Most regular readers of my blog know that I was a huge fan of the show How I Met Your Mother. Well that’s a “was” not because the show ended but because of the way it ended.
Spoilers to follow, so if you haven’t seen the episode, I beseech you to go away.
You see, the reason why I loved the show was because, for me, it symbolised hope. That it doesn’t matter how long you wait, that all those years of waiting will mold you into the right person who will meet the one when the right time comes. And when she comes, all that waiting will be worth it.
But no. All that waiting for the one to arrive, and when she arrives, you only marry her after 7 years and 2 kids, and then she dies, and you go running back to your ex who rejected you many times and was wrong for you on so many levels.
It felt like the slap of a thousand suns to my face.
I wanted to go:
I could say a lot of things, but I am too mad to be coherent. So I’ll just quote some of the reviews I agree with.
I do not want to dwell on how we had, by my rough guess, about 45 seconds to learn Tracy’s name, see her meet Ted, mourn her, and get the hell over her so the kids could laugh it off and tell their dad to get out there again so we could return to Status Quo 2005. (For the audience, it was How I Met, Then Quickly Moved Past Because Remember She Was Not the Original Love Interest, Your Mother.) I do not want to dwell on how it all ended with a surprisingly unmoving reunion, some clumsy editing of Future Ted and the kids, and wigs. {Time}
If How I Met Your Mother had only lasted three seasons and Ted and Robin had ended up together, I think I’d be writing a very different review of “Last Forever.” As it stands, I’m terribly conflicted by the end of a show that I hold near and dear to my heart, not to mention one that, by all accounts, was having a really great final run of episodes in the lead-up to the finale. {TV.com}
The HIMYM finale was heartache for the sake of heartache, gut-ripping for the sake of gut-ripping. It was the Red Wedding with no point or purpose. It’s the story of how Robin and Barney grew to fall in love, fall apart, fall in love, and be torn apart; of how the woman Ted spent his entire life searching for actually didn’t matter because creators were too wrapped up in their original concept to accept the growth and evolution of their characters over the nine-season show. Disappointed can’t begin to cover it. Legendary? I’m still waiting for it. {Bookish}
We also know that the show took approximately two beats to convey this. It was brutally quick. It was Red Wedding sudden. La la la la we find out The Mother’s name is Tracy. La la la, Tracy gets sick and then that’s f***ing it. Now suddenly we’re in the living room and it’s the year 2030 and Ted somehow magically does not have the voice of Bob Saget and his kids are giving him dating advice and reminding him that his wife has been dead for six years. For them she’s been dead for six years. For us, she’s been dead for six seconds. {Jezebel}
Additional thoughts:
* What was the point of having an entire season of 20+ episodes leading up to a wedding, only to have that same wedding dissolved in 20 seconds? I was never team Swarkles (that’s Swarley + Sparkles. You know, Barney and Robin), so it’s not about that, it’s just not right.
* I love Robin. I think she’s really pretty, but that’s it. She was never meant for Ted. I liked them together in season 1 and 2 but after that I moved on, as I thought Ted did too! I actually cringed when Ted did the whole “I love you” thing with her in… was it season 7? I just didn’t buy it. Blargh.
* I don’t mind sad endings. Some of my favorite stories ever have main characters dying in the end, like About Time, One Day, The Time Traveller’s Wife. But I only like those if they have a good point. And this one so did not.
See what I said about not being being coherent? Ktnxbye.
UPDATE! Apparently the creators reacted to fan outrage and have decided to make an alternate ending which will be included in the DVD set. Read all about it here.
This post is part of the A to Z Challenge, a blog hop that goes through the alphabet for all the days of April except Sundays.