How I Met Your Mother: Barney's 10 Most Brilliant Plays

1. The Robin

The Robin is perhaps the most elaborate of Barney's plays, and is also the one play that had a pure motive. At the beginning of Season 8, Barney and Quinn ended their engagement and after that Barney once more returned to his womanizing ways. After Robin and Nick ended their relationship, Barney made a drunken pass at Robin that she rejected. After that, Barney told Robin he was done trying to get her (which only made Robin want Barney). Barney then began dating Robin's co-worker Patrice, which drove Robin nuts. He even burned the Playbook for her. Barney confessed to Ted that he was planning to propose to Patrice on top of the Worldwide News building (her favorite spot). In "The Final Page, Part Two" (S8E12), Ted, knowing Robin still had feelings for Barney, told her about the engagement and said she should go after Barney one last time. At first, Robin refused to go after him and denied she was still in love with Barney. Once Ted told her about the Worldwide News building, Robin freaked out over that detail because it was her favorite spot. Not believing her, Ted still had Ranjit take them to the Worldwide News building instead and told Robin to "go get him." Once Robin got to the roof, all she found was a page from the Playbook titled "The Robin." In the play, it revealed that everything Barney had done up to that point in Season 8 was all planned: "Splitsville" (E6): Barney helps Robin break up with Nick by admitting he was in love with her. "The Stamp Tramp" (E7): Barney makes a drunken pass at Robin and gets shot down on purpose. "Twelve Horny Women" (E8): Barney tells Robin that he's done trying to get her. "Lobster Crawl" (E9): Robin goes nuts after Barney closes the door on them and Barney runs into Patrice at the WWN building and gets her help in the plan by pretending to date her. "The Over-Correction" (E10): Knowing that Robin will try to show the Playbook to Patrice, Barney burns it because he won't need it any more. "The Final Page, Part One" (E11): Barney tells Ted his plan to propose to Patrice and swears him not to tell anyone. "The Final Page, Part Two" (E12): Ted tells Robin about Barney's proposal to Patrice, which will mean Ted is finally over Robin and has given Barney his blessing. The page goes on to say that Robin will be standing under mistletoe and when she looks up, she sees the mistletoe and then notices Barney. She scolds him, saying that this is going too far and is proof of while they will never work. Barney tells her to turn the page over and on the back, it says "Hope she says yes." When Robin lowers the page, she sees Barney on one knee, holding up the ring and asks her to marry him. Later in "Platonish" (S9E9), we discover that Barney met the Mother while undertaking a series of challenges from Robin and Lily and it was her who convinced her to go all-out in trying to win Robin back. After that, Barney went home and began writing out this plan.