#give me a himym where actually ted is fucking pissed at robin

[all-pacas]

HEY HIMYM ANON, i found a draft for you! i actually quite like this, maybe i'll work out an ending. it was mostly written out of spite, iirc - maybe my least favorite part of the finale is the idea that "this whole time you were talking about robin!" because. way to miss the point, ted's kids.

--

It is not a story about Robin.

After Tracy had passed, he’d spent weeks, months, ready to follow. To give up. To surrender to it, the grief and luxury of sleeping for days at a stretch, missing her, the smell of her, the smell of her hospital room, sickly sweet and sharp and deadly. They’d done everything right. Everything they could. Taken the kids traveling, taken Tracy to New Zealand, to Paris, blowing their savings on oncologists and presents.

It had been bad, when the cancer caught up and the money ran out and Tracy talked for her doctors alone for an hour and told him firmly, gently, that she was done with chemo. They had still smiled and laughed and photographed and filmed, filling album after album, their fridge full of second hand casseroles. Smiled until it hurt and dug and tore, ripping through his skin, yanking him apart.

It had been bad.

Others would take the kids for days at a time, Barney blowing in from Manhattan to take them to zoos and museums and Lazer Tag, Lily teaching Penny how to apply mascara, eyeliner, buy her first bra. Marshall cutting Ted checks, depositing them without asking first, each generosity another blow.

It is not a story about Robin.

She moves back to New York in ‘26, he hears, from Marshall, who hears it from Lily; runs into her in person some time later. She is beautiful, pristine, untouched. Smiles and glad-to-see-yous. Polite hugs. Polite, continental kisses. He’s glad to see her, glad to see her well. It’s shocking how much they remember, how easy it is to resume five year old conversations. She doesn’t mention Tracy, and he takes it for politeness and avoidance until one afternoon it hits him: she has no memories of Tracy to share.

--

Barney has joint custody of his daughter, who, at seven, loves animals, outer space, and her older cousins in that order. They go to the Bronx Zoo, the five of them: Ellie following Penny around, Luke on his Switch the whole time, Ted and Barney hanging twenty paces back and keeping an eye on the kids.

Ted’s laughing, actually laughing, at some insane work story of Barney’s when he thinks: I can’t believe we’re still friends, and in the lull he says: “We’ve been friends twenty five years.”

“Of course we have,” Barney says, mouth twisted in incredulity. He’s wearing a suit and his hair is slowly graying and twenty five years ago he started talking to Ted at the urinal, when Ted was twenty five.

Penny is getting a little snappy with Ellie, who wants to follow her into a public bathroom. Penny stomps over to Ted in a huff, and Barney takes the younger kids to get ice creams while Penny complains.

Ted hums. “Did I ever tell you how I met your Uncle Barney?” he asks.

--

They all get together for Lily’s fiftieth. The Eriksens hire caterers, waiters, rent a Long Island event hall. White tie: Barney shows up in Westchester with tuxes for Ted and Luke, claiming he doesn’t trust them to pick out their own. Penny is twelve: Lily helps her curl her hair, buys her low-heeled pumps, and she looks so much like Tracy that Ted has to go into the washroom and sit, lost, for several minutes, until he can emerge smiling and tell her how beautiful and grown-up she is without crying.

He and Marshall split a joint in the parking lot, and it helps. Perfectly legal nowadays, but the furtive feeling brings him back, makes him feel younger and reckless. Lily is fully manic, and Barney sneaks Marvin half a glass of wine.

They take pictures: the four of them, the Eriksens alone, the four of them plus kids.

Robin arrives half an hour late. Polite hugs. Kisses. Lily pleased to see her, everyone else hugging and exchanging small talk. Robin isn’t invited into the first set of pictures, but it might have been an oversight. Ted spots her, lips thin, as he’s smiling huge and fake on Lily’s order.

He and Marshall catch Barney smoking in the parking lot after their joint. “I thought you quit,” Marshall calls, joking, heading back in.

Ted lingers. “Doesn’t count,” Barney says shortly, before he can say anything.

“Robin?” Ted guesses, and Barney shrugs.

“I get it,” Ted says.

Barney stubs out his cigarette butt under his heel.

“We never really talked about any of it,” Ted says, looking off to the banquet hall.

“What’s there to talk about?” Barney asks.

[masterthespianduchovny]

You know what, I’m sick and tired of show runners swearing that their shitty series finales was because the fans didn’t get what they wanted.

More times than not, if you find yourself on the worst TV finales of all time, you earned that shit, bud.

Because, you know a show’s finale is bad when people won’t shut up about it years later. People rarely talk about mediocre endings or endings that were serviceable.

But, bad endings, especially on iconic shows, that pisses people the fuck off.

And there is nothing brave about doing what you wanted to do to the detriment of your show, characters, fans, and legacy. It’s cheap. Because, rather than do the hard work of trying to stick the landing, you indulged your worst impulse.

It should rewarding for sticking with a show. It should feel rewarding to rewatch a show. It should feel rewarding to be apart of a fandom. Instead it feels like a slap to the face as the show runners condescend to you. And go with what they want rather than do what makes sense for the series.

I truly hate the phrase, “The fans are upset because they didn’t get what they wanted.”

It’s such fucking bullshit because what I want--what most fans want--is a satisfactory ending. We want loose ends tied up, answers, or a plan of sort that lets us know you cared for the show as much as we invested in it.

1.) I think about Game of Thrones and how they shit on the plot, characters, and all of that world building. People say, “Oh, you wanted a Disney ending”, but what the fuck does that mean? Because some people did get a Disney ending and that’s the fucking Starks. And, guess what, I actively rooted for them until mid way through season 8. I liked Dany okay, but I was a Stark fan through and through and became a Dany fan and loathed the Starks by the end. They are the ones with the Disney ending...they have a Stark on the throne as another Stark rules the North as the Queen, Jon with the Wildlings, and Arya allegedly living out her fantasy of exploring the world. How is that not a Disney ending???

You know what I expected? A main character to die like Dany or Jon. A major betrayal by a main character like Sansa. Where is the Disney ending in that?

Dipshit and Dipshit sacrificed character development, world building, and fucking sense to ram their ending down our throat and we’re allegedly upset because we didn’t get what we want when all we wanted was a satisfying ending? That doesn’t even touch on glossing over the magical aspect and the significance of the Night King.

2.) I’ve divorced myself so much from How I Met Your Mother that I can barely remember the show. This, like GOT, is a show I’ve never revisited, despite owning at least 2-3 seasons. This show left such a sour taste in my mouth that the series is retroactively ruined for me. HIMYM is what happens when, as a creator, you’re so married to your original idea that you refuse to let it go when it doesn’t make sense 15 million years down the road. The sacrificed character development of Robin, Ted, and Barney for this to make sense. They had fans spend, what, a season on a wedding that was ended in less than five minutes. They somehow make meeting the mother everything fans wanted and more--the magic was there--only to kill her off and have him end up with Robin. IF they were going to have the mother die, I’d rather us sit with her in that last show with the kids. After Ted tells them this story, they go to the hospital and sit and talk with her. I know there is an alternate ending, but I stopped watching in season 8 (maybe), so it means nothing to me. I knew the show was on bullshit by season 7 and had enough.

3.) The X-Files. My feelings and relationship with the X-Files is much more complicated because I didn’t watch the series until AFTER the original series ended. So, my investment, although deeper, wasn’t enough to make me not finish the series and subsequently rewatch it. But, the Chris Carter, the creator and show runner, actions are so egregious that it’s baffling and infuriating.

Unlike the GOT show runners who wanted to end early to get Star Wars money and HIMYM show runners who went on far to long and were married to an ending, Chris Carter hated the core of his fans AND took his resentment out on the characters if he had an issue with the actors. He was a man without a plan that had a great idea, an ounce of talent, and great writers and directors surrounding him. Despite losing a lead actor, someone who he knew he was losing IN ADVANCE, and having time to appropriately deal with this departure, he did the most fuck shit things he could do. Try to undermine the relationship between the two core leads, prop up this new character, not focus on a main character absence in a way that was poignant, and continued to offer up a shitty mythology. When the other core lead wanted to dial back her responsibilities, he still was serving stale shit. His series finale was essentially a fucking clip show. This isn’t fucking Cheers (no shade to Cheers, I just mean that a clip show is appropriate for a comedy and not a sci fi drama), this was the X Files and we wanted answers and something to blow our minds, but he basically told us to blow it out our asses.

So, you’d think that a man whose show was cancelled because he couldn’t helm his creation without his core leads because the leads stepped back or away he’d learn his lesson, right?

NOPE, he kept serving uninspired drivel, undermining his characters, and creating unnecessary or fucking ridiculous conflicts that he had no intention on exploring. He retconned his mess of a conspiracy and made it even more convoluted, so much so, that the other main lead has sworn off revisiting the show!

And I don’t want to hear anything about, “it’s difficult to please everyone” and “how do you end shows like that?”

Because, you know what: THESE MEN WERE PAID TO KNOW AND/OR FIGURE OUT HOW TO END THEIR SHOWS.

All of these shows should've prepared for an endgame or pivoted to make the show narratively and emotionally satisfying. Instead, it’s nothing, but turmoil because it’s so rage inducing. 

These men had a team of writers at their disposal. They had narrative arcs or overarching plots that should’ve been OUTLINED. Yet, they let their hubris do the talking and fucked up their own careers.

Dipshit and Dipset lost their Star Wars contract due to the GOT fiasco. I honestly don’t believe they stepped away. They rushed the ending for SWs, yet they decided to leave after shit hit the fan???

Carter and Bays lost their TV How I Met Your Father. Have they even worked in Hollywood since then?

Chris Carter can only get work for the X-Files and that’s only because people want to see David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson--and that’s as a pairing. Even if he wanted to do a season 12, which I know he does, he cannot because Gillian refuses to come back. 

Stop defending these shitty as show runners and writers who fuck over their series. It is their jobs to tell us a story and make that shit worth wild. They’ve literally made millions off of this, but somehow we’re supposed to excuse them giving us a shitty ending.

A show that is not well known that struggled with viewerships for years, 12 monkeys, does what the other girls couldn’t (or wouldn’t) do! They had a far more complex plot--time travel--and their network treated them like ass, yet they delivered one of the most narratively and emotionally satisfying series finales I’ve seen in years. You know why? Because she show runner actually cared. And, even though I expected heartbreak and nothing close to a happy ending, I was satisfying surprised and happy at the end result.

I fucking hate lazy ass show runners who think they know it all. 

[beckythesooh]

On the HIMYM Finale + Deleted Scenes (rewatch)

On my hate of Ted’s relapse in season 7:

Rewatching HIMYM and of course, I’m sad again at how much I loved it sans Ted’s suddenly thinking he’s in love with Robin again after Drunk Train. It pisses me off so much, and which there were comments on how it made sense because Ted was just so down on himself that he had stooped so low as to try to get girls on the train and be so far away from his goal—I would have believed that but the ensuing episodes definitely show this wasn’t the case. Drunk Train was season 7 episode 16. They broke up at the end of season 2 and only had a heart to heart about how difficult the break up was a few episodes later, and casual sex along with screaming and anger mid season 3. Never once in between does Ted actually like her again except when Barney wanted her and he read his letter—which I’ll account for as him being down and logically and/or nostalgically thinking they would work again, rather than current feelings. I would have wanted him to be depressed because being around happy people or people that he’s jealous of or something, because that’s relatable and understandable. But him being upset that Robin was marrying someone that wasn’t him when she never expressed being in romantic love with him for the past 6 years just makes me despise Ted. And I don’t despise him, but when I take a step back, that act makes me really hate him. And like.... Ross in Friends was a horrible human. I cannot vouch for him in that he wanted to be a good human—Ross thought he was a good human when he wasn’t. But Ted really did want to be a good human. And it upsets me that this is where the line is drawn, where he believes he deserves Robin more than Barney, more than anyone, when she never showed interest in him again.

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A brief touch on my hate of Robin’s character in love:

I don’t hate Robin as a human or a character in general. But I severely hate how she was the writers’ ultimate princess on a pedestal and never thought about how she’s not a prize, but she needs to work for happiness. Never once does she work for any of her relationships. She’s incredibly selfish—and hey, that’s fine because I am and all humans are to a degree, but she’s not allowed to stay selfish and get any and every happy ending. That pisses me off to no end. I agree with the people that say Robin didn’t deserve Ted—but in reality, it was more that Ted deserved better. She never made any grand gesture for Ted or Barney when they both tried to give her anything and everything they had. I’m unsure if in any relationship she put herself on the line. I think after Don, she stopped. I think Don got the best of her, but Don didn’t quite treat her well. Kevin was the best match for her because he helped simmer her crazy and he could be a little crazier with her, but really she didn’t offer anything consciously.

She was unwilling to compromise in season 2, and she never changed throughout—she only revealed parts of her that she kept hidden. The writers made her sane and insane, kind and cruel, and every other paradox so she could fit into anything they wanted and seem rounded out even when she wasn’t. The writers kept her as this ideal girl and never understood that girls can have character development too. (Not that anyone besides Barney really had character development—which is also why everyone was rooting for him, not Ted.) The things she’d give up for Barney, she never cared about. The dogs she gave up for Ted in season 2 were her only attempt at dipping her toes in the water, but then the writers just never made her swim again (not that she should have given away her dogs for Ted). As the series progressed, it felt like she didn’t care about anything. That’s why she was consistently able to swing into a new relationship on the same day after a breakup. Because they made Robin sane enough, no one had to doubt her love and she never had to prove it. But now it all seems like a desperate girl who is afraid to be alone and has no idea what she wanted (continued in next section).

-----------------------------------------

On the deleted Robin x Ted lunch finale scene in 2020 and how it impacts the ending:

Josh Radnor said he hoped the writers kept that in the finale because it showed that Ted wasn’t always pining for Robin when he was with Tracy, and that Robin loved and was thinking about Ted as much if not more. I agree with the first part, definitely not the latter.

Before I discuss how I interpreted that scene, here is how I interpret the two endings of HIMYM vs the ideals of the fans (from my perspective).

The ending where Tracy dies and Ted gets with Robin at the end:

Pros: 

The fan theory that maybe this is a happy ending because Tracy gets to be with Max in Heaven, Ted and Robin (and Ted got the kids he wanted and Robin got her career), and Barney and his daughter.

I guess the writers get to use their original footage, but like that doesn’t really warrant a number.

Cons: 

Like Josh Radnor said, it makes it seem like Ted was in love with Robin even when he was with Tracy.

Season 8 and 9 were a total bust and a LOT of the footage and most meaningful and dramatic scenes (absolutely EVERYTHING WITH TED) were a WASTE of viewer emotion. Like I legitimately regret giving any fucks about Ted’s emotions, that lying sonuvabitch.

If it is meant to be like Robin and Ted are soul mates and belong together, the ENTIRE SEASON 3-9 made the fans believe that either 1. NO THEY’RE NOT, or 2. soul mates are STUPID and a LIE and not as amazing as Lily and Marshall made it seem. And if not, then it perpetuates that soul mates aren’t a thing.

It makes it seem that if a guy pines after a girl enough, he’ll fucking get her eventually. No one on the face of at least Democratic America wants white guys to get that message, wtf.

By perpetuating Pro #1, it further makes Tracy to be a vehicle for Ted’s children and not really anything else. Kinda ties into Con #1.

The ending where Tracy is alive (actually this doesn’t matter to me) where Robin and Ted don’t get together at the end:

Pros:

The hope and dream and ideal that a soul mate (Tracy) exists at the end of the suffering—the thing that made Ted such a good protagonist—lives on. And is finally accomplished. And we can be happy for Ted, while believing in love and life ourselves. (This is the main fucking point, in contrast to Con #3 of the previous end.)

The reassurance that even if you think you’re in love now and it’s not working out, one day, you’ll GET THE FUCK OVER IT

The hope that all the love you give out will be reciprocated (this is different than #1 for me simply based on Tracy’s personality, rather than the fact that Ted ended up with someone that wasn’t Robin. Because Tracy was kind to him and wanted to make Ted happy. Robin never tried to make Ted happy, she just rolled with the punches.)

The fact that the drumroll, the build up, the suspense of the story led to actual grandeur and a happy end, and not a fake out like the other ending. (Different from the above because this is simply the storyline, and how this way wouldn’t be like a “haha, [the ending] was in front of you the entire time!”)

Cons:

No footage of the kids?

No non-sappy way to end that doesn’t make everyone hate the writers?

No reason why Ted is telling this story to his kids?

Like honestly, while sappy, there is no con to a happy ending

Now, let’s retrace the first betrayal ending with the dinner scene:

Pros:

Yes, it does look like Ted loved Tracy / didn’t pine after Robin in his head. And yes, this was something that killed everyone in the finale and thus was a big thing.

If Ted x Robin occurs, you still get the Pro #1 fan theory.

Cons:

It doesn’t look like Robin was in love with Ted even if she admits to thinking about him. It instead just looks like she regretted her life and selfishly wanted him because he treated her well, even when she never had any intention of giving him what he wanted. 

Also the awkward thing about Robin kinda trying to get him back when he has a family and alive wife at that point in time.

If this continued with the Robin x Ted thing, it doesn’t really make it seem that Ted was head over heels magically in love with Tracy during this time. His quote, “Happiness is when you stop thinking about the ifs,” would instead be interpreted as if he settled and didn’t want any risks. And, considering he met her after Robin was married, and had kids with her while Robin was still married, this would further incriminate that thought.  Happiness is not love, but the stability of knowing that this relationship... is stable. Ted, despite having cheated on Victoria when she was in Germany with Robin, has never struck me as a cheater. He has always struck me, even in the lowest and crappiest and sleaziest of times, as someone who wanted to treasure the people around him. The fact that he was unnerved by Robin’s confession because he had Tracy and his family did not feel to me that it was because he loved Tracy, but because it was stable, it was his, and he had stopped thinking about Robin when she wasn’t there.

If Ted x Robin get together still, a la Con #1, I cannot be happy for them. Why? What the writer showed us in the original is that Ted has always pined for Robin. This lunch scene was supposed to dispose of that. But, then, it becomes that Robin wants Ted and Ted is like “I always cared about her and it’s been 6 years and I’m lonely.” And yes, this is much better than the original betrayal ending. But it’s still not a happy ending. Ted gets with her because he’s lonely, not because she’s the “one” anymore. And no one cares about that (and it’ll always be overshadowed by the ANNOYANCE OF TED IN SEASON 8-9). Robin gets together with Ted because she’s lonely, regrets many things in her life, and she knows Ted would treat her well (despite never self-reflecting that she doesn’t offer him anything because he always blindly accepted everything about her). That’s not a happy ending, nor an ending worth giving my feelings for, though admittedly more satisfactory than the original.

Overall, the show is supposed to be about how he meets the mother. How he meets his wife. How he falls in love with her. The audience is wanting to watch him fall in love. And after so many seasons of him being alone, the build up becomes grander. We want to believe that at the end of the tunnel is salvation. That this relatable, kind character will be blessed with happiness and love equal or greater to what he’s given. We like the character, and we want him to be happy. And he was never happy pining after Robin. We want to relate to his struggles, but we want him to be rewarded. We want to believe we too will be rewarded. The original ending didn’t do that. I can’t understand how anyone doesn’t understand the backlash after properly watching the show (and being a sane romantic, which should be the prime audience of this show).

So no, I will never forgive that ending.

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And just because I’m ranting,

On what I think about Robin and Barney.

I honestly don’t care if they stayed married or not. Married doesn’t solve problems between a couple. I don’t like them getting divorced from a conservative perspective, but I also don’t see them doing well in the construct of marriage (which also goes for Robin and Ted, but Robin was always portrayed as sane when with Ted. Though really, she would suck at marriage and kids. When she was with Ted, it was literally just sex. And her being his roommate showed that all non-lust side was incompatible. But I digress).

But, I dislike that the finale gave Barney a daughter as a band-aid and made it seem all right.

I can imagine Robin and Barney always fighting. I can imagine it going as far as a divorce. But I can’t imagine it getting to a point where Barney stops trying and stops caring. Because he tried throughout the seasons and he couldn’t. Why, when he gets her, would he stop. Robin never tried, and I can see her falling out of love because she’s incapable of loving (at least for everyone after Don), only of accepting love and using them as a crutch. But Barney really tried and season 8 showed it in tangible measures. While I understand that a one-way street will eventually reach a dead-end (actually I don’t think that’s true, but for the sake of a lack of a better metaphor), the fact that at that point Robin didn’t step it up makes me hate any ending that would end up with her and Ted even more. Yes, Barney was a pig. But he was able to win over the audience into making us believe that he is capable of loving someone. And Robin never did.

I can imagine Barney giving Robin space if she asked, which includes the divorce. But to try to convince us, the audience, into believing that he stopped loving her and stopped showing it in his side glances and gentle grins pisses me the fuck off. I don’t need them married, I don’t need them constantly together. But they’re a couple where I trust Barney to keep going back to as home.

Also that daughter thing—while cute in theory, Barney had an episode about his previous wing bro having knocked up a girl and being a father and it destroying his personality. I can really only imagine this as being how it winds up. I do think Barney would be a good father. And I do think that if Barney is with Robin, he would not have that chance. But I also think that Barney would always love Robin more than enough to be willing to give that up. Unlike Ted, I believe Barney if he said he’d be willing to give it all up without regretting it for the rest of his life. I hate that Barney wasn’t allowed to remain the metamorphosed character at the end of all of his character development. They had to revert all the things to give him a daughter. They didn’t even give him some sort of back story to how the hell he could fuck up the protection when he had sex with over 200 girls without issues. Yeah I’m salty about the shitty and inconsistent writing/storytelling.

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On whether I care if Tracy dies:

Not too much, because I understand that things happen. It does make me sad if we are made to think she and Ted are soulmates, only for her to die early. While I do agree that her early death and making Max her soul mate does sound cute, I refuse to believe for eternity that Robin was Ted’s soul mate, so leaving Ted without a soul mate would also piss me off about this story and basically Ted would be equivalent as Barney knocking up someone, but with a nanny that happens to be the mother of the children. So the answer is no because then we need to destroy the concept of soul mates. So this is why I would like Tracy to live, though I’m not mad at her dying.

Obviously from a storytelling perspective, it would be weird for Ted to tell his kids his whole dating history just to finally skim through his meeting with the mother and she is still alive. But really we gave no shits about why Ted was discussing all these pointless things to his kids, so that continuity isn’t needed if it destroys our hopes and ideals.

If she’s alive, it makes more sense for Ted to talk about the courtship with the mother. If she’s dead, the only reason for him to discuss all his courtships with all the other women would be..... well, in theory it makes sense to show that he’s always loved Robin, too bad that didn’t properly translate in the actual show post season 3 (like really, Robin would have needed to interfere in every relationship Ted had for it to be relevant to the betrayal ending, but that stopped after Stella and there would need to be a time skip to Victoria with inbetweens of Barney x Robin, but ultimately most of Robin’s love life could be omitted. Seriously, if that was the reason Ted was telling the story, then his storytelling skills are shit and he should be at least 65 and retired because his mind is going). And to tell the story just to be like  “I wanna date again” is also nonsense. Basically, all routes are nonsense. Shoulda just scrapped the purpose of Ted telling his sordid past into just him telling a story. Also, getting the kid actors as adults is still hilarious so I think people wouldn’t mind the kids’ continuity over a better ending.