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If you have ever worried that How I Met Your Mother might be canceled by CBS before the identity of "mother" is revealed, this bit of news should bring you great relief. CBS has renewed How I Met Your Mother for a sixth season. I give all fans of the comedy permission to join me now in a hearty "Hooray!"

In all seriousness, this is great news. Two years ago, a renewal for HIMYM wasn't a sure thing. The decision wasn't made until well into the spring. So, clearly, CBS has a new attitude about the Carter Bays-Craig Thomas creation, not to mention liking their work enough to give Bays-Thomas a rich new contract and the opportunity to make another sitcom.

(S05E13) This was one of those episodes that seemed like it would be more fun than it actually was. The stories seemed to be potentially amusing, and there were some funny moments. But this was definitely on the lower side of the ledger as far as this season's episodes are concerned.

Which one of the stories did I like better? Hm... the Jenkins one, but only by a little bit. It was fun seeing Amanda Peet playing someone who was even more alpha male than Robin, and envisioning Peet doing some of the things Marshall described Jenkins doing wasn't exactly unpleasant. Oh, and it introduced us to Big Fudge, who I hope plays more Skee-Ball as the seasons go on.

(S05E12) After I wrote my gushing preview of this episode, I went back and re-watched it, hoping my first impression was correct. It turned out that it was, but for a very different reason than I thought. The 100th episode of HIMYM didn't have everything that makes the show such fun for its fans: there was no time-shifting, and not a lot of misdirection. It just told two straight-ahead stories that were really funny and gave us confidence in how things are going to play out going forward.

Oh, and it had a song-and-dance number that was fun as hell.

If you're a fan of How I Met Your Mother -- and if you're reading this, you likely are -- the video preview of Monday's episode probably got you pretty excited. After all, it's Neil Patrick Harris and the cast, singing and dancing about Barney Stinson's love of suits. What's not to like, right? If you were wondering, though, how the rest of the episode was, I'm here to tell you that it's the best episode of the season, and maybe the best episode we've seen in a couple of years.

Come with me after the jump and I'll explain. No worries; there won't be any spoilers in this post.

Congratulations, 'How I Met Your Mother'!

The Emmy-nominated show is hitting a huge milestone -- their 100th episode -- and they're celebrating rather appropriately with a big song-and-dance number and plenty of guest stars (Mon., Jan. 11, 8PM ET on CBS). AOL TV visited the set while they were shooting the big show to get the scoop on what to expect straight from the stars and creators. What we ended up getting was so much better ...

The highlights? Neil Patrick Harris dishes about Barney's big musical performance; Alyson Hannigan reveals she's "kind of obsessed" with one of the big-name guest stars; Cobie Smulders talks about the Barney-Robin relationship aftermath; Josh Radnor teases how close we'll get to meeting Ted's future wife, the show's long-awaited 'Mother,' in this episode; and Jason Segel admits that just reading the episode's script made him emotional: "I almost started crying!" Awww.

Creators Carter Bays and Craig Thomas were not as forthcoming, though. "We might as well spoil it," Bays says with a grin. "As of right now, Ted dies." OK, that's so obviously not the case, but maybe Marshall and Lily will be making a big life change soon ... or, if you listen to Jason Segel, maybe not. "Marshall would be a fantastic father, he'd love the kid. It's literally the logistics of Jason Segel, holding a baby, that they're afraid of."

Yep, they're all just as funny in real life. There's a reason the show has lasted this long ... watch our set visit video to see it all.

If you haven't seen our game before, we give you a picture from a recent episode of a TV series and you provide the caption!

Somehow I forgot to name a winner last week for the previous Subtle Subtitles, so you had two weeks to think of a caption. The winner is trekker437 with this: "Hey, are those our ratings way down there?"

This week's picture is from this week's FOX special, Gordon Ramsay's Cookalong Live:

This was not what I was expecting.

I don't think I've ever been as confused by a TV show while I was actually watching it. Maybe because Gordon Ramsay's Cookalong was live or maybe it was because Chef Gordon Ramsay had to move at such a frantic pace to get everything done in an hour.

Whatever the reason, I found myself hating the show at first, then kinda liking it, then hating, then liking it, then finding it a little stupid, and then kinda liking it. On a scale of 1 to 10, which 1 being "I hated it" and 10 being "I loved it," I'll give it a 5.

How's that for a politician-like decision?

It was a kindler, gentler Gordon Ramsay on display in this Los Angeles-based kitchen set. The famously hard-nosed, expletive-spewing foodsmith donned a casual plaid button-down shirt and jeans and didn't utter a single bad word during Fox's 'Gordon Ramsay: Cookalong Live,' in which the chef showed the nation how to cook a three course meal all in the span of one hour. (In fact, the star of 'Hell's Kitchen' cheekily reminded those of us in the studio audience to mind our language.) There were no dishes cracked, no spit showers to "piss off, and no berating. The only thing that was remotely threatening about the program was the fiery flambé -- well, that, and the chef's tendency to lean uncomfortably close to his female guests.

I didn't know that Slate was keeping a weekly "Shame Index" for How I Met Your Mother, a regular column where they go over each episode in fine detail and list what the show does "awesome" and what the show should be ashamed of. You're probably wondering, what could the show possibly do to be ashamed of?

Basically it comes down to either 1. lame jokes or 2. being too much like Friends. I'm not a regular viewer of How I Met Your Mother (I did love Friends), so I have absolutely no opinion on the matter at all. They do point out the plot from last night's episode where they tried to quit smoking, saying that Friends did that several times with Chandler Bing's character over the years and that was funnier and HIMYM copied too much from Friends.

What do you think?

(S05E11) You know you have a good episode going when Harvey Fierstein is cast as one of the female character's "smoking voices," and that's only the third funniest thing that week.

Sure, it was great to hear Harvey's painful-sounding voice coming out Alyson Hannigan's mouth after a few days of smoking. It seems like it would fit well with her character; you know that she's only a few years from calling people "dollface," whether she's smoking or not.

But what carried the episode was seeing a new side to the gang that we haven't seen before, and how they all deal with it. Oh, and it was also good to see some new footage of Ted's kids, even if they're both visibly older.

(S05E10) I'm really starting to think that Carter Bays was telling the absolute truth when he told Mike Ausiello that the writers threw the Barney-Robin relationship into the trash heap. He wasn't being coy about a future plotline; I get the feeling that the writers wanted Single Barney over Relationship Barney and wanted to make sure they got there as quickly as possible.

Why else would we see an entire episode of Barn trying to get laid while wearing Marshall's old overalls? Here's the problem, as others have mentioned: we've seen how much of a good guy Barney can be. So seeing him back to his old tricks seems a bit emptier than it used to, doesn't it?

(S05E09) Let me start off by stating that any HIMYM episode involving the famous slap bet between Marshall and Barney is going to be funny. Just the act of Jason Segel's exaggerated slapping and Neil Patrick Harris' equally exaggerated pratfall in reaction is enough to get me rolling. I just wish the slaps weren't telegraphed so much in advance.

You have to remember that tonight is a sequel to the original Slapsgiving from two years ago. As sequels go, it's not bad; not as good as the original but satisfying nevertheless. But you knew at some point, Marshall was going to say "That's four!" and Barney was going to rub his face. So we have to examine the journey to get there. That journey started off well, but got a little predictable. Still didn't make the slap itself any less funny.

You've got questions? I've got answers. I'm The Show Girl!

Today, I've got scoop on the new season of one of the funniest, most underrated shows on TV: 'Better Off Ted.' Find out the fate of Veridian's star-crossed lovers Ted and Linda, why Phil will romance Ted, how Portia de Rossi will go from playing Veronica to Lindsay Fünke ... and if you don't know any of these people, maybe I can convince you to meet them and catch up before season 2 begins.

I also hit the set of 'How I Met Your Mother' armed with your questions about Twitter and slap bets. Who are the stars Tweeting with? You might be surprised. And is it hard to hit your co-stars? Not according to Jason Segel. (Awesome.)

Want more? Email me TV questions at TheTVShowGirl@aol.com -- who knows, I might just give you an answer on the show. Now watch, enjoy and come back next week for more. Until then, happy TV watching!

(S05E08) Could it be that, after the whole season five build-up to the Swarkles relationship, everyone would more or less go back to normal by episode eight of season six? It seems that way, and I don't know how I feel about it.

Relationship Barney wasn't that pleasant to watch. Some of his patented awesomeness tried to come through but he was increasingly becoming a content guy, which is no good for comedy. But to see him immediately snap back to the way he was pre-Robin was equally jarring. Maybe that's the way it has to be for Barney ... I don't know. But, as funny as the exploration of Barn's playbook was, it felt like the last two dozen or so episodes never happened.

Oh, and it seems like Robin's quickly moving on too, so it's not all on Barney ...

(S05E07) During most episodes of HIMYM, you tend to forget that this whole show is told from the perspective of Old Ted, who's telling his kids the longest, most boring meet-up story in history of the world. Bob Saget's narration often just goes in one ear and out the other, like the background music. But there are some episodes where the storytelling aspect of the series is firmly in place, with the exaggerations, changes, and bad memories often associated with this activity.

This was one of those episodes. Was Barney really that fat? Was Robin really that haggard? Did Archisexture really accidentally "fly" into Ted's VCR? Of course not. But those whoppers from Old Ted were what made this episode so entertaining. That and Alan Thicke. But Alan Thicke always makes things entertaining; he's Alan Thicke, for crissakes.