovered Country - The future."
I lost track of how much talent is in this episode. I kept getting distracted by Bruce Boxleitner reprising his role as the President of Earth. What a lore-rich and beautiful episode this is. I think there is something for everybody. From the classic humor in the simulator, to getting deeper into Krill lore, to seeing multiple space battles.
To the above quote, this is The Orville's version of Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country. Right down to the Abrahamic leader figure. And this time the subversion is that peace goes to shit and all anyone can do is simply prevent going to open war on multiple fronts. The wildcard, that I'm mad I didn't see coming, is that Ed got Teleya pregnant and she now has a Krill-Human daughter that could upset galactic politics and cause an uprising on Krill. Ed is now sitting on an H-bomb, and he might have to press the trigger.
Overall this episode has such a warmth to it, even on Planet Ibiza. All the vistas we get to see, all the held shots and silent moments. Seth said that every episode would feel like a movie, and so far that holds true. This is best one so far, and also one of the best of the entire series.
I cannot stress how meaningful it is to me that the camera is allowed to be in a fixed position for several seconds at a time! After finishing Obi-wan, I am so tired of free-roaming cameras and additional shaking being purposefully added in post when the scene is just someone talking.
I'm just going to keep saying it until it stops being true. Right now, there are exactly two scifi shows airing that are telling stories of this caliber. Neither of them are called Star Trek, but both of them are being worked on by Star Trek alumni. I'm at least grateful that science fiction that prioritizes smart storytelling is still an option. Gene would be proud of both of them. And I'd like to think he prefers this one. :)
Another amazingly well done episode. The pacing was perfect. Slow parts, fast parts, drama, action. Everything was well balanced.
And Klyden returns! He is such a great character. So easy to hate, but so much more complicated. There were glimpses in previous episodes of his internal struggle. We finally get to see the walls broken down. Hopefully, we get to see more of Klyden now that he has realized the error of his beliefs and has opened up to Grayson. It really was a touching moment at the end.
And Dolly! I never would have pegged her for a cameo on the Orville, but she is wonderful as always. I loved reading about how they filmed the scene twice. Once on set and once in Dolly's sound stage so they could get around potential COVID exposures. Amazing!
I do have to wonder, though. They appear to have left the Moclan collaborator high and dry. If Topa really did give the name of the collaborator, nothing appears to have been done to help him. If she didn't actually give the name and lied to the Moclans, then they left the the audience without resolution. A very big complaint considering the rest of the episode was finely crafted. This is a major screwup to not spend 30 seconds to resolve this in this episode.
This feels much more like mid season episode. That's not saying it was a bad one. Quite the opposite. I had a lot of good laughs and a lot of smiles.
One small point of critique: the whole Lysella story was too predictable. I love the dialogue between her and Kelly. It's obvious where that's aimed at. But why not show her the simulation earlier ? Could've made her understand and accept without all the back and forth.
As for the Clair/Issac relationship - who would've thought it would end in marriage when that started way back. But it works, it makes sense and it doesn't feel forced.
Final thoughts on the season:
"Future Unknown" refers as much to the episode as to the show itself. There still is no news about a renewal. It would be a loss to not have another season. I'm sure they could come up with interesting stories. Ed's daughter, his relationship to Kelly, how Claire and Isaac work out, Lysella - there is tons of potential. But they also made sure we get closure if it ends here. I would miss the characters as they have grown on me. I want to see them again and learn more about them. Experience some more adventures with them. That's a feeling no show has given me for quite some time.
Please come back.
This one provided some decent backstory for AltClare and even generated a fair amount of sympathy for her from me...until she showed me that the same events that generated my sympathy had turned her into someone who could kill an innocent bystander with no apparent issues of conscience. I also found it interesting that, prior to her insertion on "our" side of things, she showed intermittent signs of warmth mixed in with the general coldness. Other than that, there were a few things that bothered me with this one. (1) There were ways that AltClare could have mirrored Clare's lost virginity that would not have involved potential exposure to STDs or pregnancy, either of which would have not only presented the usual problems but would have killed the mission. And there's the fact that someone who knew "her" could have seen enough of what was going on to report it back to Peter. I assume that the writers intended this to serve as more evidence of her automaton personality at that point, but I couldn't ignore the lack of common sense. (2) The lack of a team in place to assist her and the resulting "You're on your own" sort of mentality were more than a little hard to accept, especially given the importance of her particular mission. (3) Would it have killed Peter to stash those cigars somewhere else? Someplace far, far way? Or at least in a locked drawer? Or at least in a drawer that he freaking shuts all the way? Oh, well. At this point, now that Peter has made it clear that he knows what's going on with her, I'm all the more curious about how things will move forward with our not-so-happy couple...
Back to the Howards living each other's life in the other's side of things. Finally we got each Howard confronting the other, one on one, about the faults from each other in each other's lives! That's something I've eagerly been waiting for and that dialogue did not disappoint, it was some of the best stuff Counterpart has given us, so far. Though he was right in some points, Howard Prime kept his same aggressive, self-righteous, douchebag attitude, while Howard Alpha finally showed some balls and set Howard Prime straight! Our Howard has been growing since he's crossed to the other side, and I love that.
Now that they've uncovered the school for the sleeping agents on the other side, I feel that they've forced the hand of the "resistance" (or whatever we're supposed to call them) and we should be expecting a strong backlash from them in our side, so maybe they'll be preparing a violent strike, soon...
But I really wasn't expecting Quayle to frame Howard (Alpha?) for being the mole... I sympathised with Quayle in the last episode, after him finding out he'd been played for years by his own wife, but his cowardness now was just low.
Things won't be looking good for either Howard, from now on... Which means they'll be looking great for us, the viewers!
