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How I Met Your Mother had one of the more successful runs on television compared to a lot of other sitcoms at the time. Though the show will be remembered for its hilarious cast, witty jokes, and disappointing finale. One joke established early on in How I Met Your Mother seems to be a perfect analogy for the shows downfall after 9 seasons. This is by far the worst episode of How I Met Your Mother.
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over the course of its nine season run how i met your mother proved itself to be a case study in
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how a sitcom could quickly become a victim of its own success while the show enjoyed critical and
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commercial success its final season became infamous for a resolution that disappointed
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and confused longtime fans but the writing was on the wall for this decline perhaps sooner than
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fans might have expected, and it all begins with the story of Slapsgiving
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It's the one day we set aside each year to gather together and give slaps
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Perhaps the best way to explain the downfall of How I Met Your Mother is through the saga
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of Slapsgiving, a running gag where the execution over the course of the show is a microcosm
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of the show's inability to provide a satisfying conclusion to its audience
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The story of Slapsgiving truly begins all the way back in Season 2, Episode 9, Slapbet
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What the hell's a slap bet? Whoever's right gets to slap the other person in the face as hard as they possibly can, but no rings
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In this episode, Barney loses the slap bet over whether or not Robin was once in an adult film
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After Barney prematurely assumes victory and slaps Marshall, Marshall is awarded five slaps that can be doled out from that point on through eternity
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This becomes a running plot point that continues all the way up to the show's final season
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The slap bet represents one of the major storytelling differences between How I Met Your Mother and The Average Sitcom
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Many sitcoms up to this point follow a cyclical format where characters experience conflicts
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that emerge and are resolved by the end of the episode. The shows were deliberately designed in such a way that audiences could tune into any episode
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and understand the entire plot line without any further context about the series
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Of course, this structure was a necessity in the early days of television, where the only way to see an episode again was to be lucky enough to catch a rerun at
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some point in the future. As the modern age of television moved into seasoned box sets
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and bingeable streaming, the sitcom was able to become more serialized How I Met Your Mother in particular took advantage of this building the ability to have callbacks to earlier episodes and plot lines an integral part of its structure The show would even build out its character history
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with flashbacks and references to events we did not see within the timeline of the series
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Float on through, brother. With its narrative framing device of each episode
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being narrated by the future version of the series protagonist, Ted Mosby, the show could easily slide
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in references to old storylines as necessary. This allowed for multi-season jokes and escalation of gags, such as the slap bet
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While two of Marshall's slaps in the initial bet were used as throwaway gags
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the writers decided to give the idea of the bet a greater focus in the season 3 episode, Slapsgiving
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There, you said it again. Said what? Slapsgiving. In the episode, Marshall and Lily hold Thanksgiving at their apartment for the first time
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Meanwhile, Marshall tortures Barney with a countdown promising that the night will end with the first ever Slapsgiving
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The running gag of Barney's psychological torture over his fear of the slap is a great
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bit of comedic deflation for the character. Oh God, don't slap me again
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I don't want to get slapped again. The first two times hurt so bad. I don't like it
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I don't like it one bit. Simultaneously, the episode also continues the progression of the post-breakup relationship
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of Robin and Ted, utilizing the show's serialization to great effect. Slapsgiving not only adds a great new comedic premise to the series, but also provides the
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series with a chance for genuine character development. This structure continues in the
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season five episode, Slapsgiving 2, Revenge of the Slap. Once again, the writers find a way to both
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humorously torture Barney as well as advance the story of the characters forward. Here, the series
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introduces Lily's estranged father, and the episode ends with the two finding a sense of
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reconciliation. The idea of the slap provides the group with a tender sense of camaraderie
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as they each offer one another the chance to slap Barney with a heartfelt speech
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ending with Marshall granting Barney a reprieve from the slap, but then slapping him anyway
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The writers again use the Slapsgiving episode to provide both the comedic tension of the promised slap and satisfying moments of character growth In many ways the use of the slap bet reflects the conceit of How I Met Your Mother itself The slap bet has a clear end goal of five slaps
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while also clearly establishing a structure to these stories whenever they arise
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By comparison, the show's central premise of a father telling his children the story of
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as the title says, how he met his future wife, provides a perfect framing device for a narrative
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as well as a clear end point for the series. And that, kids? is how I met your mother
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However, as the show continued on, the premise extended long past its logical conclusion
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and thus both concepts began to collapse in on themselves. With the series, the story ended up lasting nine seasons
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One has to imagine the absurdity of a dad telling his kids a single story that lasts 10 years
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By the same token, the slap bet itself was extended in season seven
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almost as if the writers knew they needed to pad out the possibility of not ending the bet too soon
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Ultimately, though, when it comes to both the story of how Ted met his future wife
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or how the slap bet played out, both come to unsatisfactory and frankly bizarre conclusions
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Up to this point, the Slapsgiving-themed episodes have a clear, satisfying structure
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However, the final episode, despite using the Slapsgiving title, completely ensues the idea of Thanksgiving being a part of the episode's structure entirely
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Instead, the episode opts for a bizarre structure where Marshall claims he's been
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training to deliver the final slap to Barney. What follows is a series of kung fu film pastiche vignettes
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featuring Marshall's training to deliver Barney's slap. These sequences contain each of the central characters
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as martial arts movie archetypes. In attempting to upend the expectations of the audience
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the writers of How I Met Your Mother instead left the viewer completely baffled
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Perhaps the lesson to be learned here is that it's sometimes OK to fulfill
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the exact expectations of your viewers. When a series like How I Met Your Mother
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has gone on for a decade, the desire to break from formula and convention can be overpowering
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and it can also be very successful. However, it's important to reflect
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on what tropes you choosing to subvert and what is the artistic value in that subversion Upending expectations just for the sake of surprising the audience will always be less satisfying than
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delivering a cathartic payoff to years worth of setup, even if that catharsis is exactly what the
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audience is expecting. There's a tendency in contemporary storytelling to always try and be
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two steps ahead of the audience, especially since modern audiences are able to theorize and predict
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possible plot points at a scale unlike anything in the history of fandom. However, an ending that
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delivers on exactly what the writer promised isn't a bad thing. In fact, it means the writer did their
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job correctly by establishing a cohesive structure that logically reaches its conclusion
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That's all of them. Well, wait, I'm free. There's a reason why the cliche
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if it ain't broke, don't fix it, exists in the first place. The writers of How I Met Your Mother
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fell victim to this trap. Instead of following in the tradition of prior Slap's giving-centric episodes
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they made a pretty hollow, bland, and tasteless parody episode that didn't advance any plot of characterization
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at an incredibly late point in the series' final season. The series had clearly established a pattern
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of emotional stakes and character growth in relation to the slap bet
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But rather than delivering on that promise, the writers allowed those satisfying elements
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to fall by the wayside. The show's ending follows a similar suit
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focusing more on upending expectations and delivering on an idea that seemed satisfying
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in the mind of the writers, but just left the viewers feeling frustrated
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When creating mass entertainment, especially comedy, there's a delicate balance that must be struck between the artist and the audience
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Now, sometimes an artist can deliver something that the audience didn't even realize they wanted
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but there is also the risk of completely alienating the audience that brought you success in the first place
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the saga of slapsgiving illustrates how not to subvert expectations. Without providing the same level of craft and care
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then surprising your audience won't matter. All they'll be left with is the unsatisfying feeling
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that their investment in the work has been wasted. A feeling that stings even worse than a slap in the face
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