The other bartender

KT is not a wuss, but she is writing this review. Hey, okay, okay, maybe she’s a wuss, too. Ow.

HOW I MET YOUR MOTHER: 4.10  “The Fight”

Five great things about this episode:

1. Jason Segal finally cut his hair.

2.  Stealth callouts:  check out that “sandwich” that College Ted and Marshall are “eating” while watching the kung fu movie.  And did you notice that the song behind the second flashback of the Erikson boys was “Murder Train” — the song that Robin’s old flame from Canada convinced her to play on the news… and got put behind an ad for an animal shelter?

3.  Marshall pulls off that ridiculous toupee (almost symbolic of his own haircut, don’t you think?), clocks Doug, and saves the day.  And doesn’t have a scratch on him.  I like seeing Marshall’s sensitivity from time to time, but this was satisfying, too – and made good sense, considering how we’ve seen him interact with his brothers in “Belly Full of Turkey” and “Arrividerci, Fiero.”

4.  Carving turkey with a lightsaber.  In three to five years.  Which Marshall can predict because he’s on the forums every day.  Adorable.  (Still… although we know these guys are Star Wars nerds, doesn’t it feel like there have been a lot of Star Wars callouts this season?)

5.  “Kids, I’d love to leave you with the message that fighting is bad and you shouldn’t do it, but I know that’s pointless.  So I’ll leave you with this:  Don’t ever get in a fight with Uncle Marshall.  That’s guy’s freaking crazy.”

Five awkward things about this episode:

1.  What did the rest of you think about Doug?  Insisting on doing you a “favor” that you don’t really want done is kind of a pet peeve of mine, so the character got off on the wrong foot for me, and his babbling about the toupee wasn’t funny to me either.  On the other hand, that did make me really pleased when Marshall knocked him out in the end.

2.  Robin going all bibbledy over guys who fight was a little painful.  At first, I thought she was going to go beat those guys down herself, which I think would have fit her character in the tough, former hockey player, can take care of herself kind of way.

3.  Coming back to what actually happened in the episode, don’t you think it’s interesting that – after the big fight Ted and Barney had last year over Barney sleeping with Robin – Barney and Robin are clearly expressing interest in each other and Ted has nothing to say about it?  Although Robin’s extended “That, uh…” line as she backs out of the room creates a really expressive moment of tension between Barney, Ted, and Robin.  And I’m still waiting for a Ted and Robin as roommies episode.  Here at least we clearly saw her coming home to what used to be Marshall and Lily’s room, but that’s it.

4.  Kindergartners who talk like they’re fifteen.  Somewhat cute, but very weird.

5.  The guys Doug beat up weren’t aware that Doug was the only one beating them up?  With three guys to one, you’d think one of them would remember who was there.  But apparently they all panicked and blacked out really fast and decided to go by the stories that were circulating around McLaren’s.

Conclusion:  Solid mid-season episode.  The dialogue and the jokes are good – more than just the ones I’ve mentioned here.  I mean, Ted thinks about prison and says he could finally get some reading done?  Love it.  But the overall concept isn’t quite strong enough to make it a classic.  But at least now we know how our characters always manage to get the same booth.

Change, it is a-comin’

Ok, everyone. Let’s welcome our guest HIMYM poster, KT! We’re excited to have her on-board. She’s drawing some great points from previous seasons to flips of the future, so I know she’ll give us some great insight.

How I Met Your Mother:  4.04 “Intervention”

I love how this show can cram so many moods in together.  For an episode that starts out laugh-out-loud funny, it becomes sort of an elegy for the apartment, dances dangerously close to much-ado-about-nothing territory, and leaves you with just enough foresight to be insanely curious!

First, I think it has to be said:  As far as I’m concerned, Neil Patrick Harris can totally play Thomas Edison any time he wants to.

I think what makes this a good episode is the way that Barney’s old man make-up starts out as a big joke – and a good joke! – and, without being obvious about it, they carry that thread through the episode until at the end it pays off and leads Ted to change his mind about moving.  Barney’s character has always been invested in maintaining the status quo:  Stay single.  I will always be as awesome as I am now.  It was nice to see Ted look at an exaggerated version of this side of Barney and accept that sometimes you have to grow up and move on.  I did think that the way the writers had Ted declare that he was moving and therefore everyone else should too was a little too cut and dried, but since he was also the domino that started to make the others think they should stay, I’m going to let that slide.  I’m fairly comfortable with where Ted was at the end of the episode, thought I still worry about how much he’s been freaking out lately.  We’ll see where that goes.

The weakest part of the episode for me was the series of interventions.  They were reasonably funny as a running gag, but in the end, they were mostly filler.  Between the flashbacks and the gang’s backpedalling that “This was all before we got to know Stella,” the story point – that the gang is worried about how fast Ted and Stella are moving – didn’t come across very strongly.  But at least we know that we aren’t the only ones thinking it.

However, Robin’s Seuss-inspired letter about Marshall’s hat was just plain awesome, and I did appreciate learning later on that Lily’s fake accent was precipitated by watching all the Bond movies back to back.

One more thing about the interventions:  I have to say I feel pretty sorry for Stuart!  In a way, he’s the Jonathan of the series (for you Buffy fans out there) – he keeps showing up in supporting roles.  Unfortunately for him, each time he’s appeared, his situation seems… less good.  Remember how he was the guy spewing cliches at Marshall’s bachelor party in season 2?  And now he’s an alcoholic?  Poor guy.  It did bother me a little that his wife seemed to be the dark haired woman, even though Stuart and Claudia’s wedding was significant in season 1… at which point Claudia was very blonde.  Presumably she’s just changed her hair color.  I didn’t get a good enough look to tell whether it was the same actress.

As per usual, let’s take a close look at that brief flashforward shot of the gang a year from now.  Lily and Marshall are fine, good.  Ted is alone, which means nothing – could be between relationships again, or perhaps he just didn’t bring Stella (or whoever…).  Robin has her hair up in a very becoming and vaguely Japanese-looking style.  And is it just me, or are she and Barney sitting a little closer than usual?  And…someone is still living in the apartment upstairs!  Who?!

One last thing:  I love the way HIMYM dishes out the nerd references.  Of course Ted – who, as we know is a huge Star Wars fan and plays World of Warcraft – would enjoy a Ren Faire!  (Undercover nerds… they’re all around you!)  And his pronunciation of “encyclopaedia” totally fits with what we’ve seen of Pretentious College Ted.

One last quibble:  Who can we pay to get Marshall to cut his hair?

Bring me back the Muppets I knew

STUDIO DC: ALMOST LIVE w/ Selena Gomez

I can just picture the Disney corporation tying Kermit to a chair in a dark, cement-walled closet with one lightbulb and leaving him there. To die.

Disney is killing the Muppets.

I’m watching the most recent Studio DC: Almost Live special, and I’m just wincing at pretty much every moment. I’m surprised I’m even chancing it again, considering how amazingly pissed I was at the first special for having the Swedish Chef “speak” in English. But I’m trying it because I’m and avid Muppet fan.

But this is brutal. For example, who is the new voices for Statler and Waldorf? Terrible. They aren’t even good at heckling! The New York Times Op-Ed cartoon was more quippy than this show.

But basically, they aren’t funny anymore, and now this show seems to be a 30-minute long advertisement for every Disney Channel show imaginable. Or movies. Within 10 minutes, we mentioned Selena Gomez’ new movie at least twice. And how many times has Wizards come up? Uggh.

Not only are they trying to fit in every possible star they can, but if someone can’t appear, they’re name-dropping like mad: Miley Cyrus, Jonas Brothers, Ashlee Tisdale. I even saw a picture of Billy Ray Cyrus in the background of the Cheetah Girls’ song.

I just remember back to The Muppet Show when a guest star–or even a few, like when we had the Star Wars crew appear–it was still about the Muppets. True, the guest star appeared in skits (good skits…let Disney know about that bright idea), but in the end, it was about the Muppets.

Now, the Muppets are accessories. Just annoying charicatures that are appearing in the background. And if we’re lucky, not saying anything. Because whatever dribble they’re making the Muppets say now is just painful.

So let’s make a list of what could be changed:

1. One guest star/host — That might be good to get the focus off some of these annoying people.

2. Get another writer on deck — I’m sorry, but you’re sucking. Let’s go back to the good ol’ days. If we can’t find the actual writers, at least WATCH some of The Muppet Show to find out what used to be funny and what the Muppet characters ACTUALLY are like.

3. Less musical numbers and more skits — In the first special, there was one actual skit and it wasn’t BAD. It wasn’t great, but it wasn’t bad. Give them something more like that to work with. We’ve seen all the songs fifty million times on all the music videos on Disney Channel, so let’s try something fresh.

That’s just three things that MIGHT help. But honestly, I think the best thing to do is release the Muppets from the lecherous grasp of Disney and move on to bigger and better things.

I miss the good ol’ days. Bring me back the Muppets I knew.