How I Met Your Mother - "Tailgate" Review

PUZZLES! Go for Barney.

So, as it turns out, while most of America's TV networks resorted to boring reruns this week, How I Met Your Mother decided to broadcast a New Years' episode, the first since the first season, if my memory serves me. And for the most part, "Tailgate" delivered, not as a particularly funny episode, but one heavy on nostalgia and inside jokes to previous seasons. By far, my favorite element of this episode was the unexpected resurrection of Ted and Barney's ambition to open a bar from the season 4 episode "Three Days of Snow". They even brought back Will Sasso as Doug, from the season 4 ep "The Fight", and named the bar "Puzzles", such as in the previous episode, as the name itself is puzzle, of course. However, before I really get into this one, I should recap how I've felt about the season at large. Unlike a large portion of the HIMYM fanbase, I am against the idea of Barney and Robin together. I seem to be the only one who remembers that a good portion of season 5 dealt with how Barney and Robin were absolutely wrong for each other, and how being together destroyed them and turned them into miserable saps of their former selves. Barney got fat, and Robin grew homely and unkempt. And yet, the writers seem intent on pushing them together constantly, if only because they need someone to be Barney's bride for that future wedding they've teased us about so much. As such, I like Kal Penn's character Kevin more than most people do. He's not the best guest character the show's ever had or anything, but he has good comedic timing and him and Robin make a pretty good pair. I liked his involvement with Barney and Ted's bar in "Tailgate", and think he's been a successful addition to the show. More than Zoey was last season, anyway. I was unopposed to Marshall tailgating at his father's gravesite, and thought the emotional arc of this episode worked, especially when Lily reconciled with her father, but overall, I think that a year is long enough for Marshall's recovery from his dad's death. His character arc has been about it for the better part of the last year, and now, I think it's time to move past it and onto him becoming a father himself. For me, however, the highlight of this episode was the return of Sandy Rivers. His sad, drunken antics were highly amusing, and I laughed my ass off, when Kevin went into the bathroom and Sandy said "You must be from the escort service. The scenario is 'high school wrestling match'" (Sandy bends over tub, I die laughing). Robin getting to go on New Year's was also a nice step forward for her character after the dark turn her story took in "Symphony of Illumination" (Have I mentioned that I LOVED that episode yet? Some hated it, but I dug the way Bays and Thomas played with the viewers' expectations there), and there was a hint to her brighter future ahead. So overall, How I Met Your Mother succeeded with a lighter episode than the previous ones, and kicked off 2012 in fine, if not perfect, form.

"Tailgate" - 3.5/5 stars