i know i'm one of the only people on ilx who watches *how i met your mother* on a regular basis, but did anyone else see the robin sparkles episode? where robin didn't want people to know that she had

your spelling jumped the shark with the post

but what did you think of the episode, max

i thought it was OK

well that was kind of awful, even if marshall did rip up a phone book.

LOLed at kenny rogers' audiobook about sparky

Robin/Barney angle was OK. Lily being a wet blanket in generic sitcom jam was kinda lame. Kenny Rogers gag was amusing. Fiero/500 Miles callback was great.

I liked the Kenny Rogers and all of the Canadian baiting. The Tim Hortons looked very realistic.

when max says he thought is was OK, he really thought it was shit, but doesn't want to sound like me bitching

it sucked

oh that was last week

this week sucked too

the show is self-aware enough that it will probably jump the shark by having barney jump a shark.

― da croupier, Tuesday, April 14, 2009 12:10 PM (6 months ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

i think the show is self-aware enough to know that doing the 'lol jump the shark' thing literally would be pretty lame

― brewer and what (some dude), Tuesday, April 14, 2009 12:24 PM (6 months ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

but by that point it would be a lame show, so you see

― da croupier, Tuesday, April 14, 2009 12:37 PM (6 months ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

the show is self-aware enough that it will probably jump the shark by having barney jump a shark.

what would be totally amazing and unprecedented is if they had Henry Winkler aplaying a recurring character and then showed him jumping a shark for no reason in one of the late episodes

― Bostin' Legal (sic), Sunday, April 26, 2009 6:25 AM (5 months ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

haha totally forgot about this whole exchange

last weeks was ok this weeks wasn't very good though

stupid plot, characters acting more stupid than usual

loved the Proclaimers callback though

the Robin Sparkles episode was on uk tv yesterday. her video was all kinds of fantastic especially the robot and the robot.

not really feeling ted and robin as a couple though. is unconvincing.

good thing the whole show isn't arranged around the premise that they belong together and she's the future mother of his children, then

you know what sucked? they went from TANTRUM! to just being sedate&boring in the car all episode.

Yeah exactly! TANTRUM! was great, doesnt work if you get the audience all hyped up and then *they're* disappointed with the rest of the episode. This show has always been kinda hit and miss like that though. O well. Im sure it wont be too long before another good ep.

why did tv stop in america?

because we're a week away from November Sweeps

what are november sweeps?

one of several 'sweeps' periods during the course of the US television season. generally they are times when they establish that more people watch tv than at other times of the year (i think this is how it works?) so they all compete with as much new programming and, usually, bigger storylines.

most important thing is that the ratings during sweeps are used to determine advertising buy rates, so this is when every network puts out their most gimmicked programming, attention grabbing stunts (am I fired because I'm a lesbian?), celebrity stunt casting, and even pulling weak shows temporarily just so keep their numbers up (current example: Dollhouse being pulled until December for reruns of House... it's doing that badly).

it's typically held in November, February (mid-season debuts and returns), May (season finales) and July (this one I don't totally get, but I guess summer still needs to be monitored). note how the month before all these tends to be stuffed with reruns

if you remember earlier this year there was a kerfluffle because sweeps had been "moved" from february to march because the mandatory switch for broadcasters going from analog to digital signals was originally supposed to be in feb. -- nielsen said they didn't want this to effect metering -- of course, then the date was pushed to June. this led to some mix ups, some networks went with it and moved their new episodes to march (including this show, i believe), others took the usual route anyway

just laughed all the way through barney's one man play.

epic episode

shut the bagpipe up!

Loved Ted calling himself "T-Mose"

best episode of the season so far, but still not really feeling it. maybe i'm just not that interested anymore.

yeah i don't want to be a downer - i'm still enjoying the show, but i don't feel like any episode's really hit it out of the park yet, it feels like they're kind of coasting on standard sitcom relationship plots still (i mean, this one had two: committed couple vs. newly in love couple, and the couple that pretends everything is great when shocker! they're fighting all the time), like they don't know what else to do with the Barney/Robin pairing. but what's nice about their pairing is that they don't care about maintaining the typical relationship facades, like lily/marshall do... in theory

otoh, lily's extra sluttiness this season has been wonderful

haha yeah, between the stripper lily and the barney fantasy sequence it's almost like she's asking the writers to find ways to have her slut it up without totally changing the character

'people upstairs making lol noises' also a pretty obvious sitcom convention.

i have really enjoyed this series but only since i finally admitted to myself that it would never do anything as awesome as say the original Slap Bet or the one about seeing a friends play again.

i don't think the plots or the Barney/Robin pairing are bad per se, but considering how funny Robin had gotten in the last couple seasons i think they're kinda squandering her by making her the new default straight man to Barney's antics -- her shutting down Ted's nicknames was like a little glimpse back of the stuff they used to give her to do more often

you're totally right, Robin is strangely subdued for these arcs, when the last couple years she's really gotten awesome

Ted making up New Relationship Smugness, or NRS for short, is a further sign of him becoming Barney.

well that made me :(

love horny lily so much tho.

best ep of the season i thought, i was dying when they were all in the station wagon

oh it was a great episode, i just wasnt expecting them to kill off robin/barney so quickly.

i got squat!

can't believe they didn't use the opportunity to bring back Ted Moseby: Sex Architect, though

also whenever Murder Train comes back it's always amusing!

^^^yes!!! to both of these!!!

yeah the stakeout and "legend WAIT FOR IT...s of the fall, legends of the fall" were great but it was definitely subpar for me, although a lot of that was just cringing at them totally going for it with NPH in fat makeup.

they seem to kind of change relationships once every season but maybe they saw that there wasn't that much fuel in the barney/robin thing after all. although marshall and lily only stayed broken up for like half a season so nvm.

marshall and lily have tons of chemistry, but barney and robin have pretty much none, hate to say

the fat suit stuff was kind of lame, but lily's kraken plan was really amusing. i'm kind of glad they did this, though, to end the generic sitcom couple plots - that they cut it off so early probably means they realized it just wasn't working, as you say

I thought it was dumb for the writers to put Barney and Robin together and then have them act like a conventional couple, so I'm glad it's over.

tonight's episode in the uk featured Winnie Cooper and Audrey from Dawson's Creek...

tricycle ep, right? that was ok, but it's always nice to see those two. and she is Kim Kelly from Freaks and Geeks!

cbs seems to be delaying putting the full episodes up on their site by a week now. lame.

oh, i just assumed they weren't doing it at all after the first few episodes. now i can catch up.

just watching an old episode + the school teacher from mad men is on it

crazy eyes?

no it was blah blah