“How I Met Your Mother”: The Front Porch Recap

Synopsis: To the dismay of everyone but Ted, Karen (Laura Prepon) is back this week. Marshall doesn’t sugarcoat things when he tells Ted that Karen is a complete douche. Oh, wait — that was sugarcoating. Of course, Marshall realizes what Ted sees in her. Since they met in high school, Karen was “the first person to touch his wiener besides himself, his mom and his pediatrician.” She won’t be touching it again, though, because while she and Ted are teasing each other about which one of them likes 2002 chianti — which is apparently a put-down of epic proportions in their world of pretension — she finds one of Robin’s diamond earrings in Ted’s bed and breaks up with him.

Later, while Ted, Marshall, Lily and Barney gather to watch Robin’s 4am morning show for the first time, Lily reveals that she planted the earring to end Ted’s relationship — and it’s not the first time she’s done it. She also planted a Creed CD in Ted’s dorm room to get rid of a college girlfriend named Angie, and dressed up as Darth Vader and pretended to be Ted’s weird sci-fi girlfriend to dump him (as Luke Skywalker) while he attended a Star Wars convention with Marshall (Chewbacca). It turns out, if a girl doesn’t fit Lily’s plan of growing old together with Marshall and Ted on the front porch of some future beachfront property, then she has to go. Another girl who didn’t pass Lily’s front-porch test — Robin, who returns home covered in soot, breadcrumbs and placenta after an unbelievable episode of live television that none of her friends saw because they were too busy discussing relationships and nightshirts.

Ted is understandably furious, but Lily makes it up to him by coming clean and fixing things with Karen. After finding out what Lily did, Karen confides to Ted that she really doesn’t care for his friends, and he breaks up with her on the spot. This leaves Robin to enjoy Lily’s gourmet dinner (or, for those who host TV shows at 4am, breakfast) with Ted, as they discuss whether or not they would still be together if not for Lily. While they don’t decide to start dating again, they do commit to being each other’s backup plan if they’re both still single at 40. Looks like Lily is still working her manipulative magic …

What We Liked:

• The revelation that Barney sleeps in suitjamas, complete with a sleeping cravat, just in case two hot girls show up covered in massage oil in the midst of a who’s hornier contest and need to use his shower. After all, he can’t leave the greasy sluts hanging.

• Barney’s initial reaction to Marshall in a nightshirt:

“Hey, guys, you know how in the future we’re always saying, ‘Remember when Marshall wore a nightgown’? This is that time!”

“So, flying to Neverland with Peter and Tink — was that amazing?”

“Was it nice to finally get out of that crowded bed and take Charlie to the chocolate factory?”

“Something about Scrooge!”

• Marshall’s Chewbacca impression, which, by the way, is way better than johnnysweeptheleg’s

• Marshall (and later Barney) dreaming the dream of the nightshirt. Thanks to johnnysweeptheg for pointing out the similarity to this scene from The Big Lebowski

What We Didn’t Like:

• That a Korean channel that only shows Kim Jong Il riding a horse doesn’t actually exist in real life

• The idea of Barney’s and Marshall’s junk on a tropical island


Best Barneyism:

“Ninja star danger jock,” which apparently is the coolest name one could use to describe pajamas. Of course, it still wouldn’t make wearing a nightgown OK, though.

Photo: Monty Brinton/CBS ©2009 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Right Reserved.

3 Comments

  1. When Marshall insists that his pajamas are a “nightshirt” not a “nightgown,” Barney tells him that he can call it a ninja star danger jock if he wants, it doesn’t make him any less of a cross-dresser. I take that to mean that ninja star danger jock is the coolest name Barney could come up with for pajamas. Aside from that, it has no meaning.

  2. Hi, guys. What does ”Ninja Star Danger Jock” mean? I didn’t understand at all.

  3. Woah, woah, woah. Wait. My Chewbacca is pretty awesome. It’s just because he was in a full Chewbacca bodysuit, that you thought his was better.

    I may have to upload my Chewbacca to YouTube or something.

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