<p>Except we, the viewers, actual real people, never got to see that love or that grief. We didn’t even get a happy married years montage of actual scenes. We got “I finally got around to marrying your mother” -> “I loved her, and she died” -> their (lovely) meeting -> “go bang Aunt Robin, Dad.” Seriously, the mother, Ted’s supposed soulmate, got about 4 minutes in this finale, most of which were Ted a) not marrying her (even though the guy was obsessed with marriage) and b) her being killed off. We saw no grief, no montage of years alone, no funeral. It was quite literally “she’s dead; go after Aunt Robin.” That’s horrible pacing and horrible storytelling.</p>