Episode 20 - Mosbius Designs
14 September 2009
Review
Synopsis: Ted hires an assistant to help start his new company but keeps procrastinating. His assistant PJ hooks up with Robin causing friction within the apartment \office. Barney is so angry about this that he confesses his love for Robin to Marshall. To avoid being fired Marshall decides to become “Sports Guy” around the office and run a fantasy baseball league. He finds it stressful and ends up hiring PJ as a paralegal to do the hard work for him.
The Good: The “moral” or point of these two stories make sense. Ted admits that his life hasn’t reached the point he hoped for. He now fears he will fail at running his own architecture firm and Robin encourages him to get going. Meanwhile Barney admits his feelings for her to Marshall because Lily isn’t around. In real life Alyson Hannigan is off having her baby and the filthy joke Barney tells is a decent enough reason to remove her from the story for a while.
Ted admitting his life isn’t where it should be makes sense. It fits with his failed relationships and work status and sets up the show to go on for a few more seasons yet. And Barney gets closer to the big reveal when he tells Robin how he feels.
The Bad: Thinking about it, considering how much Lily enjoyed talking about Canadian sexual positions (418), it must have been a pretty dirty joke.
Ted is a bit like Ross from Friends. They are both intelligent, conscientious, serious, family and career orientated guys. Substitute palaeontology for architecture and you can see the similarities. With both characters the writers try to channel their love for their professions into the kind of self indulgent pompousness that makes for easy comedy. Why did I find Ross funny and find Ted very unconvincing? There are several reasons. First is just that Ross’ enthusiasm for dinosaurs was a consistent part of his behaviour and when he would get excited on the subject I believed he meant it. Ted acts like a normal guy with a sense of proportion most of the time, but when he talks pompously about architecture it doesn’t sound like him anymore (with an honourable exception in 212). He suddenly puts on a far away voice and talks in a way he never normally does. It sounds so deliberately arrogant and delusional that jokes here about touching buildings and taking “wisdom walks” fall flat.
When Ted opens up to Robin about his feelings he is back to being a normal guy. And as I am always keen to point out, when he is being normal he is likeable and believable. His story about the architect who didn’t account for the weight of books in a library sounds so much more authentically Ted and makes the point about his emotional state very well. It is that normal state which I believe in. That is who I buy Ted as, as a character. So jokes about using an intercom even though PJ is six feet away fall flat for me. I just don’t believe Ted could be that unaware, so the joke looks ridiculous.
Robin and PJ’s interaction is fine for what it is. Though considering their complex relationship history, it’s a little weird to see her seducing a guy in front of Ted. The writers make a good point about her finishing work at 5am and not being able to meet regular guys though.
The “guys” (Food, Toy, Fantasy etc) at Barney and Marshall’s work are the kind of stereotype humour which can only amuse so much because of how obviously manufactured for the episode they all feel. I don’t believe in Marshall either when he campily runs down the street afraid that a baby knows he is carrying money.
The writers have done a decent job of establishing the things Robin and Barney have in common but it would be nice to see them interacting in a way where they could be alone and enjoying each other’s company.
Comic Highlight: Barney bringing back his “wait for it” after every word as he confesses his love for Robin.
How I rate your episode: The story ends up in a sensible place. How it gets there could have been a lot better.
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