Wednesday, November 19, 2008

A LEGEN- WAIT FOR IT -DARY ZONK

Now that Marshall is working at Barney's firm on 'How I Met Your Mother', they've developed a code word ("conference call") to get out of work and go up to the roof to drink beer. (And Barney also uses that time to crush the beer cans and throw them at the pigeons.)

During one such trip up there, Marshall had an epiphany: they were living the corporate dream of drinking on the job and as he told Barney, they were now just like 'Mad Men'.
Barney: "We ARE mad men..."
Marshall: "Yeah, it's just like the show."
Barney: "What show?"

I typed that out the way I wanted to hear it. Of course, the reference was supposed to be to 'Mad Men', the show about the grey flanneled executives of Madison Avenue advertising in the early '60s, but I'm still hoping (against hope) that I can keep 'Mad Men' in the main Toobworld. So I need to see that Zonk eliminated.

In the perfect Toobworld, Marshall was just making reference to the fact that by drinking on the roof in the middle of the day, they were plain old garden-variety madmen. And Barney agreed. But then, when Marshall says it's just like the show, the Toobworld interpretation would be that he's referring to some other show known in the TV Universe, but not watched by us here at home in the real world.

Of course, ever since 'Mad Men' showed that clip from 'The Defenders' and actually talked about it - naming the episode and relating other specific details about it - I'm thinking they just want to be seen more aligned with the real world than to the artifice of Toobworld; that everything but the characters of their show should be the real deal. So it's more than likely I will have to banish 'Mad Men' from our little sandbox; probably send it off to reside in the alternate dimension for 'The West Wing', since it's unlikely 'Mad Men' will last long enough to encroach into the years of the Owen Lassiter presidency.

And if that's the case, then it's only fair play that 'How I Met Your Mother' can refer to 'Mad Men' as a TV show, since 'Mad Men' refers to 'The Defenders' as a TV show as well.

BCnU!
Toby O'B

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