Death may not walk behind us, but he certainly made a spectacular appearance at the end of this past Monday's episode of the CBS sitcom "How I Met Your Mother." Titled "Bad News," the episode involved the married couple of Marshall and Lily (for those who aren't familiar with the series) trying to determine whether or not both of them are able to sire a child. Marshall holds off on calling his father with any news; Lily turns out to be fertile despite their inability to conceive, leading Marshall to think he's sterile. He doesn't want to call his father with this bad news, but he ultimately tells him in person when both of his parents visit him. Upon learning he too is fertile, Marshall calls his father on a borrowed cell phone but doesn't get an answer. Then Lily arrives with an answer of a different sort - the weaver's answer. She tells Marshall that his father has died of a heart attack.
Marshall's father's death came as a shock to most viewers in an episode ironically building up to something monumental happening at the end, but the anticipation wasn't just in the performances from the cast or the dialogue from script writer Jennifer Hendriks. The episode also featured the numbers from 1 to 50 in reverse numerical order - a visual countdown to the end - hidden in inconspicuous props and backgrounds. The placement of these numbers was so subtle that many viewers, while expecting some kind of dramatic climax, didn't notice them. They appeared on book covers, magazine covers, cereal boxes, sports jerseys, and ominously toward the end, a clock in Marshall's father's empty workshop, among other places. The Grim Reaper was sending a signal for anyone to see, but, ironically, it went over the heads of many of "How I Met Your Mother"'s fans. And those who did notice the numbers likely expected the countdown to be to something wonderful - yet another irony.
I myself only noticed a few of these numerals but didn't tie them together as a countdown to anything about to happen. I had to watch this episode of "How I Met Your Mother" again online to see the sequence. The number 48 appeared on a ketchup bottle! More irony: If the countdown had started at 60 and the number 57 had appeared on a ketchup bottle, more people would have likely noticed. This episode made me upset and depressed enough when I saw it on TV; taking note of the countdown when I saw it again online, I found the whole thing creepy and morose.
(One other clue appears to have been planted. Throughout the series, the characters have crossed paths with their "doppelgangers" - people who look almost exactly like themselves, a common dramatic technique in American situation comedies. The doppelganger of Neil Patrick Harris's character Barney was the fifth and last one to be seen, in this episode - a medical specialist whom Marshall and Lily go to for help. He is also the only doppelganger any of the characters have any kind of association with. In many cultures, doppelgangers are bad omens.)
In killing off Marshall's father, the show's producers pulled off the greatest shock involving death in a sitcom since writers Everett Greenbaum and Jim Fritzell killed off Henry Blake in the third season finale of "M*A*S*H." (Read the attached comment for some of my observations about that shocker.) Monday night's episode of "How I Met Your Mother" not only left people angry, sad, and shocked, it generated heavy Internet chatter full of reaction to the episode's outcome - most of it negative - and likely sparked more water cooler discussion among those lucky enough to have a job these days than any other sitcom had done since "Seinfeld" was last on network television. I'm still as upset and disturbed over this episode of "How I Met Your Mother" as I was when I saw it; I don't know when I'm going to calm down.
This episode is sure to set the tone for "How I Met Your Mother" not just for the rest of this season (its sixth), but for the 2011-12 season, which will likely be its last. Seven years are long enough to explain how Ted Mosby (the first person of the show's title) met his wife. But before we find out who she is, we're in for some sharp, more dramatic turns in a series long known for its surrealistically quirky humor. It remains to be seen what effect this will have on "How I Met Your Mother." But most of us will be watching to find out.
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The episode of "M*A*S*H" in which the writers killed off Henry Blake when the actor who played him, McLean Stevenson, chose to leave the show, had some references to the its shock ending.
For starters, it was titled "Abyssinia, Henry" a pun on "I'll be seeing you" and the ancient name for Ethiopia that suggests a belonging to the ages. When Henry learns he's been discharged from the Army, Radar O'Reilly gives him his itinerary - Tokyo, San Francisco, then home to Bloomington, Illinois. Henry's plane gets shot down over the Sea of Japan, meaning he doesn't make it to any of those places. Also, Henry leaves the 4077th M*A*S*H wearing civilian, rather than military, clothes - a black suit.
The final scene, in which Radar tells everyone that Henry was killed, was filmed and edited on after most of the cast thought they'd completed making the episode; Alan Alda was the only cast member who knew in advance that a final scene announcing Henry's death would be added later.
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