‘How I Met Your Mother’ Has a Character Inconsistency With Season 1 Robin and Her Fleshed Out Role
How I Met Your Mother is a long-running TV show that helped to solidify Neil Patrick Harris’s status as a comedy icon – and introduced viewers all around the world to clever characters such as Ted Mosby and Barney Stinson. How I Met Your Mother ran from 2005 through 2014 and remains hugely popular in syndication to this day. Although critics and fans have praised the series for the writing and character development, there’s no doubt that there are several obvious plot holes in How I Met Your Mother, including one involving Robin that still has fans scratching their heads.
‘How I Met Your Mother’ is a cult-classic TV series
How I Met Your Mother debuted on TV in 2005. The series tells the story of Ted Mosby, a single man living in New York City, and his exploits with his friends, including the womanizer Barney Stinson, portrayed by Neil Patrick Harris, and the news reporter Robin Scherbatsky, played by Cobie Smulders. Although the series features lots of clever humor and outrageous antics, the love story at the heart of How I Met Your Mother makes the show a sweet standard for viewers of all ages.
How I Met Your Mother received many awards and nominations throughout the course of its run on TV, including the People’s Choice Award for Favorite Network TV Comedy in 2012. The performers in the show were also praised, with former child star Harris winning the award for Favorite TV Comedy Actor twice over the years.
What is Robin’s major character inconsistency in ‘How I Met Your Mother’?
As one of Ted’s best friends and his eventual love interest, Robin is one of the primary characters in How I Met Your Mother. Robin is a non-traditional news anchor, who has a deep fondness for scotch and cigars—she’s also, as revealed in later seasons, a gun aficionado.
However, this twist is in direct contrast to the portrayal of Robin in the first season. According to Insider, in the Season One episode “The Limo,” Robin is visibly terrified when a man known as Not-Moby brandishes a gun when Robin and her friends are out enjoying New Year’s Eve parties.
Considering that Robin was plainly shown to have an affinity for guns in later seasons of the show, regularly visiting the shooting range and even wearing a gun-shaped necklace, this can most likely be chalked up to an obvious plot hole that was missed by showrunners. Likely, the writers hadn’t clearly fleshed out Robin’s role at this point in the series.
Other notable plot holes in ‘How I Met Your Mother’
Robin’s plotline involving guns isn’t the only instance of things not lining up precisely in How I Met Your Mother. Insider reports that there are several obvious plot holes throughout the course of the series. One of these involves Lily’s supposed dog allergies.
Early on in the series, the character of Lily explains that she can’t move in with Robin because she’s allergic to dogs – but just a few episodes prior to that storyline, Lily was shown sitting in Robin’s apartment and even petting a dog. While it is possible that Lily wasn’t telling the whole truth involving her allergies, it could also be explained as a simple plot hole.
Casting for certain minor characters wasn’t always consistent, either. In fact, Barney’s brother-in-law was played by two different actors throughout the course of the series. This particular issue isn’t confined to How I Met Your Mother—many TV shows have recast minor roles during a series run, sometimes with great success and sometimes not.
