So, I love both of these shows ... have from day one. Both have amazing casts, terrific storylines, both stand-alones and season long arcs, both are funny as hell (though Castle, being an hour-long crime drama as well, does touch on the serious more often).
But tonight I had a HUGE moment of deja vu watching HIMYM ...
BIG SPOILERS AHEAD
On How I Met Your Mother, it was the night of Barney's (Neil Patrick Harris) "Bro Mitzvah" - a.k.a. his bachelor party. He had put his friends - Lily (Alyson Hannigan), Marshall (Jason Segal), Ted (Josh Radnor) and fiancee Robin (Cobie Smolders) - on alert that he expected the most LEGENDARY night of his life, completing the demand with a list of criteria they were expected to meet, including such items as booze (duh), cigars (duh), strippers (duh), a moment where they fear for their lives, mind-blowing entertainment and a visit by the Karate Kid - no, not Ralph Macchio ... to Barney, Ralph was the ENEMY. No, the TRUE Karate Kid to Barney was William Zabka, who played villain-to-everyone-else Johnny.
At the same time, he left Robin to endure dinner with his mother (Frances Conroy) alone, which was disastrous from the start. Or so it seemed ...
See, the group had quite the dilemma: how do you make a night memorable for a guy who makes every night the best night of his life? Robin had the answer - give him the worst night of his life. And so "The Barney" was born (only fair, since Barney put Robin through hell for weeks leading up to his proposal).
So Barney was treated to a bad Atlantic City hotel room, a clown for entertainment, ex-fiancee Quinn (Becki Newton) as his stripper, Chinese mobsters to whom Barney supposedly sold Marshall for $80,000, and an appearance by ... you guessed it ... Ralph Macchio.
Robin then confronted Barney about her horrible night and called off the engagement. Barney, at rock bottom, was dragged back to his apartment by the mobsters, who joined the whole gang in yelling "Surprise!" to the stunned Barney, who then proceeded to run down the hell of the night and disbelief about how they could do that to him ... before saying it was AWESOME!
It was a great ruse and a fun episode. But I couldn't help but think back to a few weeks ago ...
See, recently Castle did an episode that was a tribute to Rear Window, with Castle (Nathan Fillion) stuck in a wheelchair with a broken leg. After depleting every possible amusement withing reach, he resorted to people-watching through binoculars. It was then he happened to witness a murder in the building across the street. He did everything he could to get girlfriend and police detective Beckett (Stana Katic) to believe him, growing more and more frustrated that no evidence was found, no body and no one believing him. He even roped daughter Alexis (Molly Quinn) in, having her watch his back as he broke into the suspect's apartment.
Finally, after ruining a glamorous, romantic evening Beckett had planned to celebrate his birthday, Castle drove her to go over and confront the killer. As Castle watched through the binoculars, he saw Beckett get attacked by the man. Castle and pal detectives Ryan and Esposito (Seamus Dever and Jon Huertas) raced to save her. As they burst into the room, Castle was greeted with a hearty "Surprise!" as Beckett laid out exactly how she had roped everyone in to create the mystery just for her man. Castle, too, looked to be incredibly upset and Beckett was worried she had screwed up ... until Castle declared it the best birthday ever!
See what I mean? I almost wanted to see if the same person had written both episodes, cause they were damn similar, don't you think? Doesn't mean I enjoyed either any less because I didn't. And both played out very and believably well - I personally didn't see either twist coming (HIMYM revealed their half-way through the ep and continued with us in the know, Castle saved it to the end, stringing us along to be surprised right along with him).
But definitely deju vu to the nth degree.
Catch How I Met Your Mother Mondays at 8 p.m. on CBS.
Catch Castle Mondays at 10 p.m. on ABC.
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