How I Met Your Mother: Platonish

Happy Hump Day my fellow readers. Monday nights episode was one of the best of the season and I feel like I keep saying that but it's because it's getting better and better. The episode was completely in flashbacks and the familiar scenes in the bar and apartment came spilling back. When this season structure was brought I thought every episode would be like this... here's to hoping some of the remaining 15 episodes :((( are structured this way as well. This episode had a lot going on a lot that I'm sure made you cheer and groan because THAT story line was brought up for the millionth unnecessary time, yes you know exactly which one I'm talking about.

1. Ted and Robin: Let's just get straight into it because you know you all groaned at this. And if you didn't groan it's because you ship them beyond friendship and well then bless your little heart. These two will ALWAYS have something between them there is no denying it, and I think this episode kind of showed that just because there's something between them doesn't mean anything is going to come of it. Ted is in love with the idea of marrying Robin and always has been. He has been waiting around for her to change his mind for as long as anyone can remember, but here is the the kicker.... brace yourselves because I am about to blow your mind. Robin isn't in love with him *kaboom* told you it was intense. I feel like that was established in season 7 and PEOPLE DISREGARD IT. Like including Marshall... I understand he is or should I say one of Ted's best friend and wants him to be happy but shouldn't Robin's happiness be accounted for? Maybe I just follow the wrong people on twitter and tumblr but this whole Ted/Robin not working out thing is always thrown back on Robin, like she can't help who she loves for one thing. In this episode of flashbacks there was so many times that if Ted was really in love with Robin he would have acted on it. Like he said eight years ago he would have jumped in a cab and stole the blue french horn for her to win her back. He instead sat in the bar and said what's the rush as if she was going to be waiting around for him, forever. Which has has not been the case. Ted closed the door to the married at forty deal and in that time Robin moved on and fell in love, she can't be blamed for that. The show is also called How I Met Your Mother. Not.... How I Met Aunt Robin Who I Called Aunt Robin In The Pilot. You know Ted wins in the end because it is a love story in reverse, he gets the girl, the house and the kids. So yeah they dated in season 1 and 2 it was heartbreaking when it ended because you knew it wasn't going to work out and now they are best friends, The End.

2. Bryan Cranston Returns: Hammond Druthers coming back was one of the best things ever, I think I was more excited than most because I am currently watching Breaking Bad for the first time. So therefore I have a lot of Walter White feelings. I however loved Hammond back in s2 and when Ted put him in his place, I think it's essentially when his career began to take off then fall drastically downhill then slowly take off again. What I picked up from the conversation that they were having that maybe people didn't think was Hammond wanted him to join his team in Chicago. Now these flashbacks were set back in the Fall of 2012, well if we remember at the end of 8x24 Ted said he was leaving New York to move to Chicago to get away from Barney and Robin and to let them be happy. My thought now is if he went to Chicago he would need a new job to pay his rent, so maybe he "took" the job with Hammond, but will obviously turn it down again when he meets the mother. But it's just a thought.

3. Barney/Robin/Lily: Robin and Lily spent the majority of the flashback giving Barney challenges to complete because he never does any given by other people. Some of the challenges were really strange like the dolphin one made me a tad red from embarrassment but I laughed when Robin called the girl and was like oh sweetheart no. The next challenge was to pick up the girl wearing a garbage bag and not use the letter "E" which I thought was extremely clever. Barney continues to be invisible and Robin has had enough of it. The challenge of the night HAD to be the Ryan Gosling one and Barney pretending he was in fact Ryan Gosling had me rolling around on the floor. Robin and Lily were so fed up that they sent Barney on an errand which led to one of the best plot lines in a long time.

4. Barney and the Mother: If you didn't scream or at least squeal I don't know what to say to you. I thought this was one of the most clever plot lines the show has ever given us. It further proved that the Mother will be perfect for Ted because she is thoughtful and always tries to make other lives better. It also helped people who still don't believe that Barney is perfect for Robin, if you are one of those people I apologize. The mother put Barney in his place and helped him come to term with his feelings because ever since he and Robin broke up the first time he had buried himself deep within in the Playbook to try and keep himself from feeling vulnerable. Before Robin the only other person he loved was Shannon and certainly not to the same degree, and that break up changed him. Barney realized he wanted to stop playing the game he had been playing all these years and go the distance to win. The mother told him to give it everything he's got and then is how the Robin / the Final Page he would ever need came to play and I think it is a magical thing. What I also love is according to Carter Bays these flashbacks occurred after Splitsville and before the Stamp Tramp meaning that Barney's "I am hopelessly irretrievably in love with her.." speech wasn't planned for the play he did it on his own, which makes you want to weep let's be real here.

Quotes

• “I just need to stop crying does anybody know how to turn this off? Is there like a button or something.” - Robin
• “Oh god we are back to your stupid private little joke again.” - Lily
• “I only know of one genuine platonic relationship.” “You and me?”  “Don’t make me laugh Lily you want to hit this so hard.” - Barney and Lily
• “Honey listen to me… I’m going to need you to take a year, a full year and just be celibate okay?” - Robin
• “Challng Accptd.” - Barney
• “Look Ted I can make your life very difficult.” “How?” “How?! I will call you a lot, I will tweet at you like crazy. I will live on your Facebook wall.” - Hammond and Ted
• “What could I possibly be sad about?” “I think you were in love and you messed it up. And every moment of your life since then has been spent trying to stay busy enough to ignore that fact.” - Barney and the Mother
• “I always regret giving up… it just ended so quickly.” - Barney
• “Do you want to keep playing or do you want to win?” “I want to win… What am I doing in less than twenty minutes Robin and I could be...”  “Oh no no no, this is going to take a lot more than twenty minutes.  This is going to take everything you have got. This is going to take all of your time, all of your attention, all of your resources. This is the big one.” - The Mother and Barney
• “I have no idea who that girl was but she set me straight, after that I had one challenge and one challenge only. Get Robin Scherbatsky to fall in love with me.” “Challenge completed.” - Barney and Robin

I thought the episode was really good, I mean besides the parts where I was like we've been down this road before but okay go ahead then. I'm excited to see the reaction of the Mother when she finds out her band is playing for Barney and Robin's wedding. I want Marshall to pay Lily the god damn five dollars so he can shut up about it. I'm just excited for the rest of the season, I am liking where it is heading and hope it continues to get better and better. Let me know what you guys thought. You can hit me up on Twitter or Tumblr if you want to chat about anything, I don't bite I promise. I hope you all have a fantastic rest of the week and weekend.