Who is Marshall Eriksen in How I Met Your Mother?

Show

How I Met Your Mother

Played by

Jason Segel

First episode

“Pilot”Season 1, Episode 1, aired September 19, 2005

Role

Main cast

Network

CBS

Occupation

Lawyer, later a judge

Show run

2005 to 2014

Also known as

Marshmallow, Beercules

Marshall Eriksen is a gentle giant from St. Cloud, Minnesota who has loved Lily Aldrin since their first day of college. Played by Jason Segel, he is Ted's roommate, best friend, and moral compass, and he proposes to Lily in the very first episode.

On How I Met Your Mother, Marshall Eriksen's story runs through Lily Aldrin (Wife), Ted Mosby (Best Friend), Barney Stinson (Slap Bet Rival), Robin Scherbatsky (Friend), and Tracy McConnell (Friend).

Who is Marshall Eriksen?

Marshall met both Ted and Lily during move-in week at Wesleyan University, roomed with Ted, and fell for Lily almost instantly. After college the three of them moved into an apartment in New York, where Marshall studies law at Columbia when the series begins. His proposal to Lily in the pilot is what pushes Ted to start looking for his own future wife.

He grew up the youngest of three brothers in a big, rowdy Minnesota family, and that small-town warmth defines him. Marshall is the friend who believes the best about everyone, cries easily, and takes friendship and marriage completely seriously.

Personality and comedy

Marshall's comedy is goofy and sincere. He is convinced that Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster are real, he is a lifelong Minnesota Vikings fan, and he throws himself into bets and traditions with total commitment. In college he earned the nickname Beercules during a famously messy drinking game, a side of him the older Ted happily recounts.

The most famous of those traditions is the slap bet. After losing a bet to Marshall in season two, Barney agrees to let Marshall slap him five times whenever he chooses, and more slaps get added over the years. The slaps become a running gag for the rest of the series, complete with a countdown website and a Thanksgiving tradition the gang calls Slapsgiving.

Key storylines

The first big crisis in Marshall's life comes at the end of season one, when Lily leaves for an art fellowship in San Francisco and calls off their engagement. Marshall is heartbroken through the start of season two, but the couple reconcile and finally marry in a chaotic two-ceremony wedding in "Something Borrowed." Afterward Marshall takes corporate jobs he does not love, including a stint at Goliath National Bank, to pay off Lily's credit card debt and their crooked new apartment.

Season six brings his saddest storyline. On the same day Marshall and Lily learn they have no fertility problems, his father dies suddenly of a heart attack, and Marshall spends much of the season grieving. He later leaves corporate law for environmental work, and he and Lily welcome their son Marvin, named for Marshall's late father, at the end of season seven.

Judgeship and ending

In the final stretch of the series, Marshall is offered a judgeship and accepts it without telling Lily, who has already planned a year in Italy for her own career. The secret blows up over Barney and Robin's wedding weekend, and the two work through it when Lily reveals she is pregnant again. In the finale, Marshall eventually becomes a judge and is elected to the New York State Supreme Court in 2020, and he and Lily raise three children.

Series co-creator Craig Thomas has said Marshall and Lily were based on himself and his wife, which may be why their marriage feels so lived in. Jason Segel played Marshall for all nine seasons while also building a film career with comedies such as Forgetting Sarah Marshall.

Marshall Eriksen: frequently asked questions

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