It’s the big question How I Met Your Mother is facing right now, beyond the usual ‘Who’s the Mother?’ one – Is Season 8 the last one for the show? With CBS saying they’d like the show to return for a Season 9 next year (and that they are ”very optimistic” about that occurring), but no new deals in place so far, the show is going into Season 8 with a lot of uncertainty about just how much longer it will run for.
I attended a screening of the Season 8 premiere of How I Met Your Mother this morning, and during a Q&A afterwards, creators Craig Thomas and Carter Bays discussed the show’s current status - which is made trickier because this is a series heading towards a specific resolution to its story, unlike most TV comedies.
Said Thomas, of the Season 8 premiere, “That premiere is the first episode of the final season of How I Met Your Mother. I don’t feel like we pulled any punches. That’s the premiere of the last season of How I Met Your Mother for sure, ultimately. We wrote it in a way…” He and Bays both noted that whatever decision is made on a renewal, they didn’t alter their plans for the premiere, which puts at least one major new piece into the puzzle.
Thomas added, “We’re writing this season like it’s the end and we’ll have to sort of figure it out and have a Plan A and a Plan B going, and we’re approaching the moment where those two things will diverge. But we really feel like this launches the last season of How I Met Your Mother.”
Josh Radnor and guest star Thomas Lennon in How I Met Your Mother's season premiere
The duo admitted that the more time that goes on without knowing, the more problematic it gets for them. Said Bays, “Without saying too much, because there are discussions going on right now for that, but yeah, it gets more and more difficult as it goes on… It’s going to be more and more work that we’ll have to throw out if this isn’t our last season. So we’d like to know as soon as possible, but it’s also a lot of big machinery moving around, so we’re staying out of it and letting it sort itself out.”
Thomas added, “The upside is we’re not coming to work and sobbing every day. ‘This is the last time we’ll do this… We only have 18 more episodes!’ There’s something actually merciful about that, because it’s going to be so hard to say goodbye to it.”
Bays noted what an unusual position they were in, remarking, “We are just teetering right in the middle of the spectrum, which is a weird place to be… It’s like the undecided voters! The people who haven’t made up their mind about who they’re going to vote for, they’re the ones that get all the attention. If this is the last season of How I Met Your Mother, it’s everything we ever dreamed of and more and eight seasons is great. That being said, do we have a ninth season in us? Absolutely. We could do a ninth season if it was possible.”
The How I Met Your Mother cast are all signed through Season 8, so new deals would need to be struck for them to return. Asked if they could conceive of going into Season 9 without the entire current cast, Bays deadpanned, “I would prefer to do it without one or more of the actors. I’m really sick of, like, three of them.” More seriously, he noted that if How I Met Your Mother does come back again, it’s with the entire group, saying, “No, we would never. We would never do it. We’re a family and we’re finishing this thing together.”
I asked whether it seemed like the decision would be made soon and Thomas replied, “There’s a negotiation that’s begun between the studio and the network and actors, but these things can move slow and we don’t know exactly what the case will be. We’ve never been in this exact position before. But we’re going to need to know pretty soon.”
As for their overall thoughts on the show possibly ending this season, Bays said, “We have plenty of idea of how to extend the series, I think one more season, and I think that could be great, but wrapping it up in Season 8 would be amazing. There’s a part of us as writers… We’re drawn to that, a little bit. Because it’s exciting. We get to answer everything and every episode of the season is so much more important because of that. There’s something sort of thrilling and also very nostalgic and sad to think about, but it’s going to be exciting to write. So we’re okay with either outcome and we’re really writing it like it’s the end. We sort of come in every day and go, ‘This is the last season of How I Met Your Mother… Until we hear different.’”
How I Met Your Mother: Season 8 premieres Monday, September 24th at 8pm on CBS. Check back here at IGN TV after it airs for more from our chat with Bays and Carter about what's to come this season.
Source : ign[dot]com
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