'How I Met Your Mother' Season 8, Episode 21: 'Romeward Bound' Recap

Our narrator tells us that by the spring of 2013, Marshall and Lily have life figured out. Lily is making her name as an art consultant, and Marshall is a superstar environmental lawyer. Their home life is smooth… until…

Lily speaks to The Captain regarding a small note—he is moving to Rome for a year and would like her to come with him. He tells her to tell him by the end of the day.

Barney shows up and immediately has to leave. Why drink and take clothes off girls when he can do that at home?

Ted spots the girl from his yoga class… he talks about how girls have a bewitching little detail that makes you fall immediately in love with him. This girl’s bewitching detail is her “ridonkulous body.”

They wait for her to take her coat off, and Barney decides he can stay after all.

Lily comes in to tell them about the proposition. Ted thinks Marshall would be excited… Lily calls him, and he tells her he is working on a big case and can’t talk. Lily realizes if they moved to Rome, it would be her in the spotlight, and Marshall caring for the baby alone.

Lily stops the fantasy to ask why it is so hot—Barney has turned up the heat, trying to get the girl to take her coat off. Lily calls The Captain and tells her she can’t go to Rome. She gets swiftly dismissed.

The girl puts on a scarf, and Lily calls Barney creepy for being so interested. Robin comes in and hugs the woman in the coat. She comes over with Liddy. Barney is certain it is a threesome, but Robin reminds Barney she is the wedding planner. Ted is smitten.

Lily goes to Marshall’s work to tell him she is now unemployed. She finds Marshall working on his “big project,” an actual house of cards. They haven’t had a client in months. Lily finds out that all the times Marshall said he was busy, he was just being way too literal (a lot on his plate? Hamburgers).

Lily tells him what she has given up, and Marshall says if they live in Italy, he could take care of Marvin and do all the things from her fantasy that she thought he would hate.

“It sounds like a dream!”

He tells her he will go to The Captain and get her the job back.

Liddy helps Barney and Robin with the menu while they wait for her to remove her coat and Ted gets awkward. She goes to the bathroom and Robin asks why they’re being so weird.

“Did you pay Carl to turn up the heat again?”

Robin says she is wondering the same thing. Liddy never takes her coat off!

“It would be like trying to explain a rainbow to a blind person.”

Ted explains he was about to ask her out before she took off her coat, overwhelming him. It was too much.

“Indiana Jones wouldn’t look at this body. This is a body that would melt a Nazi’s face.”

Barney wishes Marshall were there… Liddy would do what he said. He has no “stink.” No smell of desperation. Robin catches him—isn’t he as happy with her as Marshall is with Lily? Why doesn’t he ask her to take her coat off?

Liddy comes back and Barney tries to  muster it. He asks her to take off her coat. He is pleased with himself for being immune to other women—until she removes it and he is blinded by its power. But then, so is Robin.

The Captain calls Lily, and says Marshall convinced him to offer her the job again. She turns it down again. She says the real reason is, if they move to Rome, Lily is worried she will fail at her job and throw away her comfortable life. Marshall, who is touring Little Italy, gets a text that Lily has turned down the job and is furious.

Barney tells Ted he can’t wait for his wedding day… because Liddy will take off her coat.

Ted warns him to be careful. He hasn’t been acting like a guy about to get married. He thinks Robin is cool, but maybe not as cool as Barney thinks. Barney reminds him it isn’t his place.

Marshall asks Lily how many times she will turn down her dream job. She tells him she is scared and he comforts her. They decide to move to Italy.

Barney comes home to find Robin sitting seductively on the couch in a big coat.