The Rough Patch

"The Rough Patch" is the seventh episode of the fifth season of the CBS situation comedy How I Met Your Mother and 95th episode overall. It originally aired on November 9, 2009.

Plot

Future Ted explains the gang's apprehension as Barney and Robin entered the later months of their relationship. Barney gives Ted all of his porn. Marshall can tell Barney is serious about Robin since he has developed "relationship gut" - weight put on when in a stable relationship from eating so much food. Marshall and Lily steal videos from the collection when Ted is not looking and head home. Ted puts in a movie called "Archisexture", but the movie is suddenly overlapped by a message from Barney. The message assumes Barney is either dead or in a committed relationship, which he tells Ted to save him from. After showing the tape to Lily and Marshall, Ted starts to agree with the past Barney. Barney and Robin now have a declining attitude towards each other and their relationship. Lily and Marshall just think the couple is going through a rough patch, and convince Ted not to interfere.

At MacLaren's, Marshall watches Barney eat an entire plate of ribs and asks him directly if he is happy. Not giving a proper answer, Barney describes his relationship in a depressing manner, convincing Marshall that he is unhappy. He and Ted ask Lily to help break up Barney and Robin, given her experience^[1] in plotting breakups. Since Lily has reformed her ways, Ted plans a repeat of what broke up^[2] his relationship with Robin, involving champagne and a wedding ring. Much to their surprise, the plan results in the couple merely mutually surrendering to the idea of matrimony, and after they announce it in the bar, Lily agrees to break them up properly.

Lily has a plan to remind the couple of their four biggest arguments: dirty dishes,^[3] the presence of Barney's ex-girlfriends, whether Stormtroopers are cool, and a Canadian-American war. She contacts Robin's friend, Alan Thicke, to meet the couple at their usual diner, along with one of Barney's insane one-night stands, Meg, a passing actor dressed as a Stormtrooper, and a busboy carrying dirty dishes. The gang stakes out the location in a rented station wagon. Marshall is annoyed at Ted for being too cheap to rent a proper stake-out van. Thicke and Meg arrive and apparently know each other. Lily was unable to find a Stormtrooper and instead finds a man dressed as the robot from Lost in Space, as she thinks Stormtroopers are also robots. As they argue over the station wagon and a pizza delivery, Barney and Robin look right in their direction. Ted and Marshall think their cover is blown, but Lily executes the plan anyway.

As the plan unfolds, they notice that neither Barney nor Robin is angry or arguing, and they kiss each other before leaving the diner. In MacLaren's they share a beer with Thicke and the pizza delivery boy, and Robin stops by and explains that they have broken up. What the gang thought was Robin and Barney looking at them was really the couple aghast at their reflections. The realization makes them examine their relationship and they agree that "two awesomes cancel each other out", making them less than they want to be, so they break up. They quickly avoid all of Lily's traps and kiss each other goodbye. Barney laments that they will not be able to go back to being friends, but Robin tells him not think of it as a break-up but as getting back together as friends. Although Robin says it might take Barney a while to recover from the breakup, he appears as his old self, catching enticing glances from most of the women in the bar and declaring "Daddy's home".

Before he leaves, Thicke reveals that he and Robin starred in a short-lived Canadian variety show. Barney runs off to find the footage.

Music

• Peter Gunn Theme by Henry Mancini

Continuity

• Barney's message is dated Aug 12 2005 which is 38 days before the first episode of How I Met Your Mother was shown.
• Alan Thicke made a cameo appearance in the episode Sandcastles In The Sand, where he played the father in the second "Robin Sparkles" music video.^[4]
• Meg (April Bowlby) previously appeared in "Dowisetrepla" and the "The Bracket." Barney slept with her and sneaked away leaving her in the apartment to-be-bought by Lily and Marshall.
• During the montage of what Lily plans will occur during the 4-level fight, the song playing is "Murder Train" by the Foreskins,^[5] Robin's ex-boyfriend's band. The same song can be found in four other episodes: "Sandcastles In The Sand," "The Fight," "The Leap," and "Mystery Vs. History."
• Lily displays a lack of Star Wars knowledge, mistaking the Lost in Space robot for a Stormtrooper, similar to the time she said "Live Long and Prosper" while wearing a Darth Vader costume in "The Front Porch."
• Robin mocks Barney for having a life-size Imperial stormtrooper statue in his apartment calling them "Stormpoopers".^[6] In the episode "World's Greatest Couple," he previously had a Clone trooper costume in his apartment.
• Lily suggests they keep watching Barney's homemade porn, again displaying an intense fascination with Barney's bedroom activities, shown previously in "The Goat," "Miracles," and "The Naked Man."
• Marshall states that at some point Lily had gained weight in their relationship. Lily is shown with a pot belly after winning a hot dog eating contest at the end of the episode "The Possimpible". This is a reference to Alyson Hannigan's weight gain while she was pregnant in real life.^[7]
• The robot cookie jar from the season 2 episode "Moving Day" is clearly visible in Ted's kitchen.^[8]
• The footage from the failed variety show will appear in the season six episode "Glitter".^[9]
• The Battle of the Dirty Dishes (the first major fight that Lily mentions) uses the clips from the fight montage in the previous episode "Bagpipes".
• Ted learned that Lily had broken up seven of his relationships in season 4 episode "The Front Porch".
• Barney suggests to Robin that if they were still single when they turned 40 they could get back together, but Robin already made that deal with Ted in "The Front Porch". In response, Barney amends the deal, suggesting they could get back together at 39 instead of 40.
• The flashback in which Robin thinks Ted is proposing to her is from season 2 finale "Something Blue".
• Marshall has a habit of criticizing people's robot voices as seen before with Robin in "Three Days of Snow"

Barney's Blog

In his blog Barney compares women to food, and asks readers if they can tell if he is talking about food or women in a series of sentences.^[10]

Cultural references

• Barney modifies his "Legen-wait for it-dary!" catch phrase to describe an evening where they watched "Legen-wait for it-ds of the Falls! Legends of the Fall!"^[6][11]
• In the video message Barney has taped over Archisexture, he requests that, in the event of his death, Ted honor his memory and take his body to the Hamptons and reenact Weekend at Bernie's.^[11]
• Marshall's suggestion to "release the Kraken" in order to break up Robin and Barney.
• Robin describes musician Neil Young as a Canadian treasure.
• CBS used clips from this episode and other episodes to promote Frosty the Snowman, redubbing it as Frosty the inappropriate Snowman.^[12]

Critical response

Reviewer Scott Tobias from The AV Club though skeptical of fat suits for what he describes as the Norbit Rule but felt it was worth it thanks to the "I’m my own wingman tonight" quip, and thought everything Alan Thicke related was funny. He is disappointed to see the show retreat back to where it was before but accepts Barney and Robin are not same characters unless independent. He gives the episode a rating of A- describing it as a near-classic.^[11]

Brian Zoromski of IGN gave the episode 7.8 out of 10.^[13]

Joel Keller of TV Squad notes this episode makes particularly effective use of Future Ted (Bob Saget) and the exaggerations and distortions he lends to the story, from fat Barney and haggard Robin, to the video flying magically into the player.^[6]

References

External links

• The Rough Patch at the Internet Movie Database
• The Rough Patch at TV.com
• The Rough Patch at TVGuide.com