Never Look Back, Never!

Had to get this out of the way before tonight’s line up. Enjoy!

Major spoilers below...

How I Met Your Mother – “Symphony of Illumination” (B+)

It was hard not to feel for Robin as future Ted finished his ending monologue. It was one of those moments this show does so well, the kind that stick with you long after the episode. We generally don’t get a lot of closure on How I Met Your Mother. We know that Ted will eventually meet someone and get married and a few other select details about the future, but for the most part these characters are still evolving. Maybe that’s why the closing moments of this episode were so powerful. For once we got a definitive answer, and while on one hand it was somewhat sad that Robin was never able to have kids, there was something quite touching about the way Ted told us that “she was never alone.”

The rest of “Symphony of Illumination” was more scattered than that ending might suggest. There were bits and pieces I liked, the gangs various reactions to Robin’s bad news and a well place pole vaulting gag being examples. But Marshall’s side story really wasn’t doing anything for me, and the rest of the episode had a rather meandering feel to it. If not for Robin’s surprisingly deep journey “Symphony of Illumination” would have floundered under the weight of its many disparate elements.

The episode did however have a ton of implications towards a future Barney/Robin relationship. I’m a bit of a hopeless romantic when it comes to fake TV relationships and I really, really want to see these two sail off into the sunset. And quite frankly, this week’s offering was a virtual smorgasbord for speculation. First off, I couldn’t help but notice that Robin immediately chose Barney as the hypothetical father of her children. Sure, that was all part of the ruse early in the episode as Barney was really the only candidate, but later when it’s revealed that the kids aren’t real, does that not say something about where her true feelings lie? I’m going to over analyze and say it does.

On the other hand at no point in Ted’s assessment of Robin’s future did he ever mention Barney. Part of that is a logistical thing – the writers can’t give away the whole game now – but still, every time we get a look into her future the only things we hear about tend to be career related. It makes me nervous. And tack onto that Barney’s newfound love of children (it better be a passing fad) and you can cast some serious doubt as to whether these two ever get together again.

I really hope some of this gets cleared up at the end of the season when I can only assume we’re going to meet Barney’s bride. An episode ago, when we all though Robin was pregnant, her candidacy seemed all but assured. Now she’s still got a pretty good shot, but we’ve still got a ways to go before we get our answer, and a lot can happen in half a season. Even if she’s not the bride though I’m hoping she takes on some sort of wedding crasher type capacity...

They’re ending up together, damn it!

Line of the night:

LILY: Most women want to be a pole vaulter?
ROBIN: In Canada... it’s very big up there. You know, it’s meet a nice guy, get married, vault some poles.

Modern Family – “Express Christmas” (B)

One of the best things “Express Christmas” had going for it was that if you didn’t like a particular storyline or bit, it would be onto another one pretty quickly. That may sound harsh, but for a mixed bag episode like this one it’s actually probably what saved it. I love that the writers are using some new character pairings, but with no fewer than five separate story threads, it was nearly impossible for all of them to succeed.

First things first though – I wasn’t a big fan of the set-up for why the family needed to do Christmas in an afternoon. It came off rather obligatory, like the writers already knew what they wanted to do and didn’t really care if they gave us a satisfactory explanation as to why (which is probably exactly what happened). The idea that each of the families were somehow all taking a trip over the holidays came off somewhat pretentious to me, which undercut the many of the theme of togetherness running through the episode.

Of the five main storylines, I think the standout to me was Claire and Haley. I quite enjoyed their trip through Target (blatant advertising aside) and all of Haley’s shopping prowess. Claire set it up all really well with her “this is your destiny” speech. Also good was Gloria and Luke. Whenever we get to see Gloria’s ruthless side it’s almost always good for some big laughs, and watching her go into crisis mode after running over the Christmas tree and breaking the angel was no exception.

Mitchell, Alex, and surprisingly enough Lily turned out to be a pretty good grouping as well. When the show cast an older actress for the role of Lily at the start of the season, I assumed she would be playing a larger role, but save for a few early episodes she’s been relatively absent over the first half of the season. Here though, young Aubrey Anderson-Emmons was killing it with some perfectly placed lines. Her “I have two daddies” comment was awesome, and the way she made her entrance behind Mitchell and Alex with a branch of the broken Christmas tree was a great way to cap off the bit.

Jay and Cam on the other hand couldn’t pull off the same magic they’ve had with each other in previous episodes. It just felt like their storyline didn’t really have an arc... or jokes. That’s an oversimplification I know, but their scenes together were surprisingly unfunny. The same went for Phil and Manny. They had a few good lines together in the beginning, but once Phil got hit by that stun gun the whole thing devolved into an over the top mess.

The ending itself was a little too cute for my liking, but I’ve enjoyed similar endings before so I’ll give the show a pass this time. The novelty of fake snow is kind of a foreign concept to me. I understand why the kids might be excited, but the adults too? I don’t know, maybe I’m just jaded.

Line of the night (perfectly timed):

LILY: I have two daddies.