How I Met Your Mother, or HIMYM as abbreviated by no-one in real life, was a respectable replacement for everybody's favourite show, Friends. Creators Craig Thomas and Carter Bays played the long game and gambled on CBS renewing their show each season by teasing the pay-off and if there ever was threat of cancellation, they could drop storylines and get straight to the good stuff. With every episode essentially being a flashback (or having a flash forward, depending on how pedantic the person watching it is), in order to keep with continuity producers came up with a moment of genius and filmed all the scenes with Ted's kids in 2005. Like Friends it cashed in on celebrity fan status with cameos from Britney Spears and Katy Perry, no Jean-Claude Van Damme and Bruce Willis but a respectable effort. HIMYM also helped reboot the career of Neil Patrick Harris (Barney Stinson) who was still shaking off cries of "Hey, Doogie Howser!" on the streets and marked a welcome return to telly for Alyson Hannigan who had been away since Buffy ended in 2003. The final double-length episode aired in 2014 and was watched by 10 million Americans, it did finally feature a certain mother and the blue French horn came back for the show's final curtain-call, having previously featured in episode one.
