Less shushing, more passionate romance, Robin.
As a former Tumblr fanatic (before school conquered almost all of my Internet endeavours) I never pictured myself as a “’shipper,” one of those people who loved a show so much they imagine a romance between their favorite characters, some of whom are actually together in the show and some of whom really don’t even make sense together unless placed in alternate realities wholly devised in the minds of the web denizens who create fanfics and scour the show for the perfect three seconds of footage of the characters together they can cut into a .gif that perfectly demonstrates the undying love these two characters possess and the fact that they will be together forever and ever as soon as they realize they are in love.
I never thought I was one of these people until tonight’s episode of How I Met Your Mother, “Splitsville,” when Barney burst into the ice cream shop of the same name notorious for break-ups and confessed his love for Robin, effectively ending her slowly failing and largely sex-based relationship with Nick and setting the two on the path to the wedding that’s been so heavily foreshadowed by Ted. Though Barney takes it back later, we all know he meant it when he said of his love for Robin: “It’s been overwhelming, humbling, and even painful at times.” I may have swooned.
To summarize how the plot got to that point: Robin and Nick are unable to have sex after Nick pulls a groin muscle while playing basketball on Marshall’s after-work league “for lawyers and accountants and architects who sew.” Forced to actually communicate with her boyfriend a lot more frequently than she is used to, Robin realizes how unintelligent Nick can be. (Case in point, Robin’s attempt to end it with Nick: “I am just worried that as a couple, we’re not working out.” “You want to start going to the gym together?”). Barney has given her a deadline – either end it by 8 p.m., or he’ll send an e-card inviting Robin’s clingy coworker Patrice to a full day of BFF fun.
Meanwhile, Marshall and Lily are acting really strange, as we later learn, because of their halted sex life. Every time the two even touch each other, prescient baby Marvin lets off a wail of disapproval, even if he can’t see them doing anything. Each Erickson expresses sexual frustration in different ways – Lily by taking a strange interest in Robin’s sex life and dropping oddly specific and mildly awkward lines about a naughty foreign woman; Marshall by redirecting all his attention into working out and leading his basketball team, Force Majeure, to victory in the championships. (Top prize: A $25 gift card to Bennigans.) I miss Lily – she hasn’t really shown her comic potential much this season, reduced to the role of “new mom,” but I think it’s good that the show is giving Robin the opportunity to steal the spotlight. Ted takes baby Marvin out for the evening, giving the new parents some much needed alone time.
And then of course, Ted: A minor character this episode, he is mainly focused on his own basketball team, the T-Squares, architects who seem to spend more time evaluating the physicality of the court (“You know if a genie gave me one wish I would knock down that one wall and create a nice flow”) than the game itself. Though Ted manages to math out one perfect basket in their big game, those points are later retracted and they lose, bringing the final score of their game to a very close 117-0, and ultimately causing the team to dump Ted as coach over ice cream at Splitsville.
I’m still running mental victory laps over the budding relationship between Barney and Robin. Even though I know something will go wrong, either because of Barney and Robin’s compatibility (I always just try to forget about how it ended the first time they dated) or because the writers just love to throw a wrench in the gears, I’ve decided not to think about it. Some fans are still supporting the theory that Robin will end up as the elusive mother, but the series seems to have let that ship sail long ago – too many clues seem to point against it. I’ve already expressed my disappointment with the show’s continued use of Robin as Ted’s fallback love interest, and I sincerely hope we saw the last of it with last week’s episode. But with this show, you never know. For now, I will hang on to hope that Robin and Barney will make it.
Tidbits:
–Was anyone else really disappointed when “Robin and Patrice’s BFF Fun Day” wasn’t another Robin Sparkles video?
—I’ll just leave this right here
–Nick suddenly got funny over the past two episodes – and now they get rid of him? Jeez.
–“Oh my gosh guys we have to rush Robin to the hospital because somehow she swallowed her vocal cords and they got lost in her rectum because now she’s talking out of her ass”
— Nick, on Gypsies: “I always thought they were just made up, like goblins or trolls or dolphins.”
–“Is Nick a genius? No. But does he have average intelligence? …No.”
–It’s interesting that the show seems to be putting Marshall in these weird archetypal roles every week. Last week, he was a sassy southerner, this week he seems to have fallen out of Remember the Titans. His pep talk to the team before their big game against the Number Crunchers: “So we are gonna go out and we’re gonna go wipe the floor with those accountants, and afterward we will feast like kings on Southwest fajitas and Cajun shrimp and that check, that check will be marginally less expensive!”
–Nick, on love: “Feels like I have a pulled groin muscle in my heart.”
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