How I Met Your Mother - "Bad Crazy" - Review

How I Met Your Mother is a case study in “stalling” tactics for a television series. I know I’ve reiterated this to the point of beating a dead horse profusely. However, it bears repeating simply for the fact that the show may finally have found a story that unlike many stories it’s done in the past actually works as a stalling effort. The Jeanette story is clearly a stall tactic but works much better than previous stall tactics because it feels like there’s real stakes and significance to this plot beyond it being something to distract us until we meet the mother.

Older Ted makes the claim that Jeanette is the last stepping stone that Ted needs to cross in order to be ready for the mother. In the flash forward, we even see Ted say: “No more dating. I’m settling down”. Whether this story will prove to be a plausible enough catalyst to lead Ted to want to cut ties with single life remains to be seen, but it’s a start. 

Though this isn’t exactly the most interesting story the series has attempted (and there's some leaps in logic), it’s still amusing and at turns charming, and the writers find nice ways to milk jokes (the Lily-Robin flash forward every few years plot started to grate but then they did the Mike Tyson reveal and it made it all worth it).

While the two plots of this episode clashed with eachother at times, both in terms of format and tone, taken on their own, they’re both two of the better plots the series has done this season. I wasn’t blown away by this, but like last week’s Robin Sparkles video (although to a much lesser extent) the series still managed to find some nice character moments and some good jokes (even if at turns both were a bit predictable).   

Stray Observations:

-The flash forward to the aftermath of Jeanette could be another one of those things the series never really pulls off that gracefully, but the writers have executed such things well in the past, just not in the last three seasons.

-The montage of Barney and Marshall bringing stuff to Ted’s apartment is clichéd but it gets in some solid jokes including Marshall leading in a horse, and Barney somehow defying physics and carrying both ends of the boat.

-Jeanette really likes Marilyn Monroe … so they had a séance … where they talked to her cat.

-Abbey Elliot is really great as Jeanette and she makes the character charming and sweet even as she’s threatening to kill a referee.

-“You’re the one who invited in the vampire”

-Jeanette’s apparently a cop. And cue more Departed references. They have not felt at all organically introduced even if it's fun to watch Josh Radnor and Jason Segel say "Cawp"

-Jeanette’s description of Lily is possibly the funniest line of the episode: “with her fancy medical degrees and her sexy southern drawl”

-Apparently Mike Tyson is a senator in the future.

-“We heard you screaming from three blocks away”

-One of the mysteries Barney puts out there as never going to get answered is his job.

-“Oh right. I’m a monster.”

-“May be the old lady with a face tattoo is right”

-“I think you’re a little crazy right now” – Lily convincing Ted to keep dating Jeanette felt like a really nice and true character beat. Even if I don't buy the rationale behind it.

-Lily on when things end up going badly with Jeanette: “And when things go up in flames, and I expect there to be literal flames”

-“I’m going to send Lilly a dead animal in the mail”

Grade: B-

What did everyone else think?