All 206 Episodes of How I Met Your Mother (before the finale), Ranked

A bit more than a year ago, perhaps when 30 Rock was wrapping up, I said on Twitter that when How I Met Your Mother ended, I would make 100 top 10 lists about the show. A bit later, I also said I would rank all the episodes. Then I said I'd do the 100 lists, all the episodes, and also the top 100 characters, like I did for 30 Rock.

Today is the final episode of HIMYM, and all I've got for you are the episodes.

Now granted, that's 206 episodes, which is a lot. But this show isn't 30 Rock and ranking characters isn't that easy. And it ended a lot earlier in the year than I expected. So forget the character list, but the 100 top 10 lists are still coming, probably in May or June.

But for now, here's the first 206 episodes of How I Met Your Mother, ranked. Keep in mind, this list is 1. incredibly subjective, and 2. somewhat random. When you get to comparing something in the 120s vs. the 160s, it may just be a more recognizable episode title or a single joke. When you get the 180s, it may just be alphabetical (it is not alphabetical).

#	Episode
1	Slap Bet
2	Drumroll, Please
3	Ducky Tie
4	How I Met Everyone Else
5	Girls Versus Suits
6	Sandcastles in the Sand
7	Arrivederci, Fiero
8	Intervention
9	How Your Mother Met Me
10	Game Night
11	The Bracket
12	World's Greatest Couple
13	The Pineapple Incident
14	Last Words
15	Something New
16	Ten Sessions
17	Three Days of Snow
18	Something Borrowed
19	Cupcake
20	Mosbius Designs
21	Lucky Penny
22	Pilot
23	P.S. I Love You
24	Blitzgiving
25	Moving Day
26	The Wedding Bride
27	Slutty Pumpkin
28	Swarley
29	I Heart NJ
30	Little Minnesota
31	Robots Versus Wrestlers
32	No Pressure
33	Coming Back
34	Miracles
35	Columns
36	Slapsgiving
37	The Playbook
38	Trilogy Time
39	Sweet Taste of Liberty
40	The Naked Man
41	Perfect Week
42	Spoiler Alert
43	Bachelor Party
44	Definitions
45	Bad News
46	Zip, Zip, Zip
47	Showdown
48	Shelter Island
49	The Stinsons
50	The Magician's Code, Part 2
51	The Best Burger in New York
52	Something Blue
53	Come On
54	Gary Blauman
55	Hopeless
56	Natural History
57	Purple Giraffe
58	Woooo!
59	The Window
60	Doppelgangers
61	Monday Night Football
62	The Chain of Screaming
63	The Naked Truth
64	Robin 101
65	Subway Wars
66	Ted Mosby: Architect
67	Glitter
68	Legendaddy
69	Daisy
70	Right Place, Right Time
71	Symphony of Illumination
72	Third Wheel
73	Old King Clancy
74	Vesuvius
75	The Platinum Rule
76	Atlantic City
77	Murtaugh
78	False Positive
79	Home Wreckers
80	Where Were We?
81	Oh Honey
82	The Limo
83	The Final Page, Part 2
84	Nothing Good Happens After 2 A.M.
85	The Leap
86	Say Cheese
87	Life Among the Gorillas
88	Double Date
89	Unpause
90	The Time Travelers
91	Slapsgiving 2: Revenge of the Slap
92	Okay Awesome
93	Cleaning House
94	The Bro Mitzvah
95	First Time in New York
96	Best Prom Ever
97	Big Days
98	The Rehearsal Dinner
99	Mary the Paralegal
100	Duel Citizenship
101	The Yips
102	Farhampton
103	Return of the Shirt
104	The Scorpion and the Toad
105	Noretta
106	The Slutty Pumpkin Returns
107	Brunch
108	No Tomorrow
109	I'm Not That Guy
110	Bedtime Stories
111	The Magician's Code, Part 1
112	Matchmaker
113	We're Not From Here
114	Of Course
115	Band or DJ?
116	The Possimpible
117	Aldrin Justice
118	Dowisetrepla
119	The Wedding
120	The Locket
121	The Front Porch
122	The Duel
123	No Questions Asked
124	Tick Tick Tick…
125	Challenge Accepted
126	Stuff
127	Wait for It
128	Little Boys
129	Single Stamina
130	Milk
131	Do I Know You?
132	The Three Days Rule
133	The Final Page, Part 1
134	The Poker Game
135	The Lighthouse
136	The Goat
137	Landmarks
138	Belly Full of Turkey
139	Bad Crazy
140	The Rough Patch
141	Everything Must Go
142	Last Cigarette Ever
143	Sunrise
144	The Perfect Cocktail
145	The End of the Aisle
146	Rebound Bro
147	Jenkins
148	The Rebound Girl
149	How Lily Stole Christmas
150	Something Old
151	Tailgate
152	Platonish
153	A Change of Heart
154	Disaster Averted
155	Now We're Even
156	Rally
157	The Autumn of Break-Ups
158	Happily Ever After
159	The Best Man
160	Karma
161	Unfinished
162	Twin Beds
163	Benefits
164	Last Time in New York
165	The Drunk Train
166	Architect of Destruction
167	Sorry, Bro
168	Mystery vs. History
169	The Fight
170	Desperation Day
171	Bagpipes
172	The Broken Code
173	Good Crazy
174	Garbage Island
175	The Stamp Tramp
176	Ring Up!
177	Mom and Dad
178	The Sexless Innkeeper
179	As Fast as She Can
180	Field Trip
181	Romeward Bound
182	The Pre-Nup
183	The Stinson Missile Crisis
184	Baby Talk
185	Knight Vision
186	Splitsville
187	Twelve Horny Women
188	46 Minutes
189	The Broath
190	The Over-Correction
191	The Ashtray
192	The Fortress
193	Nannies
194	The Exploding Meatball Sub
195	Hooked
196	Weekend at Barney's
197	Rabbit or Duck
198	Who Wants to Be a Godparent?
199	Bass Player Wanted
200	Lobster Crawl
201	Not a Father's Day
202	The Burning Beekeeper
203	The Mermaid Theory
204	Canning Randy
205	Slapsgiving 3: Slappointment in Slapmarra
206	Zoo or False

Television Top Tens of 2012: Episodes

It is that time of the year. The time for lists.

I have traditionally done 4 television lists biannually- once at the end of the TV season, and once at the end of the year. This year, I decided to cut the Top 10 Worst Series list. It just wasn't feasible to compare ¡Rob!, Work It, Are You There, Chelsea?, Ben and Kate, I Hate My Teenage Daughter, and Anger Management.

Okay, I don't hate Ben and Kate that much.

That leaves three lists that I actually did. You're also getting two lists from my friend, and occasional blog contributor Brett Alazraki. First up is episodes.

REMINDER: Lists are subjective. I ranked what I like. I don't watch Breaking Bad or Game of Thrones or The Good Wife or Boardwalk Empire or The Vampire Diaries or Downton Abbey or Brickleberry. So if a show isn't included, it's probably because I didn't watch it, or because I didn't like it as much as the shows I listed. But feel free to ask away in the comments.

To start with the episodes list, I made a massive list of episodes I had in consideration. Here are the Honorable Mentions, with the episodes that were closer to making the list highlighted in yellow. These are listed in alphabetical order by series. I also limited my actual Top 10 to one episode per series, so some of these may actually be among my 10 favorite episodes of the year (okay, "Win, Lose, or Draw" definitely is).

Some notes on those:

-"At the Codfish Ball" was the Mad Men episode I chose in my end-of-season list, but on rewatch I preferred a different episode.

-I wasn't a huge fan of girls, but the Shoshana plot in "Welcome to Bushwick a.k.a. The Crackcident" was phenomenal, as I wrote about here.

-The Late Night with Jimmy Fallon and Late Show with David Letterman episodes are the post-Hurricane Sandy episodes that went on without a studio audience.

-The Smash pilot was actually good. You probably even liked it. Don't blame it for what came after.

-Meghan Ory is my absolute favorite part of Once Upon a Time, and the two Ruby-centric episodes have been two of my favorites.

-I finished this list a couple of weeks ago, but HIMYM's winter finale 2-parter would have also made this list.

-Happy Endings' "The Kerkovich Way" and 30 Rock's "Leap Day Williams" were my last two cuts. Those two shows are two of my favorite comedies (we'll get there) but are more about individual moments and jokes than full episodes (often the B or C storylines are completely forgettable). That said, if I didn't conform to the norm and did a Top 12 (for 2012!) they would be on there.

Which brings us to the actual Top 10. Unlike my series lists, I did not rank these. It was just too much.

Let's take these in the order they're listed.

-Bent- "Tile Date": This was the season (and series) finale for Bent, NBC's short lived (six episodes in three weeks!), star-filled (well, tv-wise at least) sitcom. This episode was the highlight, and left me wanting more episodes.

-Community- "Curriculum Unavailable": The show's second faux clip show wasn't as shocking as its first, but it was still brilliant in its own right. The insane asylum flashback, in particular, was a series highlight.

-Cougar Town- "A One Story Town": I got to see this episode at an advance screening (c'mon that made me sound cool), so crowd mentality may have helped my enjoyment of this episode. Yet to me it was one of the most brilliantly constructed episodes of television I have ever seen. You get the hints from the beginning- Bobby needs to get to the kiss, the crab festival, and The Worthless Peons singing Disney songs- that are all brought together for the "Kiss the Girl" sequence. And then there's the Scrubs reunion.

-Glee- "Goodbye": A funny thing happened on the way to Glee season 4- the show remembered it could be good. The season 3 finale packed an emotional punch as a farewell (at least as series regulars in Lima) to a number of characters, and despite my complete lack of shipper-ness, the Rachel/Finn breakup was beautifully done.

-Homeland- "Q&A": This was one of my top 3 episodes of the year. The entire series built up to the Carrie interrogation of Brody, and the two defending Emmy winners earned their next nominations in that scene.

-Louie- "Late Show" Parts 1-3: I don't regularly watch Louie, but one day this fall I decided to watch a bunch of the most popular episodes. This was the arc that sold me on the series. This arc was funny, smart, and moving, and while I may never watch the show regularly, arcs like this will make me keep coming back.

-Mad Men- "Signal 30": The Campbells' dinner party was one of my favorite scenes of the year (Annie Edison AND Alex Mack!) plus Lane Pryce knocking out Pete. But really, there are four or five episodes of Mad Men you could pick this year.

-New Girl- "Fancyman" Parts 1&2: This two-parter was the start of the turnaround for New Girl. Dylan McDermott's Dermot Mulroney's eponymous fancyman brought out new elements in both Jess and Nick, and the show became all the better for it.

-Parks and Recreation- "The Debate": Another of my top 3 episodes of the year. This episode highlighted what makes Parks what it is. There was plenty of the insane comedy- the non-Leslie candidates in the debate (Buddy Garrity!) and Andy's movie reenactment. And there was plenty of the sweet- Leslie's response to Bobby's threat, and Ron stealing the cable.

-Suburgatory- "The Wishbone": And my third of my top 3 episodes. This is fairly easily the best episode of Suburgatory. While the show is certainly inconsistent, this episode showed that, when the series is at its best, it can be the best series on television. The combination of sweet sincerity and comedic extremes is, when perfected, the best thing television can bring, and "The Wishbone" perfected this.

And here are Brett's Top Ten Episodes. He did rank them. 

Up next, New Series...

13 Hours of TV to Watch this Summer When You're Not Watching Mad Men

Look, Mad Men is good. It's really good. It's probably the best show on television. The Emmy voters certainly seem to think so. It might even be one of the top television dramas of all time. I don't know, I never watched The Sopranos or The Wire. But either way, it's up there.

And it won't air in 2011.

It might never air again, it might eventually air with dramatic changes, or it might come back in the winter of 2012 as strong as ever. But it definitely will not air in the Summer of 2011. (UPDATE: Mo Ryan of AOL is now reporting creator Matt Weiner has reached a deal with AMC for 2, and possibly 3 seasons. So Mad Men will be back in 2012. Hooray!)

So what will you do for those 13 hours of your life? You could rewatch some of your favorite Mad Men episodes of the first four seasons. AMC would certainly like you to watch The Walking Dead or Breaking Bad or whatever else they air in that slot.

But here are 13 hours of television I would suggest watching. Probably none of them are the quality of Mad Men, but they feature top notch performances from the Mad Men cast.

30 Rock- "Generalissimo" and "St. Valentine's Day"

Community- "Cooperative Calligraphy" and "Conspiracy Theories and Interior Design"

Dharma and Greg- "Unarmed and Dangerous"

Gilmore Girls- "But I'm a Gilmore"

Grey's Anatomy- "That's Me Trying"

How I Met Your Mother- "Return of the Shirt" and "How I Met Everyone Else"

Parenthood- "Seven Names"

Saturday Night Live- "34x6: Jon Hamm/Coldplay"

The Office- "Customer Survey"

The West Wing- "Commencement"

Will & Grace- "Big Brother is Coming" Parts 1&2

...and the network show perhaps most inspired by Mad Men (although far less successful)...

Lone Star- "Pilot" and "One in Every Family"

Ted Mosby, Man Whore

“If you start to count all the ladies that Ted’s been with, Ted starts to look like a bit of a man whore."

-HIMYM cocreator Craig Thomas to Los Angeles Times.

Barney Stinson is the resident womanizer at MacLaren's Pub, but Ted Mosby, our romantic narrator, is no slouch. Look above. That's twenty (twenty!) women Ted has dated or slept with in the six years since How I Met Your Mother has been on the air.

And none of them (presumably) are the mother.

These are only the ones we have seen. It doesn't include girls he has pined for and missed (Carrie Underwood's Tiffany, the mysterious Slutty Pumpkin, and the dermatologist in "Matchmaker" come to mind), anyone coming before the show (other than Lauren Prepon's Karen who he gets back with during the run of the series), and anyone he fails to mention to his kids (and really, if you were telling your kids about how you met their mother, wouldn't you leave out a pretty high percentage of your exploits before meeting your wife?).

The question is, with Barney's recent bouts of exlcusivity (Robin and Norah), have the two traded places?

The TV Musical Part I: Original Songs

This is part one of a two part post on musical tv moments/episodes. Today we focus on TV shows featuring original songs in advance of tonight's aptly named Glee episode, "Original Song." On Thursday, March 31 we will look at TV performances of well known songs in anticipation of Grey's Anatomy's musical episode, "Song Beneath the Song."

Through its first 37 episodes, Glee featured no original songs, other than a brief number by Rachel about her headband a few weeks back. That ends tonight. Three original songs, "Get it Right," "Loser Like Me," and "Hell to the No," will be performed in tonight's episode. The first two songs have been released, although in full disclosure, as suggested by a handful of critics (most notably Myles McNutt), I have yet to listen to the songs in order to be able to experience them like the judges and Kurt and Blaine do tonight.

But Glee is not the first show to delve into the world of original song writing. Below are some of my favorites...

How I Met Your Mother has penned six original songs since then, but the first one was by far the best. Pehaps it was the element of surprise, or the constant Canadian references, or the rap break, or the robot, but it is hard to top "Let's Go to the Mall"

The lyrics of the Friends hit "Smelly Cat" may not have been quite as clever, but the show got as much out of the song as possible over the course of the series.

Scrubs went above and beyond with a full-out musical episode. Here is the big opening production number:



Finally, Community, which made a joke in the famous Paintball episode about Glee's lack of original songs, had a couple songs of its own, including the catchy "Getting Rid of Britta"

What other TV original songs would you consider hits?

Guest Post: The How I Met Your Mother Consistency Conundrum

Like many people, I have friends who enjoy similar things as I do, and therefore similar topics as the ones I sometimes talk about on this blog. Sometimes, they have things to say, and so I will let them write guest posts here. This post is by Brett Alazraki. If you like it, feel free to follow him on Twitter.

How I Met Your Mother has easily been my favorite show since I started watching it at the beginning of season 3.  I rushed to get the first two seasons on DVDs and I have been hooked ever since.  But lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about the continuity of the show.  For a long, long time the show was very good with continuity; it had to be, the show is an entire flashback, with plenty of flashbacks in each episode.  Or at least I, someone who has seen every episode of the show way too many times, hadn’t noticed any blatant errors.  And then over the past 6 months I’ve notice three continuity errors and I’m sure I will keep finding more. (And just for the record I am completely ignoring Lily’s hair for this post, I know they’re not perfect with that, but I just don’t care very much about it)

The first major problem that stood out in my mind, and I realized it the second it happened, was Marshall’s band, revealed in the third episode of season 6, “Unfinished.”  Marshall says that he was in an all lawyer band (the awesomely named “The Funk, the Whole Funk and Nothing but the Funk”) and Robin states that they had performed once four years ago.



Timewise, that would be in season 2, where Marshall was still in law school.  So it would not really be an all lawyer band.  A small error, just say “my law school band” or he was in an all lawyer band as a law student, fine.  But as it comes off, that’s a small continuity error.  Did it hurt my enjoyment of the episode? No, not really- actually “The Funk, the Whole Funk and Nothing but the Funk” was probably one of the funniest bits of the episode- but the point remains a show based on someone telling someone a story, messed up something. 

The next continuity error I realized was something much more serious.  In the season 5 ep, “Perfect Week,” Marshall and Lily’s story line is based on the fact that for years they have been sharing the same toothbrush, and at some point Ted and even Robin shared this toothbrush.  Ok, fine, didn’t think anything of it.  Then I happened to rewatch the first season episode “Zip, Zip, Zip,” in which Marshall and Lily are stuck in the bathroom while Ted and, his girlfriend at the time, Victoria are “talking.”  Very early on we see very clearly Marshall and Lily brushing their teeth at the same time.  Well there goes the whole one toothbrush thing.  Just like that, a major point in “Perfect Week” was undercut; Nick Swisher’s whole bit (outside of being a cameo) was pointless, because they hadn’t been sharing the same toothbrush for such a long time.  Another oversight by the writers.

The third and final continuity error I realized only within the past week.  It happened in the season 5 episode “Dual Citizenship.” Marshall and Ted reminisce about their road trips in the Fiero to a crappy Chicago pizza place.  “We ate nothing but jerky, drank nothing but Tantrum.”  That’s what Ted and Marshall did on those 22 hour road trips, and peed in soda bottles and had a bong made out of a cantaloupe.  We all, of course, know about the no food in the Fiero rule- the flashback in “Arrivederci, Fiero,” stated all the things, like water, that Marshall threw out- but apparently that doesn’t apply to jerky or Tantrum. This one for some reason bothered me more than the other two.  The no food in the Fiero rule is classic and to just blatantly break it like that; besides I think it would’ve been funnier to describe a 22hour road trip with no food or drink because of Marshall’s insane rule.

Those three errors, are the biggest ones I have noticed so far and it raises the question, how important is this continuity, or am I just nitpicking?  Well the show is based on a flashback so continuity is incredibly important. Sure these aren’t major plot points, and sure none of this involved the mother, but still.  In certain shows it doesn’t matter what happened three seasons ago, but here in a show based on telling the past, it’s incredibly important.  Now of course the writers could use the “unreliable narrator” idea, that future Ted can’t remember everything 20+ years ago and makes errors in telling the story, but that’s too easy an excuse for the writers to take to me.  Besides, shouldn’t the writers know the story of the show, shouldn’t they have seen every episode, so they can develop character and other things a show gets as it goes along for seasons.  I understand there are going to be errors, and some of them, like Marshall’s band are understandable, but the others, no matter how little they hurt the overall story, are inexcusable.  To me these mistakes really bother me, I will still love the show, but it irks me just enough to write this long rant about it. 

*This is leading me to want to start a campaign for HIMYM to hire me as continuity consultant.  They could send me scripts and I could just be responsible for making sure there are no errors like the one above.  Who’s with me? No one? Ok.  Just an idea. 

How I Met Your Guest Star

You know it is getting exciting when I have a blog entry sparked by a single episode of a (non-SNL) tv series.

Perhaps no show uses guest stars, and particularly straight up stunt casting with the frequency and extremity of How I Met Your Mother. That continues tonight with the use of Mrs. Katheryn Brand herself, the third Deschanel sister, Katy Perry. And so, in preparation of this California Gurl potentially fulfilling Ted's Teenage Dream (yeah, I went there), let's look back at the major stars HIMYM has brought in before, and grade them on how well they inserted themselves into the show's mythology and incorporated themselves with our Core Five.

Note that we're looking at stunt casting guest stars primarily. HIMYM uses a lot of guest stars. Ashley Williams, Sarah Chalke, Jennifer Morrison, and Laura Bell Bundy have all had significant arcs, mostly as love interests for Ted (although this has not been a significant storyline for Bundy. It actually just mysteriously disappeared after one episode) but they were cast because of their acting talent, and not because they were drawing in eyes. And while the significant others of Josh Radnor, Alyson Hannigan, Colbie Smulders, and Neil Patrick Harris have all popped up, none of them are big enough stars for people to tune in for them. So this is really just looking at those guest stars that got promo-ed like crazy by CBS. And no, Jayma Mays was not a significant star in 2005.

Camryn Manheim was our first significant guest star, as the title character in episode 7 of season 1, "Matchmaker." Not quite A-list, but a known TV figure early in the first season is something, and Manheim was solid in her role. B.

It was a while until we had a really big deal star, but personal favorite Danica McKellar stopped by, along wit The 88, George Clinton, Jane Seymour, Bryan Cranston, Wayne Brady, Emmit Smith, and Bob Barker.

The season 3 premiere, "Wait for It," is where the stars started rolling in. The episode featured Mandy Moore and Enrique Iglesias. Moore played the virtual opposite of what most people associate with Mandy Moore, and did it rather well. A-. Iglesias had a two-episode arc and, while irritating, did fit in well and played a necessary character in the storyline of Robin. A-.

McKellar came back in season 3 and brought with her a pre-Cougar Town Busy Philipps, which was followed by an appearance by John Cho, former costar of both Hannigan (American Pie movies) and NPH (Harold and Kumar movies).

"The Yips" brought in a plethora of Victoria's Secret models, including Adriana Lima, Marisa Miller, and most importantly Heidi Klum. You'll never hear me complain about Victoria's Secret models, but they were mostly filler outside of Klum. And while Heidi seemed like a model trying to act, she did it decently, and sold a straight faced joke in German. B+.

Vanessa Minnillo popped up at what would turn out to be a rather important St. Patrick's Day and was not all that good. It was a weird role in which we only really saw what a wasted Ted was seeing from Minnillo, but given her relatively impressive appearance on 30 Rock last week, it's clear she could do better. C.

The single biggest stunt casting bit appeared in season 3's "Ten Sessions," where Britney Spears made her first of two appearances. In this first episode she was a minor character with a few funny lines, and it brought HIMYM the ratings they needed to live on for another season. But bringing back Spears for a second episode, "Everything Must Go," later that season, was not good. She had a larger part, as Barney pretended to propose to her which she accepted and believed with an "Erin from The Office" level of stupidity. After having a minor and comedic role in her first appearance, she dragged the show down in her second. C.

"Sandcastles in the Sand" brought in James Van Der Beek to play the anti-heartthrob he was as Dawson. In fact, he may be one of the strongest cameos ever, as he opened up a whole new element of the HIMYM universe. A.

Will Forte popped up for the first time in season 3, followed by Regis Philbin and Jamie-Lynn Sigler.

"Benefits" was an episode that seemingly existed solely for the purpose of stunt casting and rating bumps. A relatively mediocre episode overall, CBS promoted the guest appearances of Kendra Wilkinson, Heidi Montag, Spencer Pratt, and Kim Kardashian. The promotion worked, it remains the single highest rated episode of HIMYM. The cameos? Quick one liners as magazines coming to life to talk to Marshall as he walks to the bathroom. Yup, that was it. They added nothing. D.

Kenny Rogers made an audio-only cameo, followed by Alan Thicke, Chris Elliot, Joanna Garcia, and an audio appearance by Harvey Fierstein.

"Girls Versus Suits" was the show's 100th episode, and featured three separate cameos. Rachel Bilson was very strong as Ted's brief love interest and (SPOILER ALERT) the "mother's" roommate, and equally strong when she appeared again this season with a surprise twist. A. Tim Gunn played himself as Barney's suit doctor in an absolutely brilliant gag where Gunn first showed the comic chops he'd later show off in the Emmy opening. A. The weakest guest appearance was by Stacy Keibler as a hot bartender. That was basically the gag. She didn't like guys in suits and Barney wanted to sleep with her. B.

Amanda Peet, Jim Nantz, and (in what I find to be an odd and overplayed in the episode cameo) Nick Swisher came by in the next two episodes.

Next came Carrie Underwood as the girl that Ted was "hooked" on. She wasn't good. That's about as nice as I could put it. The material wasn't there and she basically stood there and looked pretty. D.

The next episode featured another appearance by an attractive singer associated with American Idol, Jennifer Lopez. While she too had a weak storyline, JLo sold it well, and made for an intriguing character. B+.

Peter Bogdanovich, Will Shortz, and Arianna Huffington appeared together as themselves, followed by Jason Lewis, Malin Akerman, and Chris Kattan as actors in a film about Ted's failed wedding. Another personal favorite, Judy Greer, also popped up in that episode.

This season hasn't seen a major guest, but has featured appearances by Bilson, Brady, Ben Vereen, Maury Povich, Forte, Kyle MacLachlan, Nicole Scherzinger, Thicke, Jorge Garcia, and Alex Trebek. Which brings us to tonight.

So which fellow music star will Perry follow? Will she be solid like Lopez, fall flat like Underwood, or split the difference like Spears? We'll see.