I’m Still Not Over How Bad HIMYM’s Final Season Is (and I’m Not Talking About the Worst Ending Ever)

There is no doubt that most TV shows gradually lose their initial quality of the script by the last season. Pardon me, but I am sure this is exactly what happened to How I Met Your Mother, the iconic CBS sitcom that aired from 2005 to 2014.

As the title implies, it follows a challenging story of Ted Mosby (Josh Radnor) in his search for the love of his life. The ninth season had to be the one where he gets his happy ending and the very mother of his kids, and it is actually, but there is a big catch.

Season 9 covers the events of a weekend that leads up to Barney (Neil Patrick Harris) and Robin's (Cobie Smulders) wedding. It features lots of flashbacks and flashforwards, introducing the character of the Mother, Tracy (Cristin Milioti), but messing it up.

Firstly, I doubt the very idea of stretching out a single weekend into a full season, where the plot barely moves forward. You keep watching it hoping for more new twists, but in fact nothing really happens and what you get is filler and even unwatchable episodes. These include the notorious rhyming episode, Bedtime Stories (E11).

Another thing I dislike about Season 9 is that it doesn’t spend enough time with the Mother. Instead of giving us snippets of Tracy, where she meets the characters and eventually Ted, the showrunners could give her more screen time or even a full episode.

Moreover, where is Marshall? I know Jason Segel wanted to leave the show after the 8th season, but his small appearances in S09 don’t do justice to his character. His whole storyline is hard to follow, while his absence with the group ruins their chemistry.

Aside from poor pacing and filler content, we receive the finale that makes the whole season literally trash. By ruining Barney and Robin’s marriage, killing the Mother and reuniting Ted with Robin, the screenwriters made not only Season 9, but the whole show unreasonable, having me, as well as the entire HIMYM fandom, backlash.

It was a tremendously frustrating watch, especially given the fact that I was in complete awe of the previous seasons and was rooting for Barney and Robin’s happily ever after.

That is why I recommend skipping the last season of How I Met Your Mother, but if you want to revise this series anyway, it is now available for streaming on Netflix and Hulu .