In last night’s episode of How I Met Your Mother, we finally learned what Barney does for a living. Want to know what it is? Please. No, really, it’s please, or more accurately, P.L.E.A.S.E., which stands for:
Back in 1998, after being dumped by Shannon for Greg, Barney went through his transformation that left him awesome and decided to enter the corporate world, but with ulterior motives. He finds and asks Greg for a corporate job at AltruCell Corporation, and is given the “please” task, an acronym for Provide Legal Exculpation And Sign Everything. The task legally implicated Barney in all corporate mishaps and schemes. Barney then reveals the main motivation (besides morality) behind his employment record was to track Greg down, gain his trust, then destroy him for stealing Shannon from him. He entered the corporate world under Greg’s tutelage while secretly working as an informant for the FBI so he could implicate Greg over the years for the company’s wrongdoings and have him jailed. (Via)
It’s no D.E.N.N.I.S. System, but it’ll do. The mystery of how Barney makes his money has been a recurring joke on How I Met since season one, but creators Craig Thomas and Carter Bays are finally giving into fan service because the show’s ending soon. Here are 30 callbacks that we’ve seen so far during season nine.
Lily’s “you’re dead to me” look returns when The Mother runs out of cookies.
“Alright train,” Lily says while boarding the LIRR, “Let’s show your critics you’re not just a dumpster on wheels full of drunk idiots.” Barney and Ted learned that the hard way in “The Drunk Train.”
Robin asks Barney to cover his ears and hum “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” so she can discuss something with James, using the excuse, “It’s for the bride.” Barney used the same song to his advantage in “Something Blue.”
Marshall and Ted have been fighting with swords (and stabbing Lily) since “The Duel.”
Ted talks to the Empire State Building, which he first mentioned in “Mosbius Designs.”
ZABKA. Barney briefly makes William Zabka his best man, despite only knowing him since “The Bro Mitzvah.”
Oh, hey, Slutty Pumpkin.
While driving through Chicago, Marshall gets a pizza from Gazzola’s, a “filthy Mecca of spectacular if under cooked pizza,” courtesy of Ted. They last took a road trip there in “Duel Citizenship.”
Barney and Robin steal Marshall and Lily’s meet-cute “Pilot” story to help secure a wedding venue.
Ted uses the drainpipe to sneak into Lily’s room to steal her cellphone. He boasts, “No big deal, I can totally climb it,” a reference to “Farhampton” when he overcame his fear of climbing.
Ted sings Lily to sleep with a version of “Marvin’s Lullaby,” which Marshall and Lily wrote in “The Fortress.”
Marshall tries to get Daphne to play “Zitch Dog” with him, a game introduced in “Arrivederci, Fiero.” She declines.
While Ted is standing on a lighthouse, Future Ted explains, “I felt something inside me, something that had only happened one other time in my adult time.” That something was puke. Vomit free since ’93, except those two times.
Barney and Robin go to an underground bar, the same one Carly drags Ted to in “Ring Up.”
Ted and Robin’s private joke was annoying in “Slapsgiving,” Ted and Robin’s private joke is still annoying.
We first learned about Hammond Druthers’s baseball signed by Pete Rose during “Aldrin Justice.”
Always with the blue french horn.
In “Pilot,” Robin tells Ted that she hates olives, proving “The Olive Theory” correct. She’s since changed her mind.
I WOULD WALK 500 MILES AND I WOULD WALK 500 MORE…
Detective Mosby, formerly of the Mosby Boys from “Dowisetrepla,” is back on the case.
The Rastafarian on the beach is “eating a sandwich,” not literally eating a sandwich.
The song playing during Jerry and Loretta’s elevator sexy time is “Bang-Bang-Bangity-Bang.”
Another recurring song: “Marshall versus the Machines,” first heard in “Subway Wars.”
Ted’s hatred of wedding bands pops up for the first time since “Band or DJ?”
Rather than immediately get into a fight, Marshall and Lily say “pause” when they reunite, something they’ve done many times before to get to the good before inevitably returning to the bad.
Merry Slapsgiving, everyone.
Marshall has to be slapped by a number of people who hate Barney, for some reason, including previous hookups Crazy Meg, Shannon, Shelly, Karina, Mrs. Douglas, and Nora.
Nothing good happens after 2 a.m., except for the birth of Ted’s second child, Luke.
Barney has many levels of drunk, including Jabba the Hutt and in “The Perfect Cocktail,” Richard Dawson.
Barney has been teasing Ted that he slept with his mom for seasons. Turns out he couldn’t stretch a single into a double.
