HIMYM: "The Best Man" & "The Naked Truth"

At this point, I view How I Met Your Mother as chicken noodle soup. It's comfort food television that doesn't need to be amazing or outrageously different. Sure, there'll be times when it WILL be the best thing I've ever put in my mouth and other times when it'll be glorified chicken stock. With that said, I thought the 1-hour premiere was a solid hour making me realize how much I've missed these characters.

All of the Robin/Barney stuff will always, always hook me. Those two actors have such a great chemistry that I pretty much hand-waved the ridiculous, and frankly a bit forced, dance sequence. I also rolled my eyes that Nora would choose to call Barney just as Robin was about to express her true feelings, but was okay by that because Cobie Smulders acted the hell out of the scene that followed. Her Cyrano-like love confession broke my heart in a billion million little pieces. Now I really like Nora and Barney/Nora works for me, but I just can't imagine a scenario where Robin/Barney aren't endgame. It's not exactly Ross/Rachel, but come on it needs to happen. This whole "who will Barney marry?" might get tiring especially since it seems it'll be a season-long arc, but I hope that Robin isn't moping all season. She's done that enough last season! I ship Robin/Happiness most of all.

Speaking of shipping, Victoria is back and I am simultaneously shocked and delighted. I'm far from a Ted-hater, but bro does need better storylines and/or love interests and I think Victoria's return will bring both. She's definitely one of my favorite Mosby exes and she already has a history with the gang. Yes, she's not the mother and some might get frustrated by this, but I'm not. I don't care about the titular mother. I care about an entertaining show.

Which brings us to the final couple, Lily/Marshall. The whole "waiting to tell your friends you're pregnant so you have to pretend to drink but really you're husband is drinking your alcohol" has been done in other sitcoms before. But it still brought a smile on my face to see Jason Segel pretty much be drunk for the whole hour. It'll be interesting to see how these two transition to becoming parents. Can you image Lily as a mother? I'm already laughing thinking about it. B+