Compulsive watching HIMYM
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Anonymous
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It’s a terrible show, with laugh track and horrible treatment of women, often called four a$$holes and Marshall (the only somewhat reasonable character). It has a “ew” ending that is a terrible payout for decades of buildup.
But I’m that demographic (mid 40s) so this feels a bit like a snapshot into my life in my 20s as I wallow a bit with regret and midlife concerns. I go to my watch some TV while doing dishes, and try to watch something more nourishing, wholesome, or just better — but I keep being pulled back in. Welcome anyone else story of trash tv watching and unable to break it… |
Anonymous
| It's fun for what it is--mindless laughs and eye rolls. And I agree that there is some nostalgia there, it reminds me of being newlyweds and watching the show as we unpack our first apartment together in our 20s. |
Anonymous
NPH is great but reprehensible. I still want to call “legend… wait for it…dary” |
Anonymous
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I FREAKING HATE TED. I would never rewatch because of him. I only watched in the first place because my son loved it.
Love Barney though. |
Anonymous
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I hate Ted, too. And I hate Lily, she’s the worst hypocritical slut shamer of all time and I have no respect for Marshall for being with her. But I love the show. I’m the same age as the characters and so much of it was true to life. I didn’t watch it while it was on, but later after I had kids and it felt like meeting up with an old college roommate.
Also, it’s my sense of humor completely. I nearly died when Barney was supposed to dress up like a Canadian Mountie, but came dressed as Uncle Sam with “Living in America” playing in the background. The thought of it still makes me giggle. |
Anonymous
| Compulsively watching the same show over and over is a self soothing mechanism for people with anxiety and or ADHD. You know what it’s going to happen it’s predictable and familiar. |
Anonymous
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I do have anxiety and my spouse thinks ADHD, and I have definitely self soothed during stressful times by watching mindless TV. But I actually crave novelty and rarely rewatch anything.
I only sporadically saw HIMYM in later seasons, so watching the beginning is familiar in that I know the characters but the story is new. And we have a lot of shows I could watch like that, like MASH, Cheers, the Office, Community — definitely have not seen most episodes but know the characters. But HIMYM seems to stoke nostalgia for my 20s in a “mid life crisis” way. Sounds like a few others see that parallel as well. And OMG, Ted and Lily are awful awful people. Watching it now, I think they intended Ted to be a jerk but like in a fake nice guy way, and in my 20s it kind of fooled me but now I see it was clearly intended. Lily is more subtle (she’s based on the creators wife) and I think they were trying to show how conflicted you could be at that age but I don’t know if they intended to make her the villain she turned out to be (sabotaging Ted’s GF, leaving Marshall and only returning when she failed at art, any other examples handy?) |
Anonymous
I was in high school and college when it aired, but I was so confused that NPH was playing a straight guy. I had no idea who he was, and he was still in the closet, but I thought he was so miscast as a heterosexual womanizer. |
Anonymous
| Ha, my husband watched this entire show a couple of years ago. Looking in occasionally, seemed light and funny. He liked it, no hate watching. |
Anonymous
Oh wow, didn’t realize he was still in closet at the beginning. I assumed he was pulling a JoJo Swisha career pivot, from the goody two shoes teen doctor to a predator played for laughs. |
Anonymous
| Loved the show. I thought they should have had Victoria as the mother. |
Anonymous
| Loved loved that show! |
Anonymous
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The scene at the baby shower where Robin swaps her inappropriate gift with the grandmothers gift is gold though.
And Robin Sparkles. But yeah, the characters are awful. |