How I Met Your Mother

"Little Minnesota" is one of my favourite season 4 episodes of How I Met Your Mother. In this episode, it's near the holidays and Robin is missing Canada. I love the beginning of the episode she shows up in a t-shirt saying the weather doesn't affect her because she's from Canada. I know it's exaggerated, but it's somewhat true. I love how Marshall can relate to Robin's homesickness and takes her to the Minnesota bar. I love how Robin pretends she's from Minnesota. I love the end of the episode when Marshall takes her to a Canadian bar and Marshall sings "Let's Go to the Mall". I give this episode a 10/10.

Not a very exemplary episode, but it had its moments. Barney's renditions of Christmas carols was one, the final scene at the Canada-themed bar was another.



We had Ted's sister visiting him in this installment. Contrary to most guest stars in the show, she totally fails to do anything remotely funny. I don't even understand why we needed a storyline around her. We also had a completely disjoint storyline with Marshall and Robin hanging out at a couple of bars. Though, I am not a huge fan of Robin and Marshall rarely makes me laugh, I found this one to be mildly entertaining. Putting aside the initial scene, Barney had pretty much nothing to offer.



The show has had its ups and downs this season with mostly downs. This would have been a little higher than rock bottom.

I'm sure there's been some mention of Ted's sister once or twice in a past episode but it still seems like she was brought in from no where as a convenient plot device/filler in the "A plot". I'll have to side with Ted on calling out her immaturity. Pulling a prank on him with Barney's help to "teach him a lesson" doesn't prove she's grown-up. At all. And if Barney hadn't made me laugh earlier with his earlier holiday song parodies, I'd be annoyed at him for going along with the stupid idea. The fact that the two female leads are pregnant and there are rumors that the actress who plays Ted's little sister was brought in as a possible addition/replacement also didn't bring up her likability factor.



On the flipside, the "B plot" gave us the unlikely pairing of Robin and Marshall who give us equal parts hilarity and sweetness. Seeing Robin bond with the Minnesota sportsmen was wonderful after a streak of lonely/silly Robin episodes. The sports stereotypes and the Canadian jokes were hilarious! The clincher, of course, is when Marshall serenades Robin, karaoke-style with the song 'Let's Go to the Mall' -- one of the best "end tags" I've ever seen on this show. My only complaint is why haven't they ever interacted like this before? Hopefully there'll be more awesome moments between these cold-loving pals.



Overall the good overpowers the not-so-good. I liked the episode.

After the sham of a pimpslap of an episode last week, this one just kept on piling on the goodies.



Ted - being humiliated for his arrogance was awesome. Well done for taking care of little sis with the present though. Will be interesting to see Barney keep a promise of chastity however.



Barney - on song - literally. Fatastic tunes about screwing sisters. And that joke about the prada shirt was pure Legen-dairy. Would like to see what happened with Ted's mum!



Marshall - His home state and satirisation were good. But his rendition of "Let's go to the mall" was hilarious. And when he turned off the lights!



Lilly - top stuff that she could not lie.



Robin - again well written for. Nice speech. It pains me to say that she may have actually *acted* in this one. Good job, barbie.

An episode that I didn't think was going to be that great at first, but it turned out to be a pretty good Christmas episode, that I really enjoyed. An unlikely pairing paired up in a plot, that probably was my favorite plot of the two. Marshall invites Robin to a place that is dedicated to Minnesota, she ends up winning everybody over, fooling everybody that she is from Minnesota. marshall ends up getting jealous and reveals her for who she really is, besides that funny plot, it narrowed donw to Robin being home sick and nothing to stay for in New York. I loved the Robin & Marshall moment when Marshall convinced her that everyone loves her in the NYC. Then he takes her to a place that's dedicated to Canada to cure her feeling of being home sick. The karaoke at the end was probably the best scene. Marshall singing "Let's Go To The Mall" was absolutely hysterical. On a more serious note, Ted's sister stumbles in to town for the holidays, Ted still sees her as an irresponsible train wreck. He suspects there is something going on with her & Barney. Then Lilly walks in on them finishing up having sex, when Ted finds out he tells off his sister, only to find out that all was staged. The didn't have sex, it was to teach Ted a lesson that his little sister isn't so little anymore. Ted ends up buying the bag his sister wanted, and ended up co-signing a lease for her, now that he trusts her. It was nice seeing how he cared for her, and it fit in to the Christmas storyline perfectly. A great serious & funny episode.

What I really like about How I Met Your Mother is how well it's written sometimes. This episode was certainly one of the best this season. It's not often, but Robin can really steal a scene - or episode - every now and then. Her speech at the 'Minnesota bar' was hilarious! Marshall is once again really funny. Barney really made me laugh with all his 'Christmas carols'!



Ted's sister, though, wasn't that good. And I just feel like we should have seen a little more of Lily in this episode.



Anyway, How I Met Your Mother is really good, but it's not one of the best for me, so this episode was really impressive.

Some of the best episodes of HIMYM were 'platonic couple'-centric - Barney and Robin (pre-him falling in love with her) in "Zip, Zip, Zip", Ted and Lily in "How Lily Stole Christmas", Barney and Lily in "World's Greatest Couple" and "Do I Know You?". Finally, a Marshall and Robin-centric episode to round out the group ... and it falls back on stereotyping and insult humour.



HIMYM has lately been falling back on 'laugh out loud' humour and in the process sacrificed the more clever jokes of the first two seasons. I barely noticed the Ted's-sister subplot in the episode (barring Barney's hilarious Christmas jingles about sleeping with her) though it looks like she'll be returning as she now lives near her brother.



If the show's not careful, it'll follow the Will & Grace pattern of a brilliant sitcom lapsing into decline once it's lost its originality. They could have fleshed out the Marshall and Robin friendship much stronger but chose instead to rely on cheap gags about how Canadians are afraid of the dark (is it just me or do half the jokes in this show revolve around Canada). Having said which, the clever in-joke at the end about Robin Sparkles was a treat to watch.

This is easily the worst episode of How I Met Your Mother I have seen which hurts to say as I loe this show. This episode once again makes no mention of the main story in this series (the title of coarse) instead the writer seemed compelled to introduce us to everyone but Ted's future wife and mother to his kids. On top of all of this it takes the last minute to produce the only laugh out loud momment.



This ep introduces us to Ted's sister, to Ted she is immature and is worried that Barney will try and sleep with her. This stroy arc is not funny and when Ted realizes that he has been set up by Barney it just comes off as really lame. Needless to say Ted feels bad and helps his sister out.



Meanwhile Marshall decides to take Robin to his Minnesota themed bar to make her feel more at home. But when she steals his Vikings story he rats her out to the others that she is Canadian. This provides a few soft laughs and saves the episode from being completey pointless. The laugh out loud momment I alluded to was a scene where Marshall shows Robin a Canadian themed bar and for Kareoke he sings lets go to the mall and everyone knows all the words.



This ep was a real letdown and I can only hope that after the break that the writers wake up to them selves and start working on Ted meeting his wife. I mean his kids have probably left the couch and Ted's just talking to himself now.

How I Met Your Mother has a lucrative syndication deal coming up so I do not expect CBS to end it without at least a fifth season, but this show has just become so pitiful.



The writers are trying too hard to be clever instead of realizing that a simple story with some solid jokes could be so much more effective. The lone bright spot of this episode was Barney's rendition of classic Christmas songs replacing the joyous lyrics with that of his sexual desires. Barney is still consistently good in the show's fourth season, but unfortunately the rest of the crew isn't.

Marshall takes Robin to a bar with a Minnesota theme. Ted attempts to keep his visiting sister away from Barney. Wow I can't believe the stereotypes though. The Canadians are afraid of the dark? LMAO that was stupid but enjoyable. I liked it when the lights went off in the bar. Then Robin wore a hockey mask. Haha she looked like Jason Vorhees. I was a little surprised that Marshall mentioned all of those stereotypes, such as the Scots are cheap people, and that Asians don't know how to drive, etc. But, still, even though I couldn't see all of this episode, it was decent with what I saw.