How I Met Your Mother (season 9)

Casting

The ninth season features a cast of six actors who receive star billing. Josh Radnor, Jason Segel, Cobie Smulders, Neil Patrick Harris, and Alyson Hannigan all reprise their roles in this season. Cristin Milioti, who was revealed as The Mother in the Season 8 finale, has been promoted to series regular, a first for the series.

How I Met Your Mother was initially scheduled to run for eight seasons after CBS ordered a seventh and eighth season in 2011. The show gained a resurgence in ratings during season seven, and CBS began discussing the possibility of ordering a ninth season. By 2012, Deadline.com reported that CBS, 20th Century Fox, and all regular cast members except Segel wanted to continue with a ninth season. Segel had initially wanted to focus on his film career, leaving the fate of a ninth season uncertain. Co-creator Carter Bays observed that the negotiations were stressful, with a lot of "white-knuckled, nail-biting going on", but claimed that he was "confident that everything would work out". Craig Thomas noted the flexibility of the show's filming schedule, saying: "We've always done everything humanly possible to allow [the actors] to do other things." Segel ultimately decided to sign on for the final season, and Season 9 was announced on December 21, 2012. Thomas and Bays were relieved that a deal had been reached for another season, fearing that having to wrap up the show in Season 8 would have "felt rushed" and been "disappointing".

Bays and Thomas were first introduced to Milioti as a possibility for playing The Mother through casting director Marisa Ross. Narrowing down the candidates to three actresses early on allowed the casting department to avoid a publicized casting call for The Mother. Milioti was flown into Los Angeles to do an on-camera "chemistry test" with Radnor as part of her audition. Harris, who is a Broadway fan and had recognized her in the makeup trailer, gave Milioti a hug and exclaimed "You're The Mother!" before she was actually cast. Milioti was chosen partly because her musical history and time on Broadway, including her performance in Once, would have allowed her to play the role of The Mother, a musician, more convincingly. Bays and Thomas wanted to avoid casting someone who was well-known, fearing that the audiences' preconceptions of a famous actress might spill into her performance in the role. Milioti's casting was well received by critics, many of whom lauded the show for resisting the urge to cast a familiar face and instead opting for a relative unknown. Bill Kuchman from TV.com observed that, because "Milioti is a blank canvas to many of us", she has the "freedom to create a How I Met Your Mother character that's free of the burden of being compared to her past work".

When asked at Comic-Con about guest stars, Bays revealed that, "If there's someone we loved over the course of the series, there's a good chance they're coming back [for the final season]." Returning guest stars include Wayne Brady and John Lithgow as Barney's brother and father, respectively, and Ellen D. Williams as Robin's co-worker Patrice.

Also reprising their roles as Ted's teenage daughter and son in "The Year 2030" are Lyndsy Fonseca and David Henrie. For the bulk of the series' run, stock footage of a younger Fonseca and Henrie from the series' first season have been used, the better to reflect the kids not aging while hearing their father tell his story. The kids' scenes included one key moment filmed before production on Season 2 began; that scene, according to Bays and Thomas, served as the climax to Ted's story of how he and the kids' mother met. The climax was filmed on a set closed to everyone except Bays, Thomas, a camera operator, and Fonseca and Henrie, who signed non-disclosure agreements. Fonseca states she had forgotten the details of the scene in the years since its filming, while Henrie states, "I do remember. I think I remember. We'll see."

Main cast

Promotion

How I Met Your Mother's cast and crew hosted a panel at the 2013 Comic-Con for the first time in the show's history to promote Season 9. The panel released a teaser trailer featuring Ted's children as adults, still listening to Ted tell his story eight years from when he first began. Angry at having spent years listening, they insist Ted finish his story so they can leave. The panel answered questions from fans as well as releasing select plot spoilers planned for the season.

Bays was enthusiastic about the trajectory of the season, saying that "we've never been in a place where it's July and we've plotted out the entire season, but we have this year because there's so much exciting stuff".

Distribution

Season 9 premiered on CBS on September 23, 2013, with two 22-minute episodes, and contained 24 episodes.

Reception

The ninth season of How I Met Your Mother received mostly positive reviews from critics. The review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes gave an 80% approval rating for the season with an average rating of 7.3/10, based on 10 reviews. At the end of the season, Max Nicholson of IGN gave the season a negative review, writing: "Many How I Met Your Mother fans felt betrayed after watching the series finale -- and understandably so after Season 9 spent 22 of its 24 episodes building towards a wedding that was basically meaningless. In retrospect, almost any other arc would have made a better foundation for Season 9, including the series finale. In the end, unbalanced storytelling, lack of focus and unfunny detours led to the show's eventual downfall." Adam Vitcavage of Paste Magazine gave the season a lukewarm review, saying that "Nothing was over-the-top funny, but it was a perfect combination of laughter and sweet moments that really do make up for all of the lackluster episodes in the past few seasons."