Ok this time for real…
I know I’ve speculated on the strike affecting How I Met Your Mother before. And I was wrong. I promise I’m not trying to cause unwarranted panic, I just hadn’t heard any official news and am a bit paranoid about it. Well it looks like the official word is in. Carter Bays and Craig Thomas have posted an “official” statement to the HIMYM MySpace Bulletin board. It’s as “official” as a statement can be on a myspace page. Since MySpace requires you to be logged in, and possibly one of their friends to read the note I will paste it in it’s entirety below. Thanks to “Ted” for sending this in.
Dec 11, 2007 3:26 PM
Letter to the Fans from the ProducersLETTER TO THE FANS
Hello HIMYM fans. Motherheads? Howsiers? What are you calling yourselves these days? So first things first, thank you for the incredible support you guys have given us over the years. We mean it. When you create a show, you never think you’re doing anything more than telling a funny story. But apparently we’ve created a community, and it seems to be a community of pretty decent people. It’s a community we’d probably want to have a beer with. Our fans seem cool and smart and funny, and it drives us to want to make the show better, to never let it stagnate, to always push ourselves to try something interesting and new. So thank you.
Anyway, we’d like to take a little moment here to come out from behind the desk, cool-11th-grade-english-teacher-style, roll up our sleeves and “rap” at you guys for a bit. We want to talk about the strike. By now you probably know what strike we’re talking about, but if you don’t, watch this movie: http://youtube.com/watch?v=oJ55Ir2jCxk
What it boils down to is this: Tonight’s episode of “How I Met Your Mother” is the last new one for a while. Starting next week, we grimly trudge off the map and into the desert of reruns and reality TV.
We can’t tell you how difficult this last month and a half has been for us, both personally and professionally. We work with the best people in this business – the best at their jobs, the best at being nice and decent human beings – and the thought of all of them out of work over the holidays is almost too much to bear. We miss them all every day.
That’s by far the suckiest part of the strike – nothing tops that. But there’s other suckiness, such as the suckiness of having to put this story on pause. We love our show. We love the stories we get to tell. And this year on How I Met Your Mother, we think the story is particularly great. A very juicy, breathtaking, funny, and (to use our director Pam’s word) yummy story was just starting to unfold as the ax began to fall. We’re very excited about the second half of this season, and not bringing it to you right now, factory-direct, sparkling-new, is simply killing us.
But enough with our problems. The reason we’re writing today is to beseech you guys, the fans of this show, to bear with us. The love and support you’ve shown us over the last two and a half seasons has been truly surprising and awesome, and we hope you’ll rejoin us when this whole mess is over with. But for now, this is going to have to be a long distance relationship. We know you’ll get lonely, and Mario Lopez is such a good dancer… but come on, hang in there. Sure, long distance doesn’t ever work for anyone, but we’re different. What we’ve got is special. We can make this work.
But in the meantime, if you want to help us end this strike quickly, please visit www.fans4writers.com. That site explains exactly what the WGA is asking for, exactly why it’s completely reasonable, and exactly how you can show your support.
And just in case the strike goes on so long that the medium of television goes out of business forever and we never get to make another episode, the mother is the coat check girl.
Happy Holidays!
Carter Bays and Craig Thomas
December 12th, 2007 at 3:51 am
This letter was also posted on the IMDB Message board shortly after “The Platinum Rule” aired. There was talk of trying to crank out a few more episodes before the writer’s strike, but that didn’t happen, and “The Platinum Rule” was the last one to get finished before that. But right now there are no new episodes of HIMYM remaining, and we won’t see any new ones until the strike has been resolved.
However, this doesn’t mean we won’t see HIMYM anymore, as CBS has already released its schedule for the winter and HIMYM will be in reruns in its normal Monday 8/7 C timeslot.
December 12th, 2007 at 10:26 am
Who is this “coat check girl ” ?
December 12th, 2007 at 11:33 am
Well if a coat check girl is a person who takes care of the coats at a club (I’m swedish and don’t know all of your fancy expressions over there), then I think it’s the girl in S01E05, about 15 minutes into the episode. Happy Holidays!
December 12th, 2007 at 1:48 pm
Should be a joke isn’t it ?
The writers wouldn’t take the risk to give it away like that. What do you think ?
It’s maybe a way to keap us posted ?
December 12th, 2007 at 2:50 pm
It is a joke. In the same episode with the coat check girl, Ted (Bob Saget’s narration) says that she wasn’t the mother.
December 12th, 2007 at 3:30 pm
Yeah, that was in “Okay Awesome”, when Ted put all the coats on and got her number. She was the one he made Barney tip under threat of telling the “grinding with his cousin” story.
December 20th, 2007 at 10:33 pm
That thing about the coat check girl was a joke. On the first season DVD, the cast does a comentary for the episode “Okay Awsome”. During that comentary in the scene with the coat check girl, Neil Patrick Harris makes a joke and says that she is the mother. I think that is why they said that in their letter. I think they were trying to make a REALLY inside joke to the most die hard HIMYM fans. Because like Jaden said, in the same episode with the coat check girl, Ted (Bob Saget’s narration) says that she wasn’t the mother. I don’t think that the creators of the show would give up the ending of their masterpiece because of a writers strike that most definately will not put the medium of television out of business. I am positive that we will be seeing more episodes soon!
December 21st, 2007 at 10:59 am
I knew it was Coat Check girl! lol… sad letter to have to write but I like the way the are trying to encourage the community during the uncertainty of the show.
January 16th, 2008 at 10:54 pm
No no no no no no no no no no. You didn’t, did you?
This can’t be. This sitcom cannot over… No check girl, i wanna cry…. Buhuhuhuhuh. Can not over because it is wait, legen -wait- dary…
January 17th, 2008 at 11:59 am
Here is the video that Ted says she is not mum.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qmcozdZ6YKw
January 23rd, 2008 at 5:15 pm
It really saddens me to learn today that HIMYM is off air…… to say I am a fan would be like showing candlelight to the sun….
I would like to know from the blog admin how we can make a difference and get our damn show back on air….please let us rally our support for the people who are truly talented and deserve what they are asking for…. I am a resident of India… (..yeah I know I’m not your regular target audience but me and my friends are loyalist of the series…)
and I will try to support in whatever way it is possible for the show to continue in its entirety!!
January 24th, 2008 at 12:15 pm
Deepak, there is not really anything we can do as fans. It’s up to the writers of the show to determine when, and if they come back to write more shows.
March 4th, 2008 at 10:37 am
[...] of the Shirt), Ted’s old girlfriend, who knew Krav Maga. Coat Check Girl (OK Awesome), that Carter Bays even joked that if the writers strike ruined the show for good, she was the mother. Even though we never meet her (which would be a great idea for this season…hint, hint), the [...]