While some people are calling the How I Met Your Mother finale polarizing, I’ve yet to hear anyone say that they’re a fan of how the show ended. Since the fiasco of an episode aired, various cast members and people involved in the show have publicly stood behind the decision to ruin everything that the iconic series stood for, with the most recent one being Neil Patrick Harris.
In a recent interview on the Late Show with David Letterman, Harris re-iterated that sometimes the growth fans want from characters isn’t the same as the growth they get.
Sometimes, people’s growth doesn’t really mean that they grow up. There are certain people who you want them to get into a solid relationship and really settle down and learn from things. And you want Barney to be the guy you can bring your mom home to — but Barney’s the guy who wants to bang your mom.
The actor does have a very good point here, at least as it pertains to his character. I was actually quite happy with how Barney wasn’t able to adapt to married life. I didn’t like the arc that focused on his relationship with Robin, so I was glad that things went back to normal by the end. Although, I really wish they wouldn’t have wasted two seasons on getting them together.
No matter which way you look at it, writing a finale for a show like HIMYM is a lose-lose situation. Either you do what people expect and it’s called cliche, or you take a risk and inevitably make some fans mad. While the show definitely didn’t play it totally safe, I still believe that there were risks that could have been taken in that final episode without drastically changing what the story was supposed to be about. If the story is really about Ted’s love for Robin, then it’s not about how he met their mother. And it’s certainly not about how through persistence and hope you can find “the one,” like Ted believed for so many years. Unless “the one” is Robin, and the Mother wasn’t actually his true love, which would be even worse.
Check out the video of Neil Patrick Harris talking about How I Met Your Mother‘s finale below and let us know what you thought of it in the comments section.
