# How I Met Your Mother 5/4: Mother at Last? \[spoilers\] **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [May 5, 2009, 4:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-i-met-your-mother-5-4-mother-at-last-spoilers/495388 "2009-05-05T04:16:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Wash](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/9dc877/32.png) [@Wash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wash)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-i-met-your-mother-5-4-mother-at-last-spoilers/495388/21 "2009-05-05T15:25:28Z")
A while back (season 2?) Ted mentions the kids already know the short version of how he and the mother met, involving the yellow umbrella. During this SagetTed VO, there’s a shot of the yellow umbrella tumbling across the street in the wind. In the dark. HIMYM writers have generally been much better about continuity than any other show out there, so because of this scene, and all the other indications such as the other, blonde kids, I can confidently say that Stella is not the mom, and that today’s episode has probably been planned for a long time as a red herring to get people talking about it. ---
**Author:** ![kasuo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8c91f0/32.png) [@kasuo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kasuo)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-i-met-your-mother-5-4-mother-at-last-spoilers/495388/22 "2009-05-05T15:25:32Z")
We’ve already met her sister, the hippie chick who canceled her wedding at the Yoga spa place on the island. ---
**Author:** ![Oredigger77](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/oredigger77/32/3181_2.png) [@Oredigger77](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oredigger77)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 4:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-i-met-your-mother-5-4-mother-at-last-spoilers/495388/23 "2009-05-05T16:59:06Z")
I enjoy the sense of humor of the writers to write an episode with no other purpose then to screw with their audience. The Barney stuff was great but I was pissed at the episode until I realized her being there is another gag that will be explained next week (I hope). I am curious what the show will do once they introduce the mother. I hope it doesn’t become a couple’s show, I think that would lose me. ---
**Author:** ![Khadaji](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Khadaji](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Khadaji)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 10:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-i-met-your-mother-5-4-mother-at-last-spoilers/495388/24 "2009-05-05T22:34:27Z")
I’m doubting that the Mother is Sarah Chalke for all the reasons mentioned. I do agree that her character was annoying, but I she’s hot, so I forgive her. I was disappointed that there wasn’t a web site for Bro’s Life. I thought for sure there would be. Has the show been renewed? Does anyone know? ---
**Author:** ![Piker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ba9def/32.png) [@Piker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Piker)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2009, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-i-met-your-mother-5-4-mother-at-last-spoilers/495388/25 "2009-05-06T03:29:21Z")
> [@mr.jp](#): > > There was no sense of the backstory in this episode. > > 1. We know that Stella isn’t the mother. It was shown in an earlier episode what the kids would’ve looked like had she been the mother. So that wasn’t such a shocking reveal. > > 2. Barney hasn’t been sexually active for 16 years. It was revealed that he lost his virginity quite late. > > 3. The list with the 199 girls: Ted was allowed to see it, which means Robin could not have been on it. And she counts too. I was thinking that this was the exact opposite. This episode _rewarded_ those who have watched every episode. 1. That trick was the point. TEd, in a previous episode, has said emphatically that Stella was not the mother. I don’t understand all the worry on the internets that Stella might be the mother. **She’s not. Ted has already said so.** Stella was a trick to the audience who expected the mother to be under that umbrella. 2. I thought this was the best part for continuity! Remember the episode where Barney’s “late-blooming” came out, he was desperate to that absurd other story about how he lost his virginity, which was much like the story of Dirty Dancing. After a while, the group humored him, and pretended that Dirty Dancing story was true. Marshall saying that Barney has been sexually active for 16 years was part of that. . . just humoring Barney’s absurd fantasy about how he lost his virginity. 3. Ted definitely knows that Barney slept with Robin. -Piker ---
**Author:** ![Sean\_Factotum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/50afbb/32.png) [@Sean\_Factotum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sean_Factotum)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2009, 2:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-i-met-your-mother-5-4-mother-at-last-spoilers/495388/26 "2009-05-06T14:09:17Z")
[QUOTE=Khadaji] Has the show been renewed? Does anyone know? [/QUOTE] For two more years, I believe. At least one, for sure. Robin and Stella are not the mothers. Robin has been referred to as “Aunt Robin” since the very first show. And, as mentioned above, Stella does not match the brief view of the woman who owned the yellow umbrella. It’s also been implied (but I can’t point to a specific episode or conversation, that Ted doesn’t yet know the Mom’s name. **ETA** What **Piker** said above. We’re just going to have to wait for the next two shows to see who Mom will be. The producers have promised to introduce her before the end of this season. ---
**Author:** ![chrisk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@chrisk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chrisk)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2009, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-i-met-your-mother-5-4-mother-at-last-spoilers/495388/27 "2009-05-06T14:19:46Z")
> [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > And if they do reveal the future mother, does that mean that Ted will be monogamous from now on? If so, I think the show would lose some of its appeal, particularly if they wind up being the sort of annoying couple who call each other cute names. I don’t think so. We, as the audience, will know that they end up having kids together, but there’s still all kinds of ground they can cover before Mom and Dad find that out themselves, falling as neatly as the stuff we’ve already been through under the umbrella of “The WHOLE story of how I met your mother.” Related question - at what point do you think that the series SHOULD end? With Ted and mommy finding out that she’s pregnant? ---
**Author:** ![Gadarene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47c2d/32.png) [@Gadarene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gadarene)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2009, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-i-met-your-mother-5-4-mother-at-last-spoilers/495388/28 "2009-05-06T14:27:22Z")
**Piker** is right; Stella obviously isn’t the mother. But meeting her on the street corner presumably leads to Ted meeting the mother, which is cool because it means that the entire Stella story was actually part of how Ted meets the mother, as opposed to just a season-long red herring. Can’t wait for the episode with the goat. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-i-met-your-mother-5-4-mother-at-last-spoilers/495388.md?page=1)