How I Met Your Mother - Recap: How Barney Met Your Mother
Recap and review of How I Met Your Mother - Season 9 Episode 9 - Platonish:
We're getting closer to the midway point in How I Met Your Mother's final season, and the story is starting to largely take shape, at least in the big picture way: "Platonish" is presented as a fairly straightforward flashback episode, a change of setting from the wedding week that contextualizes this season -- yet it provides the first instance in which a member of the group meets The Mother (Cristin Milioti). In this case, it's Barney (Neil Patrick Harris), whose life love life gets a shot in the arm from her keenly observant advice. It might feel like a bit of a gimmick to some, but this has mostly been a series that has trafficked in gimmicks in the past, and to great success, so I'm not exactly sure why the show should be held to a different standard now. As long as the show can mix comedy and heart in equal measure, that should be more than enough.
"Platonish" is a flashback to several months before Barney proposed to Robin (Cobie Smulders), and depicts the story of how she and Lily (Alyson Hannigan) realized that every single one of the challenges Barney accepts is one of his own making. Thus, they set out to give him a challenge he won't be able to overcome, such as picking up a girl while talking like a dolphin, flirting while wearing a trashbag, or getting a girl's number without using the letter "E". These vignettes are amusing in and of themselves, and they also end up being a great bit of escalating comedy, as Barney succeeds at each increasingly difficult task, even talking a woman into thinking he's Ryan Gosling, having undergone plastic surgery for a difficult film role. Exhausted with Barney's continued ingenuity, Robin and Lily dispatch Barney to run errands for them as the final challenge, and it's here where he runs into The Mother.
In meeting her, Barney's immediate inclination is to hit on her. But she rejects Barney outright, and not simply because this is during the period where The Mother has that pesky boyfriend of hers that she had prior to meeting Ted (Josh Radnor). She recognizes the sadness in Barney, correctly surmising that he was in love and messed it up, and is now hitting on random women to fill the void. The Mother suggests to him that this isn't how he should be living his life. “It’s going to be OK. You’re a good guy. You’re going to get through this,” she declares. But when Barney responds that he doesn't want to give up the game, The Mother poignantly asks, "Do you want to keep playing the game? Or do you want to win?" As if struck by lightning, Barney comes to the realization that he wants more out of life. “I want to win!” he declares, and it's that day that he sets "The Robin" play in motion. In essence, Barney and Robin are getting married because of The Mother, and it's a moment that comes across a bit treacly in places, but still manages to be affecting due to Milioti's keen performance, and the vulnerability with which Harris imbues Barney in his most heart-wearied moments.
Credit: CBS
Of course, while the A-story is relatively strong, the B-story once again plumbs the depths of Ted's continuing infatuation with Robin, despite his claims to the contrary. In the flashback, Marshall (Jason Segel) is still trying to get Ted and Robin back together because of the bet he has with Lily. Though Ted tries to deny his feelings, he eventually admits that he has thought about giving it another go with Robin, wooing her back with the blue French horn. But he's already tried to win her back before, and knows she’s not interested. Yet Marshall is able to convince Ted that Robin is prone to changing her mind, since she once hated olives and now apparently can't get enough of them. So Ted rejects a lucrative, prestigious job offer from his former boss, Hammond Druthers (Bryan Cranston). “I still have things to do here in New York,” Ted declares, yet he doesn't actually pursue Robin once he hangs up the phone, rationalizing to Marshall that "It'll happen when it happens. What’s the rush?" Naturally, now it's too late, and the question remains concerning just how intense Ted's feelings about Robin still are.
Credit: CBS
How I Met Your Mother is a show that has always been working the long game, not unlike one of Barney's seduction plays. It's had its comedic moments, but it's mostly been about moving the pieces into place for this final season, in which The Mother factors into Ted's life and becomes more than just an abstract concept in the series' lore. "Platonish" gets us closer to that inevitability, as The Mother feels more and more like a vivid presence in the show with each passing week, and this development can only help in elevating what's been a fairly uneven final season so far.