How I Met Your Mother - Season 8 Episode 16 - Recap and Review - Bad Crazy
Recap and review of How I Met Your Mother - Season 8 Episode 16 - Bad Crazy:
Ted Mosby (Josh Radnor) getting to the point where he's ready to meet The Mother has been a long time in coming. How I Met Your Mother has spent the better part of eight seasons indulging in delayed gratification, getting us to believe that Ted is finally ready to settle down before detouring into another dead-end relationship. Yet these dead-ends have always been a part of the story, a collection of formative experiences that, in their totality, make Ted into the person he needs to be in order to not only meet The Mother, but to recognize that she's the one. I've always appreciated this approach to the show's storytelling, even if some of the relationships along the way felt superfluous to the goal of preparing Ted for the future. "Bad Crazy" doesn't even try to pretend that Ted's relationship with off-the-wall Jeanette (Abby Elliott) is going to last any longer than it takes to drink a cup of coffee, but the episode ultimately gives a sense that this relationship is the final, necessary component to Ted's growth - that last piece of the puzzle of the series, which has been almost singularly oriented towards preparing Ted to meet, and settle down with, The Mother.
Credit: CBS
Of course, none of that comments on whether the episode is actually any good or not. Thankfully, "Bad Crazy" is a consistent, easygoing half hour that keeps the jokes coming at a pretty fast clip, to where it almost loses track of the story. But I don't really have a problem with that when as many of the jokes land as they do here. There are callbacks to the red boots and the sword in Ted's apartment, and there's a particularly amusing sequence in which Barney (Neil Patrick Harris) and Marshall (Jason Segel) continually store their high-end stuff in Ted's place because they aren't allowed to keep any of it at their homes (a cotton candy machine for Marshall, and a canoe and a Boba Fett suit for Barney, among other things). There's also an extended, episode-long series of flashforwards that sees Robin (Cobie Smulders) confessing to Lily (Alyson Hannigan) about the mishaps that occurred with baby Marvin on the day Lily briefly left her alone with the child. It's an escalating series that culminates in a fairly random surprise cameo that adds to the absurdity of the storyline, in a good way.
Credit: CBS
The episode itself sees Ted attempting to breakup with Jeanette, but only making things worse by implicitly leading her on. Jeanette barricades herself in Ted's room, and things escalate from there, as Ted (brandishing his sword and Barney's Boba Fett costume) tries to extricate her from his apartment...only to discover that she's a cop. (Excuse me, I mean a kawp!) The story works on a comedic level, but it also works as an exploration of Ted's damage. He's been through a lot on his quest to find the right woman - he's had his heart broken, while breaking several hearts himself, and that kind of effort can really wear on a person, to where they don't recognize how their idiosyncrasies could possibly be read as craziness. As Lily tells Ted towards the end, he should simply just enjoy his time with Jeanette, since she's exactly the kind of crazy that Crazy Ted needs right now. Though the flashforward shows that the relationship eventually ends in flames, we see that it's the last push Ted needs to come to the conclusion that he wants to settle down. In essence, the psychotic relationship brings Ted full circle. I felt that it was a pretty incisive way of approaching Ted's romantic maturation.
Credit: CBS
Meanwhile, Robin has neuroses of her own, namely that she's terrified of holding baby Marvin. The story is pretty spot-on in its depiction of the anxiety that accompanies holding a baby for the first time. There really is a niggling fear that you might drop the child or otherwise make a miserable botch of it. Yet the storyline results in some less true-to-life depictions of the lengths to which Robin will go to not have to hold Marvin. However, the escalating series of mishaps during Robin's time with baby Marvin (and the flashforwards that accompany each successive revelation) are among the funniest parts of the episode. Particularly when it's revealed that the kind old lady that helped Robin take care of Marvin was actually Mike Tyson (who plays himself...and who is apparently a senator in the year 2030). Though it's never explicitly stated, Robin's inability to ever have children of her own is there in the background, informing her reticent to engage in anything resembling motherhood. This is all the more poignant when Robin is unknowingly handed baby Marvin, and realizes she's holding him, and she loves it. The cap to the episode is particularly touching, as Robin rocks Marvin to sleep through the night, not wanting to put him back in his crib. Between a neglectful father, the inability to bear children, a popstar past she'd rather forget, and her own tumultuous love life, Robin is perhaps the character that we should most want to see happy. And I know I was certainly feeling that way as she rocked Marvin to sleep, looking completely, beatifically at peace.
Credit: CBS
"Bad Crazy" is a straightforward episode, but it's remarkably insightful in its character-building aspects, and it's also damn funny, to boot. And that's more than enough to put it firmly in the "win" column.
