❤️Mr&MrStinson❤️

Barney went with her 🥺 He went with her and met her Aunt. All the way back in S2. Her BFF Lily didn't go with her, her BF Ted didn't go, Barney did. I could've melted.

The episode is S8E05 "The Autumn of Break-Ups". A beautiful Tumblrite already made a gifset of it here, I'm so glad someone already did it, thanks @marsinvestigaytions!

Honestly I don’t think it would’ve went well. And probably still would’ve ended in them getting a divorce. Because both Robin and Barney are the type of people who only like to talk about their feelings when they don’t feel pressured to. And counseling would feel a lot like pressure to them. Which would’ve lead to them fighting more or just avoiding each other all together.

Yes. Both Barney and Ted were never the most perfect partners for Robin. They both had major flaws. So did Robin. She was never the most perfect person either. BUT, the difference is, despite all the flaws of Barney and Ted, Ted never really accepted Robin for who she was and what she wanted out of her own life. When we first meet Robin in the pilot episode. She makes it clear that she is super career oriented and her job will always come first over her love life. There was even an entire episode when she was in a relationship with Don, that all the other group members made mention that Robin always prioritises her work over her love life. So Ted is well aware of this. But still pursues Robin. He knows full well that she doesn’t want marriage and kids. Or anything else that Ted wants. But Ted still wants to continue a relationship with her. So them breaking up shouldn’t of been so shocking.

Ted thought that by being in a relationship with Robin that somehow Robin will change her mind. So Ted was never really in love with Robin. But more of the idea of her. His love for what HE wanted in his life trumped whatever “love” her had for Robin. He was unwilling to compromise because what HE wanted in life was more important to him than continuing a relationship with Robin. We can all talk about all the creepy things Barney did to get Robin. But let’s not forget that Ted also done creepy things to get Robin and I’d argue Ted was worse because at least Barney is honest with who he is. Ted is the “good guy” so that makes his actions a lot worse than Barney’s. So for everyone saying they broke up because they wanted different things, that’s the whole point. They had different outlooks on life. And both Ted and Robin knew this. Ted was willing to break up with a woman he supposedly “loves” all because she didn’t want what he wanted in life. The ending was more sad than anything. It was basically two super old people who didn’t really have anyone else in their lives in a romantic way.

Barney, as flawed as he was. The difference between him and Ted is that Barney ACTUALLY accepted Robin for who she was. He never once tried to change her. When he finds out that she can’t have kids, that wasn’t a deal breaker for him at all. He still wanted to pursue Robin. Like he said to his Mother who asked him about possible grandchildren, Barney said she can’t have kids and that’s okay because he’s marrying Robin for HER. Not some idea of having kids. So Robin being so career oriented and not wanting kids was never this deal breaker for Barney. Which makes their divorce that much more illogical. Barney being tied of Robin constantly travelling and not putting time in their marriage.

Because he loved her for her. Barney was completely okay with not having kid because Robin was more than enough. Unlike Ted who was obsessed with Robin for no real reason. When Robin kept shooting down Ted constantly. There was an episode in season 8, where Robin tried to sell Barney’s house. Then later changed her mind because she said that if she tried to change everything about Barney he was never going to be the man she fell in love with. And that she accepted all the creepy sociopathic things about him. So basically Robin accepts Barney for who he truly is and still wanted to marry him and form a marriage with him. So BOTH Barney and Robin both accept each other for who they are.

All in all, Ted was never really in love with Robin. But more of the idea of her. Barney on the other hand was in love with Robin for HER. Ted was unwilling to change his outlook on what he wanted in life when he knew it didn’t match Robins. But Barney despite all his flaws accepted Robin for who she was and never tried to change her.

So who was the love of Robin’s life and her true love and soulmate? It was Barney.

Because he is - and I say this as someone whose least favorite character of the main six in Friends is Ross because the dude can piss me off A LOT.

Ross is selfish, whinny, spoiled, obsessive and immature like Ted. But the writers of Friends were far more self-aware than the writers of How I Met Your Mother - mainly because they were not using Ross as a self-insert, and would not use Twitter to say shit like "If you ship Rachel with Joey instead of with Ross, you're the reason people like Trump get elected and destroy nations." No, I am not kidding, that actually happened.

Ted CONSTANTLY acts like a creep and the show treats it as fully romantic, and if a woman (mainly Robin) is turned off by it, the show tries to spin it as "She's afraid of commitment" or some bullshit. When Ross is getting possessive over Rachel the show actually allows her to call him out and she doesn't always run straight to his arms - not to mention, she can act just as unreasonable and entitled, meanwhile the most Robin does is say "Maybe, someday, if we're both single and miserable and no one else wants either of us, I'd consider marrying you."

Even Ross's most absurd moments get a bit more of pass because they're (usually) meant to:

1 - Show that the character is flawed (Him constantly getting paranoid that Rachel is gonna cheat on him with her co-worker is meant to show he's insecure, jealous, possessive AND doesn't listen when she repeatedly says she loves HIM, not this other dude - though the writers do still want the audience to root for him and Rachel to find a way to make it work)

2 - Make a joke about how he's kind of insane (see him not telling Rachel they're still married because he can't have another failed marriage - a situation in which NO ONE in the cast makes excuse for him, and we even have Chandler rightfully saying "At point did you think this was a successful marriage?")

Meanwhile the writers of HIMYM did things like:

1 - Say Ted breaking up with a girl on her birthday, through an answering machine that all the guests in her surprise party heard before she did, finding her years later, winning her back, then breaking up with her on her birthday AGAIN is totally just what was meant to be because "Well, she found true love later"

2 - Have him use "It was past 2am" as an excuse to cheat on his girlfriend/lie to Robin about being single to sleep with her.

3 - Make him have an emotional affair with a married woman that then left her husband (who thought of Ted as friend) for him, accept getting back together with his ex that was engaged and then left the groom at the altar, and make a move on his ex that was engaged to one of his best friends on the weekend on their wedding.

4 - HAVE TED TELL HIS KIDS HE WANTS TO TELL A STORY ABOUT HOW HE MET THEIR DEAD MOTHER, BUT IT'S ACTUALLY ABOUT HOW HE ALWAYS LOVED A DIFFERENT WOMAN THAT HE WAS STILL OBSESSED WITH AFTER 25 YEARS.

Not to mention, even the stuff in Friends that genuinely did not age well at all and that the writers weren't self-aware about in any way have a bigger excuse than the stuff HIMYM did because Friends started in 1994 and ended in 2004, yet HIMYM was on the same level, if not worse, and it started in 2005 and ended in 2014. There's a reason audiences tolerated Ross's shenanigans way more than they tolerated Ted's - Friends was a product of it's times, HIMYM felt behind it's time. Ross feels like a typical character you'd see in the 90's, Ted feels like the hero of every "Nice Guy" that is actually not nice at all.

Plus, Ross had much better chemistry with Rachel than Ted ever did with Robin (or literally any love interest except the Mother) and the series made sure to never give us an alternative pairing that was much better than the planned one like HIMYM did with Barney and Robin (and I say this as someone that ships Joey and Rachel). And while Josh Radnor made the rare good scene of Ted feel great, David Schiwimmer, and the entire cast of Friends really, made mediocre or downright bad scenes enjoyable or at least tolerable. The only one in the HIMYM cast with the same talent was Neil, who was playing the character that we were not supposed to actually want to see get the girl, which just made it even easier for audiences to root for Barney, not Ted.

AAAAAAHHHHH, DON'T DO THIS TO ME! There are some many pairings I love in so many books, movies, series, soap-operas, etc.

*sighs* Okay, gun to my head, there's three, in no particular order that I absolutely ADORE, have made me cry, and that I legitimately don't understand how anyone could watch these shows and not ship them (spoilers for Friends, How I Met Your Mother and The Borgias, respectively)

Monica and Chandler

Because I was just 4-years-old when Friends final season was aired, I already knew these two were going to be endgame when I watched the show - and it didn't take long for me to see the appeal, even when they were still supposed to be just friends.

They're just so affectionate with each other right from the start, cuddling on the couch, helping each other out - and Chandler just casually says stuff like "If neither of us is married when we're fourty, I'm totally willing to marry and have a kid with you just so you get the family you want" and actively tries PROVE to her he is boyfriend material and they make a game out of it??????? Genius. Perfect. Amazing.

And then it happens, they hook up and right away they're couple goals. Can't keep their hands off each other, are super clingy, all of their friends find them ridiculously adorable, Chandler matures A LOT and Monica is very patient with him because she knows he's used to hiding any emotional turmoil behind a sarcastic joke, and they can joke about and tease each other without either of them being too mean or too sensitive.

Also their conflicts never last more than one or two episodes and they never break up after first getting together, and it was a breath of fresh air coming from the same show that gave us Ross and Rachel.

Barney and Robin

They have INSANE chemistry, Robin was the only woman Barney was truly willing to change for, and Barney was the one guy Robin was with that ever truly liked her for who she was.

They. Deserved. So. Much. Better.

Seriously, I can't get over how unfair their ending was. There's a reason I tell Zutarians to give this show a watch before they complain about how their ship, that was never even canon, was "robbed of it's happy ending."

We see Barney and Robin being teased as potentially having at least a fling someday as early as season 1, they finally hook up in season 3, season 4 is all about him struggling with being in love with her, seasons 5-7 are all about them dating then breaking up while still being very much in love yet never properly reconciliating because life gets in the way, season 8 is them getting engaged and being adorably happy together, the 9th and final season is THE WEEKEND OF THEIR WEDDING and them working through every last issue they still have to make sure they will a long, happy life together as a married couple...

Then the finale goes and says "Actually, they divorced off-screen because their hotel room had no wi-fi. Sorry." WHO THE FUCK DOES THAT? It's really no wonder the network cancelled the planned spin-off right after the finale aired.

Cesare and Lucrezia

Ah yes, a Nichya list of great ships includes a pair of siblings, specifically Older Brother X Young Sister, who would have thought? This time a kind of, sort of historical one! (Seriously, The Borgias is the kind of over-dramatic, historically inaccurate period piece I love wasting my time with, and the aesthetic is incredible).

Even as someone who is very into that kind of dynamic and that knew the show was gonna go there, I was still SHOCKED at how unsubtle is right from the start - especially once I found out the writer didn't want to play up the sexual tension originally.

Somehow, the first time we see these two on screen, Lucrezia is spying on her brother as he has sex and once he notices he playfully chases her around the garden, berating her for spying on him AGAIN, and then when they're on the ground together he just casually admits to loving her more than he loves God????????????????????????????? NORMAL SIBLING BEHAVIOR, EVERYBODY! NOTHING WEIRD GOING ON HERE!

I adore how protective (and possessive) Cesare is of her, ready to commit murder at the very thought of a man mistreating her - yet he is still willing to step aside when he thinks she found a good man, because nothing matters to him more than Lucrezia's happiness, not even his own. It just so happens that he always has to step in again because nobody loves her quite to insane degree he does, and thus she only feels truly safe, happy and loved with him, hence her saying "Only a Borgia can truly love a Borgia."

And they, legitimately, are insepareble. They're always close to each other, holding hands, hugging, cuddling, KISSING - all long before they're ready to admit, even to themselves that they're in love.

They are so clueless about what level of physical affection is normal between relatives that they made out in front of her husband and were surprised he found out about their incestuous affair.

ABBOTT ELEMENTARY (2021- ) 1x03 | 3x04