Season 1 (2005)
Genre:Sitcom
In the year 2030, a man explains to his children how he met their mother.
How I Met Your Mother was created by Carter Bays and Craig Thomas and ran from 2005-2014 for a total of 208 episodes over 9 seasons.
Analysis:
Genre:
The basic components of all sitcoms are a fictional narrative, self-conscious performance by the actors, jokes and slapstick/farce, and a laugh track or at least an audience whose presence is acknowledged in some way.
This show is fiction and the audience is acknowledged by a laugh track. Also, the audience is acknowledged as the set is made up of only three walls, showing comedy has origins in theater but also helping to make the audience feel included in the world of the narrative. An example of this is the bar set as it appears that the audience could be sitting at the table with the characters:
Jokes are also created in How I Met Your Mother by the use of Barney's catchphrase and physical comedy such as when he unexpectedly climbs out of a suitcase. Also, sometimes what the main character, Ted, says and what he does will be different, which is funny as he will say he does not want to go somewhere with Barney, only for the scene to cut and him to be shown exactly where he didn't want to go with Barney.
However, the laugh track in this show may be recorded as the actors never stop in the middle of their dialogue to allow them to laugh, such as in Miranda and Will and Grace, which would allow the audience to further identify with the characters.
Review:
I watched the first three episodes of this series and found that I enjoyed the premise of the show because even though the title suggests the audience will discover how the main character Ted Mosby (Josh Radnor) will meet his children's mother, in the pilot episode the woman who this is expected to be turns out not to be. My favourite thing about this show is the characterization as each character is distinguishable from the beginning, such as Barney (Neil Patrick Harris) always telling Ted to 'suit up' before they go out and making Ted play the game 'have you met Ted?' in the bar to attract women. I find that this makes the comedy funnier because the repetition makes it easier to feel included in the narrative as the audience knows what will happen at certain points but doesn't know what the consequences of these actions will be. Because of the strong characterization, I found even after three episodes I have already been able to understand Ted and Barney's friendship, especially because of the third episode, The Sweet Taste of Liberty. However, the second episode, Purple Giraffe was my favourite because of the parallel between the kid climbing into the claw machine to get the toy he wants after it keeps slipping from the claw's grasp, and Ted climbing out of the window and up onto the roof after Robin (Cobie Smulders). I will definitely watch more of this show, not only because of the ongoing mystery of who is the mother of Ted's children, but also because of the strong characterization and how this will probably begin to affect and shape the character's relationships with each other further as the narrative progresses.
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