How I Met Your Mother: “Good Crazy” (Episode 7.22)

Holy long walk for a short drink of water, Batman.

It’s great when a character says something that sums up an episode for us. While this season of How I Met Your Mother has done an excellent job of returning to early form with interwoven episodes that propel the series forward, there have been stand-alone episodes that have had the sole purpose of revealing a key plot point in the last five minutes.

Though “Good Crazy” loses points there, it is by no means a forgettable episode. It is one of the many times the writers have written a very Barney-centric episode, but this time he has a little bit of Ted in him, where his actions affect all of the characters in different ways.

His actual storyline, involving his jealousy over his stripper girlfriend’s profession, is short and simple. The seesaw of Barney’s mood over Quinn “taking her clothes off and rubbing herself against other guy’s junk” has gone back and forth in recent episodes, and it’s time to quit it. This episode may not have pushed the couple closer to marriage or breaking up, but it was a good prologue for the future of their relationship. Of course most of us are hoping for a break-up, and with a two-part finale standing in between us and finding out who Barney’s future wife is, hopefully our wishes will come true in a week.

The episode also does a nice job of cleaning up Ted and Robin’s up-in-the-air friendship. Ever since Ted professed his love for Robin yet again a few episodes ago (and we all groaned audibly begging, “not this again”) they have been avoiding each other. But then sometimes not. But then they do it again. It’s a little frustrating to see the writers return to a season two plotline, but I’ve held out hoping it would be different and help Ted find his future wife. While it may not do that exactly, this episode seems to put an end to their love affair once and for all.

While both of those plots plant seeds to move the series forward, it was the Marshall and Lily story that was the real winner in “Good Crazy.” Each scene with Marshall over-preparing for the upcoming birth of the baby proves how ready he is to be the world’s best father. Though we may think it was adorable to see a 6’3” man carrying around a watermelon in diapers, it drove Lily crazy, forcing her to trick Marshall into going to Atlantic City with Barney.

I don’t want to ruin the drunken scenes that take place, but it’s obvious from the beginning that Lily will go into labor. And she does. It’s a long and winding road to get to the revelation, but it sets up the two-part finale for next week. By the ways the creators have discussed the upcoming, and final, seasons, everything hinges on the finale.

If anything, this wasn’t a huge episode, but it was the introduction to what is building up to be one of the most important season finales in HIMYM history. And I’m okay with that. The episode built and built to a revelation that will have a huge payoff immediately.