The "How I Met Your Mother" finale disappointed viewers when (SAD SPOILER ALERT), the show killed the mother in the last five minutes. By the time Ted tells his kids the story of how he met their mother, Tracy, she's been dead for six years.
Robin-Ted shippers will love that the kids then convinced their father to ask Aunt Robin on a date. Ted shows up outside her window with a blue French horn. It's all very devastating, really. Below, HuffPost Entertainment's senior editor Christopher Rosen, and associate editor Jessica Goodman argue what could (or should!) have been, if the final season hadn't taken place over one weekend in Farhampton. Here's what they came up with:
Christopher: Hey, Jess, so I didn't hate the finale. But I hated the last season so much because it was just a waste of time. I think if the finale existed in a vacuum (or at the end of last season) it would have been pretty okay.
Jessica: Hey, Chris. Yeah, they drew out the season way too long and rushed the finale. It was just like COME ON at the end. It was hard to take it all seriously
Christopher: Also, there were so many great stories IN the finale. That finale could have been a 12-episode season. At the risk of being all like, "That's what they should have done," that's what they should have done!
Jessica: It would have been so great if Barney's baby mama was one of his exes, like Wendy the waitress.
Christopher: How do they leave that hanging?
Jessica: No idea.
Christopher: I definitely thought the reveal was going to be that it was Quinn.
Jessica: They should have drawn out the Robin-Barney divorce way more, too. Which other stories should they have expanded?
Christopher: Marshall's job, right? Marshall and Lily having another baby and moving. Then all the Ted stuff. I would have rather seen an entire season of Ted and the Mother being together than what actually happened in Season 9. And they STILL could have saved them meeting at the Farhampton train station for the finale.
Jessica: Marshall's job was so sad, until he became Supreme Fudge, but I agree. Tracy meshed so well with the group at Robots vs. Wrestlers, etc.
Christopher: Also, Ted's hair was blue.
Jessica: BLUE. It was BLUE. I'm kind of glad they didn't draw out her death. That would have been pretty painful, an entire episode based around that. But it felt too trite to have her die without ever actually saying it. They could have showed her funeral as another "big moment" the gang went through together.
Christopher: Yes! Also, making the whole season about Barney and Robin when that marriage was donezo was just a waste.
Jessica: I cannot believe they got divorced within 15 minutes of the finale. I guess we could see that coming at the wedding, but why invest multiple seasons in a relationship that they knew would end like this? I know it's about the journey, not the end, but sometimes we just want happy endings! Or fulfilling ones that seem like they were worth nine years of waiting.
Christopher: Also, the stuff with Ted's kids was BARF. I know they taped that years ago, but ... man.
Jessica: "Dad, we want you to ask out Aunt Robin." Just wow. But can we please talk about A) Robin's hair and B) the flashback scene in the very beginning with Lily's terrible wig?
Christopher: The wigs! A Definitive Ranking Of The Worst "HIMYM" Wigs: Robin's at the end, Lily's, Barney's at the beginning? I think Robin had four or five wigs on during the episode herself. Wigs for days.
Jessica: She got so famous, too! But I don't think they ever went back to Lily's career. What happened to them in Italy? Did she become a successful art advisor?
Christopher: No idea! They had that one scene a few episodes ago, where they were in Italy, but they never went back to that. Also, who lived in their place when they were in Italy? Did they just leave a massive NYC apartment empty for years?
Jessica: Maybe Ted moved back in when he decided not to go to Chicago. How was it just totally cool of him to leave his best friends' wedding in the middle of the night? In no world would he just not take a flight a day or two after the wedding.
Christopher: Complete insanity, and why was the Mother there if the wedding was still going on?
Jessica: I guess she also just left early. She could have stood under the awning where it wasn't raining, by the way, but instead stood in the rain with her umbrella.
Christopher: She was like, "Deuces, don't need a bassist for the rest of the wedding." Where did that old lady come from?
Jessica: No clue. It should have been June Squibb. I can appreciate what the writers were trying to do, and where they were trying to go, but for me it felt like not enough.
Christopher: I just think that smacked of them having written a finale two years ago, and then CBS being like, "But what if you did nine seasons instead of eight?"
Jessica: It was supposed to be Victoria if it ended after Season 8. But then she would have died too, and he would have ended up with Robin and that blue French horn anyway. I guess on the bright side ... Victoria's still alive?
Christopher: Victoria was the best. Spinoff with Victoria: "How I Met Your Stupid Uncle Ted." Or, how about if Barney's baby mama IS Victoria? Twist!
Jessica: Whoa. Mind blown.
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