HIMYM Fans Were the Ones Who Decided the Mother’s Name Would Be Tracy
Tracy McConnell’s name is extremely important to the plot of How I Met Your Mother, but interestingly enough, the creators have come up with it entirely by accident.
In the lead-up to season 9’s biggest revelation, How I Met Your Mother creators dropped clues and Easter eggs about who the Mother might be here and there. One of the best references came all the way back in season 1 episode 9 “Belly Full of Turkey.”
In this episode, Ted goes to Lusty Leopard, a strip club, and is forced (by Barney) to buy homeless man Walter a lap dance from one of the strippers. The dancer’s stage name is Amber, which is how Ted refers to her, but when they get to talking, she reveals that her real name is Tracy.
This prompts Future Ted to say, “And that, kids, is how I met your mother.” The children shockingly exclaim, and he hastily gives in and admits that he is only joking, but this was enough to get How I Met Your Mother fans going for eight more years.
The kids’ reaction made viewers think that the real Mother was indeed named Tracy, which is what ended up happening. However, in last year’s Reddit AMA, one of the show’s creators, Carter Bays, unveiled that this wasn’t the original plan.
Turns out, the writers had no idea what the Mother was going to be called as early as season 1, and they intended that stripper scene to be a joke and a teaser, but nothing more. Then the episode aired, and the creators saw the reaction from the audience and their reasoning, and they immediately understood that they simply had to use that name for the real Mother.
Eight seasons later, Cristin Milioti was cast as Tracy the Mother, and the name luckily fit her. So it’s actually the How I Met Your Mother fanbase who decided what the character was going to be called all those years ago, and the creators just attentively listened. Funny how things work out in the end.
Source: Reddit