‘How I Met Your Mother’ Recap: ‘Good Crazy’

At the beginning of the series, Barney Stinson was a character that existed to be the womanizing antonym to the nice chum main character Ted Mosby. Eventually the audience decided that Ted was sweet but boring and responded most to the badboy with the heart of something that may or may not be gold. But, the audience was smart and getting older by the episode. They wouldn’t tolerate and find Mr. Stinson acting like a perpetually horny 22-year-old funny forever. Tasked with maturing the character without taking away his entertaining juvenile personality, the writing staff placed him in serious relationships, for him to ultimately mess up. In last night’s “Good Crazy”, the penultimate episode of season seven (which is possibly the penultimate season of the series), Mr. Stinson’s struggles to appease his season one self and his desire to settle down finally drove his girlfriend to say that she has some things to think over.

Which is never good, by the way. (I don’t know if you know that. Thinking is the enemy to bliss.) What drove her to say that? We saw Barney admit to Ted in the previous episode that he was growing more and more jealous and insecure in the relationship, but Quinn never saw the man snap or hear his inner feelings about it until now. After needlessly defending Quinn’s honor in being able to do 50 laps…of swimming a day to Grandma Lois at Marshall and Lily’s baby shower, the couple were walking down the street when two Lusty Leopard regulars - the Deputy Mayor of the city and good ol’ Dirty Larry - shamelessly admit to not being used to seeing her with so many clothes on. Barney freaked out, then offered her a fake job at Goliath National Bank that paid the same amount of money she makes at the strip club, which he later claimed to Marshall was five hundred thousand dollars a year. Quinn didn’t take the whole “I’m ashamed of what you do for a living” thing well and claimed she liked her job, threw down the “I’m gonna think about things” bomb and left. This was halfway through the episode, but that was the last we saw of Quinn for the night, which was good because if she reappeared I wouldn’t listen to her and keep thinking about how she turned down half a million dollars.

Quinn’s early exit didn’t mean that Neil Patrick Harris was able to leave early. “Good Crazy” featured Barney driving two different stories, in addition to the one he was directly involved in. The character managed to bring humor in another week of Ted feeling emo feelings about Robin not saying she loved him back. At MacLaren’s, after ignoring Ted’s request to be set up by one of Quinn’s stripper friends, Barney suggested online dating, to which Ted said that he would never try online dating. Except he totally did in the first season of the show. Barney didn’t say anything, because he didn’t believe him. That night Saget Ted narrated that he joined an online dating website and immediately found the perfect woman. As soon as he asked her out to go mini golfing Barney admitted to writing the profile. It’s maybe the funniest visual gag the show has ever done.

It’s funny but wow Ted, it says your own damn name twice. That’s pretty damn stupid.

Ted went out on three dates (all at the same restaurant. I guess he had a groupon?) with actual women that Barney found from the internet. The first two reminded him of Robin, so much so that Cobie Smoulders appeared in his imagination and spoke to Ted as if she were there. Again. The third time around he admitted to his date that he was trying to get over someone. She was too, and they had some strange. T-Mose was feeling pretty good about the sex until Robin appeared in his subconscious again. She even disrupted the man when he was trying to have Will Forte’s Randy’s beer.

Robin/Ted’s brain explained that it was guilt from ending contact with Robin that was causing all of the hallucinations and disruptions from drinking time. Ted left MacLaren’s to talk to Robin, and immediately ran into her. She just got out of a cab to track Ted down to tell him about the Lily thing.

This was the Lily thing: In the other story, Marshall was driving Lily insane by going too far with baby preparation. With five weeks to go before she’s due Lily just wanted the two of them to enjoy the time they have before their lives are forever ruined/changed forever for the better. After a fight, Lily tells Marshall that there’s a two day baby boot camp in Paramus, New Jersey. Marshall is all about that bad boy, but as soon as he gets in the passenger seat of the car to go on the trip, the sleep deprived Minnesota native immediately fell asleep. This was all according to plan, and when Marshall woke up Barney was driving him to Atlantic City to relax. For some reason Barney decided to disguise himself as George R.R. Martin to make sure Marshall didn’t recognize him before he got into the car.

In A.C., Barney gets Marshall to agree to spend an hour getting rip roaring drunk with their phones turned off. In exchange, Barney would wear the ducky tie. Of course, as soon as they turn their phones off Lily goes into labor. An hour later when Barney turned his phone back on he had seventeen voicemails. This was his face as he heard the first one:

OH NOES! And Marshall is no longer Marshall - he is Beercules, a creature that demands to be hailed. Marshall was so drunk that he enjoyed a cigarette, which we learned from “Last Cigarette Ever” is the last cancer stick Marshall will ever enjoy, since it’s the day of his child’s birth.

Enjoy smokie!

Up next is the one hour season finale that airs in two weeks, “The Magician’s Code”, in which Lily murders Barney for getting Marshall that hammered on such an important day. It’ll be ironic and fitting that after Stinson’s passing, his friends and family will give each other condolence fives at his funeral.

Actually, all that is known is that Lily is going to pop her kid out and there’s a wedding where Barney is the groom, a wedding in which Ted will meet The Mother. You don’t need time to think about things to know that these crazy kids that we’ve been watching for seven years are about to be full fledged grown ups, whether they’re ready or not.

Things To Say While Interviewing for the Managerial Position at the Paramus Waldorf 

“And that’s the story of my only lesbian experience. I’m sorry I went into so much detail. I’ll never tell that story again. Anyway how’s *your* meal?”

“Dude I don’t want to work for a bank. Because I have standards. You people are whores. The things you’re willing to do just for some money: it’s shameful.” - The stripper

“It’s fine; I’m a child of divorce. You guys keep fighting all you want as long as the expensive gifts keep coming.”

“So there’s no baby boot camp at the Paramus Waldorf? Is there even a Paramus Waldorf?” “Bro…”

“I DID throw it away…but it came back.”

“Wayne had no manners. Wayne manners. Wayne Manor. Home of Bruce Wayne, better known as Batman, who keeps a ward named Dick Grayson, who at night dons a colorful costume and fights crime under the name ROBIN!”

“ALL HAIL BEERCULES!”

“Come again for Big Fudge?” Quinn is the third character to say that in the series.

“Please help me off the couch so I can storm out.”

Things To Ponder While Waiting for Yobin

Are Barney’s homemade cookies responsible for Lily’s labor pains?

What did Marshall put in the watermelon’s diaper to make it stink?

If a waiter said that it looked like you can stand to cleanse your palate, would you be inclined to punch him in the face?

Why does Barney continue to use 83 percent in his fake statistics when Ted called him out on it years ago?

Were Condolence Fives done before on another television show? Surprisingly enough they weren’t on Scrubs - Condolence Fives is a type of hand to hand contact that The Todd never attempted.

Who the Fuck is The Mother?

Holly, the woman Ted “cleansed the palate” with (boinked)? Probably not, which is a shame! She seemed cool.

Maybe it’s Steph, Marshall’s high school girlfriend of 4eva and 2 weeks.

Or Herm.

But it’s probably the “perfect” woman Ted was matched up with by the online dating service Missed Connections all the way back in the penultimate episode of season one, “Milk.” Why else would this show bring up online dating services again while making such a glaring continuity error, in an episode written by the co-creators of the show Craig Thomas and Carter Bays no less? Because it’s been seven years and it’s impossible not to contradict yourself at some point over such a long period of time? Probably! But maybe not.

Roger Cormier still doesn’t understand the rules of Pinyin.

‘How I Met Your Mother’ Recap: ‘Good Crazy’