Pop-Culture WI: HIMYM ending was leaked

The HIMYM epilogue is considered one of the most anticlimactic and nonsensical endings of all time, managing to disappoint its fans on a level that few has achieved, these few being the ending of End of Evangelion, ME3 and Lost for many, many reasons.

It was filmed however in 2006, in the show's second season. So I ask, what would have happened if someone has been able to leak it. How would the reaction be on a season-to-season basis(for instance, what if it was leaked with its creation, what if it was leaked at season 3,4,5..all the way to 8)

Depends on when it was leaked. If it broke only a few seasons in, the reaction might not be as...vocal as it was OTL. A lot of people had guessed that the Mother was dead the whole time, so those suspicions being confirmed wouldn't change a whole lot. Ted ending up with Robin could upset people, but then it comes down to how the showrunners get ahead of the bad press.

If it leaks during the final season, all bets are off. My guess is that they scrap the planned ending and reshoot one, and leave the original as a DVD extra (basically the opposite of what they're doing in OTL).

Why on earth would they film the season finale, in 2006?

Drunken_Soviet said:

Why on earth would they film the season finale, in 2006?

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Because in 2006 the kids that made up the show's framing device were still, well, kids. In 2014 they were in their late tees/early 20's.

Drunken_Soviet said:

Why on earth would they film the season finale, in 2006?

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The ending scene involved actual footage Ted's kids, so they needed to film the ending before they aged considerably.

If it's leaked early enough and the disappointment just as vocal, then you *might* see some story rejigging. The producers seem to be quite set on it though, and happy with it despite the vocal criticism.

I, for one, wanted Ted and Robin to end up together.

But Season 8 spent several months of my time getting me comfortable and happy with the Barney-Robin and Ted-Mother/Tracy dynamic, then ripped it all apart in the last episode.

You'd like to thing they could either leave season 8 the way it was headed and people got comfortable with, or changed the season dynamic completely.

The finale still irritates me greatly....by the time the finale came around, I was happy with Barney/Robin and Ted/Mother, and wanted a "happily ever after" episode that nicely tied things off.

Devvy said:

If it's leaked early enough and the disappointment just as vocal, then you *might* see some story rejigging. The producers seem to be quite set on it though, and happy with it despite the vocal criticism.

I, for one, wanted Ted and Robin to end up together.

But Season 8 spent several months of my time getting me comfortable and happy with the Barney-Robin and Ted-Mother/Tracy dynamic, then ripped it all apart in the last episode.

You'd like to thing they could either leave season 8 the way it was headed and people got comfortable with, or changed the season dynamic completely.

The finale still irritates me greatly....by the time the finale came around, I was happy with Barney/Robin and Ted/Mother, and wanted a "happily ever after" episode that nicely tied things off.

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But that's not why we fell for the show. The thing that sets How I Met Your Mother apart from any other twenty-something comedy programs is the way the story is told. It makes perfect sense that a man known for long mindedness would spend an absurd amount of time explaining in detail the last truly great weekend the group had together, and then rush through all of the sad stuff that the people being told the story (the kids) would already know about anyway. The show stuck to the guns of how it tells its story over a conventional way that might have satisfied more people.

And since the actual post-finale breakdown is about 50/50 content vs displeased they'd probably stick with it and more people would have made peace with it before the finale aired.

On, and also...everyone's wrong, the Lost finale is great.

Knowing the ending I doubt many fans would put up with the same finale season which looks rather pointless when the two main drives of the season Barney & Robin's wedding and meeting the Mother are both given a swift kick in the teeth with the finale. Unless the producers come out and say they decided not to go that route sometime ago and only filmed it early on because they wanted to have it as an option before the kids got too old I doubt the Series would be able to survive a stinker like OTL's season 5. One of the thing that kept people hanging in there for 9 seasons was a desire to find out who the mother was which loses a rather lot of appeal when we know that Ted just ends up with Robin anyway.

A big part of the endings flaws actually probably comes from it being filmed in the second season, if it had ended there it probably wouldn't have pissed nearly as many people off. The big problem was that the character development had changed the equation a lot in the intervening time to the point where the ending filmed in 2006 comes off as wildly out of character and reviving a relationship that had been buried already. Also it didn't help that the ending torpedoed the fan favorite relationship.

eliphas8 said:

A big part of the endings flaws actually probably comes from it being filmed in the second season, if it had ended there it probably wouldn't have pissed nearly as many people off. The big problem was that the character development had changed the equation a lot in the intervening time to the point where the ending filmed in 2006 comes off as wildly out of character and reviving a relationship that had been buried already. Also it didn't help that the ending torpedoed the fan favorite relationship.

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I agree with this 100% I actually rooted for Ted and Robin in the begging but eventually fell off the ship after awhile. The comparsion that will always be made is Ross and Rachel who seemed to be the couple meant to be together but one thing or another kept them apart. In comparison while Ted and Robin started out that way eventually they became at least in my mind two people that while having great chemistry just didn't want the same things and the rehashing of the relationship as the series went along seemed to become more and more self destructive than anything.

Draco said:

I agree with this 100% I actually rooted for Ted and Robin in the begging but eventually fell off the ship after awhile. The comparsion that will always be made is Ross and Rachel who seemed to be the couple meant to be together but one thing or another kept them apart. In comparison while Ted and Robin started out that way eventually they became at least in my mind two people that while having great chemistry just didn't work well together and the rehashing of the relationship as the series went along seemed to become more and more self destructive than anything.

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I really didn't care who he ended up for, but all I'll say is that the final moments did explain why the show was told the way it was and...at least a decade had passed in those last moments. I'm not terribly surprised that two people who had a fling that didn't work out when they were younger rekindled their romance after a divorce and death.

I'll just relink to Film Crit Hulk, who I don't always agree with, who encapsulates my thoughts better than I do.

http://badassdigest.com/2014/04/02/...lk-met-your-mother-and-the-nature-of-finales/

Anyway, that's all debate. I just don't think the writers would change anything, no matter what the reaction is. Maybe make it a two hour finale in a bit of a doubling down...which they should have done anyway.

eliphas8 said:

The big problem was that the character development had changed the equation a lot in the intervening time to the point where the ending filmed in 2006 comes off as wildly out of character and reviving a relationship that had been buried already.

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"Character Development." The ending would have totally worked before they forced Barney and Robin together because to do that, they had to drastically change (not develop which implies a gradual shift) those two characters to make them completely different people. By the last season Barney was suffering from Rachel Greene complex (in which the least "together" character at the show's outset ends up being the most emotionally mature by the show's end, seriously he makes Ted look emotionally stunted) and Robin had gone from pretty-cool-but-definitely-nerdy (remember her quoting Ghost Busters in the episode where she and Ted first go on a date?) to well-we-had-to-make-her-cool-like-Barney-so-she's-gonna-be-Stinson-with-lady-bits-now. There's no way Ted could still be in love with her if she was just the female version of Barney. (Aaaannnnnd there's a slash-fic waiting to happen.)

Anyhow, if that ending breaks sometime in this final season then there's not much that can change. The writer's had already committed to (the very stupid premise of) using Barney and Robin's wedding for the entirety of the season. As much as I'd hate to say it, I think that knowing how the show would end ahead of time would change very little in terms of viewership. I hated each of the last 3 seasons but I kept watching the show out of habit. Most HIMYM fans I know were the same way. So maybe slight viewer drop-off, but not much.

My dream of dreams would be that the secret had slipped out sooner so the writers could change it or else be forced to actually write the characters so that the ending makes some kind of sense.

I don't see it changing HIMYM's cultural status, much. The show was going to be picked up in syndication just based on its rerun-enjoyability. If we know that Barney and Robin aren't going to get together / work out at all then maybe NPH gets to keep being the clown instead of the replacement Ted, which is fine because that's where he really excels.

I dunno. That's about all I've got.

jpj1421 said:

But that's not why we fell for the show. The thing that sets How I Met Your Mother apart from any other twenty-something comedy programs is the way the story is told. It makes perfect sense that a man known for long mindedness would spend an absurd amount of time explaining in detail the last truly great weekend the group had together, and then rush through all of the sad stuff that the people being told the story (the kids) would already know about anyway. The show stuck to the guns of how it tells its story over a conventional way that might have satisfied more people.

And since the actual post-finale breakdown is about 50/50 content vs displeased they'd probably stick with it and more people would have made peace with it before the finale aired.

On, and also...everyone's wrong, the Lost finale is great.

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Things don't always go the way you think it does. Barney and Robin was not a combination I really saw going (but towards the end of S8 I was happy for them), but for them to throw that relationship away in a 40 minute episode was not really the best way of doing things.

The end result was OK, but the way they did it was what annoyed me. They could have had the wedding in ep17 or so, and the Mother Tracy die in ep18, giving a few episodes to show us Ted and Robin ending up together again in a slightly less rushed fashion, and where exactly Barney's kid turned up from; it may well have been a one night stand, but a slightly inflated story as to what exactly happened would have been nice.

terrellk said:

There's no way Ted could still be in love with her if she was just the female version of Barney. (Aaaannnnnd there's a slash-fic waiting to happen.)

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Well, that's something I wish I could unsee now.

Devvy said:

Things don't always go the way you think it does. Barney and Robin was not a combination I really saw going (but towards the end of S8 I was happy for them), but for them to throw that relationship away in a 40 minute episode was not really the best way of doing things.

The end result was OK, but the way they did it was what annoyed me. They could have had the wedding in ep17 or so, and the Mother Tracy die in ep18, giving a few episodes to show us Ted and Robin ending up together again in a slightly less rushed fashion, and where exactly Barney's kid turned up from; it may well have been a one night stand, but a slightly inflated story as to what exactly happened would have been nice.

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I will concede that I think that may have been the better course of action, but I will defend the actual end point until the end of time.

jpj1421 said:

I will concede that I think that may have been the better course of action, but I will defend the actual end point until the end of time.

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Then you and I agree!

My initial point was that HIMYM spent 99% of HIMYM pushing Robin/Barney and Ted/Mother. And then annihilated that set of stories in one double episode. It's not what they did, but how they did it that frustrated me greatly (cue some stereotype...).

Let us see the unravelling of those relationships a bit more, the death of the Mother so that it actually means something rather then a mute sidepoint, and a couple of episodes to tie things off.

Devvy said:

If it's leaked early enough and the disappointment just as vocal, then you *might* see some story rejigging. The producers seem to be quite set on it though, and happy with it despite the vocal criticism.

I, for one, wanted Ted and Robin to end up together.

But Season 8 spent several months of my time getting me comfortable and happy with the Barney-Robin and Ted-Mother/Tracy dynamic, then ripped it all apart in the last episode.

You'd like to thing they could either leave season 8 the way it was headed and people got comfortable with, or changed the season dynamic completely.

The finale still irritates me greatly....by the time the finale came around, I was happy with Barney/Robin and Ted/Mother, and wanted a "happily ever after" episode that nicely tied things off.

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Personally I wanted to see Barney and Robin remain together.

Speaking of which I have another WI:

What if someone blackmailed News Corp that unless they admit to Phone Hacking, they will leak the ending?

Actually I thought the ending was perfectly in sync with the series as a whole and rather emotional.