Spoiler Alert (How I Met Your Mother)

"Spoiler Alert"
How I Met Your Mother episode
Episode no.	Season 3 Episode 8
Directed by	Pamela Fryman
Written by	Stephen Lloyd
Production code	3ALH08
Original air date	November 12, 2007
Guest stars
Lindsay Price (Cathy) Ron Butler (Proctor)
Season 3 episodes
Wait for It We're Not from Here Third Wheel Little Boys How I Met Everyone Else I'm Not That Guy Dowisetrepla Spoiler Alert Slapsgiving The Yips The Platinum Rule No Tomorrow Ten Sessions The Bracket The Chain of Screaming Sandcastles in the Sand The Goat Rebound Bro Everything Must Go Miracles

"Spoiler Alert" is the eighth episode in the third season of the television series How I Met Your Mother and 52nd overall. It originally aired on November 12, 2007.

Plot

Ted thinks that he has found the perfect girl, Cathy (played by Lindsay Price), but the group disagrees. At first they refuse to give a reason so as not to "spoil" her for him, but eventually Marshall tells him that she talks too much. Now that Ted knows, he cannot stand her garrulousness. The five friends then let slip each other's flaws until all are "spoiled", and thus are more annoying to those who had previously not noticed the flaws:

• Lily: chewing loudly (pointed out by Ted to Marshall);
• Marshall: singing about whatever he is doing at the moment, or nonsense (pointed out by Robin to Lily);
• Ted: correcting people (pointed out by Lily to Robin);
• Robin: overusing and misusing the word "literally" (pointed out by Ted);
• Barney: speaking in a falsetto, overusing catch phrases, and spacing out when his friends are talking to him (pointed out by Marshall, Robin and Ted to Barney).

Whenever one or more of the group has these quirks pointed out to them, the sound of glass shattering is heard. This represents the shattering of their illusions about one another.

Meanwhile, Marshall's bar exam results have been released, but he cannot remember the password he needs to retrieve the results online (thus making him wait for three months for a notification by mail). Barney offers to help but this is only a ruse, and, with Marshall angry at Barney and the whole gang annoyed with one another, the arguments reach a climax. The argument is halted when the group mockingly sings one of Marshall's 'nonsense' songs (Apple Orchard Banana Cat Dance 8 6 6 3); the song was actually a mnemonic device to help Marshall remember his password (aobcd8663 - it is not shown if it has upper or lower case letters) for the bar exam results website. He enters it and proudly announces "I'm a lawyer". The group then celebrates with champagne at MacLaren's with each sliding back into their bad habits (Lily crunching loudly on bar snacks, Ted making a correction on a comment, Robin using 'literally' incorrectly, Barney saying 'Law-suit up!' in a high-pitched voice, and Marshall singing his own praises) which they all let go.

At the end, in a time leap 3 years forward, Ted runs into his overly loquacious ex-girlfriend with her deaf fiancé, and uses sign language to announce how Cathy talks too much. Even though the man is deaf and it does not affect him, Ted has 'spoiled' Cathy to her fiancé, and a subtitle displays "(Glass shattering)" as Ted walks away and Cathy's fiancé looks on in despair.

Music

• "The Underdog" by Spoon

Continuity

• The montage showing the early bloom of Ted's romance with Cathy (Ted's newest girlfriend) is composed of a scene in which the two are sitting on the sofa watching television and drinking wine; a scene in which Ted lets Cathy try the sauce they are preparing in Ted's kitchen; and finally a scene in which Ted surprises Cathy with a flower at an outdoor flower shop. The scenes and structure of this montage parallel those of the montage used in the earlier season 3 episode "Little Boys", where Ted admits to actually liking Stacy (his love interest for that episode).
• A later montage shows Ted doing the same things, but only to stop Cathy from talking or to keep him from noticing: over-induging on wine on the sofa, shoving sauce into her mouth, desperately grabbing a flower to break her train of thought.
• Marshall's habit of always singing what he's doing is a throwback to the first season episode "Sweet Taste of Liberty".
• Ted's habit of correcting people is referenced by him in Shelter Island when he informs karate master Tony that he is already having sex with Tony's ex Stella, and then nervously remarks to himself 'why do I always have to correct people?' Robin also refers to it in Benefits, telling Lily that "no one likes a Ted" when Lily corrects her spelling.
• Ted again uses sign language to communicate with Cathy's deaf fiancé. He first displayed the skill in "How I Met Everyone Else", in a flashback to when he met Barney.
• In this episode Ted is dating Cathy. In the episode "Say Cheese", he brings a girl named Strawberry to the celebration of Marshall finishing the Bar exam, although finishing the Bar exam isn't the same as getting the results back weeks later.

Cultural references

• Ted calls Lily "Chewbacca" because she chews her food loudly.
• Cathy's name and her flaw of excessive talking is a reference to the phrase and toy Chatty Cathy.
• Barney mistakenly refers to the National Security Act of 1947 as the "National Security Act of 1948".
• While both have repeatedly expressed fondness for Star Wars, neither Barney nor Marshall seem to be familiar with the Strategic Defense Initiative.

Critical response

• Donna Bowman of the AV Club gave the episode a B rating.

• IGN rated the episode 8.6 out of 10

• Omar G of Television Without Pity rated the episode A-

External links

• Spoiler Alert at TV.com
• Spoiler Alert at the Internet Movie Database