Jordan's Review: How I Met Your Mother, Season 5, Episode 1: Definitions

It’s been a long summer since we last saw the gang, as Ted prepared to become a college professor and Barney, Marshall took the gang on a leap, and Barney and Robin made out and started an undefined quest into a potential relationship. A relationship, we find early in the episode, they have been secretly continuing throughout the summer. As the gang presents Ted with a fedora and whip (“I’m Indiana Jones!”) to commemorate his new job as a professor, they also discover the still undefined tryst between Barney and Robin. Every time the pair think about having “the conversation” about what their relationship means, they find themselves just having sex instead (they both find elaborate lies erotic it seems).

Lily, ever the meddler, decides to force the two into having the talk by locking the min Robin’s bedroom, bringing Marshall along for moral support, and to play with Ted’s whip (every single whip crack was hilarious). Robin and Barney don’t know how to have the talk and spend the whole day locked away trying to avoid putting meaning or a title onto their interactions. Ted, ever the over-thinker, is too busy riddling his every action with meaning to notice much of the drama going on in the A plot as he prepares for his first day teaching. The cliffhanger from last season—that the mother is in the class with Ted—is of course clever misdirection. Turns out the mother is in that classroom, but Ted is in the wrong one. He has wandered into Economics 305, which gives him the chance to work out all of his warring notions on how to teach (“I’m Professor Mosby. But you guys can call me Ted. However, I am Professor Mosby. It’s cool if you call me T-Dog. Do NOT call me T-Dog.”) before actually unleashing them on his real class. We did see a hint of the douche-y ted that was mined for comedic gold last season this eve, and I hope that the classroom becomes a venting place for Ted’s pretentious side so we can see more of the romantic in him as he goes about his daily activities.

And speaking of romantic, the Barney and Robin plotline carried all the emotional punch I could’ve dreamed and more. This show has learned exactly how to handle these two characters and how they would handle each other. Both have feelings for the other, and both are terrified to express them. Neither wants to be with anyone else, but neither wants to commit to a relationship either. Instead of surrendering ther characters they’ve built to an unrealistic relationship as a lesser show might, How I Met Your Mother has shown that Barney and Robin can be together and still be themselves. The two decide to get out of the room by doing what they’re best at—lying to Lily and claiming they are boyfriend and girlfriend. As they explain, he looks good in his suit, she can hold her scotch, and they much prefer the idea of being together than a charade of being apart. As the two walk to brunch (the most important meal in the HIMYM-verse) they hold hands, and Ted points out, “You know they were lying, right?” Lily, on the other hand, has a better understanding of the situation. “No, Ted. They don’t know they weren’t.”


Grade: A-

Notes:

-I find that this show garners a lot of adorability points with me. I was so happy with Barney and Robin, it couldn’t get less than an A-.

-“Tell him to whip the habit Ted. I’ve got whip fever. Don’t even point it Ted just whip him!”

-Barney stealing Ted’s condoms was awesome.

-Brad came back! Yay! But what happened to Cara?

-I like that Ted’s students in his dream don’t believe he’s a professor because “where’s your whip and hat?”

-Flugelhorn is Robin and Barney’s safe-word. Its simultaneously hilarious and adorable, just like their relationship.

-“We can’t fight like this all night, we both got some good shots in, let’s call it a truce!”-Barney, after landing a single punch, in vintage NPH form.

-“I wish just ONCE you guys would call me on Tuxedo night!”

-Barnman and Robin. Awesome.

-“Doorfive! Were you there?”