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I'm going to be honest, I was worried about this episode because, while I will blindly love Jorge Garcia for playing Hurley forever, he doesn't seem like he has the widest range in the world. But, while there were occasional weird comic-timing moments, he seemed to survive well, and the writers saw fit to throw in some Lost references, like having "Wang Guy's" phone number be 481-516-2342, or having my beloved Hurley talk about having the "Blitz" curse like being on an island, or blatantly having the curse travel between people like good old Smokey... well, a small, white, non-aggressive version of Smokey.
Anyway, it's Thanksgiving, and Ted wants to leave the bar early to go work on his turkey within a turkey (a "turturkeykey," copyright pending) for their big meal and misses a wild party night that somehow ends with Zoey in his bathtub, everyone talking about "The Gentleman" (would it be a stretch for that to be a Buffy reference on my Willow's part?) and Robin wearing KISS makeup. Also, The Blitz (actual name Steve) is there, and he's excited, because for years he's been saddled with a curse that allows good things to happen when he leaves. Aw, man. That curse has transferred to Ted. Aw, man.
The curse also means that Robin broke the oven, so they travel to Barney's (where his stove is made of cardboard), Marshall and Lily's (where the sewage treatment plant has had an accident), Steve's (where he keeps cat litter and cats in the oven) and finally end up at Zoey's. During the course of their running around, the curse gets put on Barney (aw, man), and you know how pouty Barney is when he isn't in the know.
Zoey and Ted make bitter comments at each other, and she eventually throws the gang out, but in the spirit of Thanksgiving they decide to apologize (mostly because they are selfish, petty thieves who have nowhere else to go) and they all have a nice meal together that ends with Barney transferring the curse back to it's rightful owner, The Blitz. Aw, man. Sure hope that Robin hooks up with Wang Guy. Do you think it could be Desmond? A guy who could quote Ghandi and knows how to use his cell phone? You never know.
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Want more? The full recap starts right below!In the fall of 2010, Ted's hosting Thanksgiving, and he's got the brainy idea to make a Turturkeykey, a twist on the Turkducken where he's placed a slightly smaller turkey inside a full-sized turkey. Robin saw the insertion of the smaller turkey, and it involved shoe-horns. She wisely opts to eat sides, and I can't say as I blame her. Ted decides to leave the mostly vacant bar a little early to tend to his Turturkeykey, but Barney warns him against it. It's the night before Thanksgiving, which is pretty much a holiday in Barneyland, when college girls come home, have their self-esteem demolished by their parents and then go out to the bar seeking solace in good old-fashioned alcohol. It's an annual tradition.
Marshall gives him another good reason for not heading out before the rest of the gang, if he leaves early, he could be come "The Blitz." The Blitz was a college pal of theirs who was sadly cursed.
Flashback to Ted and Marshall's dorm room, Hurley (a.k.a. Jorge Garcia, a.k.a. The Blitz) is sitting with the guys and saying he's going to head out early. But Marshall and Ted, eating "sandwiches," have big plans -- they're going to watch Apocalypse Now with Weird Al's greatest hits playing over it. Hurley opts out for his own planned Kraft/Croft night (Mac & Cheese and Tomb Raider). Frankly, I'm with Hurley on this one. But a minute after he leaves, a pretty blonde co-ed walks in clad only in a towel. She thinks it's her room, and then her towel slips.
The day the two doofuses are telling Hurley all about the naked girl in their room. "Aw, man" is his reaction. Who is he, Swiper the Fox? And the movie was also awesome ("Aw, man!"), because when Brando appeared, Weird Al started singing "Eat It." "Aw, man!" OK, I'm liking the Blitz a little bit less every time he says that.
Ted voiceovers that the curse continued over the years. We see the gang at MacLaren's, and he's leaving to play Madden 2K1, but as he heads out the door, the tap breaks at the bar and there's free beer to be had. The morning, "Aw, man."
In the present, Marshall says that he should leave, just not to blame them if he becomes The Blitz. He doesn't believe that the curse is real, but he is wrong. There's yearbook evidence. Steve (a.k.a. the Blitz, a.k.a. Hurley, a.k.a. Jorge) got the curse from a guy named Jerry Windheim, who in turn got the curse from Davey Beaterman, who got it from the original Blitz, aptly named Matt Blitz. The OG Blitz, he dropped out of Wesleyan right before the school went co-ed.
Fast-forward to Thanksgiving morning, where Ted comes out of his bedroom to see his pals lying in random positions over his trashed living room. Robin comes out, with full KISS makeup and says good morning to Mr. Blitz. "Aw, man." He then tries to say he's not the Blitz, but Barney and Marshall start singing "My Blitz-y Lies Over the Ocean" to the tune of "My Bonnie Lies Over the Ocean." He tries to stop them, but they must finish butchering the Scottish folk tune. Lily then wakes up and says "The Gentleman," at which point everyone raises their hands and bows with quite a flourish while shouting, "The Gentleman" loudly. This is apparently a gimmick they picked up the night before, and Ted is not pleased that he's left out of the in-joke. He pouts and heads into the bathroom, where he hears a yawn from the tub; it's Zoey, who greets him by calling him "Blitz."
After the credits, we see Zoey grabbing her coat and heading out. She thanks the crew for an amazing night, and then does "The Gentleman" gag on her way out the door. Ted wants to know why his best friends let his arch-nemesis sleep in his tub.
Lily explains: The night before at the bar, Zoey walked in and Lily was already to take that bitch down, since any enemy of Ted's is an enemy of hers. They started brainstorming ways to torture her. Barney's involves candlewax, but he's not aware of Ted's hatred for the girl. Lily decides to steal her scarf. She not-so-subtly sneaks over, and then gets busted. When she introduces herself, Zoey realizes that she's Lily Aldrin the painter, and apparently Zoey's the only one to ever buy anything of Lily's. She's really a patron of the arts.
Robin apologizes, but says they had an awesome night with her. Flashback to the night before, and Zoey is tossing a top hat on Marshall's head. And there was a dog on a skateboard. And then they all played Truth or Dare. Marshall's up first, but Lily won't let him do truth. Oh, I wonder what dirty little secrets those two have. So he gets dared by Zoey to send a picture of his junk to a random phone number. Seemed like a good idea at the time, but present-day Marshall says that if the random stranger's phone was on vibrate when the message arrive, he basically dry-humped them. But the night before, when they are deciding on the digits, The Blitz walks in and spouts off some numbers that will ring familiar to any good Lost fan. 4-8-15-16-23-42.
Ted is upset to realize that Blitz was there, too, at which point Blitzy comes out of the kitchen wearing the top hat and doing the "Gentlemen" shtick. He tells Ted that he was there for the whole night, because he had a gut feeling that Grand Theft Auto could wait a night. Per Barney, it was "Legen-wait-for-Ted-to-leave-because-he's-now-the-Blitz-dary." Marshall says that Ted's departure changed the course of blitztory. Cue bar scene where Hurley sighs out a cloud of smoke whispering the word "Blitz." That cloud heads directly upstairs to Ted's room, and nearly chokes him. Hurley says that he's glad to be free, because he missed so many things. Such as: the university president's toupée being snatched by a hawk during their graduation ceremony; his cousin Ira's bar mitzvah, crotch shots, double rainbows... all the good stuff. In fact, his name isn't Blitz, it's Steve. He jokes that colors seem so bright now. Then he hugs newBlitz Ted.
Ted is still stuck on the fact that his supposed friends hung out with Zoey. By friend law, at least in this universe, if a friend hates someone, everyone has to hate them. Ted hated Renee Zellweger at Lily's behest, only to realize she meant Reese Witherspoon. When Lily says she still does, because of You, Me & Dupree, he realizes that she really hates Kate Hudson, which only adds to his anger. Calm down, Ted. All this rage isn't good for your heart. He goes back to his Turturkeykey quest, but makes everyone go into the kitchen with him, so he doesn't miss anything. When he goes to preheat the oven, the door falls off. Apparently, while Ted was sleeping there was a drunken rave happening his kitchen and Zoey dared Robin to dance on the oven. Everyone looks very sheepishly at him.
When we get back from the commercial break, Ted's upset that they betrayed him and broke his oven on Thanksgiving. Also, per Barney, they used all his butter to grease up Lily to see how far down the hall they could get her to slide. All the way to 4G. He's impressed, but still angry.
Soon, they're all (including the Turturkeykey) squeezed into one cab (which cab drivers just LOVE) and heading to Barney's apartment. Steve is just happy to be included. Ted doesn't know if Barney's oven is deep enough; plus, it's made out of cardboard.
Back in the cab, they are heading to DOWISETREPLA, but there's been an explosion at the sewage treatment plant. The smell is so bad that the smaller turkey is crawling even further inside the bigger turkey. At Steve's (where he lives with his mom) the oven houses an extra litter box and a kitty named Ginger. In the cab, they realize that their only other option is to take Zoey up on her offer from the night before. She extended an invite, even to Ted, because her husband always spends the day with his daughter. (It was at this point that Zoey was painting KISS army makeup on Robin.)
As Ted is coming up with reasons why they shouldn't go, Marshall realizes that Barney is missing. Turns out Barney is in his own cab, telling the driver about the Blitz curse, when the driver tells him that he could be the Blitz. Barney is at Zoey's waiting for the gang, and when they pop out of the elevator they tell him he missed it. They're covered in streamers because their cab took a wrong turn and they ended up being in the Thanksgiving Day parade. Tony Bennett gave Ted the mic and he sang "Twist and Shout," Ferris Bueller style. Ted isn't the Blitz anymore, he's the Bueller, so the smoke transfers from Ted to Barney.
The gang knocks on Zoey's door and she seems pleased to see everyone, except Ted. Still, they all go in, Ted gets to work on the Turturkeykey and Marshall gets a text back from random number guy. The text turns out to be a picture of that guy's junk. Lily make a "boomerwang" joke. Robin is fascinated by Wang Guy, and thinks his junk is quite impressive. Barney goes to get ice, but he's afraid of missing something. Steve assures him that interesting things only happen when The Blitz goes out of the building, not just the room. And who would doubt someone who was saddled with this curse for years? Not Barney. So Steve takes a coin, flips it and it lands on its edge. When Barney comes walking in, the coin falls, and thus he missed the laws of physics being defied. "Aw, man." Turns out that Steve lied so he could see something cool happen. Steve: "Sorry, I was on that island for what seems like eternity. I'm going to enjoy things on the other side." Yes, Hurley, but there was a golf course and some Dharma-van joyriding. It wasn't all running from smoke monsters and crazed Others.
Barney desperately offers Robin various amounts of money to be the Blitz, settling on 60 bucks, because that's a lot of money for someone like her. Marshall says you can't buy and sell that sort of thing, Zoey zings that it isn't like Ted's integrity. He snaps back that she's sporting a ginormous diamond, so pot meet kettle. There's some banter, he gets called a "master baster," she gets called a witch. Steve just continues to interject how awesome this all is. He's practically a sideline reporter at this point. Lily tells Ted to give Zoey a chance. Ted doesn't think they will ever become friends. Robin decides to consult Wang guy, since he's bold, uninhibited and totally unbiased. He thinks enemies can become friends. He also quotes Ghandi. Barney thinks since he heard this exchange that he's freed from the Blitz, since Zoey was out of the room, but Steve says no, and he's just being annoying. He gets huffy and then shouts that he slept with the cute Indian girl who cuts his hair, just so he has something to brag about. Ted says that he won't ever like Zoey, only her oven, and when he turns to head to the kitchen, he spills cranberry sauce all over Zoey's white sweater. It nearly escalates into a food fight, but Lily starts making up cartoon peace treaties to compare them to. This leads Ted to call Zoey Cinderella's evil stepmother, and Zoey kicks everyone out. Guess that zing hit a little too close to home. Mean, Ted. Just mean.
In the cab, they realize that Barney isn't with them. He was in the bathroom sulking and coming up with some awesome thing to brag about, while they were getting kicked out. "Aw, man."
In the cab, Lily wonders why Zoey would just kick them out. The cab driver, who is currently driving and doesn't have a bulletproof separator between him and the backseat, which is so unlikely to happen in NY that I can't even believe it, asks them where they're heading. Ted says home, but the cabbie wants an address.
Barney sighs and sits on Zoey's couch. He misses her taking off her cranberry-covered sweater. In the cab, Ted wants to know where Lily picked up a little stuffed turkey. She swiped it from Zoey's. Swiper, no swiping! When did Lily get to be such a thief? She notices that the card says "Happy Turkey Day, Hannah. Love, Zoey." They put together that this must be the step-daughter and that the stepmother comment really was rude. Ted says they have to go back to Zoey's. Cabbie still wants an address. Couldn't they just say turn back to where he picked them up? Or were they wandering the streets?
In Zoey's dining room, the gang crowds around the table, and she jumps when she sees them. I'd jump, too, if this group of practical strangers broke into my house to eat my food. How'd they even get in? This huge apartment must have a doorman. Anyway, Barney let them in, and then she freaks more that Barney was in the apartment while she was wandering around half-naked. Now here's where I can't suspend my disbelief. I think Barney's got a sixth sense about boobs, and even as The Blitz, his innate boobometer would sense that they were out and his head would turn. You can't convince me otherwise.
Ted tells Zoey he's sorry that her stepdaughter bailed on her, and she says that it was supposed to be their first turkey day together, but the little brat changed her mind. OK, those are my words, not really hers. He gives her back the purloined turkey, in case Hannah comes year. He says that people don't stay enemies forever. Gag. How cloyingly sweet.
Thankfully, Zoey sits down to eat and they decide to take a group picture to send to Wang guy. Robin primps accordingly. Zoey thinks the Turturkeykey looks awesome (it isn't). Steve hops up to light the candles, Barney looks away, and as Steve grabs for the matches, a Rube-Goldberg series of events leads to the top hat being flung on top of the Turturkeykey. "The Gentlemen." Barney tries to claim that he saw it. He didn't. "Aw, man."
In the end cap, Barney and Steve are leaving the building together, but at the elevator Steve realizes he forgot his coat. He heads back, Barney goes into the elevator, and a stunning brunette in a long red dress hops in to him. As the doors slide together, her dress gets caught, and then we hear a tear, and Steve gets his title of The Blitz back. "Aw, man."
Discuss this episode in our forums, read our HIMYM dictionary, then see why our vlogger thinks HIMYM is the new Friends, below.
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