Damn you Carter Bays and Craig Thomas!
Regrettably I am writing to express my disappointment with the recent decline in quality in the show "How I Met Your Mother". This used to be one of my favourite shows, one I would never miss and yet Season 5 has been unusually bad, so much so that I rarely watch it anymore.
The show, despite being a sitcom, had heart and a good mix of drama. Now it seems to go for the broader, obvious jokes and the majority of characters have gone from being three dimensional and subtly nuanced to slapstick jokes, a term I do not use lightly. (A fat suit for a main character? Insulting, not funny.)
In particular, my favourite aspect of the show, the Barney/ Robin relationship was handled incredibly badly. I understand that Barney as a shallow womanizer is a big draw but the writers have given the impression in interviews that people no longer found him funny once in a relationship and therefore had to end it and tell us that we were wrong for wanting this in the first place. Within 7 episodes, they were broken up for reasons which had never been shown as an issue before and the characters have resorted back to their original states. To sum up, the "reset" button was pressed, an incredibly lazy technique for such a cleverly written show.
This is jarring. For more than a season, this was built up as a big relationship, something which could and did show character development and progression. This relationship was something in which the channel actually actively promoted through videos and trailers. To callously rewrite this relationship as a mistake and tell us we were wrong to want this is insulting. As a result, I've lost a lot of trust and interest in the show.
I never thought I would say this about my one time favourite show, and Neil Patrick Harris remains a delight in everything he does but I cannot enjoy the show anymore if I feel they do not respect their audience.
The show, despite being a sitcom, had heart and a good mix of drama. Now it seems to go for the broader, obvious jokes and the majority of characters have gone from being three dimensional and subtly nuanced to slapstick jokes, a term I do not use lightly. (A fat suit for a main character? Insulting, not funny.)
In particular, my favourite aspect of the show, the Barney/ Robin relationship was handled incredibly badly. I understand that Barney as a shallow womanizer is a big draw but the writers have given the impression in interviews that people no longer found him funny once in a relationship and therefore had to end it and tell us that we were wrong for wanting this in the first place. Within 7 episodes, they were broken up for reasons which had never been shown as an issue before and the characters have resorted back to their original states. To sum up, the "reset" button was pressed, an incredibly lazy technique for such a cleverly written show.
This is jarring. For more than a season, this was built up as a big relationship, something which could and did show character development and progression. This relationship was something in which the channel actually actively promoted through videos and trailers. To callously rewrite this relationship as a mistake and tell us we were wrong to want this is insulting. As a result, I've lost a lot of trust and interest in the show.
I never thought I would say this about my one time favourite show, and Neil Patrick Harris remains a delight in everything he does but I cannot enjoy the show anymore if I feel they do not respect their audience.