How I Met Your Father season 1, episode 7 recap – “Rivka Rebel”

This recap of Hulu’s How I Met Your Father season 1, episode 7 contains spoilers. 

Read the season 1 review.

As far as rom-com careers go, those of the characters in How I Met Your Father are for the most part real jobs — mostly in the fact that they’re grounded in common institutions like bars and schools (don’t ask about Ellen’s farm). The main outlier here is our protagonist Sophie, who’s trying to make a career out of a hobby she doesn’t seem that interested in either. Even in episode three, “The Fixer”, she didn’t seem to be very good at taking photos of Jesse.

How I Met Your Father season 1, episode 7 recap

“Rivka Rebel” attempts to show Sophie outside of her love life — and isn’t totally successful at that (and raises the question of why future Sophie would be sharing this story in the first place). Tasked with photographing the bar mitzvah of a leading art curator’s daughter (a nightmarish tween influencer), Sophie barely attempts to take photographs until the end, which could seem like a nitpick if it weren’t reflective of the show’s lack of thought in all its storylines.

For example, Charlie and Ellen’s storyline entirely rests on Ellen not remembering writing a mean Yelp review about his bartending (seriously, what is it with this show and Apps!). She’s upset because he’s talking her ear off about the “merit” of hard work, and she’s envious of this drive and his relationship status. Yet the concept of writing a bad Yelp rating would arise (chronologically) later when Charlie brags to the group about his overwhelmingly positive comments. The problem only exists when it sets itself up, it doesn’t make sense outside of that initial conversation. 

The storyline that holds up best to scrutiny is also the slightest. Jesse and Sid prepare for a “pound day,” which they make clear is not sexual but productivity-related. Sid is trying to work out wedding invitations (which I feel like he should do with his fiancé, especially considering last episode’s conversation), while Jesse wants to break his writers’ block and write a song, something he hasn’t done since his embarrassing breakup. Of course, neither end up working hard, first getting distracted online then locked out of their apartment as it’s been taken over by pigeons. 

Being How I Met Your Father, everything ends up resolving itself. The bat mitzvah tweens attempt to steal Valentina’s Xanax (she’s blown off Sophie in an attempt to impress the cool teens and boost her Instagram following), but end up taking Ibuprofen instead. When they’re caught the bat mitzvah girl agrees to pose for Sophie, impressing the curator-mother so much that she agrees to consider one of Sophie’s photo samples. Now, of course, she needs to take one (see what I mean).

The ending

Charlie apologizes to Ellen with her own Yelp review (I don’t understand how she’s on Yelp, sounds weird Charlie), but being an idiot, has added her real phone number so that every creepy guy can call her. Jesse and Sid eventually get back in; their time on the balcony gives Sid a chance to reflect on his difficulty merging the Indian and American sides of his identity, deciding that he should honor his family and have an Indian wedding, which his fiancé agrees to. Finally, Jesse manages to play something, finding inspiration in a bangle Sophie gave him at the start of the episode. Why did she give it to him, you may ask? The answer is so the episode could have a “neat” ending.

Additional notes

• Another thing that happens is that Valentina reveals that she’s been lying about a lot of her job to Sophie… which feels like it should be a really big deal considering their friendship but is kind of blown off.
• “Wait Timothee Chalamet the Pro wrestler?”
• Sonny Bono did revolutionize copyright law… leading directly towards Disney owning half of the entertainment industry (including this very show! Woohoo!)
• “This video is 18 minutes long,” bro, what? Have any of these writers ever been on Tiktok?

What did you think of Hulu’s How I Met Your Father season 1, episode 7? Comment below.