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Ray Richmond is contributing to Deadline’s TCA coverage.
The trendy new term at TCA is, “That’s a high-class problem,” and the CBS comedy How I Met Your Mother has one. The show is improbably enjoying its best ratings ever during its seventh season and is also CBS’ youngest-skewing series. And while the series is contracted to remain on the air through next season, that doesn’t necessarily mean it will be “8 and out” for the show. Its co-creator and co-showrunner Carter Bays said during a TCA panel this morning that there hasn’t been a discussion about setting a series end date. “Oh, we’ve talked about it,” he admitted, “because we’ve gotten the question a lot. But I don’t think we can say what it will be just now. It’s not a high priority for us. I imagine when we’re going into the final season, we’ll get people hip to that. But right now it’s hard for us to say it will be May 14, 2000-whatever. It will happen when we’re officially out of ideas.” Bays added that he knows what the Mother endgame is going to be but naturally had no inclination to share it. Star Jason Segel added that he’d simply love to see the show go on long enough so the story comes to a natural conclusion, “whether that be 8 or 9 years. I was so relieved when I found out there was an actual plan,” he said.
After the panel, Bays elaborated a bit on the idea of setting the end date. “We totally might want to go beyond Season 8,” he noted. “Obviously, it won’t just be our call. It will also be about what our actors want and of course what CBS wants. But right now the network is delighted with the numbers we’re getting. If everyone’s game to go beyond Season 8, it will be a matter of how much story is left. We have that big ending planned, and we know how we need to get the characters in place to make it there.” Would nine seasons be the most that How I Met Your Mother would run then? Bays says he’s not necessarily saying that — or even if there will be a Season 9. “But it sure feels good right now to see how our numbers have trended up. Bottom line: We’ll do this show as long as it feels creatively fulfilling. And as long as they want us around.”
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Why not bring IN the mother while the show continues and then we can follow the relationship and end the series with the Marriage?
Agreed. Have Ted meet the mother at the end of season 8 as originally planned just so you don’t stretch it out so much that Ted is pushing his late 30s when he finally meets her.
Then if you want more seasons, you can have episodes where Ted is courting the mother and going out on dates with her, with references back to earlier girlfriends so that we can see how those experiences have made him a better person. You know, like what the original plan was before they decided to stretch it out so long.
The show is called “How I Met Your Mother”, not “How I Married Your Mother”. That said, if “The Nanny” could keep going after the nanny married the father, then I guess anything is possible.
They could always change the title; that unusual move would generate a bit of buzz.
Easiest thing in the world. Bob Sagat says to the kids, “and that’s how I met your mother.”
Kids chime in- “What was your wedding like?”
YEA- problem solved!!!!
Let’s, I don’t know, just start with giving us a show to watch regularly instead of just once a month. As an added request, when we DO get to view an episode, give us something worth while to watch. Lately, the episodes have lacked story progression. The combination of the two is absolutely infuriating. At this rate Bays I hate to say it, because I previously enjoyed watching the show, but we’re going to stop “wanting HIMYM around”.
Herb, we’ve already met the mother. Didn’t you know that?
But Ted hasn’t. At least, he doesn’t know he has.
I was a DIE-HARD fan through about the first 5 seasons, and then the show just went into a hardcore state of decline. I don’t care what the ratings are, if you tell me that the writing is as strong and “legend-wait for it-dary” as it was in those earlier seasons then I have a bridge to sell you and oh, The Simpsons is still a great show after 20+ seasons. The Brits have it right. Limited episodes, limited series. Get in, get out. But hey, Hollywood isn’t about quality, it’s about money. Just look at THE DEVIL INSIDE, right?
I watched 136 episodes of this show on Netflix during my Christmas hiatus. Season 6 was definitely not as good as the other five seasons. Season 7 is not as good as 6.
I’m feeling the same way. My gut feeling is that Barney’s character couldn’t continue at the earlier levels credibly and that Lily’s character has flattened a bit post-marriage. Ted is too often a clueless self-centered jerk and the writers can’t decide whether to have Robyn and Marshall’s career be ascendant or mired.
I’m still watching though. As far as the new audience, well, they don’t have a basis for comparison and I don’t want to be that guy sneering that this is the “Worst… season….. ever,” pedantically telling them they missed the moment that, I, the real fan, saw. I’m no Ted.
Plus, over the years, I’ve forgiven many a long-running series for the unreality of the same few people in stasis.
IMO, the first two seasons were perfect, then the show went into decline after the writers’ strike in Season 3, with the nadir being the aimless Season 5. Season 6 was a vast improvement though Ted’s arc with Zoey fell apart. Season 7 so far is very clunky but well-intentioned, and still definitely not as bad as Season 5.
I COULD NOT AGREE MORE! I don’t want the last scene of the show to be seeing the mother.
Proof that Christopher Hitchens was right all along…
“It will happen when we’re officially out of ideas.”
So he’s gonna go back in time and end the show 3 years ago??
I honestly know of only 2 people who watch this show. Everyone else I speak with agrees with me that it’s woefully unfunny. What’s the draw? Not being snarky….
HIMYM is one of the best shows around. This is great news for fans everywhere.
You only have two friends??? Sad. HIMYM is funny, witty, serious and silly all at the same time. It has an enormous fan base world-wide.
Love the show! I think they could go 10 seasons!
It just feels joyless now. Although they’ve given the characters a chance to grow and develop into “real adults,” it never holds my attention for a full episode. Bring the mother in already.
Also have to add that the jaw-dropping “barren Robin” episode felt too much like slut-shaming for the ambitious career woman of the group.
ARG. JUST END IT, PLEASE.
We watch the show in my house weekly, but it’s getting to the point that if Ted doesn’t figure out who the hell he’s marrying and soon, we’ll stop watching the show just to make the ratings decline so that the network forces the end.
I’m sick and tired of all the side plots, GIMME THE MOTHER AND NOT THE FAKE ONES LIKE THAT CHICK FROM HOUSE.
JeninChicago must be the only one of three watching Whitney with her two friends. Tragic.
HIMYM is one of the most intelligent comedies on television.
1. The show’s still fun. (From my perspective.)
2. But if they were looking to go this long and repeat in the future and the adult Ted Bits were supposed to be far in the past that’s probably going to be harder to share (come 2025).
(But the “Back To The Future” option of “future clothing” might have been impossible to pre-plan too.)
The show’s amazing, and i would enjoy it if the show continued for as long as it possibly can. it would be good though, if he (ted) met the mother by season 8, and maybe elaborate a bit into their relationship, and ultimately the birth of the kids.
I didn’t watch the show until I was flipping through the channels at my in-laws house. It was the slapsgiving episode. We’ve been hooked ever since and watch in on Netflix all the time. When the show does end, I will probably end my life, as there will be no other reason to live. JK about the killing myself part. But seriously, there will be no other reason to live.
Because the show is called how I MET your mother, not how I MARRIED your mother. Do you think future ted’s kids really want to sit through his entire relationship as well?? It took him 8 years just to explain how they met lol
Funny show.
I liked the one where Ted and Marshall ate a “special sandwich” at that concert and thought tons of time had gone by when it hadn’t.
This bromance is an awful lot like romance. I still say Barney is the mother, and the kids are adopted.
I agree I love This show but I think it’s odd that this season has such high ratings because I am very disappointed in this season thus far
I agree stretching the “Meeting the Mother” past season 8 is crazy. I mean the kids are teenagers in 2030 which means if one of them is only 15 then they would have to be born in 2015. That is not much longer to meet, get married, and have the kids.
I love this show, yes the last two seasons have been weak sauce, but that’s because the “Mother Mystery” is getting too over complicated. I always thought that they could have solved that mystery in Season 5 and then started a “How I Married Your Mother” scenario. Where they could have introduced and rotated antics with the Mother’s friends into the core five of HIMYM.
I love this show and the fact that it may go another season or two is fine with me. However I am quite upset that out of the last 6 weeks there has only been maybe two new shows and they are dry and not as entertaining as in the past seasons. Don’t get me wrong, I’ll still watch it and not because I have nothing better to do but because I have seen every episode and I want to see the conclusion…just not yet.
so whenever they do decide to end, will we find out who his wife was? And if they do have a final episode where they disclose this, then they will never be able to reboot it later and say, “oh wait, lets keep on going and have another season”
Love, love, love this show!!! It is one of my faves from all time.
The show has had some different angles lately, but it is still funny. As long as they keep me laughing, I will keep on watching.
Did they say that we officially have met the mother, or have they only referenced the brushes in life between her and Ted in the past?
I never want this show to end!!!!!!!!!
It should go on afterwards as When I Met Your Mother, or How I Proposed to Your Mother, How I Married Your Mother, etc….
Love it!!
I have watched every episode of HIMYM multiple times and still love all the new episodes just as much as the older ones. I am a die hard fan and will be sincerely sad when it ends.