Marshall:(giving a toast) To my fiance!
Lily: To the future!
Ranjit: To one hell of a night!
Lily: To the future!
Ranjit: To one hell of a night!
In the year 2030, Ted begins recapping to his children the events that led him to meeting their mother, starting back in 2005 with the engagement of his friends Marshall and Lily.
This episode provides examples of:
- Abuse Mistake: Of the "innocent mistaken for abusive" variety after Marshall accidentally hits Lily in the eye with a champagne cork. Marshall is still apologizing when they're getting into a cab to go to the hospital and the driver immediately demands to know if he hit her. Marshall and Lily pause for a second before exploding in laughter at how unlikely that is given Marshall's Gentle Giant nature.
- Analogy Backfire:Ted: I gotta do what that guy couldn't. I gotta take the leap. Okay, not a perfect metaphor, 'cause for me it's falling in love and getting married and for him it's... death.
Barney: Actually, that is a perfect metaphor. [to Marshall and Lily] By the way, have I congratulated you two yet? - Arc Symbol: The blue French horn, not only to this episode, but for the entire series as a whole. The reason is it represents Ted's devotion to Robin.
- Bait-and-Switch: The audience (and Ted's future kids) are led to believe he will eventually marry and start a family with the beautiful woman he meets at MacLaren's bar and takes on a date. At the end of the episode, Future Ted reveals that the woman actually becomes not his children's mother, but their Honorary Aunt.
- Big Damn Kiss: All his friends, Carl the bartender, and even Ranjit, the cab driver they just met, tell Ted that Robin was giving him signals to kiss her the whole time and he missed the moment to give her one, while he refuses to believe it.
- Barney tries to demonstrate that signs don't exist by giving a big smooch to Marshall without any warning.
- Big "WHAT?!": That's not only Robin's reaction when Ted blurted it on the first day, it was the reaction EVERYONE, including the rest of the gang and Ted's kids in 2030 have.
- Blonde, Brunette, Redhead: Robin's friends. The blond is the Woman Scorned, the brunette is their Token Black Friend, and the redhead is the one with a skunk stripe.
- Early-Installment Weirdness: The kids' clothes and the living room are very different from later episodes.
- Everyone Looks Sexier if French: Barney comments that Lebanese women have replaced half-Asian women in his fantasies.
- Eyelash Fluttering: Discussed: after his horrible date, Ted tells Barney that he apparently ruined it because she was giving him "the signal" and he was missing it. A confused Barney adds, "What, was she gonna bat her eyes at you in Morse code?"
- Foreshadowing:
- When Ted is clamoring his Love at First Sight to Robin, Barney interrupted him.
- The last lines in the episode pretty much sums up the entire series.Future Ted: And that is how I met your Aunt Robin.Ted's future son: Aunt Robin?!Ted's future daughter: I thought this is about how you met mom?!
- Gory Discretion Shot: Lily's Eye Scream due to being accidentally hit by a cork is not shown on screen. The injury's only emphasized through Marshall's horrified reaction.
- Heroes Love Dogs: Robin has five dogs. Ted is pleased because he is a dog person and always wanted to date and marry a woman who loves dogs.
- Love at First Sight: Ted looks through the bar, sees a beautiful woman and instantly falls in love with her, based just on her looks and her smile. When he meets her and asks her to have a date, his feelings only grow stronger.
- Meet Cute: Barney invokes and enforces this on Ted via his "Have you met Ted?" game/joke/gag.
- Mixed Ancestry Is Attractive: Barney once had a thing for half-Asian women specifically.
- Mrs. Hypothetical: After Ted comes home from his first date with Robin, he excitedly and dreamily says he has found the future Mrs. Ted Mosby.
- No Sense of Personal Space: Ted jokingly complains that Lily and Marshal are not very private people. They share a lot because Ted and Marshall have been roommates since college.Ted: I've been there for all the big moments of you and Lily. The night you met, your first date, other first things.
- Opposites Attract: Invoked in the whole base of Lily and Marshall's Olive Theory, as Robin and Marshall hate them and Lily and Ted love them, meaning that it's a sign that they complete each other. Later averted when Barney discovers that Marshall lied about hating olives just to give them to Lily on their first date.
- The Reveal: The episode ends with the kids learning that the girl was their aunt Robin, not their mother. The story was just beginning.
- Running Gag: Barney keeps nagging Ted to wear a suit. On and on and on. "I can't believe you're still not wearing a suit!"
- Too Much Information: When Marshall and Lily take a cab to the hospital, the driver at first thought that Marshall hit her, but Lily clarifies that Marshall could never be rough, even when they were having sex. She stops when Marshall reminds her to not overshare with strangers.
- Wacky Marriage Proposal: Marshall to Lily. He planned to make just a romantic dinner in their apartment and pop up the ring, but could barely keep it a surprise. Right after having sex in their kitchen floor, Marshall accidentally hit Lily in the eye with the champagne cork. Lily never got mad at him because she was too happy with her engagement ring.
- What Happened to the Mouse?: Robin's friends from this episode just disappeared from the show.
- Woman Scorned: One of Robin's friends from work just broke up with someone, was hating all men on the planet, and Robin asks Ted if she could throw a drink on his face just to please her.
- Your Princess Is in Another Castle!: An obvious use: At the start, Future Ted starts to tell the story of... how he met his children's mother. However, by end of the episode: "And that, kids, is the story of how I met your Aunt Robin." Justified, since Future Ted said it would be a long story.
