For nine years and just over two-hundred episodes, we heard Ted Mosby tell his kids a passionate story about How I Met Your Mother. In the wake of Friends ending, this show did it’s best to fill that void with its own brand of merry and quirky New Yorkers. To an extent, that’s how the show started, but the series forged its own path over the course of its run. While plenty of fans were split about how it all ended and the show’s much-maligned final season taking place over one weekend, when you stop to think about it, the show really couldn’t have ended any other way than having Ted and Robin end up together.
The slaps, the challenges, the emo-montages all helped to make HIMYM something special. But the big fete the show was able to pull off over the years was weave a mosaic of interlocking and interweaving narratives that stretch all over the show’s timeline from when the characters were little kids all the way until one more go around with the iconic blue French horn. One thing the show knew how to do (for the most part) was craft some emotional season finales. Where does each one rank? Is your favorite the best? Here’s Every Season Finale Ranked Of How I Met Your Mother.
“Miracles” Season Three
Stella always felt like someone that Ted was trying to shoehorn his epic love story right into. That was long before Robin was the one who eventually broke that news to him. The third season finale, “Miracles” showcased that long before they broke up.
After an argument, Ted breaks it off with her but gets into a car accident shortly after. She forgives him, not realizing that he broke up with her. If all of that’s not confusing and silly enough, Marshall running around shouting “miracle,” every three minutes wasn’t nearly as funny as the show thought it was.
“The Magician’s Code, Parts 1 & 2” Season Seven
It’s one of the big moments that the show has been building to for years, the birth of Lily and Marshall’s son Marvin. Only Lily went into labor after sending Marshall to get rip-roaring blackout drunk with Barney.
Ted decides to be selfish and run off with Victoria, one of his all-time great loves. Barney proposes to Quinn as only he can, with a magic trick. All of this and the big reveal of who the bride is was revealed to be Robin in a jaw-dropping moment.
“Challenge Accepted” Season Six
After a year of watching Ted and Zoey fight about a building, they finally decide to break up, but Barney and Robin think that he wants to get back together with him and try to stop him at every turn.
Barney and Ted argue over who should press the button to blow up the site that Ted will get to build his skyscraper on. Barney matures a little bit and makes a real move to try and be with Nora. Lily and Marshall find out the best news ever, they don’t have food poisoning, Lily’s preggers! One half of the wedding mystery is revealed - the groom is Barney.
“Doppelgängers” Season Five
Over the course of the series, the group have spotted four out of five alternate versions of themselves. The only one they haven’t found yet is Barney’s doppelgänger. Lily decides that she’ll be ready to have a baby when they finally find him. Which they think they do, but it’s just one of Barney’s plots to pick up women.
Robin, who has finally found love gives up a dream job for it, only for Don to not reciprocate, leaving her to move back in with Ted. Ted explains that so many years removed from first meeting and everyone’s a doppelgänger of themselves. Oh, and he thought it would be a good idea to dye his hair blond.
“The Leap” Season Four
As the episode title says, it’s all about taking the big leap. Marshall thinks he can make the jump from one roof to the next. The gang are planning Ted’s 31st birthday party. Barney and Robin are having trouble admitting they have feelings for each other. Barney wants to make sure Ted is ok with it.
Lily brings a goat home from her kindergarten class and we finally get the epic story of Ted vs. the Goat. Ted gets not the offer that he wants but the offer that he needs right now and the entire gang takes the literal leap with Marshall
“Last Forever, Parts 1 & 2” Season Nine
The epic story comes to its conclusion. Would the show be able to stick the landing that it has been building up since minute one? Unlike a lot of sitcoms, How I Met Your Mother had been stacking the deck, building to these final moments since the very first minutes of the first episode.
Ted always pined for Robin, he finally got her. Barney had a baby, and Lily and Marshall have their final Halloween rooftop party. The gang’s futures all dovetail with their past as Robin and Barney finally tie the knot and Ted and Tracy have their sweet meeting and bittersweet ending.
“Something Blue” Season Two
Lily and Marshall’s wedding reception is in full swing. Ted and Robin have been teasing Barney with an announcement of their own. Barney recoils in horror thinking that Ted and Robin are now engaged, but Robin had the same reaction at that thought. He thinks Robin’s pregnant and says she’s going to get fat.
Barney finally deduces that they broke up. Their breakup was handled in the most touching of ways. Barney is happy to have his wingman, Ted back. Ted realizes that Robin isn’t “the One.”
“Something New” Season Eight
Just like a few moments of how a series finale can jade some fans on the entire series, the closing moments of “Something New” were pitch perfect and can make any HIMYM fan shed buckets of happy tears. Marshall lets it slip to his mom that they’re moving to Italy and takes Marvin to spend the week with her. Robin and Barney are gearing up for their wedding weekend in Farhampton. Ted knows where Robin’s locket is and is overjoyed with emotion. Lily figures out why Ted is moving and just wants him to be careful with his feelings for Robin.
This is all nice, but pales in comparison to the closing montage. Set to the Shins’ “Simple Song,” the gang are all heading to into their futures intercut with a certain bass playing, yellow umbrella carrying woman that we see for the very first time asking for her own ticket to Farhampton.
"Come On” Season One
Just because Future Ted already told us Robin’s not the mother, didn’t mean Ted Mosby wasn’t going to try one last grand gesture to win her heart. Two, in fact, he sets up and entire blue string quartet to play in her home, and (he thinks) he made it rain so that Robin wouldn’t be able to go her work trip.
Marshall finds out Lily’s having second thoughts about a life together since she wants to travel the world. It’s Ted’s best day ever and his best friend’s worst in an incredible first season finale that was legen-wait for it...dary.