How I Met Your Mother: Season Four
by Michael J. Shea, Pamela Fryman, Rob Greenberg
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Actor: Alyson Hannigan, Cobie Smulders, Jason Segel, Josh Radnor, Neil Patrick HarrisDirector: Michael J. Shea, Pamela Fryman, Rob Greenberg
Brand: Fox
Writer: Carter Bays
Writer: Chris Harris
Writer: Chuck Tatham
Writer: Craig Gerard
Writer: Craig Thomas
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Subtitled); French (Subtitled); Spanish (Subtitled); English (Original Language)
Format: AC-3, Box set, Color, Dolby, DVD, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.78:1
Running Time: 513 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2009-09-29
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Studio: Twentieth Century Fox
Product features:
- Condition: New
- Format: DVD
- AC-3; Box set; Color; Dolby; DVD; Subtitled; Widescreen; NTSC
DVD Reviews of How I Met Your Mother: Season Four
DVD Review: A series in decline? Not so fast!
Summary: 3 Stars
Much like Season 3, Season 4 of How I Met Your Mother was strongly affected by outside influences. For Season 3, the writers' strike interrupted the flow at very nearly the halfway point of the season, and most the rest of the episodes felt rushed and incomplete.
Season 4 was similarly affected by the pregnancies of stars Cobie Smulders (Robin) and Alyson Hannigan (Lily). While the show gamely poked fun at the pregnancies--neither Robin nor Lily was pregnant, and their baby bumps were hidden or shown in outrageous-but-creative ways--the real-world exigencies that go along with impending motherhood did impact the show, with Hannigan's leave taking her completely out of four episodes (albeit with a hilarious exit strategy).
The producers elected to film the Season 4 Finale, "The Leap," in January. At that time, Hannigan was barely showing and Smulders was barely pregnant. This allowed them to do some of the more physical bits in the episode, as well as working a full shooting schedule, which would become impossible as the pregnancies progressed.
So with The Leap in the can, they had what many would consider an ideal situation: they knew what the end result of their story arcs was and so could have used the last half of S4 to set it up.
Unfortunately, that's not what happened. Instead of giving us 7 or 8 episodes that built to this inevitable climax, most of the last half of S4 came off as stand-alone fillers, largely featuring Barney as a main character. While Barney is almost unanimously considered the funniest character on the show, I think he tends to work better in support of the stories or as part of an ensemble story than he does when he's the full focus of them.
Still, for all the difficulties getting the show out of the gate during S4, the season did provide viewers with some truly classic HIMYM episodes the likes of which were common in Seasons 1 and 2, including "Intervention," "Shelter Island," "Woooo!," and "Three Days of Snow."
This season featured two major arcs, neither of which really appealed to me: in the Stella Arc, Ted's relationship with Stella continues from where it left off in S3's cliffhanger, resulting in some very strong episodes and some painfully weak ones; in the Barney Arc, the groundwork for the current direction of the show was set with Barney believing he was in love with Robin and struggling with his desire to pursue her and how it conflicted with his womanizing Awesomeness. This arc--which is not one I care for--is much more herky-jerky than the Stella arc, with lots of inconsistent character behaviors and Barney producing a hitherto unheard-of list of women he's slept with on his way to his goal of 200 conquests...another aspect of the character revealed suddenly, inconsistent with what has gone before (see S1's "Game Night" and S3's "The Yips").
Both arcs culminate in the S4 finale, "The Leap," setting up S5, which premiered recently. A number of fans really like "The Leap," particularly those who have been waiting for the spark between Robin and Barney to ignite. I thought it was actually the weakest of the four season finales so far, primarily because it feels like they didn't know the details when they shot it. For example, we learn in the episode that Ted is taking a job at Columbia University teaching Architecture. What we don't learn is where he got the lead on that job. Of course, from previous episodes, we know where that lead came from, but the dots never quite connect to the finale: the finale feels like "here's where we think we want to go" without having a sense that they knew how they were going to get there, and, for me, it ultimately felt very sloppy. Rather than having a complete, tight finale as a target to shoot for, they seemed to choose a couple of events even though they didn't have any idea what would precipitate them. They had planned too little of the story at the time the finale was shot.
As I write this, two episodes of S5 have aired: "Definitions" and "Double Date." "Definitions" was something of a mess as Lily forced the Robin/Barney relationship to be defined, showing the "caring but arrogant" side of her that seems to be most of her personality these days. "Double Date" was much more on-target...my favorite episode since "Three Days of Snow." More importantly, though, these first two S5 episodes feel much more solid than most of S4, as though more time was allotted and taken to make sure they fit. Both are beautifully shot and meticulously edited, and "Double Date" uses some very impressive visual effects in a very creative way.
So after two years of being frustrated with a show that seemed to be losing its direction and not living up to the potential it proved in its first two seasons, S5 seems to be back on the right track. Let's just hope some outside force doesn't come along and derail it this year.
Description of How I Met Your Mother: Season Four
Studio: Tcfhe Release Date: 09/29/2009 Run time: 561 minutes Rating: NrThe fourth season of the charming sitcom How I Met Your Mother (or HIMYM to fans) remains as inventive yet as heartfelt as ever. The writers pull off all kinds of narrative tricks, and though events are sometimes absurd, they never feel gimmicky--the show has a solid grip on its characters and keeps everything grounded in their ongoing lives. Devoted womanizer Barney (Neil Patrick Harris, riding a wave of popularity in the wake of Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog) can't understand why he's having actual feelings for Robin (Cobie Smulders), whose career as a TV anchorwoman is floundering. Marshall (Jason Segel) and Lily (Alyson Hannigan) struggle with holding on to their youthful passion under the pressures of getting older. And Ted (Josh Radnor) struggles to follow through on his engagement to Stella (Sarah Chalke)--a relationship that (spoiler alert!) capsizes midway through the episodes. While the season-long story lines are carefully teased out, each episode is flush with clever or daffy ideas, among them a list of Canadian sex acts, Barney trying to pick up hot chicks while disguised as an 80-year-old man, multiple interventions (culminating in an intervention intervention), Marshall's charts and graphs, Barney's fake family, wooo! girls, the cheerleader effect, the front porch test, and the Naked Man, among many others.
Attentive fans will be rewarded with a wealth of small references to past episodes. Though there are moments when the fundamental premise--that this is all part of an unbearably long story that a future Ted is telling to his children--feels obnoxiously stretched (toward the end of the season, one episode in particular builds up to a false revelation), for the most part HIMYM is a sterling example of a well-sustained sitcom; the characters have successfully grown over the four seasons without losing everything that made them funny in the first place. The number of extras is surprisingly small--only a few show commentaries, an enjoyable group interview, and an extended version of Barney's video resume. --Bret Fetzer
Stills from How I Met Your Mother: Season Four (Click for larger image)
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