First airing a year after Friends series finale, How I Met Your Mother was an obvious attempt at continuing the success found with the group of friends with a regular hangout in New York formula. Having now reached its eighth season, How I Met Your Mother is a great show in its own right, but has never quite reached Friends heights in the sitcom hall of fame. Both shows include love and career turbulence- the two most common kinds- as well as the addition of a baby, hilarious side characters and nuisance parents, but there are things that hold How I Met Your Mother back from true greatness, which is undeniable even to its biggest fans. So whats the problem? Here are 6 possible reasons How I Met Your Mother cant match up to Friends...
6. A Coffee Shop Is More Realistic Than A Bar
Its all very well setting most of How I Met Your Mother in McLarens bar - the gang can unwind after work, drink and eat to their hearts content and meet lots of new people (primarily for Barney and Ted to hit on) with the ever-present help of the best loosening-up tool, alcohol. Without the group constantly hanging out in one bar, we never would have had the gem of an episode when Carl entrusts Ted and Barney with the keys to McLarens and they end up with a whole marching band inside. Despite how much fun the bar is over the years, it just isnt realistic. Does anyone actually go to the same bar every single night like they seem to? Central Perk is much more realistic, and with its setting at the bottom of their main apartment building- another idea copied, I might add - it is natural that a group of friends would want to get coffee and chill out in their free time. It also allows for lots of different combinations of the friends together, as well as scenes starting off with one character alone, which is much less likely to happen in a bar. This distinction is made even more important when both series add a baby into the mix: Rachel can happily continue to hang out with her friends when she has Emma, as they will often be either in her apartment, the one across the hall or the coffee shop- all baby friendly locations. On the contrary, when How I Met Your Mothers Marshall and Lily have baby Marvin- an inevitable plot direction, considering how long theyd been together- they struggle to balance their baby and their friends, although at least its ridiculousness is addressed when they do bring him to McLarens.