Wed, May 7, 2008
Clues on How I Met Your Mother Ohmytotalgosh! I normally hate this sort of Lostie pause-grazing, but this is awesome! HIMYM is on fire lately!
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www.onebee.com
Wed, May 7, 2008
Clues on How I Met Your Mother Ohmytotalgosh! I normally hate this sort of Lostie pause-grazing, but this is awesome! HIMYM is on fire lately!
© onebee · all rights reserved
Joe Mulder — Wed, 5/7/08 4:54pm
What fun. I get slightly annoyed with Losties too (and I don't even watch LOST), but, with a sitcom, it's like a whole different attitude. It's still a waste of time, but, it's a more fun, psychologically healthy one. Like, in terms of pastimes and diversions, it's how playing with model trains (a waste of time, but fun) (I mean, not for me, necessarily, but, for some people) would compare with (to use an example from MALCOLM IN THE MIDDLE) taking a fine-tipped ink pen and coloring in the enclosed spaces in all of the letters on all of the pages of a set of encyclopedias (technically not harmful to anything or anyone, but, it says something about you).
I do have to say I would have objected (though not strenuously) to the characterization of HIMYM as "on fire lately" if I hadn't seen Monday's Will Forte episode. The "this happens every time I get an erection" line just killed me, and there was plenty of other good stuff. But until then, I actually thought they'd been in a bit of a mini-slump since the "Final Four" episode (this is grading on a curve, mind you; even in a mini-slump it's still one of the better comedies on TV, and pretty much the only option for people under 50 who like traditional 3-camera sitcoms).
Bee Boy — Wed, 5/7/08 6:41pm
Well, yes. In terms of overall quality, I agree with your mini-slump and your exact timeline for it. Though Forte was brilliant, and I think Sarah Chalke has been, too. (How nice to see her working with some decent material!) But my "on fire" was in reference to the subtle hints they've been throwing in post-strike, like the one at the end of last week's episode ("The Goat"). After I posted my comment on Seat 42F about that, I pared down my reference to it in the Buzzworthy section.
I just love the idea of a sitcom throwing little stuff like that in for the fans who are paying attention. Arrested Development would do it with jokes, but HIMYM's future-nostalgia gimmick allows them to do it with plot stuff, too. God bless Bays & Thomas for seizing those opportunities. I wish Greg Garcia could take some cues from their ability to innovate the format without completely mangling it.