How That ’70s Show and How I Met Your Mother are the same show

That ’70s Show and How I Met Your Mother overlapped for one season in 2005-06. Nearly three years after the latter closed its curtain, syndicating networks continue to tempt both shows’ fans and stoke their legacies with binge-level buffets.

The more one absorbs those rampant reruns, the more one can retroactively tell that the two sitcoms have several intriguing common threads beyond Laura Prepon and Alyson Hannigan.

A curious comparison instinct is crucial to breaking from the more common sizing up between HIMYM and Friends. With ’70s, in particular, there is a surface to plow through before one can uproot the rich soils of similarities.

’70s gave us a rural Wisconsin gang that started in high school, then finished the series in the conventional college age group. HIMYM assembled five twentysomething New York City residents who wrapped up their story in their mid-’30s.

To be sure, those inherent differences yield inevitable secondary effects, particularly as the ’70s gang still has more life navigation ahead. That helps to explain why their established couple from the pilot — Jackie and Kelso — does not stick for the long run like its Mother equivalent, Lily and Marshall.

But in many instances, the age group and the setting are the beginning and the end of each cluster’s discrepancies. Beneath that surface sits a sea of analogous exploits and shared character traits.

Ted Mosby and friends are more or less what Eric Forman and friends look forward to becoming. They are big-city professionals who obtain their beer legally and follow through on their weddings when they are sure the time is right.

Upon studious side-by-side examination, these programs tell us that perhaps the more we mature and the more our lives change, the more we and our lives stay the same. Seven stark examples are as follows.

Basement retreats
Eric’s basement is the location where the ’70s gang most often assembles in full. It is where they catch up, recharge and smuggle adult beverages.

Likewise, MacLaren’s Pub is the de facto basement of the apartment building where various combinations of Ted, Robin, Marshall and Lily live for the better part of their series. The bottom-level bar is where they, along with Barney, catch up, recharge and tap into the bar’s offerings.

That alone sets these cliques apart from, say, their Seinfeld and Friends counterparts. Those other New Yorkers tend to convene for coffee or a bite at the above-ground Monk’s and Central Perk, respectively.

Main man’s overcommitment
Fans of both programs, in their heart of hearts, felt that the Eric-Donna and Ted-Robin romances had to work out in the long run. With that said, each saga is prolonged, in part, by the multiple bruises and breakups both couples brook.

The first of those setbacks come when the guy looks for too much, too soon. When Donna will not take Eric’s title token in “The Promise Ring,” his reaction precipitates a season-long hiatus in their relationship. When Ted spills the L-word in “The Pilot,” he and Robin are soon back on the market, citing their respective wishes for commitment and a steady stroll. Although, they too are together within a year.

After another decisive split, each pairing lives out the third-time adage in the closing scenes of the final episode. At the very least, that is what rooting viewers can assume after watching their male and female leads grow and learn for eight or nine years.

Barney and Hyde
Steven Hyde and Barney Stinson each pursue the former and future flames of their friends. Those pursuits yield mixed results, as each guy succeeds in one instance apiece, though the woman ends up with another male member of the gang by series’ end.

Barney’s relationship with Robin serves as an interlude between her two Ted eras. Hyde is involved with Jackie between Kelso and Fez, both of whom still want her at times during the relationship in question.

When they are not dating a friend’s ex-flame or desired mate, these secondary male protagonists spend time scheming, womanizing and showing a general disregard for others. In between, they both reconnect with their long-lost fathers, learn more about their mixed-race bloodlines, date a stripper and have a short-lived marriage.

Anchors away
Although Robin is considerably more likeable than Jackie, they bear a coterie of common traits outside their personalities. They are both portrayed by their program’s youngest core cast member, and their life and career stories boast a pair of parallels.

In the middle of their respective series, they are involved in unlikely romantic relationships with the aforementioned Barney and Hyde. Not so surprisingly, neither relationship lasts.

Besides that, their professional pursuits entail leaving town to follow the same dream. Robin goes out of country to Tokyo (among other locations) while Jackie briefly goes out of state to Chicago. In both cases, the purpose is to advance their repertoires as news anchors.

Protagonists pilloried
Ted’s mortifying falling out with one-time fiancée Stella and Eric’s ill-advised first breakup with Donna both live on through loose and libelous fiction.

“The Wedding Bride” unveils a title movie that casts Ted in an inaccurately selfish light before retelling his abandonment at the altar. Eric endures similar aspersions in “Donna’s Story,” as printed in the creative writing section of the student newspaper.

Both episodes serve to epitomize each series as a sentimental sitcom. For every time we laugh at our virtual friend’s misfortune, there are moments when we cannot help but root for them and feel downcast when things go wrong beyond comprehension.

The good news is these are still comedies, and in keeping with old fashion, generally happy outcomes arrive in due time.

Circles and “sandwiches”
The teens from Point Place have broader horizons for illicit recreational products, as evidenced by the recurring “circle” segments. But even beyond college, the likes of Lily, Marshall and Ted seek periodic helpings of the same smokeable substance.

Rather than mention the marijuana by name, the users often let their mannerisms imply its usage to the audience.

Precisely targeted ending points
Did these shows run a tad longer than they should have? That is a credible argument. Topher Grace and Ashton Kutcher’s exit from the ’70s main cast after Season 7 was a hard-nudging hint. Ditto Jason Segel’s near-departure after the penultimate season of HIMYM.

Still, those who followed That ’70s Show likely had a hunch that the finale would take place on Dec. 31, 1979. Anyone who trusted that How I Met Your Mother was not going to be a misnomer knew that the narrative — as Ted tells it to his offspring — was meant to end ceremoniously with Ted meeting their mother.

Naturally, both of these easy-to-infer targets were sure to be hit, barring unexpected cancellation. Fortunately for each show’s cast, crew and fans, they gained healthy traction and built a stage for several seasons of smooth sight-seeing toward that ending.

Everyone knew, at least vaguely, when these sagas would close, but the mysteries of what all would happen along the way sustained some of their appeal.