“Truly can’t believe it has been 10 years,” Hannigan wrote on social media.
Lily and Marshall might be forever, but it’s somehow already been ten years since How I Met Your Mother ended.
The CBS sitcom aired its final episode on April 1, 2014, marking the end of a nine-season run. On Tuesday, one of the show’s stars, Alyson Hannigan, posted a carousel of photos of the core cast — herself, Josh Radnor, Jason Segel, Neil Patrick Harris, and Cobie Smulders — to mark the anniversary.
“Truly can’t believe it has been 10 years now since the final episode,” Hannigan wrote in her Instagram post.
While How I Met Your Mother was one of the most popular sitcoms of the 21st century, its finale isn’t remembered quite so kindly. After nine seasons of building to the reveal of Ted Mosby’s wife, via the story he ostensibly had been telling his children all that time — the show ended with the mother of a twist.
The kids’ mother, who we barely met in the run of the show, died. This story, told six years after her passing, persuades Ted’s kids to push him to give it a go with Aunt Robin (Smulders)), whom he clearly loves. So, Ted (Radnor) goes after Robin, who is still single after she divorced Barney (Harris) only three years into their marriage.
For many, it was a betrayal of the relationship the show had built between Robin and Barney to retcon a romance the show had outgrown. The Entertainment Weekly recapper wrote, “I feel like I was just hit by a bus.” Another staffer wondered if the episode was an April Fool’s joke and wrote about the five stages of grief they experienced watching it.
Back in 2016, Radnor defended the ending, saying 40 percent of viewers were happy with it. “It always upended your expectations, it always made you cry, it always was not what you thought it was,” he said. “So I think it was in keeping with the DNA for the show. And my suspicion is that it will age pretty well, so let’s talk in 10 years and see what people think.”
Hmm, any thoughts, Josh?
