'How I Met Your Mother' Season 8, Episode 17: 'The Ashtray' Recap

Ted gets a call on his answering machine—it’s The Captain, Zooey’s ex-husband. He asks Ted to call him back. Ted thinks it has to do with the last time he saw him.

It was a few weeks after Zooey, and he’d rekindled things with Becky (Robin’s infantile co-anchor). Lily had invited them to an art gallery, and he ran into The Captain. The Captain silently threatens to kill Ted. He invites them upstairs to see a painting upstairs. Ted toys with an ashtray.

When Ted brings up him and Zooey, The Captain aims a harpoon gun at him, which Ted takes away. He tells Ted he’s not mad anymore—he’s in love with someone else, and just makes Ted promise not to take her away too. However, Ted has to know who she is. He waits until the room clears, and checks a picture of The Captain’s new love… and it’s Becky on the cover of Boats Boats Boats.

While relating the story, The Captain calls again, and Marshall answers (hoping to get invited onto a boat). The Captain asks for Robin’s number. Marshall says he should do it… if it’s a booty call, she can just turn him down. Barney doesn’t think she’ll mind.

She minds.

Ted, apparently, is remembering the art gallery story differently than the rest of them… since he had shared a big fat “sandwich” with Becky before going out. Things play out a little differently with The Captain with stoned Ted. He wasn’t glaring at Ted, he was eyeing Robin. The way Robin tells the story, The Captain is all over her while she takes the ashtray away from stoned Ted. And it wasn’t a harpoon gun, it was a remote control. He records “Real Housewives” while Ted panics.

Robin claims The Captain tried to seduce her later, but she told him he was on the rebound, and to call her in a year.

The boys convince her to call The Captain, and she does to let him down. However, he thinks that Robin is actually Lily. So Robin gives him Lily’s number.

She minds. She tells them about the last time they saw The Captain. Robin had come from the meeting that ran long (doing shots at the bar). So Lily had stoned Ted and slutty drunk Robin hitting on The Captain to deal with. His art consultant insults Lily's taste in art.

Upstairs, Lily saves Robin from dropping the ashtray, and Lily’s version of the picture of The Captain’s true love is actually a yacht, with a small picture of Becky in the corner. Lily goes to look at the painting in the Captain’s room. She tells him she liked another painting better (the elephant painting that the consultant disagreed on) and he insults her, telling her she is just a kindergarten teacher.

So she steals the priceless crystal ashtray.

Marshall asks the gang to leave so he and Lily can fight. They go to the bar.

Marshall tells Lily he has to take the ashtray back. He asks her why it is such a big deal, and she says it’s because it’s true. She didn’t get to pursue her dream, and it’s too late for her. She starts to cry. Marshall comforts her. The next day she takes the ashtray back.

The Captain didn’t realize it was missing. What he wanted to show her was the picture of the elephant she liked at the art gallery, which he bought and hung over his bed. And just sold for $4 million. The artist became famous after she told him she liked it. His art consultant didn’t see the potential there. He offers her a job as his new art consultant.

Lily says yes.