‘The Big Bang Theory’ season 9, episode 17 review: The 200th episode and Sheldon’s birthday

Was the 200th episode of “The Big Bang Theory” everything that you wanted and then some? We’d say that for the most part, this was precisely what the showrunners wanted to do and then some. There were some funny one-liners, some great returning guest stars, and we also had a chance to reminisce about the older days of the show.

We really liked the fact that Sara Gilbert, for example, managed to come back given that she does not even know some of the people from the past several years. Also, she didn’t even know Leonard and Penny got married. Also, kudos to getting Christine Baranski, who Kripke shamelessly hit on for most of the evening. (Typical Kripke.) At one point Sheldon got so overwhelmed by the people who attended his party that he went off to hide in the bathroom, and it took a pep talk from Penny in order to convince him that it was okay. If there was ever a true testament to the growth of this character and the growth of Sheldon as a listener, this was it.

Also, the appearance of Adam West in here was for the most part extremely funny. We liked the references to Christian Bale and even “Lego Batman,” even if he was written as a character somewhat similar to Professor Proton.

As a whole, there’s really not much to write about here from a critical perspective. This was a very simple episode stylistically, but it did a lot of things well and managed to keep us entertained from start to finish. For this milestone, we couldn’t ask for anything else. Grade: A-.

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