When we last left the gang at How I Met Your Mother, Robin and Barney were finally giving in to their real feelings for each other, and Ted had announced that he’d given up architecture to become a professor at Columbia.
Oh, and we also learned that when he started actually teaching, Mom would be in the classroom.
On the first day of class, Ted’s looking for a good start. He’s nervous, having had dreams all week about losing control of his classroom and coming to class with his pants off. He tells his kids that he didn’t know that their mother was in the classroom. He didn’t know something else key either, but “we’ll get to that.”
We cut to the bar in June 2009 where Marshall and Lily are finding out about the kiss between Robin and Barney. Lily’s all excited about the double-dating possibilities, but Robin and Barney insist that it was just a one-time thing. They just weren’t feeling a relationship, so they were just going to stay friends. Poor Lily, I’m sure the ice cream helped with the “breakup.”
Back to the bar in September 2009, Lily and Marshall give Ted a good luck gift. Just a little something that belonged to Marshall’s favorite professor, Ted opens it to find a fedora and bullwhip (the Dominatrix 8000, according to Barney). Robin has a date with a guy she plans to see naked, and Barney’s looking for seconds with the Chinese girl he met the night before. Which, if you’ve ever been in this type of sneaking around situation, means that you’re totally planning to hook up.
Sure enough, after a whip-induced injury behind the bar, Ted, Marshall, and Lily head back to the apartment to find Robin and Barney making out on the couch. The weird thing, this doesn’t seem like a surprise to Ted. Probably because it’s NOT. Then what is…all right, we’ll get to that.
Lily demands to know what’s going on. Turns out it’s been going on all summer, but they haven’t had “the talk.” Why? Because no one wants the talk. The talk is awkward and wrong and every time they even think about it, they can’t stop making out. As a result, they haven’t exactly defined the relationship. They don’t seem to think that’s a problem. Is it?
Ted’s first day of class doesn’t go well at all. The first girl raises her hand and asks why they should listen to him; after all, he’s a failed architect. This causes the entire class to turn on him. Just as he realizes he’s pantsless, he wakes up and freaks out on Barney, who’s in his room searching for condoms.
At the bar the next day, Lily tries to turn Ted’s dream into a teachable moment for Barney and Robin about the importance of defining the relationship. Barney agrees with everything she says right up until he realizes what Lily’s up to and drags her away for a private convo. There is, Barney says, “No good reason” for they to have the talk. When they come back to the table, they find Brad the bar guy asking Robin to a hockey game. She hesitates, which prompts Brad to ask if she has a boyfriend. She…um…doesn’t? No problem, then, it’s a date. Bingo! There’s Lily’s good reason.
At the hockey game, Robin feels bad about accepting the date. Brad thinks they’re having “the talk,” and launches right into it. When she explains about Barney, he thinks they really need to have the talk themselves.
Which, according to the boys’ conversation at Ted’s apartment, Barney Does. Not. Want. To. Have. Marshall doesn’t know why…it’s only five minutes, and they have sex afterwards. Then Ted surprises them both by saying that Barney doesn’t have to have it. Why? Because according to Barney’s “Gremlin Rules,” Robin is already his girlfriend!
Barney came up with The Gremlin Rules during one of the tux nights a few years ago. Three surefire ways to keep a girl from becoming the girlfriend, and Barney seems to have broken them all with Robin: 1) Never get them wet – no showers allowed. 2) Keep them away from sunlight – don’t see them during the day. 3) No feeding after midnight – staying over and breakfast/brunch are OUT.
Back at the hockey game, Brad and Robin are caught by the kiss cam. Brad comes up with a plan: if it feels awkward, Robin’s meant to be with Barney. Good plan! They’re leaning in when Robin is tapped on the shoulder and Barney sucker-punches Brad (which isn’t good for his hand). Brad apologizes for kissing someone else’s girlfriend. Which they still deny. As Lily points out later, they’ve reached the point of physical violence, and they still don’t want to define their relationship. What more do they need?
Finally it’s Ted’s first day of work. He’s thought of everything (including pants), except he doesn’t know how to spell “Professor.” He thinks about how he wants to be defined by his students and goes through about twenty different variations of introductions in about twenty seconds. The one thing he’s firm about…holding questions until the end of the class. Which is why, when the blonde in the front row (who’s not Mom!) raises her hand, he doesn’t let her tell him that he’s not in Architecture 101, he’s in Econ 305! Poor Ted continues to lecture for the next several minutes actually engaging with the students (who all try to tell them in various ways that he’s not in the right classroom), until the real professor shows up. The good news, by the time he races across campus and arrives, 20 minutes late (reality check: who waits 20 minutes for an untenured prof??? At my school, it was 15 tops), the nerves are gone and he just talks to his (real) class.
But as for Barney and Robin, Lily’s got a plan. Locking them in Robin’s bedroom, she’s not letting them out until they slide an “acceptable” definition of their relationship under the door. A couple of tries later (Barman and Robin – awesome!), Marshall’s still cracking the whip and screaming “Not good enough!” They’re still in there when Ted comes home, and Marshall decides to play hardball. He wafts a pizza under the door and tempted by the fumes, they decide to really have the talk.
Okay, they actually decide to lie. They’re scared of a real relationship, but they don’t want to give up the sex. But they’re hungry. Which is why Robin suggests that since the one thing they’re good at is lying, they might as well do it. Sliding one last piece of paper under the door that reads “Boyfriend and Girlfriend,” Lily decides to let them out. They tell everyone how great they think the other is, and when they leave the brownstone, they decide to grab brunch. Ted, Lily, and Marshall follow them out. Ted points out that they’re obviously lying. No, Lily says, “They don’t realize they weren’t.”
One last time at the bar, Marshall walks in wearing a tux. He’s doing a failed James Bond impression, and when he sits down at the table, he turns to Barney and Ted declaring it was Tux night. “Didn’t I tell you? Doesn’t feel good, does it?”
I loved this episode right up until the last bumper scene. We got the payoffs they’d promised last Spring (you didn’t really think we were going to actually see Mom, did you?), and who hasn’t been in that awkward, undefined, relationship that could be incredible if one of you would just man-up and initiate the talk? Unfortunately, the bumper just didn’t work for me in the ways most of the ones in the earlier seasons did. Still, Season 5’s first episode was definitely worth waiting all Summer for, and I have every reason to believe that this season will be just as Legen—wait for it –dary as the rest of them.
