Topic: The End of How I Met Your Mother

[Dragonfire]

The last episode of the series aired tonight.  I haven't always watched...I think there are still some episodes that I haven't seen.  I have watched a bit more the this season...especially the last few months.  I liked getting to see the Mother finally and the little moments here and there between her and Ted.  I watched the last episode tonight.  Now I wish I hadn't bothered.

Maybe some will like it and be happy with it.  I just know I'm not and it has me ....annoyed.  Very annoyed.  I've lost all interest in ever watching the show again or getting the last of the DVD sets. 

Do NOT click the tags unless you've seen the episode or don't care about how it ends.  I'm serious.  I am going on a rant and will be spilling the major stuff.  So.  You have been warned.

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I have a few issues, which are mostly all connected.
I kind of feel right now like the last episode kind of.....hmmmm....shit all over the series and the whole idea how Ted was telling his kids the story of how he met their mom, the love of his life.  I remember reading some stuff in the past - even a few years ago - about how some fans of the show were absolutely convinced that there would be some twist or something and Ted was going to end up with Robin.  Well.  That is pretty much what they did and I don't like it.  At all.  After the entire freaking last season being about Robin and Barney's wedding weekend, it comes out that they got divorced after 3 years.  3 freaking years.  It was bad enough when they had them start dating to begin with and then break up.  This was ridiculous.  Then Robin basically drifts away from the rest of the group, becoming some famous news anchor - which is what wrecked the marriage for the most part..her always traveling for work and putting that first.  So..that was the first thing that ticked me off.  Oh...Barney reverted to his jerk douche ways, chasing every woman he sees.

At first, I was good with what was going on with Ted and the Mother.  Things seemed really good with them from the few bits here and there shown - still not much tied to her.  I supposed that should have tipped me off.  Anyway, we finally get to see when the first talk.  Woohoo.  We see the wedding..not all of it, but enough.  Then while that is still being show, there is a Ted voice over going on about how much he loved her...the journey to getting to that point..etc..says how he knows he will love her for as long as they have - something like that.  As soon as he said that, I thought she's dead.  And she was.  There are a few happy pictures shown..then he talks about when she got sick.  And I got pissed.  I briefly thought well maybe she got better...but no.  Then the kids are going on about how the story was really about how he wants to be with Robin - Aunt Robin.  They start pushing him to go after her.  So he does.  And that's how it ends.  With him chasing after Robin again.  Why doesn't he just go beat his head against a freaking wall?  Why didn't I do that instead of watching??  ARRHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH.  They set up stuff really well with the mother this season from the episodes I've seen - I didn't see them all - and then this.  Probably within a minute of seeing the wedding, Ted is talking about her getting sick.  What the hell??  What was the freaking point of doing all that, only to have the mother be dead the entire time basically - when Ted is telling the story she's been dead 6 years - and Ted goes after Robin.  Again.  What. The. Hell?? This is ridiculous.  That ending just sucked out all the enjoyment I had gotten from the show. 

Ok...I'm done now.  Sorry...I just needed to...vent a little I guess. 
The show has kind of annoyed me at times over the years...little to no progress toward meeting or even seeing the mother.  Barney being a jerk.  but this tops it all.

[DJ Doena]

So I take it, you were a bit disappointed?

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

So I take it, you were a bit disappointed?

Barely noticeable

[DJ Doena]

Alan writes down my feelings very well: http://www.hitfix.com/whats-alan-watching/series-finale-review-how-i-met-your-mother-last-forever-how-they-conned-us-all/

[Dragonfire]

Umm..perhaps just a tad ..annoyed.   

I'm still ticked.  It is like the audience was on the receiving end of a slap bet. 

I have been wanting to write more to post again...I think this is gonna be it tonight..finally get me to set up the blog for tv related stuff - I have one for movies and I did set up one for books that I haven't posted on yet.  Anyway.  Time to type..yes I still have more.   

That was a good article about it.  Much of what I feel too.  Once I get what I'm going to post up, I'll share the link.  I will be a bit more...articulate than I was last night.  I am slightly less...annoyed..ticked..whatever.  But I still feel that episode ruined the series for me.

[Dragonfire]

Ok...I did it.  I set up the blog to write about television shows, DVD sets, etc and I made a post about the episode.  I was a little...long winded I guess, but I had a lot of say about it I guess.     This is more like some of my longer movie reviews...and it is basically just for one episode of a tv show - yet it ticked me off that much.     I did go into some basic backstory for the series too..

Anyway, here's the link if you want to see a longer version of why I'm annoyed.

http://reflectionsontelevision.blogspot.com/2014/04/how-i-met-your-mother-finale-how-to.html

[Achim]

I have read the article Marie linked to (as she linked it on Facebook earlier). I'll agree that to seems a rather poor ending.

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I think the only way to salvage the idea of killing off the mother would have been if somehow tat would have brought Robin around...? So the show could have ended with her being the kids' stepmom? At least we'd then have a complete arc, somehow. But Ted simply being stupid to run after the woman who has turned him (and Barney) away repeatedly is ridiculously. Why would the kids even encourage him? (let me add, I haven't seen the show that much, I trusted the article I read and hopefully comprehended correctly)

[DJ Doena]

Let me copy my rant from KSiteTV here:

Wow, that was a load of crap.

I as well as most others who hated the finale (gauging from the comments on TV Line and Alan Sepinwall's blog) were not opposed to

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the death of the mother

but what came after.

For me, this finale did not work in any way.

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We have had two seasons of Barney and Robin, including one whole season only for their wedding, just to make it null and void within the first 20 minutes of the 40 minute finale.

And then you have a crapload of future info dump presented to you only to learn almost as an afterthought that the mother had died some six years previously (around 2024, ten years after the show ended).

And then you have Ted (in 2030, 16 years after the show ended, roughly 20 years after he was last an item with Robin) run back to her.

And the kids? How cavalier were they? Yeah, mom's been dead for six years, you have our permission to go bang aunt Robin)

And Barney? The Playbook II? Seriously? All his hard-earned character development flushed down the toilet.

And why did they bother to cast such an adoring actress to play a role where the viewer could truly believe that she was the one for Ted?

This ending (at least the kids) was filmed in 2005/6. But that doesn't mean one needed to use it at all cost. The characters had moved on. This season as a series finale in season 4? Sure why not. But not five years later!

[DJ Doena]

[Dragonfire]

I'm actually getting ready for work..just stopped on for a minute.  I'll watch that youtube thing tonight..but just from what I see there, I like it.   

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I would never have been happy for the mom to be dead, but I would have....dealt with it better I guess if when the story ended - if just minutes after we finally, freaking finally, see their first meeting - which really was wonderful and perfect - Ted went after Robin again.  They didn't work when they were together anytime before..she's been so focused on her work that her marriage ended and she's disconnected from the group entirely for years...yet now we are supposed to buy that things will be different?  That she would break his heart again?  And what the hell is up with the daughter actually saying to Ted that he has the hots - the hots mind you - for aunt Robin??  That really just.....I don't know...disrespected Tracey in a huge way.  It is like she is just an afterthought in the the story of Ted's obsession with an idiot.