Season's Feelings: New Girl - Season 1

Well this was just straight up the most surprising show of the season. If you had told me when the season started that my favorite, most intensely anticipated show of 2011 was going to be Zooey Deschanel in a wacky roommate sitcom, I would've slapped you across the face and demand you leave my lavish castle that instant. But when you slap together a solid writing staff, a stellar cast (headed by Ms. Deschanel herself), and even incredible production values (to this layman anyway), you get hands down one of the best new shows on television.

That's not to say it wasn't rough there for awhile. Everything up until The 23rd was pretty damn hit or miss. With a lot of miss. A LOT of miss. But once the show found it's footing and figured out the voices of its characters (especially Jess), it was pretty damn hard to mess up.

How I Met Your Mother - 7x24 - The Magician's Code, Part Two

Okay first of all, why was the last episode called "The Magician's Code Part One", when it had barely anything to do with this episode. If anything, the last episode should have been called "Good Crazy, Part 2!" I have issues with inappropriate episode title naming.

Now that that's off my chest. So much is happening!

How I Met Your Mother - 7x23 - The Magician's Code, Part One

Lily's in labor.

Marshall's half a state away and three sheets to the wind, Barney's riding motorcycles inside casinos, and Ted is sending out horrible video announcements inviting everyone to share in lily's widening cervix.

Robin is slightly more useful, showing off her heretofore unseen talents in Canadian animal husbandry. Which, in her defense, turns out to be a mostly transferable skill set. At least until she puts down the tarp and slides on the elbow-length plastic gloves. Actually, that probably still works.

How I Met Your Mother - 7x22 - Good Crazy

If you love someone, change them. At least that's what everyone is trying to do this week. Ted keeps turning his dates into Robin (who steals the episode as a hallucination. Again.) Barney tries to get Quinn to quit stripping. Marshall tries to turn Lily into the annoying hyperactive parent he's training himself to be, and Lily tries to get Marshall to chill the fuck out. Meanwhile, I try to force this show to god damn do something, by sheer force of will, and all of a sudden, I succeed!

How I Met Your Mother - 7x21 - Now We're Even

Ted is enjoying the new found freedom that comes from finally living alone for the first time in his adult life. And because it's Ted, "new found freedom" means sad, depressing, and occasionally flat out dangerous things he can do without anybody pointing out how stupid they are.

How I Met Your Mother - 7x20 - Trilogy Time

Speaking of padding...

Every three years Marshall and Ted (and eventually Barney) get together to watch all three original Star Wars movies back to back, reflect on how shitty their lives are, and imagine how much better they'll be in the next three years.

So that means we spend the entire episode swide-swooping through real and imagined versions of the guys lives between 2003 and today, accomplishing little and learning nothing we didn't already know. Well except for one bonus flash forward to 2015...

How I Met Your Mother - 7x19 - The Broath

Let's get the first disappointment of the night out of the way: Ted did not, in fact, go all Bill Bixby after leaving the apartment last week. We are not getting an episode of him hitchhiking through the village, helping widowed mothers keep the ranch, and fighting off road bandits. Instead he manages to do something stupider.

Also, now that things are getting serious with Quinn, Barney makes Ted swear that he won't tell everyone she's a stripper. So he immediately tells everyone she's a stripper.