New Meaning to Ghosting

Last time on "How I Met Your Mother": Ted had a rough start to his teaching career while Lily locked Robin and Barney in a room to determine their relationship.

Future!Ted tells us about two blind dates—one in 2009 and one in 2002. We see clean-shaven Ted in 2009 and goateed Ted in 2002. He goes to meet his date—and it’s the same girl. Played by Lindsay Sloan, who played Val on Sabrina the Teenage Witch. But neither remembers the other.

Credits.

At MacLaren’s, Barney says he has tickets to the Origins of Chewbacca exhibit. Robin and Lily decline but Marshall is like a dog on a car ride. However, Barney tells him the exhibit is somewhere else and it is revealed he did the same thing to Ted. Barney takes Marshall to a strip joint to tell Marshall his relationship is completely controlled by Lily.

At Ted’s date, he and Val have similar awkward conversations seven years apart. At the strip joint, Marshall tells Barney his lengthy fantasy about the busty blonde delivery girl that involves Lily dying from some rare but totally medically relevant hiccupping disease and telling him to move on (in an appropriate number of years) with said busty blonde delivery girl. Barney’s likewise depressed. He tells Marshall to forget Lily but the next stripper looks exactly like Lily. Marshall and Barney flip out. Ted wants a picture.

At that point, Ted reuses a joke from 2002. At that point, Val and Ted realize they are on the same date.

Val and Ted decide to remember their last date so they can avoid the same first date mistakes.

Barney and Marshall go back to MacLaren’s to say they found the third doppelganger. They found Lesbian Robin and Mustache Marshall. Future!Ted says they will find the final two doppelgangers the following summer. Robin is skived that the men went to a strip joint while Lily is excited to find out about her doppelganger. She is not excited that Marshall kills her in his fantasies, even after a sappily sweet talk where he admits he even feels like he is cheating on her even in his dreams.

After Ted learns to avoid coming off as a snob and Val learns to tone down the cat talk, they end up at MacLaren’s. They slowly learn that they enjoy each other’s company. After a flash back to Mustache Marshall, the two finish on the rooftop. Val reveals why it went south back then: Ted promises to call her in 2002. 2009? “I’ve been really busy,” he excuses. She’s upset.

Lily drags everyone back to the strip joint. She’s excited to see her doppelganger. Robin can’t believe she’s in there. They learn Barney is a regular at the joint—the waitress knows him by name and brings over his usual. The announcer even stops his introduction to say hi to Barney. He’s sufficiently embarrassed to being caught by Robin. Doppelganger Lily comes out and Lily enjoys every minute of it! Barney goes on about how wonderful it is that they are at a strip joint and Robin doesn’t care. She keeps shouting that she does. Marshall and Lily book Doppelganger Lily in the backroom.

On the rooftop, Ted apologizes to Val. But they realize they shouldn’t change but wait for the person who will accept their idiosyncrasies. Val agrees. Future!Ted tells his children that when he met their mother and told her one of his bad jokes, she laughed. And he was pretty certainly only 30% of it was pity.

Tag: Marshall talks to Lily, who suddenly has a Russian accent, while Doppelganger Lily struggles on the pole. Marshall realizes real Lily is on the pole and goes to help his wife after she falls off the pole.

Quote of the Episode: “What about Catwoman?”
“Yeah, that would make sense.”—Lily and Val (2002) talking about Val’s cats.

So, what did you think of the premise? How did you enjoy seeing 2002 Ted and Val as 2009 them learned from their mistakes? Wish you could do the same? And what do you think Doppelganger Ted and Doppelganger Barney look like?