Lily Aldrin is somewhat of a controversial character among the How I Met Your Mother fan community, some fans outright despise her, while others give her the benefit of the doubt because they love Alyson Hannigan. Still, even they can recognize that Lily is pretty selfish. She wasn’t all bad — certainly not as bad as some viewers think she is.
Across nine seasons of How I Met Your Mother, Lily did some terrible things, but she also did a few pretty great things to redeem them. So, here are the five best and five worst things that Lily did.
Best: Teaching Kindergarten
Lily’s dream is to be a professional artist, but that’s a lot easier said than done, so she needs a day job to pay the bills in the meantime. And as far as day jobs go, she picked a pretty noble one.
Lily makes her living by teaching kindergarten. She’s shaping the minds of the future generation and instilling values in her students that they’ll carry through the rest of their lives.
Worst: Leaving Marshall To Attend Art School In San Francisco
At the end of the first season of How I Met Your Mother, just when things were looking up in Ted’s love life, Marshall’s took a nosedive, as Lily accepted a place at an art school in San Francisco without telling him.
This led to a huge argument, which led to Lily giving back her engagement ring and leaving for California. The sight of Marshall in the rain, sitting on the steps outside the apartment building, ring in hand, never fails to tug on the ol’ heartstrings.
Best: Forgiving Mickey
After a childhood marked by unceasing disappointment, Lily was ready to give up on her dad, Mickey, and simply live a fatherless life. But Marshall didn’t think that was right, so he invited Mickey to Thanksgiving dinner.
At first, Lily was furious. But when she found out that someone else she held a grudge against was dead, it changed her mind and she decided to be the bigger person and patch things up with her dad.
Worst: Orchestrating Ted’s Breakups
When Ted discovers that the earring Karen found in his bed, which led her to suspect him of cheating and break up with him, was planted by Lily, it’s eventually revealed that she’s orchestrated all of his breakups.
If she doesn’t like a girl he’s with or a relationship he’s in — including his relationship with Robin — she’ll step in and break them up without hesitation to preserve a fantasy version of the future.
Best: Stealing The Playbook
The Playbook is Barney’s book of tricks to get women into bed, and it’s a pretty horrible document. Offended by Barney’s “plays,” Lily decides to steal it.
Unfortunately, her stealing the Playbook turned out to be an integral part of the final “play.” Still, she made the right call by stealing it from him.
Worst: Hiding Massive Amounts Of Credit Card Debt From Marshall
Lily has a habit of buying clothes and shoes when she’s feeling stressed. She doesn’t have the money to buy them, so she’s built up a huge amount of credit card debt.
Ironically, the stress that perpetuates her shopping habit is her credit card debt, which exists because of the shopping habit. Marshall didn’t know about any of this until they were trying to get a mortgage.
Best: Being An Unbiased Slap Bet Commissioner
After Barney lost a “slap bet” to Marshall, and Lily was named the “Slap Bet Commissioner,” it would’ve been easy for her to be biased in her rulings. On one side of the bet is her husband and on the other side is the pervert she doesn’t really like.
So kudos to Lily for remaining unbiased in all her rulings as the Slap Bet Commissioner. It’s a real show of integrity.
Worst: Pressuring Marshall To Work For GNB
When Marshall found himself unemployed for a few weeks, he desperately wanted to find work as an environmental lawyer, but he was struggling. The last thing he wanted to do was take a soul-crushing corporate job.
But Lily wanted money, and lots of it, so she pressured Marshall to take a job alongside Barney at Goliath National Bank. She made him sell out his convictions to fund her shopping habits.
Best: Making Barney Apologize To The Women He Hurt
When Lily is approached by a woman who’s been warning Barney’s suitors about his deceitful ways, she has power over her womanizing friend in that she’s the only one who knows who’s been destroying his life.
And before she hands over the information, she makes him apologize to all the women he’s hurt — or at least the ones he hurt the most, because apologizing to every woman he hurt would take forever, because let’s face it, he’s a pretty deplorable guy.
Worst: Almost Abandoning Her Family
This one was so bad that it’s still the worst thing Lily did, even though she didn’t actually go through with it. Lily tricked Ted into driving her to the airport under the guise of picking up a guest for Marshall’s fundraiser, so she can ditch Marshall (again!) and fly to Spain.
This leaves Ted with the unenviable task of telling Marshall that his wife has abandoned him. Fortunately, she comes back at the last minute after changing her mind.