Thirty-Two minutes before the wedding we’re brought back to the scene of Robin in a wedding dress doubting her future marriage. A scene that once left us with a burning curiosity of who she was marrying. Well this time around, we know she’s marrying Barney.
Robin is doubting she can marrying Barney because she never found the locket she buried in 1994 hoping the man of her dreams would find. A man who according to Robin would, “always come through” for her. The guy who happens to have her locket is Ted, but of course we know the chaos that may cause if he’s the one to give her the locket.
Instead of giving her the locket, Ted takes it to Barney and admits he tracked it down and planned on giving it to her as a surprise. He coaches Barney on the importance of telling her he was the one who found it. Barney follows through and turns the locket into a weepy Robin. It turns out, Robin doesn’t believe Barney was the one who found it and confronts Ted on where exactly he (Ted) found it.
Barney continues his task of finishing up his wedding vows. A task he’s been struggling with and therefore, Marshall and Lily offer to help. Barney refuses the help, as he doesn’t believe their advice is valid since they haven’t been keeping their own vows since their own wedding. He describes their wedding vows, as the next option after they run out of toilette paper because that’s all their marriage has been “one-long six-year wipe after that double flusher of a wedding.”
Instead of dwelling on that description of their marriage, Marshall takes Lily to renew their vows. He vows to stop shouting stuff at her when she’s “dumpin out” and to stop pointing out dog erections in the park; to which she responds “just don’t point and scream, ‘maybe it’s Maybelline’” (ha!) Lily vows to tell him when he has green stuff in his teeth and stop getting mad when he interrupts her, which he responds with plans to interrupt her less. Most importantly he vows to keep updating their vows as they go through life.
Robin, convinced Barney’s story of how he found her locket is a lie, tells Ted he’s the one whose always there for her and therefore should be marrying him. She says, “shouldn’t I be with the guy who finds me my locket, the guy who steals me a blue French horn, why shouldn’t I be marrying that guy?” he responds by admitting he’s not that guy anymore (which we saw a glimpse of who he turns out to be in the last episode where he doesn’t pledge his love or desperation for The Mother.)
After a very sweet and heartfelt speech over why Robin and Barney’s love doesn’t have to make sense, Robin decides to runaway by herself, but on her way out slams right into The Mother—which ends up being the story of how they met. The Mother notices Robin was running away from her wedding (I love that she has the same quirks as Ted and also has a ‘detective’ past.) She gives her the advice of taking three deep breaths to calm down. At the end of the third, Barney shows up and admits he only needs one vow and that is to always be honest with her. He also admits he was not the one to find her locket.
Barney and Robin finally get married, but not before Marshall delivers the final slap from the slap bet. And there really was a ring bear-er!
What an episode! After all the filler episodes this season, it’s nice to see the way it has all came together for the finale. Although this episode had a serious moment for each character, they still managed to do it in a classic HIMYM humor. I’m excited, but sad for the finale.
In honor of the second to last episode, here's a look back at the first season.