There was a plotline where Lily had to live with Barney for several days and he brought several girls home with him during that time. Unless Lily was also a part of the ruse which she would have no reason to, there’s no real suggestion in-universe that Barney was notably unsuccessful with women and lying about it.
edit: There was also a plotline where Barney had to apologize to a bunch of exes with the gang in tow and all of them confirmed that they were indeed seduced by Barney and did regret it afterwards.
And those aren’t counting people that you’d consider girlfriends (ie Nora, Robin, Quinn, [looks up the coffee shop one from when he had a ponytail] Katie).
Even if he padded his numbers when he they had the bracket going to figure out which girl he pissed off or if he lied about sleeping with just shy of 200 women, I still think he gets around. I don’t think he’s in bed with a different woman every night, but I think he’s slept with considerably more women than most people.
Also, looking at the math, Barney meets Ted when he was 25 and the episode where he was going to sleep with the 200th person would have been at some point after they met. But lets say Barney was 25 and lost his virginity at 18. That works out to just a bit over one new sexual partner every other week. Spread it out over more than 7 years and/or knock down the number a bit to account for Barney exaggerating and/or Ted not recalling the details correctly and it doesn’t seem undoable for someone like Barney that was consistently on the prowl.
According to the wiki, there are some continuity goofs, but in the show Barney lost his virginity at 23 (to a friend of his Mom) and is 32 when the episode aired. So that’s really only about ten different women a year over 9-10 years. Which actually doesn’t seem like a lot, given that hitting on women is mostly all Barney does when he’s not at work.
I didn’t say he NEVER got laid, just that he overemphasized his success. He’s like Schrodinger’s Wangmeister–it only works if/when he’s being observed. I like to think of Barney sitting on his couch watching reality TV then draaaaaaaagging himself to the closet to suit up to go out once again in service to his literal fanwanker. You have to admit, this is a very Barneyesque hypothetical.
Anyone is free to come up with any fan theories they want about any show but there’s clear in universe evidence that, despite Barney’s penchant for exaggeration, he was sleeping with a significant number of women still. Nothing indicates that your theory was ever intended as an interpretation of the show.
Did I say it was? What I SAID was that I like to think this. I find it makes me snicker and if it doesn’t amuse you then by all means go ahead and die on the hill of what you simply KNOW the writers meant. You’ll be SO much fun at parties!
I think you are both right. There is enough in-universe evidence for us to assume Barney’s 200 number by age 32 or so is accurate. HOWEVER, what is overemphasized is how “awesome” that really is.
With a few exceptions, Barney typically never sees any of these women again. Which means, based on simple math, Barney only has sex about twice a month. Barney’s success rate with women is also extremely low, based on the sheer volume he hits on.
In fact, there is an episode (maybe the same one) where Marshal argues that he is more successful with women than Barney both in terms of success rate (100% Lilly) and total volume of sex (Marshal and Lilly claim to have sex very frequently).
IOW, how “awesome” is Barney really, if he only sleeps with a girl once every few weeks, given how much effort he puts into it?
And everyone assumes Barney is good at sex, but we can’t assume that. He sleeps with a different woman once every couple of weeks. So chances are he probably doesn’t get much feedback and, given Barney’s nature, probably doesn’t care anyway.
See, my problem is that Barney taken strictly at face value is really an indefensible character who has juuuust enough charm and deniability to keep you from hating him. Adjusting my belief meter allows me to still enjoy rewatching the show, which I really do. It has many very redeeming features and is overall very smart. It also helps knowing it’s such a sham and that NPH is playing all that womanizer as an acting exercise and has no personal agenda. If he were straight it might hit differently/worse.
I suppose I see Barney as more of a caricature of many of the people I used to know when I was that age working in Manhattan. A lot of 20 and 30 something finance/tech bros in suits or Patagonia vests all trying to look like big shots. Go to the bar at Bryant Park after 6pm and you’ll find a hundred “Barneys”.
I don’t see anything inherently wrong with Barney wanting to sleep with lots of women. These are young women out partying in Manhattan and are probably not opposed to sleeping with some attractive, interesting, successful man they just met. The way I look at his various “plays” is that the women aren’t really fooled by them. They’re attracted to Barney and find his approach amusing enough to go home with.
Don’t forget the show is told through Ted’s eyes. So what we are really seeing is the two competing sides of Ted’s personality in his friends. Lilly and Marshal are Ted’s ideal relationship. But there is also very much a side of Ted that wants to be single and do whatever he wants. That side of Ted is projected onto Barney.
In fact, I recall a St Patrick’s Day episode that provided evidence to how skewed Ted’s perception can be. In the episode, Ted and Barney went to a club and thought they were being “awesome” the whole night. The next morning, Ted found out he but-dialed Marshal and Lilly and their voicemail recorded most of the evening. Turns out Ted was behaving like a total A-hole, almost on par with Barney. IIRC, Ted ended up getting punched by some guy for using his credit card and Barney woke up the next morning behind a dumpster in an ally (which they don’t really have in Manhattan FWIW).
Well sure, if you ignore the modifier “basically” and the suggestion that you intentionally use that lens… And that’s just me injecting my own unreliable narrator into the show, as we all do to one degree or another.
And that’s just me injecting my own unreliable narrator into the show, as we all do to one degree or another.