HIMYM 8x11 and 8x12: The Final Page

Initially, this episode was actually two separate episodes rather than one 'hour-long spectacular'. But, if the producers want to make two bags of crap into one giant sack of crap, who am I to argue?

The first half was initially called 'The Silence of the Jinx'. Marshall and Barney order the same drink at the same time, and Barney is subsequently jinxed. The gang follows slightly different jinxing rules than most people I know, so Barney can only regain the ability to speak if someone who was present at the jinxing releases him. Normally, grown-ass adults wouldn't care about such things, but the last time Barney ignored a jinx was right before he got hit by the bus at the end of season three. Now the whole gang takes jinxes far too seriously, and since Barney hasn't been jinxed in years, it's time to make him pay by letting Ted talk about Buffalo Nickels.

That's exactly my reaction whenever Ted gets to talk.

Anyway, with the GNB building's opening approaching, Ted sent an invitation to the celebration to his old freshman architecture teacher, Prof. Vinick, who said that Ted's designs sucked and that he'd never be an architect. This, of course, had a profound effect on Ted and he's been obsessed with gaining the man's approval ever since. So, when the RSVP comes back as a 'No' complete with a 'I have no idea who Ted Mosby is' note, he heads back to Wesleyan with Marshall, Lily, and Barney in tow.

They're just there to watch his mental breakdown, though.

When they get there, Ted attends one of Vinick's lectures with the intention of finding a moment to jump in and tell him off. Instead, he finds himself really enjoying the lecture, and at the end he gets his old professor to take a look at his building. Vinick says it's crap and that Ted will never be an architect.

Elsewhere on campus, Marshall and Lily bump into their old acquaintance, Daryl, who's been somewhat obsessed with them ever since they played hacky sack with him once. He's even started a business selling premium hacky sacks.

Hackmigos forever we'll be.

He takes them back to his house to show them something in his dark, windowless basement. They think he's going to murder them, but instead he offers them a cheque for $100,000 for helping him come up with the idea for his very successful business. But, seeing that people he thought were his friends were kinda dicks makes him realize that he doesn't need their validation, and he tears up the cheque.

It feels oh so sweet.

Back in New York, it's employee evaluation time at World Wide News, and Robin gets to fire Patrice. But after a brief discussion, Patrice gets her to admit that she's only firing her because she's with Barney, and that's not right. Patrice is unfired, and collectively, the gang learns that they need to look out for their own happiness and not be so concerned about other people.

On the ride home, Lily and Marshall make a pit stop, and while they're gone, Barney tricks Ted into unjinxing him by showing him an engagement ring. He then immediately jinxes Ted and explains that he's going to ask Patrice to marry him because for the first time in his life he feels settled and happy. Ted gets unjinxed with the provisos that 1) He won't try to talk Barney out of it, 2) He can't tell anybody, and 3) If he breaks either of those rules, Barney gets to hit him in the nuts three times with a wiffleball bat.

This half of the episode ends with Barney jinxing Lily and Marshall, and enjoying a fart and smoke-filled return trip to Manhattan.

The reign of terror is back.

The second half was originally known as 'The Robin' although that pretty much gives away the ending to anyone who knew both the old and new titles. I was hoping I was wrong about it. I thought there was no way they could ever possibly do something so stupid. But they did. Oh, they did.

That comes at the end, though. In the beginning, as an early Christmas gift, Mickey gave Lily and Marshall 24 consecutive hours away from Marvin. In standard sitcom fashion, at first they're ecstatic, then their plans get slightly derailed, then they suffer from extreme separation issues. This despite the fact that the day before they drove to Connecticut without even giving it a second thought.

They're terrible parents.

The meat of the story, however, revolves around Ted. The GNB building is holding its opening night celebration, and since he's single, he asks Robin to come along as his date. However, he feels a bit guilty for not telling her that Barney's proposing to Patrice, so he calls Marshall down to the bar for guidance. Ted thinks Robin should have a chance to go after Barney one last time, but Marshall's Team Tedward and says that he should go after Robin instead.

Robin shows up wearing a slinky red dress, so Ted does the obvious thing and tries to convince her to go after Barney. She doesn't want to, though, and gets Ranjit to drive their limo to the GNB building. Instead, Ted tricks her and surreptitiously has Ranjit take them to the WWN building where Barney's about to propose on the roof. Robin keeps insisting that she doesn't want to go up there, but Ted just won't let up until she goes.

On the roof, she finds not Barney and Patrice, but a bunch of candles and a page from The Playbook entitled "The Robin".

There's a lot written on it, but apparently Barney used a small font so it would all fit on the bottom half of the page.

The Robin consists of sixteen simple steps that outline what Barney's actually been up to over the past six weeks. He really was in love with Robin when he helped her break up with Nick, he meant for her to reject him after they got drunk at the strip club, he enlisted Patrice's help in getting Robin back and wasn't actually dating her, and he's on the roof to propose to Robin, not Patrice.

At first, Robin reacts as any normal woman would. She's incredibly angry that he's been lying to her and manipulating her for weeks, and she's adamant that she won't ever get back together with him. Until she sees that step 16 is a proposal, which she quickly accepts.

They're perfect for each other: They're clearly both insane.

The episode ends with Ted staring out the window of the GNB building while everyone behind him enjoys the party.

What I Liked
-Sandy Rivers' rationale for firing someone is pretty good. If one of my subordinates ever gives me gonorrhea, then I'm damn sure going to fire her.
-Marshall says Daryl's basement is "gimp-storagey". That may be the only time that phrase has ever been used, and I appreciate things like that.
-Bruce Grey gets some work. It's weird how often his character has come back considering how unimportant his character is. Still, he was good on Traders, so it's nice to see him making some of that fat American sitcom money.

What I Hated
-The pit people metaphor.
-They showed more of angry biker chick Lily. They really need to stop that. It's making me sad.

The back of Seth Green's head could probably still pass for 19, though.

-Ted's song about Prof. Vinick. It was short, but stupid.
-Marshall and Lily's lullaby for Marvin. It went on forever and none of it was funny.
-Marshall and Lily kinda freak out without Marvin. They both spend every work day away from home, but for some reason, leaving for twenty seconds makes them both into idiots.
-The Robin.

Final Thoughts
Treating this all as one episode is a little unfair, since 'The Silence of the Jinx' wasn't actually all that bad. It was by no means good, but it certainly wasn't as blatantly offensive as 'The Robin'.

For the last several weeks, Barney has apparently been running a long con. But, far too much of The Robin was left up to luck, and a good portion of it was clearly written post hoc since Step Six is "Check with your doctor about possible broken ribs" after Patrice hugs him too hard in Step Five. So, it wasn't some master manipulation that Barney was running; he was basically just lying to everyone for six weeks. If Robin hadn't rejected him, it wouldn't have worked. If Robin hadn't gone nuts afterwards, it wouldn't have worked. If Ted had kept his mouth shut or Robin had put Barney's happiness ahead of her own, it wouldn't have worked. Heck, if Robin had reacted like any normal woman would have -which she initially did- it wouldn't have worked. Since the writers can make things work out for the best, they can just say 'Hey, look at what a master manipulator Barney is' but entirely too much of his plan was left to chance for it to be believable. What would have happened if Robin hadn't shown up in her underwear that one night? Would he have just played crazy eights with Patrice until 2am?

In fact, the only part that was completely believable was Robin's initial response to reading Barney's final play. They haven't dated in three years. They haven't slept together in over a year, and after that, she rejected him in favour of Dr. Kal Penn who, incidentally, asked her to marry him ten months ago. Then Barney gave up on her so Ted could profess his love without remorse. He was engaged to Quinn less than four months ago, and she just got out of a fairly serious relationship with Nick. I may be wrong here, but agreeing to marry a guy you haven't gone out with in years seems insane. Heck, asking a woman you haven't dated in years to marry you is insane, especially if your previous engagement just recently ended. Barney just split up with his fiancee because she didn't trust him, and now a woman he's been lying to for six weeks is going to marry him? That's nuts.

I've been wondering how they were going to go from where they were to where the flashforward said they needed to be, and now I have my answer: Magic. They just snapped their fingers and Robin and Barney were engaged. No need to go through all the rigmarole of turning them into people who should date each other and then into people who are ready to get engaged when you can just go *poof*?

After writing this review, I went through a few comments on other reviews, and apparently the ending had a lot of emotional resonance for people. Maybe it's because I'm a robot, but I felt nothing. Nothing but contempt for the writers.

I'm assuming that the first episode of the new year will have everyone talking about how insane it is for Barney and Robin to be engaged, which will add a little credibility back to the story, but they just pulled some sixth-season-of-Lost-level BS, and it's going to take a lot to dig the show out of that hole.