How I Met Your Mother - Jason Segel Plans to Leave in Three Years

Thanks to charliefan4life for the heads up.

In a recent interview with GQ, 'How I Met Your Mother' co-star Jason Segel said he plans to leave the show in three years to focus on other projects.

Segel's contract with the hit comedy expires in 2013, he said, and he doesn't plan to stick around to play bumbling married guy Marshall Eriksen one minute longer.

"I think after eight years, I'll feel like I honorably did my commitment. It's funny -- it's the greatest problem in the world to have. Jeez, I'm the luckiest guy in the world. But when your idol is Peter Sellers, playing one character for eight years isn't what you're trying to do," he told the magazine.

Segel, who has more than six movies in development including the upcoming Muppets big screen revival, said he's done about all he can do with the character of Marshall.

"I don't really feel like I have that much more to offer with this character. Maybe if we got divorced or something, but that's not gonna happen," he added. "It's gonna be some iteration of, like, my TV wife opens the fridge, and she's like, "What happened to the birthday cake?" And I walk in with a little frosting here [points to corner of mouth] like, "What birthday cake?"

Segel also detailed a few dark ideas he pitched to producers for how to end 'How I Met Your Mother.' The first one has the show's mysterious mother dying before Ted's kids ever get to meet her. Another has Ted and his kids stuck in purgatory with Ted doomed to tell his story over and over again for eternity. And yet another ... well, I'll just let Segel explain:

"And then my other suggestion, which they never used, which I think would be so funny, is -- it's the future, right? I think in one of those scenes, they should open the window, and it should be, like, a post-apocalyptic wasteland outside. It should be like 'I Am Legend.' Horrible mutants.

Source: TV Squad