Photo: Cliff Lipson/CBS

By Amy Amatangelo, TV Gal®

These are the television things keeping me awake at night and stressing me out. I’m so going to need to invest in some new anti-wrinkle cream.

1. That there might be a ninth season of How I Met Your Mother:  At this point I feel about the characters on How I Met Your Mother the way I felt when I saw Sex and the City 2. It wasn’t a good movie but I was happy to see everyone again. HIMYM hasn’t been funny this season (except when Barney recapped the entire show in true Barney style) but I still like spending time with the characters each week. I said this years ago and it’s even truer now – the show should tell us who the mother is and stop dragging it out. It was an inspired and clever gimmick to build a show on. And it was a gimmick that worked for a while. But the series, at its height, was funny enough without the gimmick. Now delaying the inevitable is making viewers cranky.  We all know Victoria isn’t who Ted marries so we are spinning our wheels watching any story lines about Ted and Victoria. Executive producer Craig Thomas told me that there’s an ending sequence that will get activated once the show knows it’s in its final season.  So please the show needs to end this season.  No more yellow umbrellas (what is that umbrella made of that it has lasted for all these years?). No more false hopes. Let us meet the mother and let the show have a glorious series finale in May.
2. The leaps of logic and plot conveniences on Homeland: Let me be clear: I love Homeland. It is the absolute best drama on TV right now. That scene at the end of Sunday’s episode where Carrie realizes with relief and vindication that she was right?  Brilliant. And Damian Lewis is an amazing actor. Brody snaps a man’s neck and yet I still feel sympathy for him. He lies to his wife without flinching and I understand his plight. Lewis does an astounding job of conveying Brody’s internal struggle. But I have this nagging feeling about the show. There are times when you can totally tell the people behind 24 are behind Homeland.  It was a little too convenient that Brody just happened to be in the White House and was called into the situation room to see the attack on Abu Nazir, And that he was able to text a warning without anyone seeing what he was doing. Really? Isn’t Brody a nationally recognized war hero? Would he really simply don a red baseball cap to go take a terrorist to a safe house? Show his face to the gas station attendant? What I loved about the first season of Homeland is that the show continually surprised me. I never knew what it was going to do or where the plot was going to take viewers.  It makes me nervous when viewers are supposed to just roll with these leaps of logic and the writers take shortcuts to take the story where they need it to go.
3. The Kalinda Storyline on The Good Wife: I’ve talked about this extensively in the weekly reviews I do of The Good Wife episodes for Paste Magazine but it’s time to sound the alarm. I am in full panic mode. The Kalinda storyline is in a free fall – it’s getting worse at an alarmingly rapid pace.  It’s bringing down the show and ruining one of TV’s best characters.  Make it stop. Now please.
4. Daphne and Chef on Switched at Birth: I have had it with the whole teenage girl has a relationship with her boss/teacher/fill-in-the-blank authority figure.  Switched at Birth is such a terrific show – I’m bummed it’s taken on this television trope.  I miss Wilkie. Can he please come back from boarding school?

What is stressing you out on TV these days? Talk about it below. Also be sure to follow my blog so you’ll know every time I have a new post.  I’ll have this week’s “where have I seen them before” and quotes on Thursday so please email me your favorite quotes and familiar faces through my contact page.