The How I Met Your Mother Blog

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! I know I’m personally thankful for all of you who make running this site worth it. I’m also thankful for the discussion, which is above and beyond what I could’ve hoped for when starting Have You Met Ted. We’re about two weeks away from hitting 3,000 comments on the site. That’s insane.

But that’s not all I’m thankful for. And I hope you can all agree with what else I’m celebrating today.

I’m also thankful that How I Met Your Mother continues to be an awesome show. Lately it would seem that a lot of people feel differently. I challenge anyone who whines that the show isn’t what it was in season one to consider this: we’re still getting new episodes. I think that’s something to be thankful for. The show hasn’t sold out, it hasn’t changed that much. It’s impossible to maintain the same new-car-smell magic that the first season of any great show promises. Think of all the shows you like, are they the same as they were in the first season? Themes change, motivations change, and it goes in different directions. If it was constantly the same notes, it would be boring. I think it’s a testament to the show that they’ve taken it in a new direction which keeps the episodes fresh while still preserving the soul of what made the show great in the first place.

Think about a show like The Office. When it started, it followed the UK format of creating incredibly awkward situations that were identifiable by those who work in a similar environment. The Michael Scott character was played as a deplorable antagonist that everyone loved to hate. Now look at it. It’s a dramedy about people struggling to break out of day-to-day tedious mediocrity anyway they can and the character of Scott, once despised, has become one of the great tragic characters of American television, someone who can’t get out of his own way. The show grew since it knew it’s original premise couldn’t survive season after season. (It’s worth comparing the two since even though The Office is a season ahead, it and HIMYM have the same number of episodes.)

Now think about a show like Freaks and Geeks. It’s first season was focused on a singular idea and it was awesome. Then it got canceled. You can’t tell me that you’d wouldn’t have rather seen it keep getting renewed, even if that meant it had to shift it’s focus as it progressed. I know I’d rather have a few seasons of the show rather than just the one.

I guess my point is that it’s easy to complain that a show you love has changed. It’s harder to see that show for what it has become, and appreciate that it’s still on the air. Find the new things to love about it, dont just focus on what you miss. Don’t be a curmudgeon that gets something they want and then complains about it. Let’s celebrate the great things about How I Met Your Mother and hope it continues being awesome for as long as it can, whatever changes it might go through.

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