How I Met Your Mother- A Complete Report
When How I Met Your Mother premiered on CBS TV network on Sept 19, 2005, it had some pretty big shoes to fill. The network had telecasted the series finale of one of their most loved comedy show, Everybody Loves Raymond in May that year, which became one of the most watched series finale of all times with 32.9 million viewers. But, How I Met Your Mother filled the shoes pretty well. The show registered an average viewership of 9 million+ users in its past 8 seasons. The show is currently in its final season. Before bidding adieu to this show, we decided to estimate the popularity of the show, especially its final season. We monitored the chatter on social media related to the show for a span of 4 weeks from Jan 3, 2014 to Jan 31, 2014. About the show
The sitcom revolves around the life of male protagonist Ted Mosby, his friends and his life journey to meeting the love of his life and the mother of his children. Ted, in the year 2030, recounts to his son and daughter the events that led him to meeting their mother. The major show cast is as follows: Ted Mosby: Josh Radnor(Present Ted)/ Bob Saget(future Ted – voice only) Robin Scherbatsky: Cobie Smulders Barney Stinson: Neil Patrick Harris Lily Aldrin: Alyson Hannigan Marshall Erikson: Jason Segel The mother: Cristin Milioti The ninth season has 2 major plots. After 8 seasons of mystery, finally the mother has been revealed (name still a mystery). Barney and Robin are finally getting hitched. The results of our analysis of the social media presence of the show in the form of insights are shown below: Social Media buzz
The show has 24 million+ fans on Facebook and 663 thousand+ followers on Twitter. Considering that the average viewership of the show is estimated to be 9 million+ viewers, the figures above indicate the potential of social media as a mean of measuring the true reach of the show compared to the more conventional methods.
Within the monitored time-span, the least popular day for the show was January 14, 2014 just one day after the episode 14:Slapsgiving 3: Slappointment in Slapmarra, while the maximum mentions were registered on January 19, 2014, one day before theEpisode 15: Unpause.
The show registered least mentions on Friday, while maximum mentions were registered on Sunday Character Popularity Analysis
Barney Stinson Rocks The series revolves around six characters. Ted, Barney, Robin, Marshall, Lily and “the mother”. However, the analysis of the social media chatter clearly shows that the character of Barney Stinson, a serial womanizer played by Neil Patrick Harris, is clearly the most popular character on the show. The character alone managed to capture 35% of all the conversations around the show. Ted Mosby, the lead protagonist played by Josh Radnor came in second and the mysterious mother, played by Cristin Milioti, came in third. Bro Code is Legen.. wait for it .. dary Even the catchphrases made by the Barney Stinson such as Legendary(different variations), Bro Code, Awesome, Wait for it got more mentions than some of the main characters of the show. “The Mother” is a dud The unveiling of the character of the mother turned out to be a dud. After keeping the character suspense for 183 episodes, the final unveiling of the character could not create the excitement that was expected. “The mother” whose name is still unknown managed to capture only 8.45% of the total mentions around the show. Robin Tanks Even Robin’s character couldn’t get the expected boost. Nothing could make much difference for Robin, neither her marriage with the most popular character on the show, Barney, nor Cobie Smulders’s(actress playing the role of Robin Scherbatsky) role in 2013 blockbuster ‘The Avengers’. Robin only managed to capture 4.17% of the chatter around the show. Sentiment Analysis: Not lovin’ it
When the series’ final season is going on, it is crucial to know if your grand exit is living up to the expectations of the audience or not. Unfortunately How I met your mother could not achieve the expected love. Only 17% of total mentions of the show were positive, 9% negative and 74% of the total mentions were neutral. Is it because people are sad about the end of the show or the final season is a disappointment? HIMYM: What’s hot and what’s not The show has created a lot of stir in past 8 years. It is a significant achievement for the show to get more than 24 million fans on Facebook. Let’s see what people expressed on social media What’s Hot
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The Bro Code rules “Bro Code”, the bibles of the Bros (so says Barney), a book commonly referred on the show got so much attention of the audience that it became more popular than the cast of the show. The Bro code got more mentions than all the characters (except Barney) combined. Even the so called lead actor Ted Mosby, played by Josh Radnor couldn’t keep up with the Bro Code. While Bro code was mentioned in 20% of the conversations around the show, Ted, Lily, Marshall, Robin and “The Mother” could only account for 17% of the total conversation.
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Barney Stinson: That guy’s awesome Even though the show revolved around 5 friends living in New York, especially around Ted Mosby and his mystery future wife, it was Barney Stinson or Neil Patrick Harris who stole the limelight. Even, the catch phrases used by Barney Stinson on the show are more popular than the one of the leading character Lily Aldrin, played by Alyson Hannigan. “Wait for it”, one of the famous catchphrase on the show, registered nearly twice as much mentions as the character of Lily Aldrin.
What’s Not
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The Mother is a dud
The much waited unveiling of the mysterious “mother”, character played by Cristin Milioti, turned to be a dud. There are more mentions of “Bro code”(if you know HIMYM, you know Bro Code) than the “mother”, the title character of the show (How I Met Your “Mother”) and a mystery for past 8 seasons of the show. While the mother (since no name has been revealed yet, we should awkwardly call her “The Mother”) was present in less than 5% of the total conversation around the show, Bro Code was mentioned in more than 20% of the show’s conversation
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Couples: The Bro Code – Article 1: “Bros Before Hoes”
Even though Barney and Robin are getting hitched this season, the mentions of the couple are surprisingly low. While Barney is present in nearly 46% of the total mentions of Robin, Robin couldn’t have that same impact on Barney. Robin was only present in 3.1% of total mentions on Barney. Mentions of Barney-Ted duo are nearly 3 times more than Barney-Robin. It’s the Bro Code.
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Lily’s not blooming
Lily was the least popular character on the show based on social media chatter registered, getting only 1.1% of the total mentions around the show. Even Barney’s catchphrases beat her to it. Maybe that’s why Marshall and Lily named their son Marvin waitforit Erikson Given to the above ratings and sentiments, the show has undoubtedly had an impact on the audiences and has been able to build up a strong background for itself on the social media domain. However, they missed the mark in the final season. Let’s see how the series finale fairs out. Other Interesting results Top 3 Advocate MeetatMacLarens (HIMYM dedicated account of WGN America cable and satellite television channel) @MeetatMacLarens Legen...Dary @_legen_dary_
HIMYM (HIMYM’s official Twitter account)
@HIMYM_CBS