Ted is desperate to find his life partner and How I Met Your Mother is his story.
Have you met Ted? Well, I have and he’s a little boring. “Have you met Ted?” is actually a line regularly uttered in the sitcom, How I Met Your Mother. It is a line “created” by a character, Barney, as a way to help his best friend, Ted, break the ice with a girl he likes.
This is essentially the crux of the sitcom’s storyline. Ted, a 27-year-old single guy, is desperate to find “The One” ever since his other best friend Marshall got engaged. Ted thinks that it is time for him to settle down, or at least start finding someone he can settle down with in the future.
While the plot is hardly exciting, what really makes the show interesting is the fact that each episode is told in reverse. Well, sort of.
The cast of How I Met Your Mother isn’t very impressive in the first season.
You see, the show is set in 2030. Ted is now 52 and happily married, with two teenage kids. One day, he sits his son and daughter down and starts telling them the story of how he met their mother.
The thing is, it’s a very, very long story. Rather than telling them about the day he met their mother, Ted starts to reminisce even further and talks about his life as a single guy living in the city back in 2005, which is where 98% of the stories take place.
Ted lives with law student Marshall, whose fiancée, Lily, recently moved in with them.
The three are friends with the over-confident but also single Barney, who is by far the funniest in the group. There’s also Robin, a new girl whom Ted initially thought was The One.
Together, the group hangs out in a bar, constantly talking about a girl Ted likes, or a girl Barney is two-timing, or even about Robin’s horrible, confidence-killing job.
They hardly talk about Marshall and Lily – they’re mainly just there to finish off someone’s sentence or be the butt of someone else’s joke.
Ted is a boring character, too. Sure, he’s a sweet guy and a little different from most other male characters in so many sitcoms, but he is not really likeable. And Marshall, Lily and Robin? B-O-R-I-N-G!
The only character who is mildly appealing is Barney, but that’s only because he is over the top and says funny catchphrases like “suit-up!” (which means to wear a suit, like how he always does).
He also came up with the “Lemon Law” concept for dating. The Lemon Law is normally associated with the act of buying a second-hand car – basically, a person only has 30 seconds to think about whether or not a car is worth getting before the salesman kicks up his sales pitch and suckers you into buying it, even when you know the car is a total “lemon”.
According to Barney, that same theory works in dating, too – in 30 seconds, you need to figure out if the person you’re on a date with is worth getting to know.
Of course, there are obvious flaws in many of Barney’s “theories” but you don’t really care because what matters more is that the character is interesting enough for you to keep watching the show.
Barney is played by Neil Patrick Harris, who is perhaps more known for his title role in sitcom Doogie Howser. Harris plays the part of a cocky ladies’ man down pat. What really makes him endearing, though, is his straight-laced, clean-cut look that doesn’t necessarily match his character.
Josh Radnor, a relatively unknown actor, plays the present Ted. Meanwhile, future Ted is voiced by Bob Saget (you can only hear him and see the back of his head).
Alyson Hannigan, a regular in silly films like Date Movie and the American Pie “trilogy”, plays Lily. Now, here is an actress who is no stranger to comedic roles, yet, as Lily, Hannigan is as bland as baby food, and a little annoying too.
Still, the show is going into its third season in the United States and is greatly favoured by millions of viewers there. Even critics are constantly raving about it.
So perhaps, this show has not really picked up its pace yet and I may need to give it a few more episodes to see if it improves over time. Besides, I am a little curious to find out how long it will take Ted to finally tell his kids exactly how he met their mother!
How I Met Your Mother airs on Star World (Astro channel 70) on Thursdays at 8pm.
References: The Star Online
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